Developers Sue Camden County Over Building Moratorium, Permit Reversals

Three development groups and an individual landowner are suing Camden County, the county manager, the county planner and a former planning director, alleging the county reversed itself on permit decisions for three South Mills-area projects after the developers had already spent money relying on the county's earlier positions.

Allied Properties LLC, Camden Yards LLC, North-South Development Group LLC, South Mills Landing LLC, Kirk-Old South Mills Development LLC and Justin M. Old filed a federal lawsuit May 22 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina against Camden County; County Manager and Interim UDO Administrator Erin Burke; County Planner Hunter Munro; and Amber Curling, who served as the county's planning and building department director during the events described in the case. Burke, Munro and Curling are each named in their official capacities only.

The 29-page complaint, case number 2:26-cv-00025-M-RN, raises five claims: two requests for declaratory judgment over the validity of a 2024 development moratorium and the meaning of a phasing agreement, a substantive due process claim, a breach-of-contract claim over a settlement agreement, and a claim under the federal civil rights statute 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The plaintiffs say they have also filed a related case in North Carolina Superior Court challenging the moratorium's adoption under state law. They are seeking declaratory rulings, monetary damages and attorneys' fees, and have demanded a jury trial.

The county had not filed a response in court as of this writing. Camden Tribune has reached out to County Manager Erin Burke's office and the Camden County Attorney's office for comment and will update this story with any response received. Curling, who has since left the county, could not be reached directly.

Wharf's Landing: Septic, then sewer, then septic again

Allied Properties owns and is developing a proposed 149-lot subdivision in South Mills called Wharf's Landing Phase II, according to the complaint. Allied began the permitting process in 2021 to build the lots with individual septic systems and wells, and filed septic and well permit applications with the Albemarle Regional Health System in June 2022 at a cost of about $85,726; the applications were approved shortly after. Weeks later, on Aug. 1, 2022, the county Board of Commissioners adopted a zoning text amendment barring individual septic systems on half-acre lots in the Suburban Residential district — a change the complaint says wasn't posted publicly for months after it was adopted.

Allied submitted a complete preliminary plat application in July 2023 based on the 2022 septic permits, according to the complaint. County staff later directed Allied to pursue sewer connections instead and forgo the septic permits, then — months afterward — the county's utilities director recommended denying the application for lack of sewer capacity, the complaint says. The county ultimately approved the preliminary plat in November 2024 with sewer connections specified, according to a settlement agreement attached to the complaint.

By 2025, engineering work indicated the sewer extension needed to serve Wharf's Landing would require gravity mains more than 13 feet deep and two pump stations the county would own and maintain permanently, the complaint says. After Justin Old met with Burke to discuss the cost, Burke wrote in a July 23, 2025 letter on county letterhead: "Per our conversation of July 22, 2025, the use of septic systems for Wharf's Landing Phase II will be acceptable to Camden County. There will be no need to extend sewer services to the development as a result of this decision." Allied says it redesigned its plans and closed on the property on Aug. 28, 2025, for more than $3 million.

About four months after Burke's letter, on Nov. 21, 2025, then-Planning Director Amber Curling issued a written determination concluding the opposite: that half-acre lots could not use individual septic systems under the county's development ordinance. Allied appealed administratively, and the county and Allied settled that appeal in February 2026, with the county agreeing to a review schedule for new construction drawings. The lawsuit alleges the county has since missed elements of that schedule.

On April 28, 2026, County Planner Hunter Munro wrote that Allied's engineers' answers "do not adequately address" the county's stormwater concerns and asked for a redesign, without specifying which requirements weren't met, according to the complaint. At a May 1, 2026 meeting, county staff and the county's stormwater consultant told Allied's engineers the plans were deficient on setback and drainage grounds — but the complaint says it was then determined that the consultant had been reviewing the plans against a drainage code that had already been replaced. Allied resubmitted revised plans May 4; after Allied's attorneys met with the county attorney May 12, the county approved the stormwater plans the next day, according to the complaint. The project still requires additional permits to proceed, the lawsuit says.

