Attorney Jerry Reese , Chairman of the transportation improvements committee of the Tryon North Development Corp. is trying to stop a land swap deal that is attempting to bring AAA Baseball and the Charlotte Knights to a piece of Downtown Charlotte real estate.  Currently, the Charlotte Knights play at Knights Stadium in Fort Mill, South Carolina Real Estate Market.  Reese is trying to stop this deal because he wants a Major League Baseball Team in Charlotte instead of Minor League Baseball.  Jerry Reese is also a proponent of heavy rail transportation similar to the kind found in Chicago and Atlanta.  He wants to see light rail built from Kannapolis to UNCC, uptown Charlotte, and on to Charlotte Douglas International Airport.

A judge says that a state panel should have given Mr. Reese a chance to review the decision to let bonds not approved by voters be used for the land swap.  However, a Senior Administrative Judge Fred Morrison stressed that his decision did not reverse local government’s approval of the package nor does it stop Mecklenburg County from using bond money.  If the Executive Committee doesn’t accept the judge’s recommendations then Reese has a chance to appeal.

The bond package in dispute contains $161.3 million of certificates of participation bonds that don’t need voter approval.  $19 million of that money would be spent to erect Knights Stadium.  The rest of the money would be used for other county projects such as school construction. 

Reese and his lawyer maintain that the de novo review means that the executive committee’s review is irrelevant but, Mecklenburg County is moving forward with their activity on the project.  Mecklenburg County sold the bonds earlier this year & is already using the funds & making payments on the loans.  At this point, the courts have thrown out three of four of Reese’s lawsuits.

The Charlotte Knights plan to build a 10,000 seat stadium on county land between Mint, Graham, and Fourth Streets and Martin Luther King Boulevard.  This particular area of downtown Charlotte real estate was earmarked for a public park.  At this time this piece of Charlotte North Carolina Real Estate is vacant and an eyesore for the entire city of Charlotte.  As part of a land swap deal, city officials had planned to exchange public & private land to free up property for the stadium and clean up and improve an area of uptown Charlotte that needs improvement.  However, now, due to the lawsuits, officials plan to sell the parcels of land to one another to get around the lawsuits.