Category: Government

BLYTHEWOOD (Jan. 14, 2016) – Harold Pickrel, the developer of Blythecreek subdivision on Boney Road, took rejection badly Monday night after the Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA), on a 2-2 vote, turned down his request for a variance that would have allowed him to build nine homes 10 feet closer to the street.

“You can all go to Hell!” Pickrel told the Board as he stormed out of the meeting room, loudly slamming the front door as he left The Manor.

Before leaving, Pickrel spewed out several expletives, telling Board members, “You’ll see me in court. You gave people in Cobblestone variances and you shot mine down. If that’s a fact, I’m suing you.”

Earlier in the meeting, Pickrel told the Board he purchased the property in 2005 but has since sold all but 19 of the lots in the development to residential developer D.R. Horton. Pickrel said Horton requested the variance on the remaining lots because the topography of the property, which is located on Boney Road adjacent to Oakhurst subdivision, is challenged with drop-offs up to 20 feet on the back side of some the lots.

He applied to the BZA for a variance to reduce the required 25-foot front setback to 15 feet. If he had to meet setback requirements, the homes would have no back yards because of the drop-offs or he would have to cut away more trees on the back of the lots to accommodate the houses, Pickrel said.

Board Chairwoman Sabra Mazyck told Pickrel that the Board had to follow five criteria set out in the state statute for granting a variance. She said she did not feel his request met all those criteria.

Reading from the statute, she told the Board, “The fact that property may be utilized more profitably, should a variance be granted, may not be considered grounds for a variance.”

“I promise you,” Pickrel said, “there is no profit in Blythecreek. It’s about leaving the trees.”

He later said that it would be cost prohibitive to build up the drop-offs.

While Board members Ray Fantone and Pat Littlejohn agreed with Pickrel that the drop-off at the back of the lots constituted extraordinary and exceptional conditions (one of the five criteria) for building homes, Board member Ron Friday blamed Pickrel for the predicament he found himself in.

“When you laid out these lots you knew what you were faced with, the topography, the lots,” Friday told Pickrel. “When I first looked at this, I said ‘This is about the drop-off at the back of the lot.’ When you laid this out, all these factors (trees, drop-off) should have come into play.”

“If we can’t get a variance,” Pickrel told the Board, “then the lots can’t be built on. At some point you can’t build a $100,000 retainer wall on a $22,000 lot. That renders it unbuildable. We’d have to build a much smaller home to fit the lot. “

In an attempt to make his case, Pickrel said, “I’ve built out over 30,000 lots and we’re granted variances all the time. Builders sometimes build over the line. There are things you have to do.”

“We can’t just say OK, go on and do that ,” Mazyck told Pickrel. “We have to follow the rules set before us. We can’t just give it to you. We have to follow the law.”

After the tie vote rendered a failed motion for the variance, Pickrel told the Board, “You just killed the neighborhood. That’s idiotic what you just did.”

Because the BZA is a quasi-judicial board, appeals of its decisions must be made to Circuit Court.

 

WINNSBORO (Jan. 8, 2016) – Rising water and sewer rates have been a fixture in the Town of Winnsboro’s annual budget in recent years, yet the utility has struggled to break even, borrowing money from the gas and electric departments. But with the Town’s ambitious Broad River project scheduled to break ground this spring, and with a $14 million loan from the S.C. State Revolving Fund approved in November to pay for it, water and sewer is going to have to do better than break even.

And water and sewer rates are likely to climb at a consistent rate into the next decade.

“The whole goal is to get (rates) up to where all the utilities would be self-sufficient,” Town Manager Don Wood said, “rather than one having to rely on the revenues from gas and electric to make everything balance.”

Town Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to accept the recommendations of a rate study conducted by the Willdan Group that would bump water rates up 4 percent each year beginning July 1, 2016 through the 2019-2020 fiscal year. Rates would increase 5 percent in the 2020-2021 fiscal year.

Sewer rates would increase at 7 percent a year through 2020, with a 5 percent increase in 2020-2021.

“We’re doing this bond to get to the Broad River to ensure we have enough water, so a significant amount of that revenue has to come from water and sewer,” Winnsboro Mayor Roger Gaddy said. “You can transfer some from the other utilities, but you’ve got to have a certain amount of it from water. We looked at the rates and we’ll increase the rates some at what we think is a tolerable level … so that we can make sure that we generate enough revenue to satisfy the State Revolving Fund people.”

