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NC counties will ask for state’s help to resolve neighborhood’s border confusion

Confusion over where the Mecklenburg and Union county border line is could soon be settled — but not without a little state government help.

Mecklenburg County commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to ask the state legislature to turn a county line resolution into a bill that would keep tax and school service boundaries the same for residents living along the border in Stallings.

Earlier this year, Union County officials told Mecklenburg officials they were using different maps. That meant some residents in the Shannamara neighborhood were living in Mecklenburg when they thought they were Union County residents. The confusion comes down to where the border line is drawn on Abergele Lane in the neighborhood that straddles the county line.

“The lines we are adopting tonight are the same lines we’ve gone by for all these years,” Board Chairman George Dunlap said.

Tuesday’s approval comes one month after Union County officials approved a similar framework. Some residents who thought they lived in Union County would officially live in Union County to minimize the financial burden of taxes in a different county, according to the presentation to county commissioners.

Commissioner Laura Meier asked if the state legislature could say “no” in response to their request, and County Attorney Tyrone Wade said, technically, yes.

“The state can do that. I don’t know that the state will do that because of the problem it will create with residents living in these particular areas,” Wade said.

When the Shannamara Subdivision was developed around 2001 and 2002, there was confusion around the exact location of the county line, according to the resolution. In 2007, the town of Stallings in Union County annexed a portion of the homes that were in Mecklenburg County. A preliminary survey of the county line was completed in 2009, but an official establishment of the line was never finished.