Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

All Lexington County committees are being broadcast live on the Lexington County Spectrum channel thirteen o two and Lexington County's website meeting portal. As such, this commission meeting film today will be available for viewing anytime on demand at our county website. May we have an invocation?

Absolutely. Let us pray. Dear heavenly father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for the wonderful weather. We thank you for the opportunity to be stewards of your creation, and we pray that you will guide our hearts, minds, and discussions this morning to glorify you in all that we do. We ask that you please bless those who serve our county, our state, and our nation in the armed forces in in uniform. Lord, we ask that this time of year, you especially keep us mindful of the things that we have to be thankful for and all things we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.

Amen. Please stand for the pledge of allegiance.

To the flag

of The United States Of America

I'm

going turn it over to staff for introductions and announcements.

Thank you, chair Mitchell. I appreciate it. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for being with us today and serving the citizens of the County Of Lexington and supporting our staff and group for your service through the Planning Commission. We have a couple of staff introductions today. I will start by turning the meeting over to county administrator, Lynn Sterke. He he has been our county administrator for five or six years now, and he has, an announcement to make.

Good morning. Thank you, Holly. Thank you everyone for being here, and thank you for your service to the county. We certainly appreciate everything you do. I think I've had an opportunity to talk with most of you individually. But just officially and for the record, just my name is Lynn Sturkey, the county administrator since 01/01/2021. So I wanted to come to you this morning and make an announcement that after thirty years of public service, mister Holland Leger has decided to retire. I am gonna miss him. I appreciate everything that he's done for the county of Leyton, especially since I've been the administrator. His last day will be December 19.

We do have another planning commission meeting on December 18, so he'll be getting us through that. We will get you additional plans as to an interim or and some direction going forward. Obviously, the staff will still be involved and so forth, but just wanted to take an opportunity this morning to let you know we just announced to counsel on Tuesday that that was occurring, then to all the department heads yesterday morning and now to the planning commission this morning. So I just wanted to publicly tell Holland thank you for everything you've done for me, for this body, again, since being the planning your involvement of the Planning Commission and everything you've done. Any questions for me or anything or anything for Holland that you would have before I step out?

No? I'm always available as well. If you ever need anything, please give me a call. I'll get back with you if we can answer it as soon as we possibly can. So thank you.

Hope you

have a great day.

Thank you, Linda. I appreciate it. Once again, good morning, everyone. Yeah. This is a hard day today for me.

Been doing this a long time.

I'd like to just say something. He has been incredibly diligent about doing things. As a matter of fact, I'll never forget, shortly after I came on board here, it was actually snowing at my house. And all of a sudden, somebody is ringing my doorbell. And I'm thinking, okay. It's somebody that wants to come into the warm because we have a generator. I looked out there and here's Holland delivering this to me. Okay? That's just how dedicated he is. So we appreciate everything you've done.

Thank you, Ms. Pike. Really, the hardest thing for me is is after ten plus years with the county and and actually working for local government service since I was 12. You know, I've been doing this a really long time. Silly almost.

But the the really the hardest thing for me is is, you know, after ten and a half years with the county, I've I've managed to hire a really competent and excellent, eager and and very capable staff. And to to fill the office with capable people and then step away is is really one of the hardest things. The other, I guess, second hardest thing is to kinda leave you all to the to the devices of the county and how that should proceed,

you know.

It's hard as well, but, you know, we all get to the point where, you know, you've done your duty and you've done the best that you can and, you know, I appreciate your service to local government. Honestly, I've been blessed for for a very long time to to keep my health and to keep my sanity working with the county councils, city councils, and planning commissions. So I thank you for the sentiments and appreciation forward.

I know, for one, I can say I've always enjoyed our conversations, your experience, and wisdom. They've always been very helpful, and, you'll be sorely missed.

Thank you. You have made us all better, you've made the county better in your time here, and we appreciate that.

Just to echo, if I may. Megan and I have been with you just about the whole time you've been here. I remember as soon as I was appointed, you called me and said, Hey, I need you to come up to my office and we've got to go over some things, and just kind of an introductory to the Planning Commission. I walked out of this building going, What have I gotten myself into? And lo and behold, almost nine years later, privilege to serve under you as the chair of this commission for a couple years, and we went through several big projects.

Still never will forget that gym, and we talk about it all the time, that gym in 2020 out here on Ballpark Road that you put together, that was a memory of planning commission I'll never forget. But you know, your diligence, as others have said, and your loyalty to the county over your ten years or ten plus years here have been well received, you definitely made your difference and made your mark here, Holland. We appreciate what you've done.

Yes, sir. Thank you very much. Otherwise, I would like to introduce a new employee, one of which that I filled the department with. We have Mr. Jonah Andrews here. He is taking our planning and GIS technician one position, extremely intelligent young man. I hope for good things for him. He's got a degree in computer science with some emphasis in mathematics and and graphic arts and and has some experience with GIS and been with us about a month now and really hit the ground running. He's doing really well. I I hope to see good things from him.

But, yeah, we're glad to have you. And, obviously, I think some of you know miss Kelsey.

She's our manager.

You might be seeing more of her in the next few months, but that's our introductions, and I appreciate all the sentiments. And

Welcome.

I'll be with you for another month or so, but and I'll always be available to you if you need to have any questions or anything of that sort. I don't play golf, but I'll figure something out to

do. We can teach you.

Yeah. Alright.

Thank you.

Alright. Moving on to tab a minutes from last month. I have a motion.

Motion to approve.

I'll second them. Yeah. Hutter.

Commissioner Price?

Yes.

Commissioner Cox? Yes. Commissioner Shealy?

Yes.

Commissioner Pike? Yes. Commissioner Hutto? Yes. Commissioner Campbell?

Yes.

Vice Chairman Frost?

Yes.

Chairwoman Mitchell? Yes. Copy activity reports.

Yes, and thank you. Let's see. Just really briefly, our permits for the last month or so have dipped a little bit. I mean, you know, they've maintained in the hundreds for quite a number of months now, but we're down to 117 at this time in October of site built permits and 31 manufactured home permits for a total of 148, which was somewhat considerably less than past previous months. Single family on the year, again, 117 for the month.

The total let me move the slides forward a little bit. The total on the year is fourteen fifty four, just shy of last year, so we have two months left to go. I suspect we'll achieve last year's numbers and surpass it by, you know, several 100. I'm surprised that October is as slow as it is with all of the new developments happening and all the the lots that are being proposed lately, but permits do lag behind. Manufactured homes, at 31 on the month and a total of four twenty two.

And again, we will surpass last year and the year before and probably match twenty twenty two, if not surpass that as well. On the pipeline projects front, we have had one this month. It is Brevard Towns, a 106 lots on 17 a little over 17 acres. That's a new project under using the new ordinances. It's located off of South Lake Drive in southern part of the county near Red Bank, right near the intersection of Platte Springs Road on the west side of of Number 6.

There are I believe that's County Council District five. I think that's Councilman Fisher, I believe. And then, we have the concurrency map mapping that we try to provide to you now. We'll we'll moving forward, I I made you all aware that county council has rescinded the need for the school district review of of concurrency projects. They will continue to be reviewed by the county departments, fire service, EMS, and so forth, but the school district, at this point, will be out of it for the time being.

We have had no updates in the project area. We are kind of status quo since last month. And I believe that is the development activity report for the month.

Great. Thank you. Moving on to tab e, our first access policy variance.

Good morning. First access policy variance that we have today is on property of James Monroe Lindler. He owns approximately 19 and a half acres on Highway 378 in Lexington, which is near the intersection of Highway 378 in West Main Street. This is the sketch that's been provided to us, a preliminary plat that was submitted by their surveyor. Mister Lindler is represented today here by his daughter, Melanie Webb.

The family would like to create two one acre parcels to deed to two of, mister Lindler's grandsons. There is an existing 20 foot easement that serves 208 Highway 378, which is owned by mister Lindler's daughter. She uses a an existing 20 foot easement to get to her property, and the request today is to use that existing easement to access the two additional one acre parcels. A variance is needed to item three of the access policy, which states if an access easement is used to provide a driveway for a landlocked parcel, that access easement may not serve another landlocked parcel. So, again, this sketch shows of the existing parcel owned by miss Webb.

We'll see the 208 address, there on that property. This is just a little closer view. You'll notice that driveway, is the existing easement line, and this is showing how they would like to create those two one acre parcels. We do have some site photos at the driveway location of Highway 378. This is looking, into, where that driveway is, and this is along the driveway and showing the areas where those two one acre parcels would be.

And, again, that is their sketch. Mister Lindler wrote a letter to Planning Commission, which you have a copy of in your packet, and he also submitted the standards for a variance, and I'll read those into record. A, there are extraordinary and exceptional conditions pertaining to the property or properties. The existing easement driveway supports one family home and can easily logically support the two additional properties being requested for my family. Adding two additional easements would result in unnecessary destruction of property and two additional access points to Highway 378.

