City Council Report: November 10
Staff Report
The Folly Beach City Council held its regular meeting on November 10 at 7pm. The work session which had been scheduled at 6pm to discuss litter was cancelled. All members of Council were present.
Expanding criticism
The City did not discuss the City Hall expansion except to debate when and how another meeting on the matter should be held for over half an hour. However, that didn’t mean that the public didn’t have anything to say.
Pennell Clamp expressed his displeasure with the Council’s indecisiveness. “You had the right to vote the way you saw fit,” he said. Then he added, “It doesn’t appear this City Council has the ability to get things done.” He noted the City has “put the cart before the horse” as it expanded its Public Safety Department over the past few years before providing them with a proper place to operate. He also criticized Tom Scruggs’ idea to give employees raises instead of using the money to expand facilities calling it “appalling”. The end result, he said, is that the City has to go back to the hard working residents and ask for more money to do what could not be done the first time.
Local businessman DJ Rich said the City needs to work together and make concessions in order to get things done for the benefit of the City. “Let’s get the ball rolling,” he said.
Finally Ken Holland admitted that the Council’s job is a tough one and he thanked them for serving. However, he added that the public has not been properly informed and did not know there were any other options beside the $1.6 million expansion Mayor Carl Beckmann presented. “Get together. Put the politics behind,” he said.
Part of the rush for those who supported the $1.6 million plan was the low construction prices and the fact that the bids were only good through November 30. However, Administrator Toni Connor-Rooks said that all the bidders agreed to extend their offers for an additional 60 days.
The City scheduled a meeting only nine days after this one for November 19 in which a hired facilitator, Kathy Church, was required for the meeting to progress. Eddie Ellis was the only one who voted against the meeting stating it was a waste of taxpayer money to hire a facilitator. Details on that meeting can be read here.
College of CARTA
Isaiah Nelson, Vice President of the student body at the College of Charleston, returned to Folly Beach to further discuss the CARTA route he helped establish over the summer. Originally, CARTA agreed to two trial routes that each ran for two month periods, mainly to get College of Charleston students and other downtown folks to Folly Beach. The route was considered a great success by Nelson. As a result, Nelson is now asking CARTA for an uninterrupted route that would run from April through September and asked the City Council for support of his goal.
“I’m thanking you for your past support for this,” Nelson said to the Council.
Later in the meeting, the Council unanimously passed Resolution 56-09 which expressed support and approval of the extension of the CARTA route in 2010.
Stalling the bridge
Waterfront neighborhood resident Francis Cantwell asked the City to postpone any decision on which a bridge replacement option was chosen until the South Carolina Department of Transportation and/or the City met with residents of the Waterfront community. At a public hearing regarding the bridge replacement, several members of that community expressed displeasure and concern that their homes would be disproportionately impacted by the suggested alternative which swings the new bridge out at a much larger angle, bringing noise, traffic, and light much closer to their homes. Mayor Beckmann responded by saying the City would have to sign off on any plan before the State could begin the project.
Resolutions and ordinances
The Council unanimously passed all resolutions and ordinances that were before them. The first on the list was R49-09 which authorized the City to assume a claim deductible with the South Carolina Municipal Insurance Workers’ Compensation Fund. They simultaneously passed R56-09, the CARTA resolution mentioned earlier as well as R55-09 which names the memory garden at the Community Center the “David Israel Memory Garden”. The Council also passed second reading of Ordinance 19-09 which gives senior citizens a discount on building fees.
