COASTAL OBSERVER

Proponents of raising the sales tax in Georgetown County to fund capital improvements realize that the 22 projects on the priority list won’t appeal to everyone.

But if there’s a project they really don’t like, “know that if you vote ‘no,’ you’re not just killing that project, you’re killing the whole list,” said Mark Hawn, who chaired the committee that drew up the project list that will appear on the ballot in a November referendum.

Everett Allen, who attended a meeting on the capital project sales tax last month, took Hawn’s words to heart. So it wasn’t until the end of the meeting that he said he really wasn’t happy with the No. 2 project, which will provide $1 million to relocated power lines to allow the widening of a portion of Black River Road in Georgetown.

“All the trees along Black River Road have to go,” said Allen, a Heritage Plantation resident.

Others have also raised opposition to the project, part of $74.3 million in projects that would be funded through eight years of collections of a 1-cent sales tax.

Last year Mayor Carol Jayroe asked the Grand Strand Area Transportation Study to come up with a less intrusive plan.

“All the houses on Black River Road are going to lose two thirds of their front yards,” Jayroe said in July 2023. “Not to mention that we’re going to lose 12 huge oak trees.”

Jayroe asked the GSATS policy committee to consider rerouting truck traffic a half-mile farther on Highway 17 to the Five Points intersection with Highway 701 to reduce traffic on Black River Road.

She declined to comment on the project this month.

The $6.1 million project began at the request of the city and Tidelands Health in 2015. It was originally going to widen the entire road between Church Street (Highway 17) and North Fraser Street (Highway 701). 

Under the current plan, the road would be widened from Palmetto Street on the south to just past Landgrave Street on the north to create a two-way left-turn lane.

“There is a high volume of turning movements associated with the hospital,” Stacey Johnson, the project manager for the state Department of Transportation, told the City Council earlier this year as it prepared its list of projects to submit to the sales tax committee.

There were 114 collisions on Black River Road from 2014 through June this year, according to the state Department of Public Safety. Those resulted in 47 injuries. Less than a third of the accidents were in front of Georgetown Memorial Hospital, but nearly half of the injuries took place there.

There were 28 collisions at the intersection with Church Street and 12 at the intersection with North Fraser Street (Highway 701). Those areas are outside the DOT project.

There were 37 collisions in the area in front of hospital. Those resulted in 22 injuries. All but one occurred in daylight. The other was at dawn.

Most of the accidents, 15, were caused by a “failure to yield,” according to state data. Distracted driving and following too close were the cause of seven collisions apiece. There were five caused by “driving too fast for conditions.”

Tidelands Health lobbied the city to secure the $1 million it needed for utilities through the sales tax. It also lobbied the sales tax committee to place it on the ballot.

“From our perspective, it’s more than just about widening the road,” Carl Lindquist, associate vice president of government and community affairs at Tidelands, told the City Council. 

Traffic is expected to grow from 11,000 daily trips today to 14,000 trips in the next 20 years, according to DOT.

Black River Road will be a key route to the beach as the western part of the county grows, and a route to Walmart for people who live at the beach, Lindquist told the council.

Allen also spoke to the council. He said he was invited by the mayor.

“You’re tearing down trees that might be a thousand years old,” Allen said.

He suggested DOT design around the trees.

Johnson said the city was told in 2020 that the design would impact 12 to 15 trees. DOT acquired right of way based on that design.

“We would open ourselves up to a lot of lawsuits, to be honest,” if the design was changed, Johnson said.

Allen said at the recent sales tax meeting that he was resigned  to the project going forward.

“There’s nothing we can do,” he said. “We have to live with it.”

Whether it’s through the sales tax or some other revenue source, the last $1 million will be found, said Walt Ackerman, the county’s Administrative Services director, who is leading the sales tax meetings.

“I really think the city’s behind getting this done,” he said.