The existing easement was strategically located across from, Bruton Smith Road to optimize traffic flow and minimize congestion and hazardous entry. Three accesses on Highway 378 in very close proximity to each other would only add confusion and opportunities for traffic accidents. B, these conditions do not generally apply to other properties in the vicinity. This is a unique property exclusively for immediate family members that would provide access to three family homes. There would be no commercial or business utilization of this property.

C, because of these conditions, the application of this ordinance to the particular property or properties would effectively prohibit or unreasonably restrict the utilization of the property or properties. Per the Lexington County Planning Commission access policy, item number three, a single easement cannot be used for an additional landlocked property. My request is to use the common driveway currently used to access my daughter and son in law's home at 208 Highway 378 to access two properties for my grandsons and their wives. It does not seem logical to or safe to add two additional access points to Highway 378 when the current easement is sufficient. The newly deeded property would then each have a private driveway splitting off the common drive.

It is a waste of resources and destruction of property to add more easements. The the authorization of this variance would not be a substantial detriment to adjacent property or the quality of life for the residents of the county. This variance would serve my immediate family only and is desired by my daughter and son-in-law to facilitate their sons to build on family land. I would have it would have no impact on any adjacent property owners and would be better for the residents of this area by not having additional entry points. E, when deliberating a variance request, financial hardships alone cannot be considered for the basis of a variance.

While adding additional easements would increase project cost, the variance request is not based on finances. It is simply about land preservation, traffic safety, and efficient use of an existing easement for my immediate family to live on my land. I have lived in this location for sixty four years on family land, and your favorable consideration to now allow future generations to live on this property with me is most appreciated. Again, his daughter, miss Webb, is here today. If you have any questions for her or if you have some questions for me, I can be happy to try to answer those for you.

The property that you showed on the satellite image, the tax map, 180, how was that accessed? I didn't see a driveway just from the from the image. Go back one. Or yeah. See over to

the right

to that one?

Over on the right side, 180, it looks like it's coming from that same drive. Is there a different access for that?

Oh, well, it does have road frontage. Miss Webb, if you would come up and K. And answer that question. Are y'all using that existing easement to get to that address as as well?

If we could get your your name and address, please.

I'm Melanie Webb. I live at 208 Highway 378 Lexington. So to answer the question, the 180 has a separate access driveway. So where you see the $2.00 2

Yes.

Is the

dollar where the Dollar General is.

Uh-huh.

And then my driveway is to my driveway is to the left, and the 180

driveway is to the right of the dollar. Okay.

So it's a completely separate driveway?

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

What what are the plans for that property behind two zero eight? That's part of your plan also, isn't it?

Nope. No plans at this time. There's, 14 Mile Creek is on that property. A lot of it is in a floodplain area on the backside.

Right. And that is no access to any roads?

There's no access to there.

This is kinda messy.

Yeah. Was the DRM submitted?

It it was not. No. Just because it would be just creating the two separate parcels, we did not do a development review meeting. We knew that it wouldn't meet the access policy, so this was just our first step. We discussed all of their options and the family wanted to pursue the just the access policy variance because they said they didn't foresee any future plans of additional lots. It would just be these two lots per family.

But then can I ask why we're dividing these lots up this way instead of making, like, larger parcels if it's unusable or you don't plan on using the creek or any of these other kind of jigsaw areas here, why not just make a larger parcel and do the flag lots off of that instead of the driveway and these and a 20 foot easement on top of that for three lots? Seems like a weird way to divide it up because I'm kinda just trying to wrap my head around it.

Well, like she said, my dad owns 19 acres at this time. Eventually, that I I have a brother, so eventually, that would get divided into two two parcels. And then there's two grandchildren on each side, so eventually, you know, eventually that property would be inherited to someone else.

Right. And probably subdivided for grandkids or Possibly. Did you, by chance, go all the way down the driveway? Do we have access and shoulders for emergency vehicles?

Yes. I'm bit when the the current driveway there goes to miss Webb's home and it is a circle driveway. You're able to So yeah. Go around You're able to turn around in her driveway to go back out.

I applaud the effort to reduce curb cuts on Highway 378 because that is definitely a traffic hazard. Although I do share the concern that there's a lot of property here left, and we're headed down a road of having now we've got three, there could be five, six in the next ten years. I question where does this end? And and we've talked about this over and over and over again with the with the

And I feel like it's almost putting them into a bad situation in the future, if nothing else, because then you're having to redraw property lines and redraw easements. And really feel like there's a better way to design this to where everybody's happy and you guys, you know, win.

I would submit why do we care? Yeah. I mean, it's their

Oh, I I

If they want to pay the money to get it cut up 40 different ways and they're going to use one, you know

If we'll be back here in five years adding three more lots to this, we're just compounding the problem. If you're doing

an acre at a time,

it's not

like they're cutting up into quarter quarter acre lots. I mean, know, if they're doing larger lots, that's what we want. Right. That's what everybody here, everywhere around wants is big lots, so

I want that one.

I personally don't have a problem with it. I don't care. I mean, I I don't I

don't think

about you want to.

I think what I would probably prefer to see over multiple accesses over an easement is maybe a request for a private road instead. Can you what would that take?

We discussed that with the surveyor when Ms. Drafts first did the survey and the family's immediate plans were just to have, I think even with this, they're looking for the two one acre parcel approvals. Only one grandson is ready to go ahead and build a home. So the second one acre lot, it may be sometime before that one is actually built upon. So they decided to request this first. If they were to go and pursue a private road, then you will it would most likely have to come back to Planning Commission for that as well because of the paving requirement.

Remind me, what what's the lot requirement or maximum for a private road?

If it's an unpaved private road, it's a maximum of 10 lots. But it's accessed from a paved public road, so the private road policy does require that a private road be paved. So if they didn't want to bring it to those standards, then that would be a request from Planning Commission.

The reason I asked about the DRM is because I believe the DOT would say once you have more than two dwellings off of that single driveway that's there, it has to be the driveway size has to be increased once you have three or more. That's why I was curious about that was for the access to three seventy eight.

Coupled with any future plans to subdivide kind of thinking ahead again to Wally's point, why maybe why do we care? But to maybe say that we're not compounding the problem later, if we were to look at a a potential private road option, they might still have to come back for subdivision, but then everything's in place for that for additional lots above the instead of piecemealing it one at a time. I was that's why I was curious. This

is basically private property. I mean, I've lived on this property all my life, not at this address, but from 180 to 208. There is no other plan to subdivide. This would be no. There's there's no one else coming back here.

Not even for family, though?

Not not none other than what we have submitted. Grown out. Okay. Yes. There's no one else. Not not in my lifetime.

And just so we're clear, they wouldn't have to do this at all if they just requested the encroachment permits and put two more easements on that same property. Right?

This particular parcel doesn't have a lot of road frontage, so I don't know that they could meet the separation requirements if they were to go and put three access easements.

Yeah. I I agree. It doesn't really make sense to have three easements. I'm just saying that there's a way they could probably get around this without even doing a variance.

Well, if they were to have a lot of road frontage and could create three separate easements that wouldn't match the access policy, then no, it wouldn't require a variance.

Madam Chair, after careful consideration of the standards or the variance and feeling that this request has met each one, I move that we approve.

I second.

I will move to amend my motion. Move that we approve with the caveat that any further subdividing of this property comes back to planning commission.

Also second. As amended.

Commissioner Price?

Yes.

Commissioner Cox?

Yes.

Commissioner Shealy?

Yes.

Commissioner Pike? Yes. Commissioner Hutto?

Yes.

Commissioner Campbell?

Yes.

Vice Chairman Frost?

Yes.

Chairwoman Mitchell? Yes. Thank you. Abbeff?

Thank you madam chair. This is an amendment to the land development manual specific to

Do I have one more Robbie?

What? I'm sorry.

I have one more Robbie. Poor Robbie. Poor

Robbie. Super excited.

Going back.

Pass it in. My glasses off. Sorry, Donald.

That's alright. Alright. So the next access policy variance request we have today is on property of Miriam White Raines. Her family is represented here today by George Bradley, the surveyor that has prepared a sketch that you'll see here. Miss Raines owns approximately 5.32 acres on Windywood Road in Lexington, east of the intersection of Platte Springs Road and Old Charleston Road.

Miss Raines would like to create a separate parcel of a half acre for building a home that will be her primary residence. Miss Raines will also require acquire a 0.18 acre portion from a neighboring property so that she will have a total of five remaining acres and can apply for an agricultural tax rate with the assessor's office. Miss Rain's property is currently accessed from a temporary easement from Windywood Road across TMS, 9700Dash02Dash014, which is owned by Platt Springs Holdings LLC. Miss Raines would like to use this existing easement and extend the easement across her property to the proposed half acre portion. Steven Johnson, a member of Platte Springs Holdings LLC, has provided consent to the variance request, and you do have a copy of that in your packet.

