MARSHALL - The Madison County planning and zoning administrator position remained unfilled for roughly 18 months, but the county announced its new hire this month.
Tom Herdelin's first day as Madison County planning and zoning administrator was June 10. His salary is $55,000 annually.
Originally from New Jersey, Herdelin practiced law for nearly 25 years, primarily practicing solo in the South Jersey region.
During that time, Herdelin also served on a planning board. Herdelin also represented both applicants requesting variances, as well as opposing neighbors who had presented requests for neighbors.
"So, I'm loosely familiar with the process as a board member and as an attorney representing," Herdelin said. "The legal concepts of land use and planning are familiar to me."
Herdelin said acquainting himself with the North Carolina laws, as well as the "scope and objectives of the community" will be two of the things he plans to tackle first.
"I look at this as an opportunity to help the boards as they steward their neighborhoods, and make sure that development occurs in a responsible fashion," Herdelin said.
"I think an overarching concern of planning boards is, 'Don't make decisions for today. You make decisions for down the road,' and you see what decisions in the past have presented to you, hopefully, or the absence of decisions, and you seek to avoid it going forward by setting up good guardrails."
Additionally, one of the first objectives Herdelin laid out is bringing himself up to speed on the county ordinances.
Herdelin, who assumes the position vacated by Terrey Dolan in November 2022, will start his position in the midst of the county's deliberations regarding its Mountain Ridge Protection Ordinance, as the Planning Board's Ridge Top Subcommittee group plans to recommend to the commissioners to scrap the 50-foot setback requirement for building on mountain ridges 3,000 feet and higher, among other recommended changes, including an overhaul of the Madison County Subdivision Control Ordinance, which Planning Board members have said is "the main offender."
According to Herdelin, one of the challenges of a board of adjustment is "to not overaccommodate a present concern at the expense of the future consequences, and what's far-reaching about that."
Development Services Director Brad Guth introduced Herdelin in the new role in a county-wide email June 3.
"Tom’s role will be crucial in our ongoing efforts to enhance and develop our community thoughtfully and effectively. His expertise will be invaluable as we continue to address the needs of our residents and plan for a vibrant future," Guth said.
"With Tom’s arrival, we can look forward to innovative ideas and a collaborative spirit that will help us navigate the complexities of our work."
While Herdelin earned his undergraduate degree from East Carolina University, he moved to Western North Carolina roughly two years ago.
In his view, being somewhat new to the area is a positive, as he doesn't come into the job with any preconceived notions.
"I didn't go to Madison High School across the street, and remember the fights as a teenager over this development or that development," Herdelin said. "I'm coming to this with basically a clean slate of information on the community, and I can objectively look at it, see both sides and present that balance to the board for their consideration, and at the same time know when someone has the right to do something. I have enough legal background to be able to make the office calls that the office calls me to make, and to know where that line is."
Herdelin attended the Madison County Planning Board's Ridge Top Subcommittee special meeting June 7.
The subcommittee is composed of Madison County Planning Board Chair Jered Silver, and members Clayton Honeycutt, Lee Wilde and Daniel Rice.
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While the Ridge Top Subcommittee reiterated its intention to recommend the commissioners scrap the 50-foot setback requirement, which came to the Planning Board after Russell Blevins - who owns both sides of a ridge along more than 400 acres in Mountain Park near East Fork Road in Marshall - submitted an application to the board requesting to remove the 50-foot setback.
Blevins said he plans to build a cabin for his grandchildren on the land, and argued that the top of the ridge offers him the most stable ground on which to build.
While the 50-foot setback sits in limbo, a number of applicants have submitted requests for variances to the 50-foot setback requirement as laid out in the Mountain Ridge Protection Ordinance.
The Madison County Board of Adjustment has approved two of the variances, ruling that denying the permit would cause undue hardship on the applicants, as one of the parcels in the Seven Glens development on the Buncombe County line was subdivided prior to the 2010 adoption of the Mountain Ridge Protection Ordinance.
Last month, the Board of Adjustment voted 3-2 in opposition to a third applicant's variance request, offering that rather than be granted a variance to the 50-foot setback, the property owner would instead need to build a new well, as the applicant contended that the existing well necessitated the construction crew, Brown Haven Homes, to build at 25-foot setback.
In Herdelin's view, it's incumbent on the county to be good stewards of the land.
"I'm thinking about, this is one of the natural beauties, and you don't want to take away from that. You don't want to harm it," he said. "You want to make decisions that are seven generations down the road. That's your focus. Seven generations ago, they were supposed to be thinking about today.
"Somewhere along the line, we got off that rail. But we need to start thinking that same way: 'What's going on seven generations from now?'"
Herdelin said one of his main goals as planning and zoning administrator will be to strike a balance between individual's rights and the community's interests, particularly amid the county's recent spike in development.
"On this side you have the individual's rights, and on this side the community interests," Herdelin said. "Those two, you need to strike a balance to defend from a huge developer that wants to come in and do something that's contrary to both of their wishes.
"Their interests align more than they're disparate. You want to serve that alignment and recognize Mr. Individual, 'We understand you want to do that. Let's come up with a way to serve what your objective is without diminishing the community's interests.'"
Johnny Casey has covered Madison County for The Citizen Times and The News-Record & Sentinel for three years. He earned a first-place award in beat news reporting in the 2023 North Carolina Press Association awards. He can be reached at 828-210-6074 or jcasey@citizentimes.com.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Tom Herdelin named Madison County planning and zoning administrator
