Déjà vu: More planned madness at Vintage

You are looking at the plat for phase 4 of the Meadows at Hickory Creek development being built by DR Horton. That is the same neighborhood currently surrounded by two gas wells (what I often refer to as the Vintage/S. Bonnie neighborhood).

Yes, that's right. The plan is to build homes right up to the southern pad site and wrap them around it like a snug little blanket. It was approved by the Planning and Zoning Commission back in March as part of their consent agenda. In other words, it didn't even get discussed - just rubber-stamped. When an operator wants to rework this well (and maybe add another one to this site), the nightmare will happen all over again. It's just the next time it happens there will be homes even closer.

How could we just be rubber-stamping developments that bring homes 100 feet from pad sites just two months after we decided that a 1,200 foot setback was necessary for protecting health, safety, and peaceable enjoyment of property?

And we know that DR Horton will not tell home buyers about the gas well. It will just look like a nice fence around a patch of land. What's behind there...a water well, some equipment? Who knows? Even if someone figures out it's a gas well they'll be told not to worry, nothing has happened there for years. And then...well we know how this story goes. The oil and gas companies get their money. The developer gets its money. The residents get the pollution and the devalued property - because when they want to sell their homes once the rigs come in, there will be no hiding the industrial hazard next door.

If this is already fated to happen, can't we at least be sure that any future residents will be fully informed before they buy? I mean, the salespeople should be required to show potential buyers a video of this exact site during drilling and fracking (unless, of course, we can stop the fracking). They need to really see what they are getting themselves into.