Previously, the Raines family owned a flag lot driveway with a width of 50 feet to access their property from Wendywood Road during planning for the property that Platte Springs Holdings currently owns, and there are plans for a future development to be located there. To get into some compliance issues and future road plans, they purchased that flag lot driveway from the Raines family and gave them the temporary easement which would be abandoned once the, development has been completed and and they would have road access to that they would have access to that new public road. But due due to the current conditions, a variance to items two and three of the access policy are needed. Item two states if an access easement is used to provide a driveway for a landlocked parcel, that access easement may only be designated over one parcel. Item three states if an access easement is used to provide a driveway for a landlocked parcel, that access easement may not serve another landlocked parcel.

This is area showing that's just closer there. The 1109 address is where the property is that's owned by Platt Springs Holdings. That 1109 is an existing cell tower. And so you'll see how that curve in that property line is planning for the future road. Yes, sir.

That would be the location of the temporary easement. The blue is the easement to that she would create over her property to get to that half acre portion. We do have some photos there at the Windywood Road easement location, and this is just looking into that property. And, again, that is the preliminary survey that mister Bradley has prepared. He did submit a letter, which you have a copy of, and standards, and I'll read those standards into record.

A, there are extraordinary exceptional conditions pertaining to the property or properties. The property was subdivided as part of a major subdivision to create an access parcel for the subdivision developer that was required to maintain a roadway that would be outside of a 266 foot fall radius for an existing cell tower on an adjoiner's property. B, these conditions do not generally apply to other properties in the vicinity. Most of all parcels in the area are greater than five acres and does not appear to apply to any other parcels in the area. C, because of these conditions, the application of this ordinance to the particular properties would effectively prohibit or unreasonably restrict the utilization of the property or properties.

The property owner wants to erect a single family dwelling on the proposed half acre parcel and retain the five acre minimum for agricultural use. D, the authorization of this variance would not be a substantial detriment to adjacent property owners of the quality of life for the residents of the county. There would be no substantial detriment to adjacent property owners. Additionally, based on proposed subdivision plans for Calico Farms, a proposed subdivision that would adjoin the half acre parcel and the proposed dwelling would fit within the proposed subdivision as the same size and a larger lot than what we are proposing. E, when deliberating a variance request, financial hardships alone cannot be considered for the basis of a variance.

While there would be financial hardship if required to build the proposed home on a 5.32 acres as is the existing parcel. We are not asking for the variance based on a financial hardship. And, again, I can answer any questions you may have.

What were the two different there's two plats that are similar. They were both made on the same day. What are what's the difference between the two?

They're the same. It's just the ones that you saw here or the ones that you have in your packet.

The one in the packet, there's two plats. They were created on the same date, but the property lines are different. Owners are different too.

The one that's in your packet that was prepared for Haven Communities, I know that there's one in the packet that we that was approved, but I don't see the approval stamp on that one. Exhibit a is a copy of the plat that was prepared when they created the temporary easement. The one that you see on the screen is the preliminary plat that mister Bradley has prepared if the variants were to be approved.

Yes.

Yeah. I read through this like 10 times, and I couldn't make heads or tails of what's going on with it.

You mentioned there's potential additional development in subdivision coming somewhere here or adjacent. Where would that be and how would they access it?

That is the portions that are I will go back to that. So the 1109 address is owned by Platt Springs Holdings. I don't know that there's future plans to actually build houses on that, but that would be a road entrance to Windywood Road. I believe the additional entrance is to Platte Springs, and that's the larger piece to the north. I'm sorry. My arrow is not working on here, so I can't point to it.

It just doesn't appear based on the curve they had to do with the easement that there's any way they could go through that property to access the property at the rear. They would have to use that easement, I would assume, if they tried to get there from when you.

Right. The temporary easement is the future subdivision road, but the road has not been approved or those plans, those subdivision plans are not approved or ready to proceed yet. So when we're looking at Ms. White subdividing her parcel, we have to look at the current conditions. But that is the future plans is that there will be a new road there that that accesses that proposed new subdivision.

Okay. My read is the gist of this is we want to make sure we keep five acres for agriculture.

Well, and that's my concern is, you know, it clearly stated here it's not financial, but it does appear to be that way when you're buying additional property to meet the five acre, to keep it in a lower tax bracket. And that's just a concern when one of the standards I directed at

don't know that we again, I don't know we care, but Yes. Okay. That's the that's the the move here.

And so the I assume when this development's done, they'll come in and pave that road. It'll be a public road, and then she'll just go

back and just off of it. The temporary easement would be abandoned because she would have an address from that new public road.

K.

Do it.

You but if you could come up.

Got more questions.

And that Can

you give us your address too? I'm sorry.

5945 Westcott Boulevard, Columbus, South Carolina 29212. And the property that's

in front

of her that she's getting a little 1,800 from, that's her brother's property.

What what was that? I'm sorry. It was what?

That's her brother's property.

Okay.

Where the arrow's pointing now.

And phase one of Calico Farms is under construction. The bonded plots are in to the county for review.

So we got we got 5.32 now. Right? Something like that. And then we're gonna cut off half, and then she's gonna buy enough to get back to 5 from her brother. Right. My read on it so she can get her tax What

what is what is on her brother's property currently? Is or is there plans to develop that?

Pretty sure it's all vacant.

Right.

Property was

If you could come up to the mic. Sorry. When you talk.

His piece of property now is 5.73 acres.

Alright.

Alright, Megan. Since you're here to do it, I'll do it. Madam chair, after carefully reviewing the standards of the variance, I move that we approve the variance as requested.

I second it.

Commissioner Price?

Yes.

Commissioner Cox?

Yes.

Commissioner Shealy?

Yes.

Commissioner Pike? Yes. Commissioner Hutto? Yes. Commissioner Campbell?

Yes.

Vice Chairman Frost?

Yes.

Chairwoman Mitchell? Yes.

Robbie, Robbie, Robbie.

My turn now.

It's your turn.

Tab g's all you.

Thank you for members of Planning Commission. Again, this is ordinance twenty five zero seven amendments to our land development manual specific to the allowed disturbed acreage. Just kind of give you some background on this. In 2021, council amended our land development manual to limit the amounts of disturbed acreage for residential developments to 20 acres and limit the amount of disturbance for commercial developments to 60 acres. Over the past two years, there have been some discussions regarding the limitations on the limits of acres for disturbance.

About two years ago, we actually had some initial meetings with some members of council asking us to look into this. Our strategic retreat last January, one of the action items from the strategic retreat was to move forward with reviewing this language. Staff presented some very basic language earlier last spring or this spring. Council directed us to meet with a member of council who had a background in in land disturbance to to look at the text. So we, land development staff and myself, met with council member as directed, presented that text to council.

Council's next directive was to get feedback from two stakeholder groups. One was the Building Industry Association. The second was to develop the Lexington account responsibly. So we held sessions with each, provided the draft text, received their comments and feedback, presented those to council, and council further asked us to work particularly with two representatives from the DCLR and one developer, local developer contractor. So some text was drafted, and I will say in September, we took some initial text to counsel.

After discussion, council asked regarding I think the comment came up regarding the potential if additional acres was needed, so some additional text was applied with the I think the concern is proper public hearing of the night was the 75 acres. So that text was initially provided in a couple different fashions. Council asked us to proceed with the text that was presented in your packet today. Again, this is an ordinance amendment or amendment to our land development manual. This is not a pending ordinance.

This is not text that is in place. The purpose of this process is to provide draft text to council, to the planning commission, and to hear public feedback when discussing this to see if additional changes are warranted or need to be made. So that's kinda where we're at today. We had a public hearing Tuesday night. I'll kinda go over some some brief feedback from that public hearing Tuesday night, but within your packet is the entire ordinance for twenty five zero seven.

I know in the past, we have had text shown in red that was new text, text to be removed was struck. The way the ordinance played out, we almost had to rewrite this entire section. If it was redlined and struck through, honestly, it would be extremely difficult to follow, so we put everything in black and white. It was easier to follow. It's very simple to compare it with the previous text, so I just wanna get that out in the record as well.

So just to get started, I'm gonna hit some highlights of the proposed text. Again, this is under section six point two point nine within our our land development manual. The first highlight is to revise the minimum minimum acres of residential disturbance for residential and commercial from 20 to 25 without an expanded master plan. What this means is anything 25 acres or less, it can be approved at staff level, basically meeting minimum standards. Minimum standards for BMPs, which are best management practices, and minimum standards within our land development stormwater regulations.

