Volume 1 Issue 22

February 22, 2008

Kiawah Town Council minutes* – February 5, 2008

Town budget now available
Town Administrator Tumiko Rucker reported that the Town Budget Calendar was complete and ready for approval from Council, which Council approved. The calendar will be available at Town Hall.

Supporting the symphony
“Next, I’d like to announce something that is a joy and music to my heart,” said Mayor Wert. “This is the second year in a row that we have contributed to the Charleston Symphony Orchestra. They are a major contributor to our community and it is with great pleasure that I hand over a check to the president of the Orchestra, Mr. Leo Fishman.” With that, Mayor Wert placed a check for $50,000 into the hands of former Kiawah Island Art Committee Chairman, Mr. Leo Fishman. Mr. Fishman shook his hand and thanked the Council. “I do have a 20 minute speech prepared,” he joked and laughed as one of the council members faked a snore. “Every year I have to find enough contributions to keep a local arts non-profit operating on a quality level. When an organization like Kiawah Island makes a donation to the arts like this, it shows a sincere desire to help us and it gives us a very realistic way to get through the future. We are in debt to you, thank you.”

Watch your distemper, little lady
Councilman Lipuma reported a number of wildlife incidents, including a coyote that was hit and killed on January 9 at the Cassique entrance and the location and diagnosis of a grey fox that died from distemper. “Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve found four raccoons with distemper that had to be euthanized,” said Mr. Lipuma. “A real distemper outbreak, which we’ve had in the past, will wipe out all of the foxes as well as the raccoons on the island.”
            Mayor Wert later noted that “as an old farm boy” he knew that distemper, while an awful thing to see, is just nature’s way of controlling the population. It usually affects foxes and raccoons. “If an animal seems disoriented,” he warned, “just stay away from them.”
            Councilman Lipuma also noted that 10 new GPS collars have been received for the bobcat study, which island biologist Jim Jordan will start tracking again later this month and will continue the study over the next few months. Mr. Jordan also recently conducted a bald eagle survey along the Kiawah River. Two juvenile bald eagles were spotted, which led Councilman Lipuma to note that the “parents must be around somewhere.”
            Finally, the piping plover numbers remain about the same. The number of birds usually peaks in January, than begins to taper. There are still more at the western end of the island where the sand and mud flats are accreting; one of the piping plovers favorite habitats.
           
Arts season off to a good start
The Arts Council has had four outstanding events in the last month. Starting with the Charleston Ballet at the Sanctuary, followed by Diana Cohen in “Brahms!”, Tommy Gill and Bobby Storm and most recently, Nancy Claton and her big band.” I can’t tell you the great reviews we’ve gotten for these events,” said Mr. Lipuma. Next up on the arts calendar is Italian and Spanish Love Songs on February 24 and Tommy Gill on February 28 (see the calendar or www.kiawahisland.org for more information).

An aria in the area
Sarah Brevard of the Charleston County Public Library contacted the Council about an upcoming simulcast opera from the Met, which will be holding eight simulcast opera performances this season. Charleston is one of the few locations in the country where they are permitting the simulcast. Each of the performances cost between $2,000 - $3,000 to produce and attendance is free. The next performance will be Peter Grimes by Benjamin Britten on Saturday, March 15 at 1:30pm.Ms. Brevard also asked if Kiawah Town Council would like to make a donation and Mr. Lipuma said that he would bring it before Council. (For more information, please contact the Charleston County Public Library in Downtown Charleston at 805-6930).

PGA still up in the air
Councilman Burnaford reported that he went to the Resort and they discussed the fact that the PGA is still not under contract and the PGA is not guaranteed to Kiawah. Apparently, the PGA had to find 250 people to work during the PGA along with the Resort staff and after placing a local ad, were unable to find enough people. So the decision to hold the event at the Ocean Course is still up in the air.

