1. Modifications need to be made to the development agreement making it more competitive and giving larger benefits to the taxpayer and City from our estimated $90,000,000 ninety million investment
2. City sells the condominium unit designated for the site to build the Marriott hotel to Armada Hoffler's Wilmington Hospitality Association, LLC, limited liability company, WHA, at fair market value.
3. All "fee simple" transfers from the City to Armada Hoffler shall be sales at fair market value.
4. All Option Agreements shall be sold to the highest bidder and will not automatically be given to Armada Hoffler. Option Agreement to purchase "Future Development Unit" and riparian rights will be for ten years and this unit will be sold at fair market value. The City will have control of and may negotiate the lease of this unit.
5. All plans and expenditures reimbursed Armada Hoffler by the City shall become the property of the City. As stated in paragraph 9 of the General Development Agreement all pre-development and development activities, including, but not limited to, the engagement of architects, engineers and other professionals to design and plan for the City-owned facilities reimbursed to Armada Hoffler by the City shall become the property of the City which the City may use these use these plans to hire another Developer if a final agreement between the City and Armada Hoffler to develop the Convention Center is not reached.
6. All tangible personal property including furniture, fixtures, and equipment necessary for the operation of the Convention Center shall become the property of the City.
7. The City and WHA will enter into a Convention Center Management Agreement wherein WHA will agree to manage the Convention Center for a term of ten (10) years with no renewal options. WHA may not sell its contracts with the City to build or operate the Convention Center without the expressed written permission of the City.
8. The City will lease WHA parking spaces equal to the number of parking spaces "Leased Spaces" equal to the number of hotel rooms within the Hotel on a year to year bases the lease amount to be determined annually and shall not exceed 365 times the daily parking fee charged the general public.

Say No to Hugo Neu

Hugo Neu is our problem. By this I mean Hugo Neu is a problem for the City of Wilmington and the Wilmington City Council should do every thing in its power to see to it Hugo Neu does not locate in Navassa. Hugo Neu is a huge corporation located in New York City and a big part of their business is smashing cars and selling metals from vehicles to the highest bidder. Seventy five percent of each and every vehicle is made up of plastic, foam, and stuff made from chemicals which can be hazardous to our health. What Hugo Neu has planned for Wilmington is to store the 75% it can't sell from its crushing plants all over the USA, forever, in a massive dump 350 feet tall. It is my guess if this deal goes through Wilmington will be located next to the world's tallest trash dump. Three hundred and fifty feet tall is three times taller than Wilmington's tallest building, the Murchison Building. This massive dump will be rained on, hurricaned on, and pollutants will not stay on the one hundred and seventy acres it is initially scheduled to be built. The Hugo Neu dump at Navassa will pollute regionally. That's it. That's all.

HUGO NEU: Frequently Asked Questions

What is Hugo Neu?

Hugo Neu is scrap metal industry headquartered in New York City. They have shredding facilities in the Mid Atlantic and New England states, California, and Hawaii. They are currently selling all scrap metal to China and other foreign countries, causing double to triple price increases in metal products in the US.

Why Do They Want to Come Here?

Hugo Neu was invited to come to North Carolina by our governor’s Economic Development Commission. They liked the area because they could use rail, highways, and water for transportation. Satellite annexation of land outside the city limits of Navassa was legislatively acquired through the assistance of Senator R. C. Soles and Representative Bonner Stiller. Jeff Earp, a local Brunswick County developer, formed the Navassa Land Company, LLC, and bought the annexed 750 acres from International Paper. He in turn sold the land to Hugo Neu with the condition that the permits are granted for their facility. Jeff Earp was subsequently appointed by the Governor to a 4-year term on the Southeastern Economic Development Commission.

Is it recycling or landfilling?

Ferrous metals will be removed in the northern and mid Atlantic sites of Hugo Neu facilities. The residue (auto fluff) is to be shipped to an area just northwest of Leland, where a small amount of non-ferrous metal will be removed. The remainder will be stockpiled in a landfill covering 170 acres and rising to a height of 350 feet (17.5 feet higher than the red & white Sutton power plant smoke stacks). According to volume, 23.6% of the vehicles and appliances are recycled; the remaining 76.4% is landfilled – here in the Cape Fear Lowlands. We call that landfilling!

Is Auto Fluff Hazardous?

Shredder Residue (auto fluff) contains toxins that can make us sick

Contaminant
Potential Health Effects from Overexposure

Arsenic Skin damage, circulatory system problems; increased risk of cancer

Cadmium
Kidney Damage

Chromium
Allergic dermatitis

Copper
Gastrointestinal distress; liver or kidney damage

Lead
Children: delays in physical or mental development

Adults: kidney problems; high blood pressure

Mercury
Kidney damage

Benzene
Anemia; decrease in blood platelets; increased risk of cancer

PAHs
Reproductive difficulties; increased risk of cancer

Ethylbenzene
Liver or kidney problems

PCBs
Skin changes; thymus gland problems; immune deficiencies; reproductive or nervous system difficulties; increased risk of cancer

Toulene
Nervous system, kidney or liver problems

Vinyl chloride
Increased risk of cancer

Trichloroethylene

Xylenes
Kidney and liver cancer

Nervous system damage

According to the US EPA, Toulene, trichloroethylene, and Xylenes all permeate state-of-the art landfill HDPE liners in 1-13 days. It only takes 4 drops of the carcenogin trichloroethylene to make an average-sized swimming pool undrinkable (20,000 gallons of water).

Will The Dump Be Visible From Wilmington?