Second change was to, for residential developments, allow up to 50 acres with expanded master plan and disturbance and stabilization agreement for residential, provided the engineer provides justification for the need to expand that acreage. Again, previously 20 acres was the cap for residential, and again, it was adopted in 2021. 80% stabilization will be required for residential projects to increase their disturbance beyond any initial approvals. So if the developer wanted to have approved 25 acres and he received approval for that and he met his 80% disturbance, then he could proceed with additional acreage following the 25 rule. Currently, we allow letters of credit for the disturbance and stabilization agreement.

The proposed text will also allow cash surety to be submitted for that. For an expanded master plan, they are required to have five additional best management practices, which are noted in the text, and the site conditions will warrant which BNP should be utilized. Stormwater Advisory Board reviews and review the initial text, and they provide the information within the draft text regarding the slope, the soil types, proximity to water bodies as a means to justify what additional BMPs would be utilized. There are 14 listed in the draft text to choose from. The ideas and suggestions were taken not only from staff with site visits and seeing what occurred on-site, but from the Georgia stormwater manual and also consulting with our local stormwater consultant.

Additional changes include the notification signage is required on-site. That notification signage shall meet the minimum standards for whatever jurisdiction requires allowances for signage for contractors. Specifically, the developer and contractor information must be included on that sign. Additional changes are required mulch filter burns with silt fencing and turbidity curtains. These are for certain situations, particularly where runoff and the best management practices will impact a body of water, particularly Lake Murray.

It will allow projects disturbing over the existing the expanded master plan threshold, but less than 75 acres to potentially get that approval over the threshold of either 50 or 60 acres to go before the stormwater advisory board to seek relief, use that body as a recommending body, then go to county council for approval. Again, this is more like a variance process. Some of the original text called out a variance, but it's not truly a variance by definition. And just some reasoning for that, at one of the discussions at our council meeting, The concern was if you had projects that needed to exceed the threshold, there was no means to seek relief or get a grant approval to go above the threshold levels for acreage. So this was a method to potentially allow that for certain situations.

The corrective action plan measures can be implemented in advance of the correction action plan being approved. This will allow any violation to begin working towards correcting those issues without the formal plan approval provided staff and the project engineer agreed to that. Another big change in it is BMP's not correctly installed will result in an automatic stop report. Currently, our process for enforcement, if a BMP is installed correctly, is a write up on their inspection report. It's unsat.

If it continues, it goes to a notice of violation and further continues, it then becomes a stop work order. We felt with the the ability to open up the additional acreage, even up to 50 or 60, The best management practices are key to ensuring settlement road control measures were met, so we felt that the stop work order for incorrectly installed BMPs was essential to this. Within your packet is, again, the full ordinance itself. The public hearing the other night had several folks speak for an opposition. The vast majority spoke in opposition.

Just from feedback from both parties, those spoke in favor, concern for cost, logistics, and timings of construction. Those who spoke in opposition, focused on water quality impacts to Lake Murray, the ability to manage the site, and overall growth concerns within Lexington County. Again, this has gone through first reading, had public hearing. The process is similar to our other ordinance amendments. It goes to the Planning Commission for review.

This is recommending by it to counsel. We'll take your recommendations to the next council meeting if you're ready to proceed with that, and then we'll go to a second and third reading. Again, this is an amending text. It is subject to change, and that is the process that we're going through to ensure we have what we need to move forward. With that, I'll open up any questions for staff. If you'd like me to go line item by line item with with the ordinance, I'll be more than

happy to. Robbie, one one history lesson before we get into that. We were twenty twenty pre year 2021, we were 25 acres was the minimum. We went to 20 and now we're, in this proposal, going back to 25, is that correct?

Prior to 2021, you could have, of the 25 acres at staff level, I believe 50 acres was the expanded master plan. There was the ability to go seek relief over 50 acres and there was no threshold.

I

think we had some projects that initiated the 20 acre rule that went 90 plus acres.

So I say that to say I've read some things in the last, you know, read through this and read some things in the last, and heard some things in the last few days that I feel like is probably a little bit misinformed, and I just want to make sure we clarify the steps that have to go through, that these developers have to go through between these thresholds and what that does above and beyond what we had prior to 2021. So we're going from '25, there's this. You go to 50 or you go to '26, sorry, there's this. Then you got a threshold up to 50, then you go to 51, then there's that, right? So there's steps being put in place that require different have different requirements, different engineering.

Clarify all that for us if you don't mind, and then we can get into further discussion.

Yeah. Again, 25 acres or less is is approved at staff levels. They submit stormwater management plan, their SWIPs, their general, or really minimal best management practices, your silt fencing, etcetera, and it's approved fairly quickly. If it's 26 to 50 or commercial 26 to 60, you have to have an expanded master plan, which is additional measures that are in place to ensure that the storm water requirements are met, certain erosion control measures are met, and that would also include the additional best management practices, the additional silt fencing, the additional whatever they include within that list of 14 items that we have, and there's some pretty substantial items within that list of 14. These are not really part of our French cookie cutter type best management practices.

These are pretty substantial additional BNPs that would be in place. Above that 50 or 60 acre threshold, again, is almost like a variance process. It goes to the stormwater advisory board. They have to show proof of why they're requesting the additional acreage. The SWAB reviews it and makes a determination whether if they need additional measures.

It makes that recommendation to county council. And county council is the final arbitrator, and 75 will be the cap. There are no provisions going over 75. And I know a lot of questions that came have been brought up as far as where did the 75 number come from. Basically, it was a rational approach that we provided counsel because you have a 25, you have a 50, and the next rational would be potentially 75. There's I'm gonna be honest with the planning commission, there's no science behind it. It was a rational approach to get a number out there for discussion purposes to go through this process. What that number looks like from the planning commission, what that number officially looks like from counsel as we go through and vet all this, I don't know. It's a starting point we were asked to proceed with, so that's that's where we are today.

That's that's kind of my point was some of the stuff I read sounded like we're trying to, this is this this attempt at a a discussion document is is trying to get all the way to 75, just boom, go, go, right? And that, if you read and and you research, that just doesn't seem to be the case to me with this, that there is a lot more steps that you have to go through at each one of these thresholds, not to mention you've got to have 80% stabilization, you know, to continue with anything else, and those standards will be held, you know, through that. So I'll shut up. Y'all go ahead.

Yes, I have a question. If you have 24 acres, what kind of involvement does the county a developer proposes 24 acre development? What kind of requirements does he have to stabilize the ground?

I mean, developer has to put together a stormwater master plan, has to put together a sequence of construction to show his initial clearing, the implementation of his best management practices, phasing of the development, he has to have his pond in first, has to stabilize the pond before he can advance the project. He has to provide his stormwater calculations basically showing he's not providing any additional downstream impacts than was prior to development conditions. He has to meet certain levels of stabilization through the project and prior to when that project is finalized. Outside of land development, there are additional other measures that we have to go through, particularly our landscape and open space regs work hand in hand with land development. There's a certain percentage of open space, certain percentage of tree canopy that they would have to maintain, So at 24 or less, that's kind of the initial process.

Okay. So if he has 26 or 20 30, what's the difference?

If he has 30, then he'll have to include additional measures within his expanded master plan. So those additional measures will have to go back and look at his sequence of construction. He would have to look at the implementation of additional best management practices. He also has to put up a cash surety or a letter of credit, so if by chance during the process, if he or she fails to meet the provisions to stabilize, put in storm water structures, etcetera, we can collect on that letter of credit and we can actually install those to ensure our our storm water regs are in place and our compliance is being met.

I guess I'm having trouble understanding why those requirements wouldn't be in place if he had to do 10 acres.

You know, I mean,

the purpose is to protect the environment, I think, isn't

It is, and and I'm glad you brought that up because I was sitting here kinda thinking the same thing as as because it's a smaller project, they can potentially have more impact on streams, that that doesn't make much sense to me. I mean, I I get it. I I understand some of this, but they and but it seems like in today's world, we've developed most of the easily flat pieces of the property. And what we seem to be developing now has a lot more terrain, a lot more slope.

Especially over on our side.

And near the lake, you know, they know yeah. So it seems to me that I I don't I necessarily have a problem going from 20 to 25, but I would like to see some evaluation of having a little bit more stringent in the 20 in the less than 25 area rather than the basics.

That was gonna be my question. If you have 24 and it's on a sensitive or near sensitive water body I mean, there are state requirements that you have to do for certain BMPs and certain calculations. That's at the Is

there a time frame, Robbie, that once this project is submitted, like, statute, state statute or anything that says it has to be permitted in a certain amount of time?

Correct me if I'm wrong, Matt. Once the permits issue, they have two years to start construction, they have five years for that project to be completed.