Town Administrator’s Report
The Disaster Task Force and developers met on January 22 to discuss the progress of the Task Force. They are planning to have another round table meeting soon and information on the next meeting is available at Town Hall. Also, the group decided that this year’s annual hurricane awareness meeting will be held on Thursday, June 5.
            The company “A Services Group” began beach patrol for Kiawah on February 1 and is doing well, according to Ms. Rucker. She noted that citizens will see new vehicles and representatives on the beach.
            Ms. Rucker also attended a City Managers meeting last month where the focus of the meeting was on the initiatives and obstacles of local governments and one of the initiatives was for governments to start going green. “I was glad we could say we were already going green and we will be expanding as much as possible on future green events for the Town,” Ms. Rucker notes.
            Along the same lines, Ms. Rucker has also been working on pursuing two grants from Palmetto Pride and the Town was awarded both this past week. The grants total $5,700 and are for both litter reduction and litter enforcement. The Town received the grants from Representative Limehouse and will be increasing the number of litter clean ups in the future, as well as continuing to take further steps toward protecting the environment.
            Also, State ATAX applications are now available at Town Hall. They will be mailed out to last month’s applicants, as well as available on the Town website. The island is also currently in the middle of the business license renewal season. Ms. Rucker reminded everyone that, if they are conducting business on the island, they must apply for a license by February 28.
            Finally, Ms. Rucker noted that two months ago, she attended a meeting for the National Association of Treasurers, where the board suggested that they might come to Charleston for their 2010 meeting. “We’ve been moved up the list,” said Ms. Tucker.

Mayor’s report
The Town of Kiawah Island has been turned down by DHEC for land mitigation for the bike path. The Town is currently looking at two other alternate possibilities and are currently in negotiations, but the suggested land in Edisto has been turned down. “We’ll build that bike path,” said the Mayor. “It might be sooner rather than later, but we will get it done. We’ll find a way.”
            Mayor Wert also noted that the day of the meeting was the anniversary of a day in 1958 when his father took him to see his first New York Giants game. “For fifty years I’ve been a fan and now the two numbers that will always stick in my head are ‘New York Giants 17, Patriots 14’.”

*Please note that the approved minutes from this meeting will be available at the next Kiawah Island Council meeting on March 11,2008.

The most deadly roads in the nation are right around the corner
Staff report

            On January 19, a Charleston County police officer responded to the scene of a traffic accident at the corner of Maybank and Staffwood road.  The accident victims stated that, while they were traveling east on Maybank Highway, they were struck head on by the driver of a Ford Explorer who had crossed the center line. After being struck, the injured parties stayed in the car and observed the driver of the Explorer jump out and run away. When the officer’s found the driver, he was obviously highly intoxicated. Among other charges, the driver was charged with reckless driving and driving without a driver’s license.
            Unfortunately, this in not nearly as uncommon an incident on John’s Island’s roads as it should be. In fact, the state of South Carolina has consistently been rated in the top ten in the nation for rural, non-interstate traffic fatalities for over ten years and this year, we were ranked number one. One top of this worrying news, out of all of South Carolina’s rural roads, the intersections of Chisolm Road and River Road, and Main Road and Bohicket Road on the Betsy Kerrison Parkway were rated number 5 and number 6 in traffic fatalities respectively.
            During a press conference at the Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce on February 12, Bobby Clair of the Washington, DC non-profit organization TRIP (The Road Information Act), presented the findings of a recently completed study which looked into the causes of traffic fatalities and serious crashes in South Carolina, as well as the activities underway to improve traffic safety in the state.
            Some of the most critical findings of the report included a comparison between South Carolina’s traffic fatality rate and that of the rest of the nation. South Carolina’s traffic fatality rate is an overwhelming 52% higher than the national average (2.21 traffic fatalities per 100 million miles of travel in SC compared to the national average of 1.45). In fact on average, one person is killer every eight and a half hours in a traffic accident in South Carolina. According to the study, 34% of vehicle travel in South Carolina occurs on rural roads, compared to the national average of 26% and in 2005, the rate of traffic fatalities on South Carolina’s non-interstate rural roads was approximately four and a half times timer than the traffic fatality rate on all other roads and highways in the state (4.61 versus .95).   The 2005 study also found that 72% of traffic fatalities in South Carolina occur on rural, non-interstate routes, compared to a national average of 47%.
            Several factors contribute to our state’s high rates of traffic accidents and fatalities, including roadway safety design, higher speeds traveled on rural roads and the longer response times for emergency vehicles in rural areas. A South Carolina Department of Transportation study found that many of the state’s rural roads are “farm-to-market roads that have simply been paved. With many narrow travel lanes, sharp curves, and very narrow shoulders, these roads offer little room for recovery from an inattentive or speedier driver, and particularly for those with limited driving experience.”
            The SCDOT has implemented several projects to help improve traffic across the state, including completing a set of roadway safety improvements at 43 locations that were found to have a variety of roadway factors contributing  to higher than normal crash rates. In fact, the SCDOT is spending $16 million annually on a program called the Crash Reduction by Improving Safety on Secondaries (CRISOS), which is targeted at making safety improvements on rural secondary roads. The improvements include rumble strips, relocating utility polls and improving signage and lane markings. Because of these improvements, traffic fatalities on secondary roads have dropped from an average of 71 per year in 1998 to 57 in 2006.
            Other efforts to improve the roads include several traffic safety laws that the South Carolina General Assembly has strengthened or implemented in recent years, including reduced blood alcohol limits, an open container lat and increased penalties for repeat traffic offenders. The SCDOT is also evaluating needed, costlier, long-term safety improvements for rural secondary roads, such as adding paved shoulders, setting back ditches, improving side slopes, adding turn lanes, flattening curves and widening roadways on curves.
            For the complete report, please visit the TRIP website at www.tripnet.org.

