City Of Trenton Discusses Annexing 78 Acres
By LYDIA BERGLAR
News Editor
At the Dec. 9 board meeting, the City of Trenton Board of Commissioners approved the final 2025 budget and discussed a possible addition to the city’s territory. National developer D.R. Horton approached the city about this possible expansion, but D.R. Horton is renowned for poor quality homes.
Beginning the meeting, the board appointed Michele Holifield as the city’s representative on the Dade County Health Department’s board. Holifield is a nurse practitioner at Primary Healthcare.
The board approved a Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) purchase: a new autoclave for the wastewater treatment plant. (The current one is 35 years old.) Dewayne Moore (utilities director) explained that the autoclave sterilizes lab equipment used to test the water. The board chose the cheapest quote, for $6,561 from USA BlueBook.
Alex Case (mayor) recapped the 2025 sewer ($600,000) and city budget ($2,468,688.76) before the board approved both budgets. Compared to 2024, the sewer budget/revenue increased by $43,400, and the city budget increased by $212,988.76.
Increased sewer expenses include payroll and overtime, maintenance, and electricity. Increased city expenses include payroll and overtime, insurance, supplies and maintenance, and the contracted veterinarian.
Case noted several revenue increases, such as sewer fees and tax from online sales and alcohol sales.
Regarding the library’s request at the October meeting for increased funding, Case noted that the city is not increasing its contribution to the library’s budget. He said, “The library’s a great asset to us, but we’ve also got a lot of other things going on.”
Next, the board discussed but did not vote on a potential addition to the city’s territory. Case explained that a residential development corporation (which he later confirmed to be D.R. Horton) approached the city about three weeks ago, hoping to have two land parcels near Sells Lane annexed so that residential developments on the land will fall under the city’s zoning, be able to connect to city sewer, and make use of city services.
According to the tax assessor’s website, one of the parcels (31.31 acres) is owned by Brenda D. Poe, and the other (47.30 acres) is owned by Poe and Carolyn D. Ellis.
Case noted that the county is willing to agree to the annexation. He said D.R. Horton is planning to build 130 or more lots and will be completely responsible for all infrastructure (to be done in accordance with the city’s specifications).
He said, “The reason that they’re asking for this is because all your lenders now need a zoned environment to be able to hand that homeowner a certificate of occupancy, that it’s been inspected…That can’t happen in the county right now.”
The board also discussed the possibility of creating zoning designations for micro-communities because D.R. Horton inquired about this type of lot/zone. Although sometimes confused with tiny homes, micro-communities are not the same thing. They are smaller lot sizes, similar to the Woodford at Glenview development which is built on 7,500 square feet instead of 8,000.
Lucretia Houts (fire and utility commissioner) said, “It’s kind of hard to beat, if they offer all [the infrastructure] and want to come into your city and pay the taxes, it’s kind of hard to turn your back on that.”
Mike Norris (police commissioner) said that while he thinks homes on smaller lots will be difficult to sell, “I can’t really see a downfall to us.” He noted that additional territory will require increased police and fire department coverage.
Although not discussed at the meeting, it is safe to assume that the city would need to expand Sells Lane to accommodate traffic from 130 lots.
Terry Powell (parks/animal control commissioner) added, “I think we need the housing. We don’t have enough.”
Case noted that the city could offer three neighboring lots the option of also being annexed.
Nationally, D.R. Horton is known for poorly constructed homes. In fact, the website dorighthorton.com is dedicated to horror stories and bad press about the company. Perusing complaints on the Better Business Bureau’s site, watching reports from news sites, and reading through law firm pages about class action lawsuits against D.R. Horton raises major red flags about the powerful company.
The Sentinel asked Case if he and the commissioners are aware of the lawsuits against D.R. Horton. Case said they are aware, reiterating that nothing has yet been decided and reassuring the public that the city will do its due diligence before moving forward. He said annexation would require public hearings by both the county and city and would take months. While the builder wants a decision as quickly as possible, Case made it clear that the city has many questions to ask first.
D.R. Horton is currently building a development near Ridgeland High School, so Case said he will ask Walker County and the City of Lafayette if they’ve had any problems with the company.
Noting that a number of people contacted him with concerns when word got out that D.R. Horton is looking at Dade/Trenton, Case said, “Especially with all this coming out, we’re going to do our due diligence. There’s people that’s going to cheat. I’ve seen horror stories, we’ve learned, and we’ve got questions we ask.”
As to how the city ensures quality, Case cited inspections. The Sentinel asked if the city’s small inspections team is prepared to handle such a large development, and how will Trenton succeed in keeping D.R. Horton in line when so many other larger cities and counties have failed to do so?
Case understood the concern. He noted that the city had to address problems during the Woodford at Glenview construction when building codes were being violated. The builders complied and fixed the issues, but the city was prepared to put a stop to the project if codes were not followed.
Moving on with the meeting, Norris read the police report. In November, the Trenton Police Department answered 275 calls for service, conducted 1,694 business checks, answered four burglary/alarm calls, responded to seven domestic disturbance, two trespassing, and 25 suspicious activity calls, and worked 15 traffic crashes. From 135 traffic stops, 69 citations were issued.
Powell reported that four dogs were in the city’s shelter as of Dec. 2. Two had been posted for adoption on Facebook. He said to contact City Hall about these dogs.
Houts reported that the Trenton Fire Department answered 100 calls in November, six of which were fire related and 45 of which were canceled en route.
During Citizens Participation, Cody Doyle asked if the city is still working toward livestreaming meetings. Case said they are working with Alex McAlpin on pricing for equipment and will need to train staff to run the livestream. He said many citizens have inquired about the possibility of livestreamed meetings.