But how much time do y'all have, like staff to review? Indeterminate right now? Okay. I've heard some talk about that at state level.

State level, I believe state has a certain guideline for for their reviews. With our reviews, we do have some language within our land development manual that we have to have them out in a particular time frame. However, our reviews run simultaneous for a just for a residential subdivision, land development folks are reviewing it for stormwater and sediment and roads control, landscape and open spaces looking for open space measures, and now public works is reviewing them for infrastructure. So it's going through three entities for an initial review,

which is prolonging some of our review process. I'm here, Commissioner Frost, and

I don't necessarily disagree, but I don't want to hamstring these, like we talked about these variants we proved earlier today, that we really don't need the staff to be bogged down with those if we need them looking at something else. That's my only caveat to that is you've got have a line somewhere. You don't want to be kicking every one of these proposed developments to death when it's not necessary. Does that make sense? I mean

There's certain water quality requirements based on the acreage for the state. So anything over an acre is being looked at, then if it's five acres or more or 10 acres or more, then they have their own levels of additional measures that staff's gonna be having to look at regardless of what the ordinance actually lays out. Right? And so this is an additional

Who has to have a DRM?

Anything over an acre.

Anything over an acre. Alright. And then you haven't tapped the engineer get involved, topos, the site plan entails what?

Generally, DRM's sketch plan. They'll bring in a sketch plan, they meet with zoning, landscape subdivision, land development, public works And development does what? Land development, stormwater management.

Are overlays involved in this at all? Are they treated any different? Any of our multiple overlays we have?

Yeah. No. The the land development The land The development regulations are county wide.

Gotcha.

The way the the way the state statute's set up that there's no potential for overlays within a land development manual. They're specific to zoning regulations, but during the DRM process, DOT is also included. Sometimes we have the DRMs in person, sometimes they will submit and we submit our comments electronically depending on the nature of the project, where the developer's located, etcetera.

The

But property gets definition of an expanded master plan.

Uh-huh.

Please go I'll bring Mr. Roland up who is our land development manager so he can further elaborate on expanded master plan, what we see for those, and answer any general questions on that.

It's simply the expanded master plan is just, you gotta show everything that you're gonna be developing within a certain area.

So it's a SWIP anyway? Phase one, phase two. A SWIP with additional measures?

Well, the SWIP will be specific to the permit that we're issuing.

Right.

The standard master plan will be like just a master plan of everything in that area that they're going to be developing. However, this will be specific to this.

So is it it also involves phasing, or is it strictly on the additional measures because it's over a certain acreage? Yes. Phasing requirement also?

It'd be a sequence in the expanded master plan. Okay. So yes.

Does the expanded master plan require additional controls?

Yes. It'd be based off of a list that Robbie said, additional BMPs, and that takes the subjectivity out of the reviewers'

hands. Again,

I'm back to I'd like to see it be more site specific, I think, especially those below 25. If you're near a water body, in Lexington County, we have a lot of water everywhere, we're very dependent on it. And I just think that the levels I mean, I trust staff to do their job. I'm not really concerned whether it's 20 or 25, but I do think seeing something beyond the basic at less than 25 may be appropriate in certain circumstances.

I know it's completely unrealistic. I'd I'd like to think it's realistic, but I love everything that's in here except basing it off of the acreage. And much to what commissioner Frost is saying is why don't we make it more site specific to the surroundings, upstream and downstream impacts, what you're bringing on, what you're discharging to the adjacent property or street, what have you, and have a suite of those expanded master plan BMPs to kind of tailor it to the site instead of trying to fit square pay ground hole situation just because it met a size requirement.

But what's the criteria? You don't make

could be sensitive water bodies, could be you know, they might even get credit if it's a redevelopment versus tearing down trees, when there's available land around that could be redeveloped. There could you know, was it an old industrial site? So you might have wells out there and you need to make sure there's remediation, and then you get some, maybe even some level of credit because you're providing more of an amenity or beautification to a development that otherwise is just

And I wouldn't be in argumentative. I was just curious what

what would you use if you didn't use acres?

I would think soil type would

Soil type matters.

Slope? I mean, you're do 10 acres of flat land, farmland versus 10 acres on the edge of Lake Murray that's got, you know, 20 foot slope. I I just think that makes up

Which I do realize gets complicated, right, because you can't you cannot just identify and itemize every little possible aspect. Totally respect that.

Put From

a staff level Yeah. Because I review this, and I get it. Like, it's it's it's impossible. You don't know until you get it. But instead of basing it just on size, if you take the circumstantial and on-site circumstances to what it had been previously used for or what what kind of impact it can make, again, upstream, downstream, are the soils good? Can it infiltrate? Was there, you know, a previous use that probably could be remediated? Is there a heavy slope? The insensitive water bodies nearby. Then you have you have your arsenal of BMPs that you can require on a staff level.

And then the state requires the phasing anyway, but then you've gotten you're tailoring it, and it isn't as cookie cutter either, right? In turn, you don't end up with every site looking the same with maybe a pond too, which nobody wants. Nobody wants to maintain them, build them, inspect them.

One one last question. What what are you looking for us today? Are we just discussing and you're gonna take this back, and are we looking to rep make a recommendation and a vote today?

We can do a variety of things. One, we can discuss today, and we can bring this back to the agenda in December to kind of rehash everything and make a formal recommendation to counsel, or if you are ready to make a recommendation today.

Okay. I just curious what you wanted us.

I think it's a lot of it's a lot of language to really soak in and kind figure out, so if if it's again, we're we're this is a recommending body. If it's to recommend yeah. Go through with all of it or if it's to recommend, hey. We wanna go back and council needs to consider a, c, and d like you're mentioning now, we can include that. I know to commissioner Mitchell's comments, I think staff, we have reviewed the opportunities for soil types, topography, proximity to water bodies on different scenarios.

The two things that really that really kind of throw a loop into is one, the soils books we all reference, even the ones that are online and by USDA, they are so outdated. It's a very general soil survey, so it would include additional measures as far as soil testing or whatnot similar to a perk test throughout larger sites. That's one thing that they'd have to look at. Two, a lot of the engineers, a lot of developers go by to topos online. Those topos online aren't exactly accurate, so again, it'd be some additional measures of potential surveying and looking at that.

So I mean, it's trust me, we we have kind of kicked that around for quite some time trying to figure out how to actually get that as a standard is a task that we that we're, to be honest with you, we're kinda struggling with trying to figure out what direction to go with it. Have positive on enforcement,

I think is great. I mean, it helps staff, it helps developers or contractors. It doesn't waste time.

Straightforward.

They know. They already know. There can be, you know, circumstances where you just have an unusual rain event and then but the ones that know, they go out there and they maintain it. So this is a very straightforward and probably overdue measure. I mean, all of that, think, is good, and I'm no long I'm no, in way, shape, or form making a motion.

But if I had a recommendation, it would be just to look at trying to either lessen or remove maybe the size requirement and make it more site specific and give staff the the leniency with your BMP manual and your land development ordinance that you have in place, which is good and staff is qualified, then to make those determinations on a site by site basis as long as it's over one acre. I mean, the state requires the 80% anyway for stabilization before you can close out or move on. That's not new either. So you can work that into your expanded master plan and things like that. But I would like to see it in addition to everything else that's on here, which I think is I have no comment on other than it was a good effort.

I'd like to see it. The size requirement is a little concerning, especially getting getting up above 25 acres. Because there are like like my colleagues have said that there are smaller sites that probably need the same the same care and attention, and we all know how those plans can look when they come in. And if they meet the ordinance, they meet the ordinance, but they might need additional attention.

Will each one of those plans have to have a SWIFT? Over an acre, all of them?

All of them.

Has everyone ever has anyone not gone through a binder of SWIFT?

I certainly haven't.

Okay. Could staff do a presentation on that?

So so what just to clarify the SWIP, there's a simplified SWIP out there for one to two acre sites. So it's not that big binder.

It's it's condensed.

State has it online.

Yeah. We've got an example of it that we share with

Could we do a presentation with you guys when maybe next month or a month after where we kind of go through a one acre commercial, a 20 acre development, fifty, seventy five, and let's see what those look like. That way you guys know what it is that's actually being required of these people that are building and developing these things. I think it would surprise you how much goes into those binders and how many BMPs are in place already. And, yeah, it's it would probably give you a little bit more confidence in storm water.