But although Council voted Tuesday to accept the study, the increases won’t become a reality until Council votes to incorporate them into next year’s budget.

“We accepted the study and the rate increase,” Gaddy said, “but we’ve still got to do the budgeting process, which means they (the rates) could still be off.”

The Broad River pipeline is expected to bring approximately 1 million gallons of water a day into the Town’s reservoir. The $14 million Revolving Fund loan carries an interest rate of 1.88 percent.

Wood said the Willdan study cost the Town $40,000.

If the Willdan rate increases are implemented, the water system is projected to have a final balance at the end of the 2020-2021 fiscal year of $163,513 – a monumental increase from the projected 2016-2017 loss (without the rate increase and without fund transfers from gas and electric) of $102,291.

In the first year alone, the recommended rate increase is expected to turn the $102,291 loss into a $129,249 gain, again without fund transfers from other utilities.

The sewer system, without the rate increase, is projected to lose $88,303 in 2016-2017, even with a fund transfer of $700,000. With the increase, and including the projected fund transfer, the system is estimated to come out $22,887 to the good.

As the rate increases continue, and the fund transfers decrease, the sewer system is projected to come out $21,793 ahead by the end of the 2019-2020 fiscal year. That includes a projected fund transfer of $100,000 from other utilities. In the final year of the increase scale, the sewer system appears to be in the negative once more by $55,763; however, that figure includes no fund transfer. And, when combined with the water system’s gains, the entire system would be $107,750 in the black.

 

WINNSBORO (Jan. 8, 2016) – The Friends of Mt. Zion Institute (FOMZI), battling for the better part of the last two years to restore the former Mt. Zion Institute school buildings and stave off the wrecking ball, received some less than encouraging news from Winnsboro Town Council Tuesday night.

“One portion of it (FOMZI’s contractual deadline), we’ve passed,” FOMZI Chairwoman Vicki Dodds said after a protracted executive session with Council, “the 18 months to bring the property up to code. The inspector has pronounced that it’s not (up to code), which is no surprise. There are cracks in the bricks.”

The deadline to stabilize the buildings on the property to meet Winnsboro’s Dangerous Building Code expired on Sept. 4, and 11 days later FOMZI spent another long night in executive session with Council. While faux windows were installed last summer on the front of the school building, the rear of the building had not received the same attention. Following the Sept. 15 meeting, Dodds said the rear windows were left open to allow the interior to completely dry in.

But Tuesday night’s revelation that the building – with or without faux windows – is in violation of the Dangerous Building Code, could spell the end of Mt. Zion Institute.

“When is the drop-dead date? I don’t know,” Winnsboro Mayor Roger Gaddy said, “but it is rapidly approaching, I can tell you that.”

FOMZI inked a deal with the Town on Nov. 27, 2013, and on March 4, 2014 Council OK’d an ordinance to transfer the property, located at 205 N. Walnut St., to FOMZI. According to the agreement, FOMZI purchased the property and its four buildings (the Mt. Zion School, the auditorium and gymnasium, the cafeteria and the Teacherage) for $5, but with the caveat that the buildings had to be stabilized within 18 months to meet Winnsboro’s Dangerous Building Code or be torn down.

FOMZI’s 30-month benchmark, which comes this September, calls for the group to hire a contractor or developer for the historic rehabilitation of the buildings. And on that front, at least, there may be some encouraging news, according to Dodds.

“The end of 30 months is when it’s kind of cut-bait time,” she said. “There is some interest (from a developer).”

Gaddy said Council has given FOMZI 45 days to produce the developer.

“We just want to know if he’s in or out,” Gaddy said. “We don’t want it to be six or 12 months while you decide if you’re in or out.”

Gaddy said the prospective developer has made two visits to the site, and although that may be an encouraging sign, it is a movie Gaddy and Council have seen before.

“We did Red Clay, we dealt with Dru Blair, we dealt with Dru Blair talking to Jim Rex about a school thing, we talked about the High School Hall of Fame, we talked about Midlands Tech,” Gaddy said. “If you’ve explored all these educational, housing and cultural things and none of them have come to fruition, then I think you’ve run the gamut.”

Dodds and FOMZI, for the time being at least, will press on.

