Oak Ridge Today

For members: Residential lots proposed on Oak Ridge Summit

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Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, pictured above on Friday, May 7, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, the former Pine Ridge above South Illinois Avenue.

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Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, pictured above on Friday, May 7, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, the former Pine Ridge above South Illinois Avenue.

The 45-acre site could have 57 single-family lots, as well as open space, on a new street and cul-de-sac with access off Summit Drive on the former ridge, according to the agenda for an Oak Ridge Municipal Planning Commission meeting on Thursday.

 

Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, pictured above on Friday, May 7, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

Residential lots have been proposed for the upper part of Oak Ridge Summit, the former Pine Ridge above South Illinois Avenue.

The rest of this story is available if you are a member: a subscriber, advertiser, or contributor to Oak Ridge Today.

Already a member? Great! Thank you! Sign in here.

Not a member? No problem! Subscribe here:

Basic

Pro

Temporary

If you prefer to send a check, you may do so by mailing one to:

Oak Ridge Today
P.O. Box 6064
Oak Ridge, TN 37831

We also have advanced subscription options. You can see them here.

We also accept donations. You can donate here. A donation of $50 or more will make you eligible for a subscription.

Thank you for reading Oak Ridge Today. We appreciate your support!

City buys, demolishes blighted home in Woodland

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South Purdue Avenue Home Demolition

A work crew demolishes a blighted home on South Purdue Avenue in Woodland on Thursday. (Photos courtesy City of Oak Ridge/Matt Widner)

  The city of Oak Ridge bought a blighted home at the corner of Northwestern and South Purdue avenues in April and demolished it on Thursday, June 26. “It was in really bad shape,” Oak Ridge Community Development Director Kathryn Baldwin said. “This one was past saving.” The home, which had been vacant, was extremely contaminated and dirty inside, and there were problems with every system in the small, single-story house, including the electrical and heating and cooling systems, said Matt Widner, Oak Ridge Community Development housing specialist. The ceilings were collapsing. “It was a mess,” Widner said. The straw-covered quarter-acre lot is now vacant. Before the demolition, a yard sign said the project was “Turning Blight into Right.” [Read more…]

Letter: Will not vote for tax increase, wants better communication with schools

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Note: This is a copy of a June 2 letter from Oak Ridge City Council member Anne Garcia Garland to Parker Hardy and members of the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce. 

Dear Chamber:

The Oak Ridge City Council has always supported the needs and beyond of the city school system. This current council has lived in that tradition. We honor and appreciate our students and our teachers and have voted to provide whatever can reasonably be provided. We have also weathered the annual School Board predictions of educational catastrophe if the increased budget projections are not allocated.

This town depends upon the base of education and economic largesse of its original homeowners at the beginning of the 1950s for its sense of pride and place in academia. It is, however, that early well-being and the growth and optimism of the early post-war years which have created a myth of extraordinary wealth and erudition with which we are burdened today. Our reality is that we are a lovely small Southern town with great diversity of education, income, and opinion. We are neither young nor old, rich nor poor, progressive nor conservative. We are all of these descriptions and many between.

This town created a wonderful culture and honored its natural environment in such an outstanding manner that it has attracted citizens from neighboring counties to live and work here. Perhaps because we did not have a large stock of new or above-average priced homes, we have not attracted a large number of the professional transferees to the federal facilities in the past couple decades. After all, “youngish” professionals selling homes in more expensive markets need the tax protection of buying comparably priced homes in this area. [Read more…]

UT-Battelle, ATLC home-building project receives labor award

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ORNL Volunteers and Horizon Award

Oak Ridge National Laboratory volunteers receive the Horizon Award from the Tennessee Labor Management Foundation. From left are Angela Gaylon, Dale McBee, Steve Jones, Mike Day, team captain Ann Weaver, and Jeff Reasor. (Submitted photo)

Team UT-Battelle’s all-volunteer project to build homes for Aid to Distressed Families of Appalachian Counties has earned the 2013 Horizon Award from the Tennessee Labor Management Foundation.

The award, which recognizes labor management partnerships that benefit the Tennessee community, will be presented to UT-Battelle and the Atomic Trades and Labor Council at the foundation’s summer conference in Nashville. UT-Battelle is the managing contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. [Read more…]

Property values decreasing, some Oak Ridge homes selling for much less than appraised values, county board says

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Anderson County Aerial View

An aerial view of Anderson County north of Oak Ridge.

Anderson County property values are decreasing to less than about 85 percent of their appraised values, and Oak Ridge appears to have several types of property that are selling for much less than their state appraisals, including older, low-priced homes and high-priced, high-quality homes, officials said.

All land tracts in the county also appear to be selling for much less than their state appraisals, the Anderson County Board of Equalization told Anderson County Mayor Terry Frank and county commissioners in a July 15 letter.

The board said the Oak Ridge properties selling for much less than their appraised values include low-priced homes built during the Manhattan Project era in World War II and high-priced, high-quality homes that are now unaffordable for most working-class employees. The Oak Ridge properties, as well as land tracts in Anderson County, appear to be selling at about 70 to 85 percent of the state appraised values. [Read more…]

Guest column: A tale of two cities

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By Leslie Agron and Pat Fain

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Oak Ridge is on the cusp of a renaissance; Oak Ridge is in its worst-ever financial shape. Despite the looming risk of the guillotine for questioning the conventional wisdom here, we want to examine where Oak Ridgers are coming from when they speak of our future. To do this we, conveniently, will compare these possible futures for Oak Ridge with two present day Tennessee cities: Farragut and Chattanooga.

Farragut is a place most Oak Ridgers are fairly familiar with. It is mostly new and upscale. It tends toward sprawl and toward heavily developed strips, but has no real heart. It has low taxes, but is not a full-service city. Chattanooga is an older city with a downtown and outlying neighborhoods of varying ages. It is a full-service city with commensurate taxes. Chattanooga has done an outstanding job of revitalizing some of its older neighborhoods. The neighborhood in the vicinity of its Aquarium is particularly noteworthy in this regard.

[Read more…]