Ravi, I I got

a quick question just

kinda going back to some comments before. Looking at what's labeled as Page four, the two bullets at the top where it's talking about violations and stop work orders, trying to understand the difference between Bullet one and Bullet two. Is Bullet two specifically for a bigger development and it's saying that the repercussions of violations are the same or is it saying that based on the size of the acreage that a stock work order means something different because, for example, like in bullet one it says, you know, violations, all permits, submittals and inspections associated with the development may be placed on hold. And then in bullet two, it's for the bigger acreage, it's all permits, submittals, and inspections will be placed on hold, so

And and the intent of that was if you have a minor breach, say if you're required to to allow to do 24 acres and you disturb 25, an acre over, the first bullet would apply. If you arbitrarily go over that five acres, if your threshold was 20, you go to 25, that's the threshold that we basically shut everything down. So it is it's more punitive the more you go above what you've been allowed to to clear and been permitted for. That's the intent

of it.

Yeah. Miss Pike, I know you've had some questions. I'm sorry.

That's okay. I just wanna make sure I understand something because is the 75 applicable to both the commercial and residential?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay. Then I don't think that's real clear in here in the language. The second thing that I'm kinda concerned about is we don't seem to have any additional protections when we get closer to the lake. And and this county is surrounded by the lake. So why do we not have some additional protections there, and has there been any discussion of additional protections?

Generally speaking, the way the language is written, if you go back to where it says the additional BMPs or best management practices, where it talks about EMPs should include at least five additional BMPs in addition to all minimum best management practices, they need to focus on topography with greater than 15% slopes, soil type, proximity to bodies of waters and or streams, water quality protection, and off-site impacts. The intent of this was to to look at those measures when determining the expanded master plan and the additional BMPs. I know to your to your concern, there have been a lot of concerns regarding additional water quality buffers potentially around Lake Murray and some perennial streams, so that may be something if if this body wants to recommend that to consider of additional water quality buffers, then, yes, we can we can certainly include that.

I I and I do believe Lake Murray is our jewel, but I do believe water quality is important regardless where you're at.

And I think the the thing is too, a lot of folks focus on Lake Murray. The biggest impact are the streams leading up to Lake Murray.

Absolutely. So if you if

you're putting all your efforts to the buffers along the lake and you're not protecting your your perennial streams, your intermittent streams with your water quality buffers, you're you're really not doing any good.

So I

think if if the focus is additional water quality buffers as part of this, then we also need to look at the the streams that are feeding these watersheds.

And I don't know that necessarily qualifies for only 20 acres or more or 25 acres or more. Right? I mean, you might have a 10 acre subdivision, and it's right there off 14 Mile Creek and double row silt fence and always cutting because I've seen it.

Matt, what if we do or what do y'all do with perennial and different types of water bodies whenever you're approving or disapproving a site plan for stormwater.

So that makes you think specifically buffers. So perennial streams require a 100 feet from, not from the centerline of the stream, but from the bank, the full bank of the stream. So each side gets a 100 foot of buffer.

That's a specific type of water body. Right? And it gets a little bit more

That's the prenatal issue. That's the prenatal stream, the the water. You see water in it all the time. Intermittent streams get half that, which is 50. Both of them can be averaged up to now thirty minuteimum, not half the buffer width of which the Atlanta Development Manual says because the state's minimum is 30 to 45. But they can be averaged. Same with shorelines. It's 50 foot undisturbed buffer. Shorelines can be Lake Murray, private ponds.

Are you doing double silt?

Yes. Any chimney that is a double silt fence.

So we've got several methods for protecting the water, like, in place with that. So it's not just the buffer, then you've got silt fence, then you have what else?

That's pretty much it. I mean, you have all the other BMPs We're going for the

add the mulch in this language. Right? So we're gonna do the mulch barriers here, and then we've got turbidity curtains. Tell us what that is.

Turbidity curtains, just, you put those in basically, think of a cove only Murray. You got a subdivision being built above the cove.

Jute. Is that what you're talking about there?

What's that?

Like, the jute.

The It's it's more or less of a a rubbery kind of material. It kinda it kinda just it's basically for aesthetics, really. It's gonna stop the turbidity that you would see in a cove get polluted from from a subdivision.

Because it's time to settle out before

Yeah. Well, what I'm talking about is the material for this curtain. So it's Almost

like a filter fabric, isn't it, though, kinda?

It's something like that. I'm I'm not exactly sure of the exact material.

Like inside a pond, what you put?

Yes.

Like a baffle?

They they were designed to be inside the water body to prevent the turbidity. Like, you can see definitely where the line's at. Discolored water versus the natural color.

We didn't have those in place before, and now we've added those to our list of things that we're gonna require people to

Yeah. We do make the request right now when we're we made the request for that, and they have been very accepted of that.

Yeah.

And they've been working really well. And that's over and beyond the 80% trapping efficiency. So that's basically trapping everything.

And it says in here for certain situations, what does certain situations mean? Is that strictly related to the acreage? Is

Certain situations would be for along the lake

Here, we'll call those out.

The pond, etcetera. So certain situations would be where it adjoins a body of water, and we can call that out and clarify that more too. We've had two sites specifically over the last, what, six months to a year where the engineer actually implemented the turbidity curtains above and beyond what we required. One particular is on Lake Murray with a clay site, very rolling site, so there have been a couple breaches with some heavy rain events with the sediment trap, and it has contained the sediments or the discoloration within that cove fairly well, and it seems to filter out very quickly. We have another one that's also on Lake Murray.

The topography, I don't think, is quite as bad, it's also a clay soil, but it is in place. I'm not sure it's really had any breaches or whatnot where it's really had any impacts, but yeah, we have two very visible sites, so they're using them now.

I just want to make one comment on this thing just so I'm on record here is I feel like everything is awesome. I think it's definitely a step up, and it's more requirements for these developments. I think it's only going to help water quality and help these developments stay in line. The only thing that I am slightly concerned about is the stop work orders and it being you know, there's, I guess, a happy medium. So instead of us saying, okay, we'll correct it or Lexington County saying, okay, here's a problem.

Y'all need to correct it. We'll come back out again. Oh, it's not corrected. Well, we're gonna give you one more chance. We went from that to immediate stop work order, which really is like if you're in the you're in the middle of developing something and you get a stop work order, it's nonsense without the ability to correct that measure then. So I feel like there's maybe a happy medium on if they identify something, a reasonable amount of time to get it corrected, they can come back out and inspect before a stop work order is put into place, maybe the one time.

Well, keep in mind, our folks are inspecting the sites once a month. The developer has to inspect the sites every nine days and, what, forty eight hours after a significant rain event. So they're supposed to go in and document any issues, and as we've explained to the developers and site contractors, again, since land development has been within community development, communication is key. These are construction sites. They're not going to be perfect. Even sites who've got complaints on, we've taken DEEC two, they've agreed, yeah, it's a construction site. There's going to be some things that happen here and there. The key is communications. If you see something, let us know, hey, this is what's happened. This is what we're doing to go back and address that issue.

The engineers being on board redlining plans and and getting us revisions back in. So a key piece of that is communication rather than the folks going out arbitrarily and just do it and saying, oh, so we didn't know or Right. We we missed this.

Your stormwater inspectors that you know?

But having folks go out every three days, every four days with four staff members with over about 300 active construction sites, it gets very difficult.

There's required third party inspections have to happen weekly.

Every nine days.

They ought to know already what the problem is before county officials get out there for their monthly. So in theory, from where I'm sitting on that on on y'all side, when we go out there, we assume that they either already knew about the problem and are actively working on corrective action or we didn't even know it existed unless we look at the third party instances.

You see stormwater come out right after a 10 inch or 12 inch rain, and they come and do their inspections the morning after. And then what? Then you've got a stop work order because you've got fatal Not for that. I would installed assume BNPs.

Generally for that is, again, their third party inspector should come out within forty eight hours. I get it. They're supposed to have

still got forty eight hours.

They're supposed to have rain data showing what those rain events are. So obviously, if it's a significant rain event, our folks are trained to identify that. Really and truly, if their B and Ps were in place, it was documented on previous inspection reports and even ours, we work with them on that because there are certain rain events that are above and beyond what those sites have been designed for.

Right. Right. But this, does this describe working with people on that or does this describe immediate

I think

this top is work an arb I don't wanna say arbitrary, this is pretty much black and white. If you go above and beyond what has been permitted for this particular section.

Okay, I

was That's reading that for what it focuses on, and the key is when you have this additional acreage open, SWIP, the plans, the project engineer, when he does the precon, he or she has that precon, goes over the entire project. So everybody there understands it and the installation guidelines are only approved set of plans. You

shouldn't But be talk or about should not be installing these, not maintaining these or not failure of

the installation is specific. They need to be installed correctly.

You're out of sequence.

Because if you've got silt fence that is wooden stakes, no wire back, that is not what's called for our specifications.

So we're just talking about the actual Installation.

Needs to

be installed correctly. Gotcha. I thought we were talking about, like, the okay.

