Folly Beach moratorium
Thursday, December 14th, 2006Council’s vote counters Planning Comission recommendation
by Lauren Dean
Folly Beach residents may soon be waking up to something they haven’t heard in a long time: the sounds of birds and crashing waves instead of hammers and power tools.
In a victory for advocates of a moratorium aimed at putting the brakes on all new construction on Folly Beach for six months, City Council voted 4-3 on Tuesday night to implement the ordinance proposed las month by Mayor Carl Beckmann.
Voting with the mayor were Councilmembers Tom Scruggs, Dave Stormer and Eddie Ellis.
It was a hard sell for Folly’s new mayor, who said his election was a mandate to stop development, and he fought hard for the moratorium as the most sensible and least painful means to an end.
“There will be some inconvenience, some delayed financial gain,” Beckmann said, “but trying to make substantial changes in our land use law without imposing any harship at all would be like playing baseball without a bat. It can’t be done.”
The mayor stressed that the moratorium is only a vehicle to allow the city and the consulting firm, which will be on board by Jan.1, to improve Folly Beach land use law without continuing to compound the problem. Th moratorium will apply only to demolition permits and brand new buildings from the ground up.
Zoning Administrator Aaron Pope said the moratorium would provide breathing room for city officials, council members and property owners while the consultants work with the residents to write the regulations that will shape the future of Folly Beach.
“We’ve had 16 new land use ordinances since April,” Pope said, “and that has caused a vicious cycle of reactions as people try to slip under the wire with each new rule.”
“What the moratorium will do is not allow anyonen to beat the system for six months,” Pope said, “but it will also give them the assurance that the game will not be changing on a monthly basis.”
At a standing room only public hearing Monday night the yeas and the nays clashed once again on the issue of property rights versus public interest and the question of whether a moratorium is necessary to accomplish the rewrite both sides agree is long overdue.
After listening to coments from its citizens, 60 percent of whome spokek in favor of the moratorium, the Folly Beach Planning Commission nixed the propasal by a vote of 5-4.
Voting against the moratorium were Commissioners Carl Hally, Lajuan Kennedy, Rex Whitcomb, Kirk Grant and Paul Hume. None opposed the rewriting of Folly Beach land use law, but all apposed the moratorium as the vehicle for these changes.
Hally said he would have voted for the moratorium if it had bee for a period shorter then the proposed six months and if the specifications had meen more clear.
“The most important thing is to write ordinances that can be enforced,”Hally Said, “that can’t be gotten around by tricky attorneys. We need good legal advice, and we need an administration that will enforce our laws.”
Whitcomb agreed that Folly land use laws need to be reassessed, but feared the moratorium would have too many unintended consequences on property owners.
“Folly Beach has spent the last 30 years reacting to the various pressures exerted as creative people have come up with ever more creative ways to maximize their profits,” Whitcomb said. ”We are dealing with a crisis of our own making. It’s not right to impose hardships on property owners.”
Grant agreed with him. “If you want to make changes that have a positive effect on quality of life issues,” he said,”regulate the rental properties, not the homeowners. The city has a responsibility to its residents not to do things that effect their property.”
Kennedy said the economy of Folly Beach runs on those rental properties, whether people like to admit it or not. She didn’t think the ordinances could be rewritten in sis months or a year, and doesn’t thnk a moratorium is necessary.
“Nothing will happen in the next six months that will be terribly detrimental to Folly Beach,” she said.
Hume called the moratorium a feel-good buzzword that would accomplish nothing and five Folly residents a false sense of security.
“The moratorium is a bnd-aid that won’t do a single thing to solve the issue, “Hume said. “What we don’t like is the mega-mansions. It’s a zoning issue.
“You can’t fault people for building what they’re legally permitted to build within the current regulations. If we don’t like the rules we have for R-1, we need to change them. We don’t need a feel-good moratorium to do that.”
Some Folly residents disagree. The moratorium appeals to them on a gut level lbecause they think about how good it would feel to wake up in the morning and know that their government had put an end to the insanity.
Every day they see rental houses built for profit by people who do not live here and will not suffer the consequences. If you don’t know your neighbors, it’s easy to block their views or to build huge mega-mansions to rent to hordes of young people who keep them up all night with loud music and throw beer bottles in their yards.
They want to preserve the old Folly-the funky, friendly old Folly where octogenarians ride beach bicycles and wear flip-flops; where doctors and construction workers converse in bars on Center Street; where everybody skates or jogs or walks their dogs on East Arctic on Saturday morning.
It’s the Folly Beach of caring and connection, where a hungry person can always find a free meal and a half dozen people will knock on your door if you don’t show up for a happy hour at Snapper Jacks.
That’s what Folly Beach is afraid to lose. They don’t want this spirit squeezed out by peole who come to town for an afternoon or a week and make their noise and their mess for someone else to clean up, taking what they want from the Folly Beach and leaving nothing of value behind.
Many think the moratorium on building is the only way to keep Folly Folly.
“I’m older then dirt and I’ve been here forever,” said an impassioned Forence O’Dennell. “Please don’t take my little piece of Utopia away. Let me die in my little Utopia. You can help me die happy.”
O’Donnell owns Planet Follywood, a Center Street bar and restaurant, and said people keep telling her that the moratorium will hurt her business. She considers it a small price to stop the proliferation of seven bedroom, five bath weekly rentals in the single family residential district.
Bonnie Zanetti said she used to cry when she saw these monster houses dwarf their neighbors, blocking all sunlight and views. Now it makes her mad.
She wishes investors would develop a sensitivity to the residents and the environment and have an interest in something besides how much profit they will make, but she does not think that will ever happen.
”Development is a privilege. You have the power to tell developers what they can and cannot do, “She told council.
Beckman said all residents have this power because the consultants hired to rewrite the land use rules will be asking them what they want.
“Instead of City Council deciding what is ‘normal’ or appropriate for Folly Beach , the people who live here will help decide that,” he said.
Whether they were for or against the moratorium, Pople urges people to attend the many public hearings that will be scheduled.
“The moratorium has given residents a unique opportunity to take control and decide what their town will be like in a way that’s never been offered before,” he said. “It’s a watershed moment for Folly Beach.”
Lauren Dean is a Folly Beach Resident. She can be reached at w3dean@earthlink.net
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