Charleston City Paper
Turf Wars
October 10, 2005
By: Neal Sakash

In recent years, developers have been devouring parts of the Lowcountry as if it were a cheap buffet, littering the landscape with the cookie-cutter markings of urban sprawl.

As large-scale land transfers make local headlines and redevelopment proposals are bandied about, the region faces a new wave of domestic growth — and also a chance to change current patterns and trends. At the center of this issue is the use of the half-cent sales tax, passed by county voters almost a year ago.

Since the plan to spend the half-cent funds hasn’t been completed, many county citizens remain in the dark as to exactly how the funds will be spent. The Charleston County Transportation Committee (CTCC) has already added at least a dozen more provisions onto what the public voted for last November. Knowing that the tax’s final plan is still in limbo, some citizens have begun to question the committee’s ability to slow development.

James Island Public Service District Commissioner Eugene Platt sponsored a resolution that would institute a county-wide moratorium for any residential developments exceeding three units until a careful implementation of half-cent funds is devised.

Platt was a central figure several years ago in the fight to preserve Parrot Point, a piece of church-owned land on James Island that is now the home of a high-end housing development.

For Platt, the first and foremost issue is securing county greenspace. By law, only 17 percent of the half-cent funds can be dedicated for greenspace protection. Platt’s proposal, formally submitted to County Council in May, was voted down unanimously at a July planning commission meeting without a single word of discussion.

Of that meeting, a hurt Platt says “political courage” gave way to silence and “a lack of respect for the ideas of an elected commission.”

Councilman Tim Scott says he would be happy to debate the issue, but from what he remembers, “the proposal had the right intention, but [I] found it to be utilizing the wrong method.” Further, Scott believes regional planners are capable of assessing the present situation without the aid of a moratorium that could create an “unsustainable economy.” Scott would rather see Council follow the philosophy of the state’s Conservation Bank Act of 2002.

The Conservation Bank offers grants to land trust firms, such as the Nature Conservancy (or even a municipality), to support property transfers from willing sellers to their foundation. Under the terms of Platt’s proposal, a moratorium would pertain only to unincorporated parts of the county, leaving County Council with little power to control development. With this considered, the Bank could serve as a logical solution to the bureaucracy encountered between regional developers and local governments.

Tim Keane, a former Charleston city planner and Mayor Joe Riley loyalist who started his own design firm, agrees with Scott, but has a more expansive view on county-wide growth.

“Regional growth is actually what officials should be focusing on; we cannot look at just the tri-county area,” says Keane.

Keane thinks all county-wide moratoriums “are, in a way, omissions of failure.” He believes the County has done as much as possible with the City’s Comprehensive Plan, which he helped craft in 2003, and doesn’t feel the people discussing the sales tax are in a race against developers because there are already two forces fighting sprawl: the redevelopment of abandoned urban/infill sites already present within the county, such as the homes being built in Wagener Terrace and the Elliotborough neighborhoods downtown, and the prevention of unbridled growth, as some view Watson Hill in West Ashley.

Further, Keane believes a moratorium would lead to what has occurred in Mt. Pleasant after it put a ceiling on the number of permits for the construction of single family homes — an exodus of developers from the town toward the outskirts of the county and the open lands of milk and honey in Awendaw and McCellanville.

Unbridled growth has since flourished in the hinterlands, bringing suburban pockets of retirees and traffic congestion to a once peaceful area. In December, Mt. Pleasant increased the number of permits to 620.

Vince Graham, the well-respected developer behind the nationally recognized I’On community in Mt. Pleasant, was pressured last month into shelving a similar community at the corner of Hungry Neck Boulevard and Rifle Range Road — formerly known as the Hassell, Batley, and Slone tracts — after Town Council voted 5-4 against both allowing him to build structures two feet taller than what its code allows and his request for an additional 10,000 square feet of commercial space.

This was not the first time Graham has fought Town Hall. In a recent letter to Mt. Pleasant Mayor Harry Hallman, Graham wrote of the troubled history between the I’On Group and Town Council, including numerous occurrences in which he believed certain Council members had a “political vendetta” against his vision for Mt. Pleasant’s future.

Graham claimed in the letter that Councilmen Kruger Smith and Gary Santos had “consistently opposed” his company’s projects. He further stated that denying his variance requests was not only an insult to his company, but also to Mt. Pleasant’s various planning committees, whose purpose is to judge the impacts of any development proposal within town limits.

Councilman Gary Santos repeatedly denies that he has any problem with “Graham or the people of I’On,” but stresses that he didn’t think the changes were necessary for the project.

“We look at everything individually … and determine if it is in the best interest of the public … I view this [Council] as a business for the public good,” says Santos, who voted against Graham’s project and the recommendations made by a town planning committee.

The ongoing “non-fight” between Santos and Graham may be a reflection of a community desperate to control development that takes its countermeasures too far.

While Graham may have found an enemy in Town Hall, Eugene Platt may have found a “hero” in a mayor who has the “courage” to stop development.

But Graham, for one, doesn’t believe Town Hall’s concern here is the protection of county greenspace. Without naming names, he says that “some people become concerned at the very prospect of any sort of change,” and he questions which public the Town Council is really serving.

Regardless, Graham has remained in contact with Santos in hope of settling their disagreement, but little has been resolved after a month. However, the initiative for more neo-urban communities in Mt. Pleasant will likely be put on hold until this disagreement is settled.

With Graham at the forefront of new development philosophy and Platt speaking for the county’s concerned citizens, the actions of Town and County councils have created an unsettled environment for the change promised by the half-cent sales tax.

The big question now becomes, once the mudslinging between politicians and developers is over, will there be anything green left to protect in Charleston County?