Leaving Wilmington over the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge, one now sees the two red & white stacks at the Sutton power plant at about 2 o’clock and the new white water tank at the Rampage Yacht facility at about 1 o’clock. The 350 foot high landfill will add another landmark to the horizon, located a little further back and between the two. It will top out at 17.5 feet higher than the Sutton stacks and approximately 5 times the height of our tallest pines.

Will It Only Affect Navassa?

No, the immediate backyard belongs to everyone who drinks county or city water in New Hanover and Brunswick Counties. That is because the Cape Fear River is the source of that water and the tide rises and falls for many miles up the river. It has even been known to flow over the lock & dams.

How Will It Affect the Cape Fear River?

A 1994 study listed the Cape Fear as one of the Nation’s 50 Dirtiest Rivers.

What Will It Mean to Marine Life and Commercial Fishing?

With the river already maxed out as most toxic in the state, it surely won’t help. Our fishermen are suffering – crabs and oysters were down 90 to 95%, and there are hundreds of acres of permanently closed shellfish beds. Clams have to be taken up near Topsail and left to live in cleaner water before they can be sold. The state, who instigated the Hugo Neu invitation in the first place, has responded by putting another tax on fishing, this time on the poor individuals who might go once a year ~ their pretext being to use the money to improve fish habitat.

PCBs are one of the most persistent pollutants known. We already have more than our share of mercury from the combined sources of the paper mill at Riegelwood and the Sutton power plant. The deepening of the river has created a higher salinity level in fragile estuaries; flooding these estuaries with toxins from auto fluff will destroy them. We can only wonder if NC is in a race to top the 5,800 square mile dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico.

What Will It Mean to Our Health?

A look at the list of toxins above will give you a good idea of how this proposed site will affect our health. The 2000 Census reported that 1 out of every 12 children born in the US are either mentally or physically impaired. This is a far, far cry from the 1 out of a million acceptable risk of even thirty years ago. The cancer rate in children is increasing at almost 2% a year. North Carolina’s cancer rate in men is slightly more than 1 out of 2; in women it’s 1 out of 3. Both rates are expected to double in the next twenty years. The NC Board of Elections recently received money to modify voting polls to accommodate disabled voters, a figure now known to be 1 out of 5. The majority of our health problems are not bacterial but are the result of severely crippled immune systems, a proven result of the more than 80 average toxic exposures we receive each day.

What Do the Neighbors Think of This Site?

At the most recent hearing (Special Use Permit), 100 people turned out in opposition, representing 20% of the population on Mt. Misery Road. Compared to the City of Wilmington, it would have been an attendance of 16,000 people. Think that meeting would have made the front page?

Can Neighbors of the Site Vote the Elected Officials Out of Office to Stop the Dump?

No, because they live in another district, outside the town of Navassa. The land was taken into Navassa through something called satellite zoning. It is land within a community in one area that is controlled by another area.

What is North Carolina Doing About Reducing Solid Waste?

Another excellent question to ask the governor’s comment line. What are they doing? In 1990, the legislators voted to reduce solid waste by 40% in the next 10 years. Ten years down the line, we had increased by 40% and the rate keeps going up.

q In the meantime, just before 2000, the state began considering granting permits for a regional dump in the Green Swamp, a dump that sworn testimony now reveals was owned by Waste Management from day one. Waste Management, the world’s largest trash handler, owns the contract for New York City waste. New York’s leaking Fresh Kills Landfill closed in ’99 due to the excessive legal costs of keeping it open. Reputed to be the largest landfill in the US, it left Waste Management looking for a place to build a new dump. What we know from that point is that New York has built a $54 million barge facility where trash is being stockpiled with no place to go. The site in the Green Swamp would be forced to accept any out-of-state waste, including New York, due to Interstate Commerce Laws, which have already been unsuccessful challenged in the US Supreme Court three times. Our state’s Department of Transportation has paved rarely traveled roads through the swamp and repaired and upgraded bridges between South Carolina, our coast, and the site. There is rumor of a barge landing facility that would lead to Midway Road on Highway 211, then a straight shot to the site in the swamp. The landfill is labeled Municipal Solid Waste but would also accept “special” waste such as incinerator ash and industrial sludge. The site drains through a series of wetlands and creeks to the Waccamaw River. Citizens currently have it held up in a court decision.

q The State invites Hugo Neu, another New York industry, to locate its trash in our river basin. The company president, Don Hamocker, had the last word at the most recent hearing. After his experts had testified there was no danger in auto fluff, he lamented that it was not their fault that vehicles contained PCBs, mercury, and lead (all three highly toxic according to EPA and the rest of the world, for that matter).

q Waste Industries, owner of the regional landfill in Sampson County, has requested an expansion that would increase their territory to include land from Detroit, Michigan to Naples, Florida (everything east of I-75, an estimated 83 million customers).

So, we repeat – What in the world is our state government trying to do – turn us into a dumping ground for the rest of the country? The only way they can do it is if you and I sit back and say nothing.

How Can You Help?

q Join the citizens bringing a lawsuit against Navassa. They meet 1st and 3rd Monday nights of each month, at the Senior Citizen Center on Village Road in Leland (behind the old post office) at 7 p.m. Get involved with a committee and feel good about digging in and protecting your children’s future.

q Call the Governor’s Comment Line at 1- 800 662-7952 and give your opinion.

q Write a letter to the Editor of your local paper (See contact list on our site)

q Contact your local representatives (see contact list on our site)

q Call into a local radio talk show:

o WAAV Radio ~ 980 AM at (910) 763-4000