By Rupert Howell
Panola supervisors took under advisement a decision whether to appeal last month’s Land Commission board’s approval for APAC and Magnolia Rock LLC. to have a special exception allowing property located between Batesville and Sardis west of Highway 51 near Harris Road to be used for gravel and sand mining, wash plant and crusher.

The motion passed narrowly with Supervisors Cole Flint and John Thomas voting against taking the matter under advisement.

Nolan West who is a principal in H & G Land Company that filed the appeal represented that company’s interest stating he objected to the county’s land commission approval saying the decision was, “arbitrary and capricious,” and alleged several details concerning the application process, documents and lack thereof, signage, minutes of the commission’ s meeting, abundant permits already within the area and track record of APAC.

Attorney Kevin Watts directed APAC’s side of the hearing calling APAC Mississippi president Dwayne Boyd who testified that APAC has zero operations in Panola County and has offered to relinquish agreement with H & G on a Como site but has gotten no response from H & G.

That Como site, owned by H & G, became controversial when a neighboring church as well as townspeople and businesses in Como objected to a special exception so close to town and the church. That matter is still tied up in the state’s Supreme Court according to West, but Boyd said that APAC has no plans to mine the Como site, citing opposition by local residents.

Admitting that H & G could be a potential competitor, Boyd said his company decided to pull the plug due to so much opposition from a nearby “church and businesses that didn’t want us there.”

He explained the current location was thought to be, “out of sight, out of mind.”

APAC’s aggregate manager Tim Rakestraw revealed that the company had another site under lease already permitted on Highway 51 north of the Tallahatchie River.

Supervisor Cole Flint questioned that while APAC was listing only one entrance to the facility Harris Road would have to be crossed by the a new road to the entrance making three entrances to the facility.

APAC officials explained that those would not be be used by trucks coming to and from the plant, only the Highway 51 intersection.

At last month’s Land Commission meeting, Dr. Mike Havens who is also in the aggregate business in the Eureka Community spoke against the number of permits to process aggregate in the county.

Any decision by supervisors could then be appealed further to Circuit then the state’s Supreme Court.

The board’s next scheduled meeting is Monday, December 7 A vote will not be taken until the second Monday in December, 14 in  Batesville on the appeal.