We begin to refute them

I promised to begin countering the College Station 'negative impacts' as they have stated on their own webpage. Here's one take on what they write.

From the www.cstx.gov/wellborn webpage--

Negative impacts of cities allowing communities to incorporate within the ETJ

While allowing Wellborn to incorporate within College Station’s ETJ would reduce city staff’s future workload and responsibilities, there are many ways in which incorporation could negatively affect College Station residents:

Loss of ability to influence College Station’s growth and development

College Station is a vibrant and growing city, but because the City of Bryan and its ETJ borders College Station to the north, west and east, the only direction to accommodate our growth is southward.

Also, by granting Wellborn permission to incorporate within our ETJ, we forfeit any ability to employ zoning; therefore, we lose the most important tool in terms of influencing the character of future growth in that area.

Did I just read that? College Station will be hemmed in by Wellborn? Ha. A ha. A hahahahaha.

First of all , the 'line' that separates Bryan and College Station is not an east-west line, more SW to NE, roughly along University Drive (Hwy 60). The eastward 'blocking' done by Bryan's ETJ is only about 5 degrees off level. In fact, College Station is blocking Bryan to the south and east! How dare they. Another thing to consider is that after the 2010 census, if College Station exceeds 100,000 residents, the ETJ entitlement will extend five miles and in fact will begin to curl up around Bryan. Us Wellborigines do know how to read a map for goodness sake. CS planning recently approved the plat of 2200 acres SOUTH of Wellborn, which runs from Hwy 6 to FM 2154. So now who is south of whom? Hmmmmmm?

OK, if you're smarter than a third grader, here's the geography lesson:

Brazos County has 590 square miles.

Bryan is 43.4 square miles

College Station is 40.3 square miles

Wixon Valley is 1.8 square miles

Kurten is smaller than 2 square miles (you'll have to trust me on this).

So, that leaves over 500 square miles of 'county' unincorporated land!

Wellborn is mapped at 3.8 square miles, give or take an acre or ten.

Wellborn is less than 1 % of the unincorporated land in the county!

Now, by their own admission (Mayor White on WTAW on 2/10/10), College Station has enough UNDEVELOPED land already within the city limits to accommodate a population of 125,000 with an estimated 93,000 now. So, the population would have to increase (125,000-93,000)/93,000, or 34%!!!

So, they have 'no plans' to annex anything in the near term. Heck , they plan to develop what they got!

Zoning. Yes, College Station says that they have no authority to enforce zoning in the ETJ. Correct. Unincorporated land is not zoned. If Wellborn incorporates, the Wellborn City Council and the citizens of Wellborn will decide how to zone the City of Wellborn. Therefore, the City of College Station is PREVENTING zoning. They claim that zoning is their most important tool. We agree that zoning can provide predictable results. However, Wellborigines want to zone our own land, land that is not in College Station. By keeping us in limbo status, the City of College Station is implying that the absence of zoning is better than the zoning that would be provided by Wellborn. Gee. Did you just insult me?

People in Wellborn want our city to look great. We live here! Duh, we don't want to live in a slum. But if the City of College Station denies our right to vote and we remain in limbo, anything can happen. We want to promote the backdoor gateway to College Station because it is our home.

BTW, we did not 'spring up' on the periphery of College Station. Most of the 'developed' parts of Wellborn which are east of the tracks have been there since the 1980s, from FM 2154 up Greens Prairie Road through Woodlake. College Station grew up in OUR periphery. We are not sprawl, we are not a doughnut.

We are Wellborn!