Thrills in New Berryhill

NEW BERRYHILL -- Oops, that dateline doesn't officially exist. Yet.

But it will one day if pro-incorporation residents have their way. This bustling area in and east of Cordova is ground zero in the current flap over the future growth of Memphis and its suburban communities.

Here the "Four S's" of suburban development come together: streets, sewers, schools, and soybean fields (which is what many of today's subdivisions used to be and tomorrow's still are).

In honor of the beginning of the new school year, here is a little quiz:

1. If two Cordova families live in identical houses two blocks apart, their property taxes are: A) the same. B) different by 100 percent.

2. Cordova High School, the new city-county high school, is: A) open for business. B) under construction. C) both.

3. The future residents of this edge city will be citizens of: A) the town of New Berryhill. B) unincorporated Shelby County. C) Memphis. D) who knows?

4. When the Memphis City Council says it will turn off the water and sewer service to these people if they insist on incorporating, the council is: A) dead serious. B) bluffing. C) on shaky legal ground.

5. The fate of New Berryhill will probably be known in: A) a few weeks. B) a few months. C) a few years.

The correct answers are B, C, D, C, and C. But don't hold us to them. Things change quickly out here, where the icons are a flagman spitting dust, a bulldozer, and a sign that says "Future Home Of."

In fact, it's doubtful that an area has ever grown so full-speed-ahead amid so much overriding uncertainty about such "details" as taxes, sewers, and citizenship.

At the new Cordova High School, teachers' cars and heavy machinery compete for space in the parking lot. School buses to the right, cement trucks to the left. If you're a freshman, report to the south wing; if you're a bricklayer, they need you right away on the north wall.

On the football field, the scoreboard is in place but not the gridiron. Likewise, the baseball fields have lights and dugouts but no diamonds.

What the school does have, thanks to the city of Memphis, is the Grays Creek sewer, which made it all possible. The sewer extension runs right under the future football field and east along Macon Road to the new elementary school. When developers tap into it, their bulldozers will transform the soybean fields and woods into new subdivisions which will house the families that will produce the children that will fill the schools.

And when the sewer is extended ever farther north and east as planned, the whole process will repeat itself until the Grays Creek area has some 30,000 to 50,000 new residents and a dozen more new public schools and a few private ones, too, such as Briarcrest.

The issue, of course, is whether they will be residents of Memphis, Shelby County, New Berryhill, Independence, or some other fancifully named place. Memphis plans to annex the area in return for providing the sewers and other services. But annexation opponents got fresh hope and a rallying point from a new state law easing incorporation of suburban communities. A hearing in Davidson County Chancery Court in Nashville September 9th will clarify the law but probably not settle things, given the likelihood of legal appeals.

"What does Memphis offer us? Not much," says Tom Galloney, who is helping raise money for the incorporation of New Berryhill. For several weeks he has been calling on fellow residents and businesses in the area, and finds sentiment "very strong for incorporation."

Some developers aren't so sure incorporation is the way to go. Holiday Inns founder Kemmons Wilson, who began building houses in Memphis before World War II, is part owner of a 65-acre commercial site on Germantown Road near Trinity Commons, which is in Memphis.

"I think it would be bad," says Wilson. "It would be better if it were all under the city of Memphis or Shelby County."

For now, this area east of Germantown Parkway, south of Interstate 40, and north of Macon Road offers some not-so-subtle contrasts amid all the dust of new construction.

In the part of Cordova that was successfully annexed by Memphis several years ago, property taxes are double what they are on nearly identical homes in the unincorporated areas. One homeowner pays city and county taxes; the other only county taxes.

The annexed area is served by the nearly new Cordova Elementary School for grades K-8. A new middle school is planned on adjacent property.

Nearby county residents have equally spiffy (and more lavishly landscaped) Chimneyrock Elementary, where classrooms spill out into portable buildings to handle the overflow.

Both the city and county schools feed the new Cordova High School, which is starting with ninth-graders and adding one grade a year. Which parent will ultimately take custody of this baby is unclear.

At a glance, the annexed and unannexed areas are more alike than different. They use the same roads, public parks, churches, stores, employers, and in some cases schools. But developers are betting much more heavily on Cordova/New Berryhill than the wide open spaces that have already been annexed.

Waymon "Jackie" Welch, who sold the land for the new high school and elementary school, is putting in new subdivisions of 250 to 500 homes around both new schools. He and Shelby County Mayor Jim Rout were instrumental in getting the city to extend the sewers to the new high school.

These subdivisions would be immediately affected if the Memphis City Council makes good on its threat to refuse to allow would-be incorporated communities like New Berryhill to tap into the sewer system. The issue will be played out first in the political arena, where Welch, as tough as the council is pliant, is one of the most experienced and skillful operators around.

Welch has moved a few times and knows the meaning of "property values" as a homeowner as well as a businessman. When he moved from Whitehaven some 15 years ago, he sold his house for $77,000. It wouldn't fetch much more than that today. He is selling his current home on Germantown Extended for roughly $150,000. And he is building his dream home in Collierville, the fastest-growing city in Tennessee.

It cost a bundle, but he can afford it, thanks to his knack for scoping out and nourishing future hot spots like New Berryhill.