Pulte Rejects County's Offer on Sun City Roads, Drains

Sun City Carolina Lakes’ developer has rejected Lancaster County’s demand that it secure a $3 million line of credit to handle storm-drain repairs before the county will take responsibility for all of the development’s roads.
In a Nov. 15 letter, Atlanta-based Pulte Group contends that under its 2005 development agreement, the county is clearly responsible for both the roads and the storm-water system at the massive Indian Land project.
The letter gives the county 10 days to accept the company’s position or face legal action.
Last month, County Attorney John Weaver sent a letter to Pulte Vice President Cisco Garcia, offering a five-year plan to resolve the decade-long dispute over the county taking on financial responsibility for the roads.
Under the development agreement, Pulte was required to construct the roads to meet county standards, after which the county would adopt them into its system. The county has already accepted more than two-thirds of the nearly 30 miles of roads.
The developer’s attorney, Daniel Ballou, responded in a letter dated Nov. 15. He said the remaining roads in Sun City have passed numerous inspections and Pulte “has gone to extra effort to demonstrate… that the roads meet applicable standards.”
“The county has not provided any evidence to support its concerns about the quality or condition of the existing roads, relying instead on speculation and unsupported accusations,” Ballou said.
He said the county has not informed Pulte of any repairs not made, nor has it indicated that the type and number of repairs has been excessive for a  residential community.
The county says otherwise. The debate over the roads started not long after construction began in 2005. As the 3,200-home development nears completion, county officials and Sun City residents want assurance that they won’t be left with unsatisfactory roads and without funds to repair them.
Each side interprets the development agreement differently.
“The agreement is what the agreement is,” said Steve Willis, county administrator. “If they say no, they say no.”
Willis said the roads are going to be the county’s responsibility, but if the underlying problem causing a road failure is a storm drain, the county is not going to fix the storm drain. That is up to Pulte or the homeowners’ association.
“That is someone else’s problems,” Willis said. “We are in a position to barricade the road, in effect saying when you get the storm drain fixed and repack the ground, let us know and we will come in and repave.”
But Ballou contends that the storm-water infrastructure is the county’s responsibility. His letter quotes the development agreement: “Public revenue bonds may be issued by the County to offset the cost of maintaining the storm water infrastructure that is publicly owned.”
“There would be no reason to allow the County to issue bonds for maintenance obligations the County does not have,” Ballou said.
Willis said the key words in that section are “may be issued.”
“The development agreement makes it absolutely clear that the county has no responsibility for storm-water whatsoever,” Willis said.
“The agreement was drawn up by the Pulte attorneys,” he said.
Willis pointed out this wording from Section 4.08 paragraph D, Storm water management: “Pulte will construct or cause to be constructed all storm water runoff and drainage improvements within the Property… and such infrastructure will be maintained by Pulte or a homeowners’ association.”
And further into the paragraph: “County is not responsible for any construction or maintenance costs associated with the storm water runoff and drainage for the property.”
Pulte agreed to stand by the terms and conditions of the development agreement as they understand them. That is, they will perform any outstanding repairs and qualifying future repairs during the one-year warranty.
Ballou gave the county 10 days from Nov. 15 to provide a list of required repairs and an official confirmation that the county will accept all roads.
If the county fails to do so, Pulte threatened to move forward with legal action, demanding also that its attorneys’ fees be paid by the county, a provision granted in the development agreement.
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Follow reporter Mandy Catoe on Twitter @MandyCatoeTLN or contact her at (803) 283-1152