On a Tuesday night in April 2026, the Harris County courthouse in Hamilton filled past capacity with residents who had come to watch commissioners decide, for the second time in six weeks, whether a company called Timberland 109 LLC could build houses on 586 acres off McKee Road, land identified in local reporting as part of the Ellerslie community. Anyone comparing land here against other parts of the tri-city area should understand what happened in that courthouse, and what it actually predicts.
The board voted 3-2 to uphold an earlier denial, as WTVM reported. That result made the news. What matters more for a buyer is the pattern this vote fits into, a pattern that stretches back thirty years and points somewhere different than "the county said no."
Two Votes, One Direction
Timberland 109 first asked Harris County to rezone the McKee Road property from agricultural to low-density residential in early March 2026. The initial pitch called for 191 homes on roughly half of the 586 acres, marketed as a conservation subdivision. Commissioners voted 3-2 to deny the rezoning, even though county staff had recommended approval contingent on new turn lanes, updated traffic studies, and a construction schedule the school district could review. The board sided with the room instead.
Timberland sued. Rather than starting a fresh rezoning request, the company pursued a preliminary plat under the property's existing agricultural zoning, using a two-acre yield calculation to arrive at 179 lots. The Harris County Planning Commission rejected that interpretation, ruling Timberland would need a formal rezone to residential in order to use two-acre minimums at all. When Timberland appealed that rejection to the full board in April, the vote came back the same, 3-2 to uphold the denial, and the case was on record as Randall Creek Preserve. By then, more than 900 residents had signed a petition against the project, up from roughly 600 a month earlier.
| Date | Action | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Early March 2026 | Board votes on rezoning request for Randall Creek Preserve | Denied, 3-2 |
| April 2026 | Board hears appeal of Planning Commission's plat denial | Denial upheld, 3-2 |
| Ongoing | Timberland 109's lawsuit against the county | In discovery |
The lawsuit has not been resolved. That detail matters and I will come back to it. But the two votes on their own tell you what the county's current appetite looks like, and that appetite has history behind it.
The County's Math, Not Just Its Mood
At a Harris County Commission meeting the same month, one commissioner recounted the county's lot-size history out loud. The minimum lot size moved from half an acre to a full acre in 1993 and 1994. It moved again, from one acre to two acres, in 2003 and 2004. According to that commissioner, the two-acre era is when the county saw its largest growth, not its slowest. The same meeting record put a number on how commercial the county still is: about 30 restaurants total, countywide.
That detail changes how you should read what happened with Randall Creek Preserve. The easy assumption is that Harris County is choking off supply to protect its rural feel, and that land near Ellerslie will only get scarcer as the board holds the line. The county's own record argues something closer to the opposite. Every time the minimum lot size went up, growth followed the increase rather than stalling behind it. The board denying a one-acre subdivision this year is not new caution. It is the same lever the county has pulled twice before, at exactly the moments it grew the most it ever has.
What The Petition Was Actually Protecting
Jacqueline Moyer organized the petition against Randall Creek Preserve. Her framing was about density and lot size rather than opposition to growth itself.
"We don't mind if you build, but build smart."
Attorney Andy Welch, representing Timberland 109, offered his own read after the second vote, telling WRBL, "had there been a different outcome that would've resolved the matter." Both sides agree on what is actually being contested. Nobody in that courthouse was arguing Harris County should stop growing. The argument was over lot size, and on that question, the board has now sided with the residents twice in six weeks.
What This Means If You Are Shopping Near Ellerslie Right Now
If you are comparing Ellerslie against other tri-city communities on the assumption that land here will loosen up once this fight resolves, the county's own history suggests you may be reading the signal backward. Timberland's one-acre pitch was already a compromise aimed at what the company thought the board would accept, and the board rejected even that. If the historical pattern holds, however this dispute ends, whether through settlement, a rezone at a higher standard, or a court ruling, it is more likely to preserve large-lot character near Ellerslie than to open the door to smaller lots and faster building.
For a buyer, that has two practical implications worth weighing before you write an offer. Existing acreage near Ellerslie is not about to compete against a wave of new one-acre lots, because the county's pattern says that wave keeps getting turned back at the courthouse. And new construction near Ellerslie, when it does come, is likely to arrive slower and priced higher per lot than in areas without this kind of layered review, since turn lanes, traffic studies, and school capacity reviews are the price of entry even for a project the county's own staff recommended approving.
The road work GDOT has planned nearby fits the same story. The department's current project for SR 315 intersections calls for single-lane roundabouts, a scale of improvement built for intersection safety, not for subdivision-level traffic. Growth near Ellerslie keeps arriving in a specific shape, and that shape has not changed in thirty years.
The Part That Is Still Undecided
None of this means Randall Creek Preserve is finished. Timberland 109's lawsuit is in discovery, and Welch has said an appeal to Superior Court remains on the table regardless of how the county's internal process ends. If a court eventually sides with the developer, the county's long pattern of raising lot minimums ahead of growth spurts would meet its first real legal test in this cycle. That is worth watching if you are timing a purchase near Ellerslie around how this settles. It is not, on the record so far, a reason to wait for smaller lots and faster inventory. Nothing the county has done points that direction yet.
A Few Questions Worth Asking Before You Look At Land Here
Does this dispute affect homes already built near Ellerslie, or only future subdivisions? Only future supply. Randall Creek Preserve was proposed on undeveloped agricultural land off McKee Road. Nothing in the case touches lots or houses that already exist.
If the lawsuit succeeds, does that change what land near Ellerslie is worth? It could, if a court forced the county to approve smaller lots more readily. That would break with thirty years of precedent, so it is not the likely outcome, but it is a fair question to raise with your agent if you are buying raw acreage with future subdivision potential in mind.
Why does the county keep raising lot minimums instead of just limiting the number of new subdivisions? That is a question for the commission rather than for a real estate agent. The public record so far suggests the board treats lot size as the lever that protects the character residents are choosing to move for, without needing to cap growth outright.
Buying land near Ellerslie right now means buying into a county with a documented habit of drawing a line around lot size, and growing anyway. That is a different story than a county closing its doors, and it is worth knowing which story you are actually walking into before you make an offer.
If you are weighing Ellerslie against other parts of the Columbus, Phenix City, or Fort Benning area, Move With Mia can walk you through what is actually available on the ground here, acre by acre. Let's Connect.