Shaping the future of John’s Island property development
By Kristin Hackler

     During the last John’s Island Council meeting on February 7, several representatives of St. John’s Properties, as well as Russ Seamon of Seamon, Whiteside & Associates and Robert Miller of MiLand Solutions were present to unveil their latest community concept for John’s Island. A 59 acre property located off Bryan’s Dairy road which seemed perfect for the typical suburb developments that have been springing up like dandelion weeds on John’s Island was stopped before it even started. After briefly considering turning the small patch of coastal forest and abandoned pastureland into a 52 home subdivision, the developers sat back and thought, “sure, but what would the people of John’s Island like to be built here instead?”
            That thought led the team to an idea that could possibly inspire the future of John’s Island communities. Instead of 52 half acre and acre lots, the land was redesign to handle a conservative 16 lots of plus or minus one acre. The lots are clustered within the forested area with a clear delineation around a three acre wetland and two large community gardens have been placed on either side of the lots area. The open pastureland, which formerly held three radio towers and a deer stand, will be converted to an eight acre farm that is fully accessible to the residents but will be maintained by a community farmer. Profits from the food raised on the land would go toward the farmer’s salary, but the produce would also be available to residents. For children, a green-friendly playground would be built into the property, along with a treehouse and tire swing. A central pole barn would be available for community oyster roasts and festivals.
            “Basically, we’re trying to emphasize the rural nature of John’s Island,” said Bev Jenkins of St. John’s Properties. “We want to keep the land as ‘green’ as possible.” Robert Miller of MiLand Solutions agreed, pointing out that all properties built on the land would have to follow strict LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building code, as well as the Audubon Gold International standard, which is tailor-fit to each community to ensure that its specific environmental needs, priorities, resources, and challenges are addressed.
            “We’re even looking into the possibility of an environmentally-friendly septic system,” said Mr. Miller. “A good simulacrum would be the area around the entrance to Hilton Head Island. There are great fields of produce right in the midst of a planned unit development.”
            The land is currently zoned AG-8 and is surrounded by land zoned AG-R. This was the group’s first time presenting their idea to any organization, including Charleston County. “We felt that we should get an idea of what the John’s Island residents thought about this kind of development before we went any further with it,” said Mr.Seamon.
            Since the attendance at the John’s Island Council meeting was below quorum, St. John Properties, Seamon Whiteside and Robert Miller of MiLand Solutions will all attend the next John’s Island Council meeting on March 6 at 7:00pm. They are asking for as many people as possible to attend the next meeting in order to get the necessary feedback to make this sustainable development compatible with what John’s Island, Wadmalaw Island, Kiawah Island and Seabrook Island feel to be the appropriate direction in which they want their communities to grow.
            John’s Island Council meetings are held at the Berkeley Electric Co-op, located at 3351 Maybank Hwy on John’s Island. For more information about the John’s Island Council meeting, please contact Chairman Chris Cannon at 343-5113.

To find out more about the Audubon Gold International standard for sustainable community programs, please visit www.auduboninternational.org.
To find out more about LEED green building code, please visit the US Green Building Code website at www.usgbc.org.