“We’re continuing on,” Dodds said. “For a little while, anyway.”

 

Executive Session May Have Violated FOIA

BLYTHEWOOD (Jan. 7, 2016) – Conducting his first meeting Monday evening as Chairman of the Planning Commission, Buddy Price called for and received approval from his fellow commissioners to move an executive session with the Town’s attorney Jim Meggs from the end of the agenda to the front of the agenda. But the reason for that session might have run afoul of the state’s Freedom of Information statute.

Price said the closed-door session was for the purpose of receiving legal advice on matters covered by the attorney-client privilege concerning a lawsuit that had been brought against the Town of Blythewood by Prestwick Development LLC. Filed Nov. 23, 2015, the lawsuit was concluded on Dec. 11 when the 5th Circuit Court Judge L. Casey Manning issued an order reversing the Nov. 10, 2015, decision by the Planning Commission to refuse to approve a site plan for Prestwick Development for multi-family housing in the Town Center District. The development has since continued to move through the Town’s approval process.

After holding up the agenda for 30 minutes Monday evening for the executive session, during which time those attending the meeting had to wait outside closed doors, Price explained to the returning audience that the town’s attorney had briefed the Commission on the lawsuit.

“If there was some kind of appeal to the lawsuit planned, it would be legal to discuss that behind closed doors. But that doesn’t seem to be the case,” Bill Rogers, Executive Director of the S.C. Press Association told The Voice on Tuesday. “The public is entitled to hear his (Meggs’) explanation of the suit. Audience response is not listed as an exemption in the FOIA.”

Meggs also held an executive session two weeks ago during a Board of Architectural Review meeting for the same purpose.

Following the executive session, the Commission elected a vice-chairman. Price nominated Robert Cappadona. Commissioner Ernestine Middleton nominated Don Sanders who declined the nomination saying his home was for sale and he might be leaving the Blythewood area. Sanders then nominated Middleton who said she, too, might soon be moving away and declined the nomination. Price then called for the vote and Cappadona was elected unanimously.

The Commission then voted unanimously to approve amendments to the Landscaping, Buffer Yards and Tree Preservation Ordinance. The amendments were suggested by representatives of the Home Builders’ Association of Greater Columbia after the ordinance was approved by Council last fall. Michael Criss, the Town’s Planning Consultant, said there were five substantive changes including changes that gave more flexibility to the Town Administrator when making decisions on whether to require tree surveys and on permitting for tree removal.

 

WINNSBORO (Jan. 1, 2016) – County Council, during their Dec. 15 meeting, gave the OK to nearly $175,500 in expenditures, forwarded by the Administration & Finance Committee from their meeting earlier that afternoon.

The expenditures, Interim County Administrator Milton Pope told Council, were all built into the County’s 2015-2016 budget, and all but one came in at or under budget.

Council approved $69,644 to replace computer servers and workstations in the County’s 9-1-1 Department. During budgeting negotiations last spring, Council planned to spend up to $75,000 on the replacements.

New extraction equipment (Jaws of Life) for Emergency Services came in just under its $30,000 budget at $29,771. The Sheriff’s Office will be replacing 13 laptops for patrol deputies, at the budgeted cost of $34,630.

A new patrol boat for the Sheriff’s Office, meanwhile, came in slightly higher than expected. Council had budgeted $40,970 for a new Sea Hunt boat to replace the department’s aging 1994 Key West boat, but the Sea Hunt was not available on a state contract, Pope said. Instead, the County will shell out an additional $467 for a 2000 Honda boat with a 130 HP engine, Pope said.

“It’s a little bit more than what we budgeted in the Sheriff’s (Office) budget,” Pope told Council, “but I reminded the Committee members that the last several purchases of vehicles we had for the Sheriff’s (Office) we under budget, so we can take that $467 from residual capital funding left over from the savings from the vehicles we purchased on the last two purchases, so the Committee recommended unanimously that we move forward with the purchase of the boat.”

Molly Creek Bridge

Pope also told Council that the County had received notice from the S.C. Department of Transportation (DOT) that Molly Creek bridge near Lake Wateree was found during a recent DOT inspection to be in need of repair. The DOT, Pope said, had asked Council for a letter of support for the repairs, which the DOT would use to push the bridge up on the state’s priority list.