Crouse: A second dispute over the moratorium's reach

Camden Yards LLC owns and is developing a roughly 358-acre tract in South Mills known as Crouse, according to the complaint. The lawsuit alleges the county declined to act on a pending rezoning request for the property while the development moratorium was being drafted, and that the Board of Commissioners voted to deny the rezoning application on June 3, 2024 — the same meeting at which the board, on its consent agenda, set a public hearing on the proposed moratorium.

Camden Yards later pursued a smaller quadraplex-and-triplex development on the same property. After months of exchanges with county planning staff over comments on the proposal, Justin Old had a phone conversation with Burke on the morning of Feb. 27, 2025; in a follow-up email that day, Old thanked her for "clarifying key aspects of this process" and asked for confirmation that the project could proceed. The complaint alleges Burke told Old in that conversation that the project was not prohibited by the moratorium. Camden Yards says it then spent more than $500,000 on engineering, stormwater modeling, test wells and related work over the following year.

On April 7, 2026, the county attorney emailed Camden Yards' counsel that Burke, reviewing the pending application, "noted her initial concern is comment 2 ... regarding residential subdivision," adding that the moratorium question "could be a non-starter." On May 18, 2026, Burke issued a written determination addressed "To Whom It May Concern" finding the project "in violation of the moratorium ordinance because the proposed project constitutes the type of residential density and multifamily development activity that is temporarily paused, regardless of the form of ownership." The letter noted the determination could be appealed to the Camden County Board of Adjustment. Camden Yards says this reversed what Burke had told Old fifteen months earlier.

South Mills Landing: A clubhouse caught between two phases

South Mills Landing LLC and Kirk-Old South Mills Development LLC own about 185 acres in South Mills being developed as a 567-lot mixed-use community with single-family homes, townhomes, commercial space, a clubhouse and a pool, according to the complaint. The county approved the development's master plan in January 2021. That master plan's phasing schedule lists the clubhouse as an "other improvement" associated with Phase 2, with an estimated completion tied to Phase 2's 2022 target recording date; the accompanying phasing map shows the clubhouse building itself drawn within Phase 1's mapped boundary, near the development's main entrance. The complaint argues this means the clubhouse must be completed by the time Phase 2 lots are recorded — not that the clubhouse itself is a Phase 2 structure requiring Phase 2 approval first.

The county approved Phase 1 construction drawings — which the complaint says included the clubhouse site plan, grading and drainage plans and parking design — in March 2025. After South Mills submitted a building permit application for the clubhouse in March 2026, Chief Building Inspector Jason Corbell wrote in an April 1, 2026 email that "a permit will not be issued due to the club house being part of phase 2 and it has not been approved yet." The complaint alleges the county's planning department followed up the next day stating the clubhouse permit could not move forward until Phase 2's preliminary plat and construction drawings were approved — a sequence the lawsuit says would prevent any Phase 2 lots from being sold until the Phase 1 clubhouse is built.

The moratorium

The Board of Commissioners adopted a 30-month development moratorium, Ordinance 2024-06-02, on June 25, 2024, citing limited water and wastewater treatment capacity. It is set to run through Dec. 25, 2026; the complaint says county officials discussed extending it as recently as February 2026.

The ordinance's stated justification — language nearly identical to a memo Burke had sent weeks earlier — says "according to the Albemarle Regional Health System, the use of traditional septic systems are difficult to permit," and that "on-site waste water treatment plants were also considered" as an alternative but "run the risk of improper maintenance and failure." The lawsuit contends that doesn't satisfy a North Carolina law (N.C. Gen. Stat. § 160D-107(d)) requiring moratorium ordinances to state what alternatives were considered and why they were rejected, noting a March 2024 staff presentation to the board had listed several other options, including a shorter 24-month moratorium, increased storage capacity and public-private partnerships with developers. A May 2024 staff memo recommended the 30-month term despite the board's earlier request that staff research a 24-month version; the county Planning Board endorsed the 30-month moratorium 6-1 later that month, and the full board adopted it in June.

Plaintiffs are represented by Steven D. Weber and Mallory S. Sparks of Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein LLP.