By Lolita Huckaby
BEAUFORT
Last week’s City Council workshop agenda included the term – development moratorium – and the crowd that showed up filling the meeting room, seemed ready to discuss.
Unfortunately, the majority of City Council members weren’t in the mindset to explore the proposal put on the agenda by Mayor Phil Cromer. The idea of a development moratorium, to give the city planning staff time to at least finish updates to the building regulations, went nowhere.
Councilman Josh Scallate led the limited debate, arguing the code updates are expected to be before Council for approval “soon” and there was really no need for a moratorium.
Local developer Dick Stewart voiced his concerns that a moratorium would make it more difficult for the local governments to achieve their goals of bringing “affordable housing” to the working people.
Beaufort County Council Chari Alice Howard, a year ago, brought up the idea of a possible county-wide moratorium at a county committee meeting. The response from her elected colleagues was the same. The county administrative staff said there was no need for a moratorium since most of the potential development sites had already been permitted for new houses, apartments, retail stores or commercial buildings.
This response from the Beaufort City and County councils takes place against a growing call from citizens to “do something” about the number of residences and accompanying traffic being experienced.
Indeed, two dozen residents from Cat Island sat through the City Council meeting to beg the city officials to “do something” about the proposed residential and commercial development announced recently for their neighborhood on Cane Island. Unfortunately for them, the City Council’s hands may be legally tied because the development plans were approved as a PUD (Planned Unit Development) when the property was annexed more than three decades ago.
Interestingly enough, the Port Royal Town Council, also last week, voted unanimously to extend their moratorium on new multi-family construction, a freeze that was imposed a year ago to give town planners time to update building codes including the town’s tree protection and short-term rental ordinances.
The Port Royal council, representing a population of 15,000-plus, took that action after realizing at least 1,500 new apartments have been approved but not yet constructed.
Port Royal’s mortarium, which will be extended another six months, included an exemption for the Safe Harbor development firm’s property, the Bluff, identified for future residential development. The latest agreements with the town include allowances for Safe Harbor to sell off the residential section of their property and focus on building a “world-class” marina and boat storage facility.
And across the county lines, in Jasper County, they’ve been living with a moratorium for the past 18 months, also designed to give planners an opportunity to “catch up” with the massive growth taking place and planned in the northern part of the county along the Euhaw/Broad River area.
As outlined by fellow columnist Scott Graber in the March 26 edition of The Island News, the Jasper County Council is expected to vote on their revised development codes in the coming weeks. Whether the moratorium will have achieved the council’s goals is to be determined. Will there be “smarter growth.”
That’s the hopes of most people who live here.
Pine Island development … it’s back
ST. HELENA ISLAND – Speaking of continuing growth, Elvio Tropeano and the developers of Pine Island are back, coming at the Beaufort County Council for a second run to get their plans for a residential community
This time they come with a local attorney – Kevin Dukes of the Harvey, Battey and Tom Davis law firm (yes, Sen. Tom Davis’ firm) – and plans to include a community center for the neighborhood that may, or may not support the plans.
Since November, 2022, the owners of the isolated island located in the St. Helena Island neighborhood, have been pursuing their development plans which require an exemption to the established zoning code. Hundreds of neighbors including the Coastal Conservation League, the Gullah community and even Gov. Henry McMaster, opposed any rezoning and eventually won support from a majority of County Council members.
It will be interesting to see if those same council members will have the same response.
Lolita Huckaby Watson is a community volunteer and newspaper columnist. In her former role as a reporter with The Beaufort Gazette, The Savannah Morning News, Bluffton Today and Beaufort Today, she prided herself in trying to stay neutral and unbiased. As a columnist, these are her opinions. Her goal is to be factual but opinionated, based on her own observations. Feel free to contact her at bftbay@gmail.com.