“This is the second bridge that will now (be) closed at Lake Wateree,” Council Chairwoman Carolyn Robinson (District 2) said. “There’s already Martin Road, and by closing Molly Creek, which I believe is the next bridge down, it creates … some problems with EMS response, with fire protection response, so the sooner we can get this worked and repaired will be greatly appreciated by all those citizens and people who visit the lake.”

Robinson asked that a copy of the letter of support be sent to the county’s state legislative delegation.

 

WINNSBORO (Jan. 1, 2016) – Like last year, County Council will hold its annual retreat in another county. Unlike last year, their decision to do so was not aired out at a public meeting.

Chairwoman Carolyn Robinson (District 2) confirmed Tuesday that Council will hold its retreat on Jan. 9 at the Midlands Technical College (MTC) campus located just off Farrow Road at 151 Powell Road, Columbia, beginning at approximately 8:30 a.m. It is the same location where Council met last year.

“This year, as the Chair, I just made the decision,” Robinson said.

Council will also, like last year, be paying a facilitator to guide them through the meeting, although Robinson said she did not know how much he was being paid.

“It’s a nominal amount,” she said.

Use of the facility, she said, will cost the County nothing, and will allow for more space.

Last year, however, Council used only one room at the MTC facility. It was a room much smaller than planned, after an oversight by MTC staff.

At press time, an agenda had not been sent out for the meeting, which is open to the public.

 

BLYTHEWOOD (Dec. 31, 2015) – Acknowledging that the heretofore piecemeal maintenance of the landscaping at Blythewood Road and the I-77 interchange has long been the target of complaints from citizens, Town Council addressed the issue Monday evening, voting unanimously to assign all the maintenance work to one contractor, Tobias Services of Blythewood, instead of dividing it among several contractors as they have in the past.

The winning bid was $14,875 and includes: mowing 12 times annually, weeding four times annually and pine straw application and pruning one time each during the year.

“We’ve been fighting this thing, trying to get it to look like we thought it would,” Mayor J. Michael Ross said. “If we don’t do something like this, it’s going to continue to look like it does now. I guess we just didn’t have the foresight, but I think we’ve got a great bid now and I’m happy that we have a Blythewood company doing all the work.”

Councilman Eddie Baughman suggested that the Town’s landscaped plot at mile marker 32, on the Fairfield County line, should also be included with the Blythewood Road/I-77 interchange landscaping when the work is bid out next year.

Comp Plan Passes First Reading

With an increased focus on economic development and more industry for the Town this past year, Council voted unanimously (5-0) on Monday evening to pass the first of two readings to update the Town’s Comprehensive Land Use Plan. In the works for almost a year, the Comp Plan also presents all new demographics for the 29016 community and a complete and accurate mapping of utilities in the Town.

“We’ve already seen the results of this new emphasis on the economic development component of the Comp Plan in the recent industrial zoning of 650 acres on the west side of I-77,” the Town’s Planning Consultant Michael Criss told The Voice before the meeting.

Town Administrator Gary Parker pointed out that the mapping of the water, sewer and other utilities will be important for new businesses and new development coming to the town.

Manor Addition

Crunched for office space in Town Hall and needing an on-site office at the Manor for its Director, Steve Hasterok, Parker has been campaigning since last summer to expand The Manor to create that space. The Town’s Architectural Consultant Matt Davis of Davis Architecture designed an expansion that includes two new offices as well as a bridal dressing room by enclosing the left and right sides of the front porch of The Manor. The winning construction bid was submitted by CGI Development of Columbia for $63,500. Construction is expected to start in January and be finished in six to eight weeks. The vote in favor of the bid was 4-1 with Councilman Tom Utroska objecting, saying he feels the addition is unnecessary.

Park Trees Removal

With mounting concern about tree limbs overhanging the playground area and walking trail of the Town Park, Council accepted a bid from Sox and Freeman of Columbia to remove six large trees that pose potential dangers to park-goers, trim one tree and monitor several others. The winning bid totaled $10,285. About 25 trees were initially assessed by an arborist and the bids were based on his specifications for removal and maintenance.

“All of the assessed trees were impacted by the construction and development of the park site in varying degrees,” Parker said.