Things happen during construction sites. We understand that as long as it's being documented and maintained,

and They're working to correct them

We have within the the ability to work with

them guidelines. On

Gotcha. Everybody brought that up because my note was and maintained, And while I agree that we don't need to run out there every time we see a break, or an overflow and stop something, I do believe that the county should not be their maintenance contractor either. So we shouldn't be showing up and telling them what's wrong at their site. They should already be aware of that

and

be Yes. Working on. They're supposed to be. So I just think that's JEAN back on the contractor. That shouldn't be something you but I don't want to belabor this, but I appreciate the work you have done, Robbie, on this. And you all had had a lot of meetings and went on way. I still am back to I would like it see to be more site specific characteristics that drive what your BMPs are rather than size.

I totally agree with those sentiments that it should be more site specific. I was just wondering, has the storm water board reviewed this?

Yes, ma'am. Storm water advisory board reviewed this early on in the process, and in all honesty, the text that was submitted to the storm water advisory board was not this detailed. Their main comments, we looked at, they tried to provide consistency with commercial and residential when we when they reviewed it. Again, they were very similar situation the Planning Commission is. They really wanted to focus on site conditions, especially for the expanded master plans with slow proximity to water, soil types, etcetera. So they're following the same suit of what you all look at. I think Mr. Campbell is actually Yeah,

was on that board at the beginning of the year. That's when we first got this task. Yeah. It's changed a lot and

It's gotten a lot more detailed since we met with the SWAM, so it's progressing, yes ma'am.

Megan, I wanted to address these SWP's again that you talked about. There's a lot of paperwork coming. We got plans that are sometimes 80 pages long that we have to review. We have calculations that's part of the SWP. They're this thick. Right. And the SWIP itself is just a story about the specifics of the project site.

And it goes through, like, migratory birds and bodies of water and protection of these habitats.

By the time we look at all that and go back and forth with reviews, we got a good product coming out of our office that's been approved and looked at by everybody.

Right.

The challenge is getting that implemented. The opportunities are getting all that implemented. So we're trying to

get it more black

and white so less objectivity, more black and white, we can have a better leg to stand.

Right. I'm with you on that.

Is being more site specific, is that even doable from a staff perspective?

Again, that's real challenging.

Would look It sounds like it would be very labor intensive to do that.

Even the even the protective order sheds, the the TMDLs, I mean, how far to downstream do you go?

Right.

Right? How do you how do you quantify

that? Downstream analysis, how far do you go?

Having downstream analysis, how far do you go?

The next nearest water quality monitoring station

And if you've got and if you've a cross line pipe on a private driveway, do you you pick that up, or are looking at the roads? I mean, it's a lot of variables.

It's Yeah.

It's difficult for us to cover every single one of them.

We even spoke about some kind of matrix with a local engineer, because is there a matrix we can come up with to develop some kind of scoring system to see what kind of BMPs.

Yeah. I was going to ask about that. Did y'all get any input from any of these local engineers? Yes. Like

okay. Do you need anything in the form of, like, a formal recommendation, or do are you just taking notes right now and We we do need

a formal recommendation and vote to senate council. And, again, if it's something if it's something you all wanna take today, if not, if you wanna think about this until our December meeting or reconvene and and pick this back up, we're we're amenable to either way.

Madam Chair, I think that this discussion has been great. Reading this and discussing it is two totally different things for me. It's the way my brain works. And I I think that, with the feedback that we've given to staff, they could chew on us maybe, think about, you know, maybe some some things that would make us a little more comfortable, and we can also chew on it in our brains and and throughout the month of November and and half a day.

Can we circle back to it?

Bring it back.

In December? I'm wondering if since this has changed so much since the storm water board reviewed it, should storm water board go back and review it again?

You would like us to take it back to storm water advisory board for their comments before we bring it back to the planning commission? We'd be more

I think so. Yeah.

I like that idea.

Have a couple general questions, not nearly as specific as everyone else's. After watching the public hearing, one of them is does this in any way allow to open up more acreage in total? I mean, it's the same project, it's just the phases in which it's done, right?

It allowed them to open up more acreage at one time potentially.

At one time, but in the end it's going to be the same project, Okay, and opening up more at once, does that allow for more creativity and stuff in the design of the subdivision? We are able to Maybe to allow more trees, to allow more things that they have to they can't do by doing less.

Staff being not design professionals or engineers or developers, I believe, Matt, you

can correct

me if I'm wrong, we've heard points for and against that. So there may be situations where, yeah, it may allow creativity. There may be situations it may eliminate creativity by clearing everything and reducing the the tree scape. So I mean, think it's pros and cons both ways. Again, without us being true developers and dealing with the overall design of projects day in, day out, we really can't comment on that.

But then you get into if you're talking about getting rid of trees, so then you talk about your landscaping department and then you have trophy trees and they go in and they do a survey of all the different trees that are worthy of saving and then they give them credits for those trees in

It would seem to me as if you were able to do, maybe not all of it, but a larger piece of it at once, it would allow for more creativity in what you can actually build.

It could.

In the

end, the end product, I think

probably it just more or less has to do with stockpiling material. So if you're moving dirt in phase one and you've got to either get rid of that dirt or take that good soil and move it to your where it's going to be in Phase two, so topsoil or whatever, instead of moving it off-site and trucking thousands and thousands of loads of material on our public roads and and stockpiling them either somewhere else or having to offload them. It just it puts a lot of strain on the trucking industry by not allowing them stockpile. That would be the biggest thing that I would see, and correct me if I'm wrong, but

I think it all goes back down to comments even from planning commissions, from Schwab, even staff internally, from a public hearing the other night. Even both sides admit the issue is protecting water quality. The developer's aspect was, okay, we open up more, we can stabilize it and develop it quicker. On the flip side, you open up more, what's the potential impacts to a water body? So I think everybody involved in this whole process understands the main issue is water quality and protection of those water bodies.

Right.

So I think that's the goal for everybody on all aspects.

Okay. So I guess the question is, is the consensus to table it, let it marinate? Will we I think we're sorry.

Go ahead.

Come back in next month with actual recommendations or we

I think we're gonna

take it to Storm Guard.

Yes. We'll take it to the Storm Guard Advisory Board, which I'm not sure if we can get a meeting scheduled in December, it may be January. Okay. But once we have the Storm Guard Advisory meeting and have their comments, we will present that back to planning commission and move forward

with it.

So do we need a motion,

Wally? No?

I don't know if we need a motion, do we? And and I again, anything they can do to look at site characteristics versus if you can't, you just can't, you can't. I I get it. There are certain limitations we have, so

We'll also go back to our consultant too and just and and have those folks take a look at it and just see if they can they can come up with the ideas, suggestions, or what some other folks are doing too. Again, we've we've been we've been kinda kicking that around trying to figure out a means to do it. So we'll we'll keep seeing what we can come up with.

Thank you all so you all have heard. I understand how difficult stormwater is to deal with and manage. Yeah.

Alright. So we do not need a motion to send it back to stormwater? Okay.

I think it was just a recommendation to take it back to stormwater.

Is overall part of your discussion you want some more detail from stormwater before you you make a rendering? So yes, we can do that.

Alright. Alright. Habit h.

You gonna work, Harlan?

Road classification. Yeah. Road classification.

Well, I got a zoning map.

Alright. This is gonna be a unique presentation for a map amendment, so I'll try to explain this the best I can. I've got Walt McPherson, our zoning administrator here with me to kinda help out. So the next agenda item is a zoning map amendment application M twenty five zero one. This is for a proposed amendment to a zoning street classification of Allendale Drive from a residential local four road to a local road.

Again, it's currently RL 4 to local. The reason is request is Great Collegiate Academy would like to create an access to their campus off of Allendale Drive, and the current zoning street classification of RL 4 will not allow this access. This was actually initiated by county council on 08/28/2025. The intent from Great Collegiate is the overflow access for sporting events. I believe they are not intending to use this access for full time access to their site only for athletic events such as football, soccer, baseball, some of the larger events that are in the lower part of their property.

Exit only? Yeah. Exit

only. Yeah. Exit only. Yes. Exit only. So it's like a secondary exit for their events. Again, the change to zoning classification would allow that access for a group assembly and community education type event, which would be consistent with Great Collegiate Academy. We do have, I believe, the engineer of Great Collegiate is here today if y'all have any follow-up questions for him. But during the public hearing on October 28, we had 12 signed in favor, five of those spoke. Their comments were the proposed access was designed to be an exit only for athletic events to ease congestion from these events by providing another access for exit only.

Ambulatory safety, it was easier for first responders to get in and out in case of emergency and not using day to day operations. Sixth sign in opposition and six spoke. Obviously, are concerns for the safety of folks walking, children children, bike riders, etcetera, in the subdivision. Not only concern for children but pets, the increased traffic within the neighborhood, increased noise. They were concerned that the access would not be just limited to exit only or athletic events, and they were scared it would decrease property values.

