P8/C8 ),.*.**CAR-RT lot**c ...I '"Sopbuoenubrarv 482-4418 Wednesday, August 17, 2016 50« Council rejects Yacht Club lease proposal BY REBECCA BUNCH Staff Writer The town council last week declined a request from the Edenton Yacht Club to lease a portion of the former Northeast Com mission building. The town council voted 4 3 at its Aug. 9 meeting to de cline the yacht club request, which would have allowed the club continued access to space it currently uses in the building for storage and instruction even after the building is sold. Mayor Roland Vaughan broke a 3-3 tie to defeat the motion, which he called a thinly veiled effort to block the establishment of a brew pub at the location in ques tion. The item was introduced by Administrative Commit tee chair Steve Biggs. He and the committee’s two other members, Norma Simpson and Elton Bond, both voted in favor of grant ing the lease. Council mem bers Sambo Dixon, Jimmy Stallings and Bob Quinn voted “no” on the question, leading to the 3-3 tie. Prior to the vote the may or chastised the members of the Administrative Com mittee for what he termed bringing forward the lease proposal prematurely. “In my opinion, the mo tion (to adopt the lease) is clearly out of sequence,” he said. Vaughan said he felt the appropriate action would be for the council, in keeping with its most recent vote on the issue, to allow Raleigh businessman John Glover to return to Edenton and talk with the council concerning any questions council mem bers have regarding his de sire to establish a brewpub at the site. Once a determination has been made about whether to allow Glover to purchase the building, he said, the question of the requested lease could be revisited. “He (Glover) will come back at your invitation and talk about what he’s come up with (in terms of amend ed plans for the building),” See BUILDING, 4A Fire destroys century-old two-story house BY REGGIE PONDER Editor A century-old house in northern Chowan County was de stroyed by fire early Friday morning. Mary De Jesus’s home was located on Virginia Road just north of the Northern Chowan Commu nity Center. Center Hill Crossroads Fire Chief Mike Hamilton said the fire department was dispatched to the scene at 3:19 am. Friday. Hamilton said he arrived within three or four minutes and found the two-story wooden struc ture already engulfed in flames. The Edenton Fire Depart ment also responded to the fire. De Jesus said she was thankful that she and the other three people who were in the house when the fire started all made it out alive, even though all her possessions were lost in the fire. “I’ve about cried myself out of tears, to be honest with you,” De Jesus said Saturday morning. Hamilton said the cause of the fire is still being in vestigated but it appears to started from an electrical cause. De Jesus said the insur ance company also would be sending someone out to investigate. She said she plans to rebuild but may not be able to “build a grand old house like this was.” Some of those at the See FIRE, 4A STAFF PHOTO BY REGGIE PONDER Mary De Jesus’s home on Virginia Road just north of the Northern Chowan Community Center was destroyed by fire early Friday morning. The fire was extinguished by firefighters from the Center Hill Crossroads and Edenton fire departments. Hotel renovations waiting on financing package BY REGGIE PONDER Editor The developer planning an upscale renovation of the histor ic Hotel Hinton building is still ironing out details of the financ ing that will make the project viable. SAGA Construction and De velopment Inc. closed its pur chase of die historic structure from Chowan County in July of last year, following a due dili gence period that stretched out over two years. “We’re continuing to work on putting the financing toether and we’re starting to get closer on that,” Bob Howsare of SAGA said this week. Howsare said rruyor construc tion on the project is estimated to take about nine months. The company is projecting a 12 month turnaround once the fi nancing is in place. Howsare said that based on how he feels about the progress on the project at this time he believes the mtyor renovations should be under construction by the first of next year, which should enable the hotel to open in the first few months of 2018. He cautioned that he was dis cussing an ideal timetable based on a best-case scenario. Once the hotel opens it is ex pected to create 50 or more new jobs on-site. Although the historic structure next to the 1767 Chowan County Courthouse on East King Street most recently was used as an of fice building for the county, the building previously housed the Hotel Hinton. An earlier hotel in the same location was known as the Bayview Hotel. The site was home to inns and taverns all the way back to the colonial period. Chowan County sold the building to Preservation North Carolina, which in tum sold it to SAGA. SAGA’s plans call for the de velopment of a luxury hotel with guest rooms and suites as well as extensive meeting space, a fine dining restaurant and a rooftop lounge with views of Edenton Bay and the town’s his toric district. Edenton Town Manager Anne Marie Knighton said project de velopers are working on both new market tax credits and tra ditional bank financing in order to get the financing in place to fund the significant renovations planned for the building. “They’re still very optimistic,” Knighton said. Apex spokesman clarifies company ownership BY REGGIE PONDER Editor A spokesman for Apex Clean Energy Inc. has clarified the company’s relationship to global en ergy giant BP in the face of persistent claims by an activist in Perquimans County that BP owns ©2009 The Chowan Herald All Rights Reserved Apex. Apex is the Charlot tesville, Va.-based com pany that has applied for conditional use permits in Chowan and Perqui mans to construct the 300-megawatt Timber mill Wind Project in the two counties. A quasi-judicial hear ing before the Chowan County Board of Com missioners on the Chowan CUP applica tion is slated to begin Monday at 6 p.m. at the Northern Chowan Com munity Center. * “BP is not a parent owner of Apex,” com pany spokesman Kevin Chandler said this week when asked about Alan Lennon’s request that the Chowan Herald “correct the erroneous statement made by Mr. Chandler,” which was a reference to Chandler’s statement - cited in the article “Public speaks out on Timbermill Wind Project” in the Aug. 3 Chowan Herald - that BP does not own Apex. Chandler made the statement to the Chow an Herald for the Aug. 3 article after Lennon stated during com ments at the July 26 meeting of the Chowan County Planning Board that Apex was owned by BP. Since the publication of the Aug. 3 article, Lennon has contin ued to assert that BP owns Apex, citing in formation on the Apex website that describes Apex as a subsidiary of Greenlight Energy Re sources. Lennon also cited on line references to BP’s acquisition of Green light Energy Inc. But Chandler said that after BP acquired Greenlight Energy Inc., Greenlight executives regrouped find formed a new company. Chandler quoted from the Apex website’s his tory page: “Following that sale, the leader ship team got together again to reinvest in the clean energy industry through a new venture, Greenlight Energy Re sources." * One-stop voting schedule adopted From staff reports The Chowan County Board of Elections has announced one-stop voting hours for the upcoming Gen eral Election. There will be one-stop voting at the Agricultural Extension Center, located at 730 N. Granville St, Eden ton, and the Northern Chowan Com munity Center, located at 2869 Vir ginia Road, Tyner. The hours at the Tyner site will be 7:30 a.m. - 6 p.m. on Nov. 34, and 7:30 а. m. -1 p.m. on Nov. 6. At the Eden ton site the hours will be 8 am. - 5 p.m. on Oct 20-21 and Oct. 24-28. On two Saturdays, Oct. 29 and Nov. б, there will be one-stop voting at the Edenton site from 7:30 am.-l p.m. Oct 31-Nov. 4, the hours at the Edenton site will be 7:30 am-6 p.m. The number of days of early voting in the county reflects a recent court decision that overturned a state law that had reduced the total number of days of early voting. The Chowan County Democratic Party requested that one-stop voting ' last until 6 p.m, on Saturday, Nov. 5, That recommendation was not ad opted by the board as part of its one stop voting schedule. %