Land use
Move to cut density follows approval of land plan
Georgetown County will move quickly to reduce the number of dwellings allowed in its highest density zoning district after this week’s approval of an updated land use plan.
The top limit of 16 units an acre will be reduced to 12, “basically to match that to the future land use map,” County Council Member Stella Mercado said.
The council voted unanimously to start the process to update its zoning ordinance to align with the new plan, starting with the change to the density limits in its “general residential” zoning district.
The county last updated the land use element of its comprehensive plan in 2007. State law requires that the plan be updated every 10 years and reviewed every five years.
The county began work to update the land use element in 2019. The process was interrupted by the pandemic and by criticism that it lacked adequate public input. The county hired consultants last year to help complete the work.
The update drew opposition from the citizens group Keep It Green, which calculated that changes to the land use maps, which provided the legal basis for zoning decisions, would increase residential density on the Waccamaw Neck. Hundreds of people attended public hearings before the Planning Commission in April and before the council last month to ask that the plan be changed.
The council moved its meeting this week to the Howard Center in anticipation of a crowd. Only a handful of people showed up.
Council Member Bob Anderson asked that the final approval be delayed until the consultants could provide additional information about the impact on density.
“The land use plan is about people,” he said. “We have a people problem on the Waccamaw Neck.”
The consultants, led by the Columbia-based firm Boudreaux, estimated that the updated plan would allow another 1,126 dwellings on Waccamaw Neck over what the old plan envisioned once the area is completely built out. But they pointed out that if the area is developed under the current zoning, the number of additional dwellings would be over 12,000.
Keep It Green’s analysis showed that the new plan amounts to an increase of 7,023 dwellings from the old plan.
“If your goal is truly to decrease density on the Neck by modifying the zoning regulations –which, again, citizens are 100 percent behind –there is no logic to approving an underlying plan that everyone agrees increases density,” said Cindy Person, attorney for Keep It Green Advocacy, who represents the opponents. “Increasing density to decrease density does not make sense.”
She asked the council to send the plan back for revisions.
After confirming with the county planning director, Holly Richardson, that the plan would reduce density if the zoning ordinance is also updated, Council Member Clint Elliott moved for final approval. Mercado seconded.
Anderson said he wanted to defer to get data about tourists and to reconcile the differences between the numbers provided by Boudreaux and Keep It Green.
“This plan is very important to me,” he said.
He and Council Member Everett Carolina cast the only two votes against the plan.
Afterward, Elliott moved to ask staff to change the future land use on 76 acres at the intersections of Bypass 17 and Highway 707 to cut residential density. That passed unanimously, as did Mercado’s motions to update the “general residential” density and the overall zoning ordinance.
