The Chattanooga-Hamilton County Regional Planning Commission has recently been criticized by county residents and a former Regional Planning Agency director for a perceived bias toward the interests of builders, developers and other housing industry professionals who make up a majority of the board.
Former Regional Planning Agency Executive Director Dan Reuter, who recently resigned following reports of demeaning behavior at work, alleged that the Planning Commission is “unusually oriented to serve the interests of the private developers, builders and engineering companies,” according to a statement attributed to Reuter.
For the past three years, the Regional Planning Agency has been working with the community to develop Plan Hamilton, a comprehensive plan to guide development in unincorporated Hamilton County over the next five years.
The plan in May came before the Planning Commission, which voted to send it to the County Commission for review along with amendments submitted by the Homebuilders Association of Greater Chattanooga that advocated for greater density, among other things.
Residents of unincorporated Hamilton County — particularly a group in the Ooltewah and Harrison area that worked for 18 months on their own adjustments to the plan — criticized the Planning Commission for being biased toward the home builders association due to the board’s composition of mostly housing industry professionals.