So again, the concern was from the Gray Collegiate. Council initiated the amendment because it is a large stretch of road. Per our zoning orders, they had to actually initiate that amendment. It couldn't be initiated by the by the school itself. So any questions for staff? Again, I've got mister McPherson here as his only administrator. He can provide any details necessary on the on the request.

I have one question because I'm I'm confused. Where how do they access this currently? Over that. This is gonna be exit only. How do they get there?

Yeah. Actually, it's off of I can't think of the street. Unfortunately, I can't have my map up right now, but, yeah, they actually have a main access there off of Leepart. Jessamine, isn't it? Leepart Road. Leepart.

And Jessamine.

And Jessamine Road. Ben Arsdale. That's it. There you go. Got the engineer here too to answer any specific side questions for you. Map.

I'm just I'm just trying to figure out how they're accessing it currently in

Unfortunately,

we're having technical difficulties beyond our control. That's why we can't put any maps or anything on the front.

So do you come down from the back of the school down that what appears to be a big long right away where there's a practice field, or do you come in from Jessamine on the other side?

My name is Richard Jackson, two twenty one Powell Drive, Lexington, South Carolina, engineer for the project. Currently, the school has accessed by the drive off of Van Arsdale Drive. They do not access off of Lea Park.

But Barton Arsdale comes off of Lea Park?

Correct.

So, yeah, they're coming off Lee Park, getting on Barton Honsdale and then going to the

So they're coming in by the school and coming down, I guess, what's school property currently?

Correct. That's all school property.

Yes, sir. I just I'll be honest, when I first saw this, my thought was, what are we doing? You know, if I lived in a neighborhood I've driven these streets many a time being from here I would never want a football stadium full of traffic coming out through my neighborhood.

I agree.

I I agree. I just I'm sorry. Maybe there's a way to do some improvements up at Leaport Road and and, you know, provide better access and egress, but I I just I got a concern with dumping all this out through that neighborhood. I really do.

And we had a five to six.

Okay. Yes, sir. Sorry. Sorry about that. Sorry, Richard. Yeah.

Sorry. My name is Jay Ragley. I live at 144 Saluda Avenue, Columbia S C 29205. I'm a consultant to Gray Collegiate Academy, been working with them since February and can speak to more about why this issue is needed. So it is, number one, exit only as needed. So it is not an exit all the time. It's got gates. It's gonna be locked. Here's the problem. If you've got a football game at Gray Collegiate, you're gonna have between today a thousand to 1,500 people back there.

And the only way back there today is that road on the school property that you've already identified. That road's very narrow. It was just there on Friday. Doesn't have a ton of shoulders to it. If you've got an emergency back there and it's starting right as Travis coming in, there is no way that ambulance is getting out.

There's no way. And so the reason why we want to build this exit only area with gates is because with football, softball, baseball, soccer down there, there have been instances of people both in the stands as well as players on the field who needed to get out quickly. But with the popularity, candidly, of Gray Collegiate now, if we don't have a second exit, we are concerned that we will not be able to get an ambulance out. And if we have this exit only access with gates that would connect to Allendale Drive that we're paying for on our own dime, we will ensure that public safety. But we have had incidents already in the past school year, not the current one we're in, last school year, where we had to have quick egress.

So why not I'm sorry.

We Go

were lucky that they weren't, you know, the BC gray game where there's 2,000 people there, so it wasn't But the reality is we really feel very concerned about the safety, given the crowds we have down there, given the popularity of Gray Collegiate, that we need a second exit only access point if we need it. It is not an entrance point. I know I was at the public hearing, spoke to the public hearing, the community was concerned it was going to meet entrance. It's not an entrance. Never going be open as an entrance, and it's not going to be, All right, football's over, everybody come out this way.

That's not what the intent is either. The intent is it's there, and if we need to evacuate for that ambulance or as you all have seen at some of the football games here, lightning storms, tornado warnings come up. If you needed to get everybody out quickly, you're gonna need a second point. So our key focus has been on public safety. It is not about convenience for football.

Why don't we call this an emergency exit then?

Crash gate. Remember that?

Mean I'm

glad you exited.

Why are

we using it for all different purposes and and not limiting it to just you candidly said it was for, which is

were told to do. So it's a private road, as Richard knows, and that's what we were told to call it, but it's gonna have two gates, as you can see in the drawing. I mean, those gates are not gonna be open. I mean, we own the property, and to the community, we can understand their concerns about noise, but that doesn't change anything because there's already football games seven times a

year.

So I don't think the noise is the concern. I think traffic and safety is a concern for

people that Who's gonna make sure it stays closed unless it's

Emergency. Yeah. My question is is

it gonna be open at the end of every football baseball game?

No. That's not the intent.

That's not

the No.

It's not the intent.

Yeah. But, again,

I I I you know, intent Legal. Agree. Yeah. And my question is, why why can't you improve the current access road? Or it looks like you had a construction access road that came off of Jesmon.

Right. That's no longer available to Property owner's not allowing that anymore.

Okay. Well, you've got a road on your property that looks to me there's plenty of room for that to be widened and provide the necessary pay Shoulder.

If you've never been down there, if you've never and and it's you can go there. I'm happy to get doctor Newsom, the school leader, to give you a free tour of the campus. If you drove down there, you'd see that it's not wide enough to be able to have traffic and someone escape.

As currently designed, but could it not be improved?

No. I don't think you'd see any land there, you could see that. If you went and viewed the property itself, you'd see there's not anything to build upon.

If this was just an emergency only access point, I would have no I don't have any problems with it. I would change it to make it only that, and then your neighbors are gonna be happy. You're gonna be happy because you are gonna use it for the exact purpose that you stated, and we don't have to worry about the problem. But it I think it needs to be emergency only.

But I don't know that that is an actual term in your code. That's the Well,

we have those for neighborhoods.

The difference is is this is a non residential use. It is accessing a public road, and the street classification will not allow access. Within a neighborhood, single family residential can access pretty much any street classification as long as density is met, whether it's a crash gate or a full

access. If we change the classification, they can access it without restriction.

Right.

We have no means to, like you said, to enforce intent. Now I will say this, if it is changed and there becomes an issue, counsel can go back and reclassify that street back to an RL four to disallow that access again.

Well, what happens? I mean, so then you've got traffic and then you've got this neighborhood that's in discombobulated all the time until it comes back to council until yeah. No.

So remember just remember the athletic schedule, though. So we're talking 10 football games a year. That's six varsity and probably four j varsity. That's all in the fall. And then in the spring, you're gonna have baseball, softball, and soccer. Right? So between those sporting events, you probably have a total of 30 dates. So that's 40 dates out of three sixty five days a year when there's the possibility we would need to quickly evacuate the athletic part of the campus. That is not year round. And obviously, during the summertime, there's about, you know, eight weeks of where there are no students, no staff there whatsoever, so

But we're not talking about evacuating a student. We're talking about an exit for all of those events into a neighborhood

Plus the existing for that. The existing exit. Right? So you're the ability to get people out. So the other thing about the public access, again, this is school property. I've heard about the concerns about safety. Those safety concerns exist. Allendale Drive is a public road already, so this isn't putting more traffic on there. But those neighbors, candidly, should not be on the school property. Like, they should not be going through the gate. They should not be riding their bikes on the gate.

They not the should be riding down their sidewalks in their own neighborhood?

Well, there's no sidewalks in Allendale Drive, believe.

Okay. Well, then they're, you know, they're playing in the streets.

Right. And that's not a school problem. The school can't control what the neighbors are doing in their neighborhood.

But you can funnel traffic through that neighborhood.

But we're not. That's I've just told you

Oh, know. Know because this is going be an emergency only driveway. Right.

Intensively. Final question. What what was the school's plan to access this property and get people in and out safely to begin with? You when you bought that piece of property and come up with a master plan, what was your plan?

So the honest answer is I started in February. I don't know the master plan, Richard, if you have any knowledge of it. What I do know is this, that so the there's a so the property back there, when you get by the stadium, if you have not been back there, encourage you to go there, happy to give you a free tour. It's dirt. Right? There's power lines. Okay? There was a one time we'll give you exit access out on Jessamine, but that property owner said, we're not doing any more because of the dust. The neighbors were concerned about the dust that was going on there. That probably would have been more ideal, but that didn't fault didn't come through. Doctor Newsome, who's the school principal as well as the board, did talk to members of Allendale Drive and tried to work this out another way without coming to this.

They were How long just is not that access, that dusty drive? Like, could paving it

or Well, the graveling it or

whole thing can't be paid because those are power lines. So we're not going be able to, I think, do anything with that because that's not our right? There's power lines over there that we don't know. Right?

I don't know that the power company would disallow you to pave it. They might even like that. They're going to let you pave it at all.

Don't No paving.