Annexation

New Town Council member Larry D. Griffin not only attended his first meeting as an elected official Monday evening, but also helped pass first reading for the voluntary annexation of the property of his neighbors, longtime Blythewood residents James and Marjorie Glymph, into the town. The property is located at 355 Langford Road.

Annual Retreat

Reviewing the proposed agenda for Council’s annual retreat to be held Saturday, Feb. 27 at The Manor, Parker said the primary focus of the meeting should be to plan for the Town’s imminent growth and the services that will be needed to serve that growth. Those services would include determining the staffing and funding levels needed.

Parker suggested the Council should revisit the ‘town vision’ presented in the Master Plan and decide whether a walkable community is possible for Blythewood and, if so, what should be done to make it happen.

Traffic and road improvements will also be on the agenda, Parker said, with emphasis on how to make the long-discussed Blythewood/Langford Road re-alignment a reality.

The monthly Town Council workshop will be held Tuesday, Jan. 17, from 9 a.m. – noon. Council’s annual retreat will be held at The Manor, Saturday, Feb. 27, and the public is invited to attend.

 

WINNSBORO (Dec. 25, 2015) – District 3 County Councilman Walter Larry Stewart, who has been locked in a standoff with Council Chairwoman Carolyn Robinson (District 2) over the location of a shared recreational facility, announced at the close of Council’s Dec. 15 meeting that the two had reached a compromise.

The recreation facility, Stewart said, would be built in Mitford.

Mitford resident Carol Turner, during Council’s Nov. 9 meeting, made a pitch to Council for erecting the facility just off Highway 200 on the site of the old Mitford Community School. The school has been owned by the Mitford Community Club, of which Turner is a member, since 1950. The Club converted the school into a community center shortly after purchasing it from the County, and leases portions of the property back to the County for the Mitford Volunteer Fire Department and a County mini park, each for $1 a year. The property sits on the boundary between districts 2 and 3.

Under the County’s revised recreation plan, approved on Oct. 12, the two districts agreed to share a facility. The location of the shared facility, however, was still a matter for debate.

“We have over 2,100 citizens living within a 5-mile radius of this point (the old school),” Turner told Council during their Nov. 9 meeting. “If it is possible to build a community center at this location to serve all of these citizens of Mitford, the Community Club, which still owns the property, potentially could make it very economically feasible in a lease agreement to build.”

But shortly after the Nov. 9 meeting, Stewart said the plan to build in Mitford was in jeopardy.

“She (Chairwoman Robinson) originally came up with the proposal to put it (a community center) in Mitford,” Stewart said. “Then for some reason at the last minute she wants to move it 8-9 miles down the road toward Lake Wateree.”

Stewart himself appeared to toss a monkey wrench into the works when, two weeks later, he proposed erecting the facility on Camp Welfare Road near Carolina Adventure World. During Council’s Nov. 23 meeting, Stewart said the old school site in Mitford may, in fact, be lacking, in that it was not the preferred 5 acres and it was not located close enough to the middle of that quadrant of the county.

“I have located 6.46 acres that is a quarter of a mile from Carolina Adventure World,” Stewart said on Nov. 23. “It’s one, possibly one and one quarter miles, off Wateree Road. It’s on Camp Welfare Road.”

The alternate property, Stewart disclosed, belongs to his CMC Foundation. If the County wanted to build on it, he said, the Foundation would sell it to the County for the appraised value of the property.

After the Nov. 23 meeting, Stewart said he only proposed the Camp Welfare Road property as an alternative to satisfy the Chairwoman.

“Carolyn Robinson doesn’t want it where it’s going to be, on that county (district) line,” Stewart said. “So I just threw that out there as an alternative. I’d rather have it in Mitford. She’s trying to say it’s not in the middle of the quadrant. Well, I gave her something that’s in the middle of the quadrant. I’m not running for re-election. She is.”

Robinson after the Nov. 23 meeting said she would prefer building the facility closer to the bulk of her constituents on Lake Wateree.

“There may be 2,000 (in the Mitford area), but there’s 3,000 here (near Lake Wateree),” Robinson said. “We don’t have enough money to put one in each community. I’ve been looking on Wateree Road.”

Robinson said she hoped to iron out the dispute before the next meeting.

“It’s a matter of us sitting and talking,” she said. “We’re going to sit down and talk. There will be a resolution.”

That resolution, according to Stewart, came in time for Council’s last meeting before the holidays.