The Town adopted the Overlay District last fall. County Council has completed two readings (votes) and was scheduled for a third and final reading. That was postponed so that County Council could hold a public hearing on James Island. The hearing is on Tuesday, May 13 at 6:30 pm at the Sons of Elijah Lodge at 1831 Folly Road.
The Post and Courier article was full of inaccuracies. To start, the date was wrong. The article said the public hearing was to be last night rather than tonight. (That has been corrected on the online version. Thank you P&C.)
The focus of the article, and apparently the emphasis of the public hearing, will be the "Neighborhood Preservation" area of the Overlay. It runs between Raphael Lane and Battery Island Drive. This is an area that begins a bit before the Brickhouse Restaurant and ends a bit before the Harris Teeter. The Sons of Elijah Lodge is next to the JIPSD Fire Station, which is on the south end of the Neighborhood Preservation area.
Some of the parcels in this area are in the City of Charleston, and it includes the old junk yard which is being redeveloped into an apartment complex. Most of the parcels used to be in the Town of James Island, but because of questionable contiguity, they were not included in the current incorporation. These parcels are in the James Island Public Service District, and Senate Bill 723 and House Bill 4265 would allow for an election to be held in 2016 that would return those areas to the Town. For now, these parcels are in unincorporated Charleston County, so County Council determines their zoning.
The article quotes Councilwoman Johnson as stating that the parcels along Folly Road are currently zoned Commercial Transitional. She said that she wanted to rezone them as Neighborhood Commercial. The article said that the Folly Road Overlay District would rezone them as residential. Councilwoman Johnson is quoted as saying that this downzoning to residential would greatly reduce property values in the area.
All of this is mistaken.
No parcel in the area is zoned Commercial Transitional. Instead, nine of the parcels are zoned as Community Commerical, which is the most intensive commercial zoning in the County. (The Town has very similar zoning in the area near the Camp and Folly intersection.) Nearly all of those commercial parcels are around the Brickhouse Restaurant. There are only three parcels currently zoned Community Commercial south of the corner of Folly and South Grimball/Grimball Ext. Roads.
All of the other parcels, approximately 90 percent of them, are currently zoned S-3. This is zoning for single family residential development, with a density of 3 units per acre. It is very similar to the zoning that applies in most of the Town, and was the zoning that applied when these parcels were in the Town just three years ago. The Folly Road Overlay District "Neighborhood Preservation" area would make no change in the zoning of nearly all (about 90 percent) of the parcels. How could this reduce their value?
What about the nine parcels currently zoned as Community Commercial? These would be rezoned to Neighborhood Commercial. This is a commercial district less intensive that Community Commercial. However, all of the businesses that have existed on those few parcels, such as restaurants and small shops, would be permitted in Neighborhood Commercial.
The County's version of the Overlay includes a list of prohibited uses. The Town removed these extra prohibitions from its version of the Overlay. None of the prohibited uses are permitted in residential zones anyway, and most of them aren't permitted in Neighborhood Commercial either.
The article had a photo and included some quotes from the Gilliard family. The grandson complained that their property would be rezoned from commercial to residential. In fact, their property is currently zoned residential (S-3) so there would be no change in their zoning.
So, what is really happening?
Developers want to build apartments and businesses in this area. They need a change in the existing zoning of nearly all of these parcels.
Just last week, I was looking at a 9 acre parcel in this area as a possible site for a new Town park. The property is across Folly Rd. from the Brickhouse Restaurant. The real estate agent told us that he had two developers looking at the site to build apartments. I was a bit surprised, because I thought it was zoned for single family development. It is. Like nearly all the parcels in the area, it is S-3.
For now. If the developers can get it rezoned, then maybe they really will pay the $3 million asking price. (This is a good bit more than the $1 million that the Town could pay for a park or its value for single family development.)
I plan to attend the public hearing and listen closely to what the people in the community want.
Here is a diagram of the existing zoning. The brown is S-3 and the red is Community Commercial.
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