County Council - Regular Meeting

No action. No action session. Right. They give you one of them. I filed. I was just ask.

Yeah. Okay, thank you all for being here. We'll go ahead and call call to order this meeting of the Greenwood County Council March 17, uh, 2026. Apologize that we were a few minutes late, but we got a lot of things going on in Greenwood County. Um, your Greenwood County Council has been in executive session since 400 pm. I'll ask for a motion now that we come out of executive session. I make a motion that we come out of executive session. Second by Miss Griffin. All in favor and we have exited. In the in the interest of total transparency, I would ask the county manager to tell the public why we had that need.

Mr. Chairman and members of county council, we entered into executive session for the following six matters. One legal matter pertaining to the sheriff's office. One contractual matter pertaining to THS and the North Greenwood Industrial Park. one personnel matter pertaining to the Greenwood County Fire Service and three economic development matters pertaining to projects Barnau, Patriot, and Helios. Thank you, Mr. Manager. I appreciate that.

Uh we do we do not have any action to take as a result of that executive session. Uh District 6 County Councilman Robbie Templeton has our uh invocation tonight, I believe. So, Mr. Templeton, if you will, please stand if you can. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for this day and the opportunity to witness the beauty that you provide um and the grace that you provide us each day. I would ask that you be with our um first responders uh and how they protect us and keep us safe. I would ask that you be with our armed services at home and abroad as they provide a blanket of security as well. um be with us in this meeting tonight as we do the business of Greenwood County and make decisions uh in the best interest of our citizens. I ask these things in Jesus holy name. Amen.

Amen. Join us in our pledge now if you will. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. As I stated earlier, we have no actions to take coming out of executive session. I trust that you have had the opportunity to review your minutes from our last meeting. Do I have a motion that we accept those minutes as presented?

So move motion by Miss Griffin, second by Miss Bishop. All in favor? Thank you. And those are so ordered. We have no pre presentations tonight, so we will move directly in our into our old business section. Ordinance 20265 dissolving the Pinsonville Special Tax District. Miss Stephanie Dorne, our treasurer. Chairman and Council, I'll take all five of the upcoming items. These are special tax districts that have not had any activity on them for some time. And so we are asking that you dissolve them as they are no longer uh needed. Any questions? Do we need to vote on these individually?

Yes. But these individually as the as the attorneys Stephanie, sorry, have we had any additional calls since then from these um homeowner associations or anything? No, sir. We haven't. the the only one which you all uh voted to deny uh the dissolution was on Spring Lake, right? I spoke with Mr. Moore yesterday. He said that he has three commissioners, but we haven't been presented with those names yet. Um I told him that we needed to get those so we could have them on your next agenda. Um Britney in my office was going to reach out to him to see if she could uh track those down.

Okay. He called me this he called me this week and I told him we would need those prior to our next meeting and he he's trying to work out the issue related to the ownership of the pond which I offered what assistance I could but I'm not going to give legal advice either. So understood. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Going back to ordinance 202605 dissolving Pinsonville Special Tax District. What is your pleasure? Motion to approve. Second. Motion to approve. Denial. Second by Mr. Alison. All in favor? No. No. No. Not deny. Not denial. Approve. Approve. Approve.

Excuse me. Excuse me. Let's do that again. 202609. Excuse me, I'm wrong again. I'm moving my page. 202605 Penssonville Special Tax District. Um, the motion is to approve the dissolution. the dissolution. Who who was my f my motion and second? Mr. Puit and Mr. Alson. Mr. Puit and Mr. Alson. All in favor? So ordered. Thank you. Pardon my confusion there. Ordinance 20260 dissolving Orchard Park. What is your pleasure? So move second. Mr. Alison, Miss Bishop. All in favor?

So ordered. Ordinance 202608 dissolving Emerald Place special tax district. What's your pleasure? I make a motion to approve. Motion by Miss Bishop. Second. Second by Mr. Alson. All in favor? So ordered. Item D, Ordinance 202609, Harborside Special Tax District. What is your pleasure? So moved, Mr. Alison. Miss Bishop. Miss, excuse me, Miss Mr. Allison, second by Miss Griffin. All in favor? So ordered. Item E, ordinance 202610, dissolving Timberlake. Council, what is your pleasure? So moved. Second.

So moved by Mr. Allison, second by Miss Miller. All in favor? That is so ordered. Thank you. We we'll now move into uh public hearings. Um after after opening Well, first let me let me ask for a motion that we open the public hearing on ordinance 202612. So move second.

Motion by Mr. Allison, second by Miss Griffin. All in favor? And we're now in the public hearing. Um, I'll ask it that first if you are in favor of this ordinance that those in favor will come up first. You will state your name and your address for the record. You'll have three minutes to speak. Um, ordinance 202612 to amend the Greenwood County zoning map as and if amended so that one parcel of land totaling approximately 1.38 acres at 1703 Calhoun Road in Greenwood County changes from R1 single family residential to C2 general commercial. Mr. Russian, are you here please? Rob Russian. Before I start, I just have a friend with me tonight. We've engaged services Mr. Eric Vincent with Carolina Municipal Services uh to assist us from a technical aspect in the planning department. Uh he's here to maybe handle some technical questions tonight. He's not as familiar with these particular ones as I am at this point, but you'll probably be seeing him in the future. Wanted him to bring along just so that we could introduce him and so that if we have any issues come up that um you'll know who you're talking with when we when you call the planning department. Uh let's see here now. So this is let me get back to my notes here. This is uh ordinance 26-12. This is 1703 Calhoun Road uh for second reading and public hearing. This is 1.38 acres currently zoned R1 single family residential. Uh the current use is vacant. Some clearing on the property has already begun. Uh the applicant has expressed an interest in commercial development and therefore the applicant is requesting to reszone to C2 general commercial.

The parcel is um bordered by C2 um to the south, R1 to the north, and I2 uh industrial or heavy industrial across the road. the future land use for this. And here's some pictures out there on Calhoun Road, which is uh DOT maintained road. It does have uh all access to all sewer, water, and gas. Um some views of the parcel on the left there. You can see uh it's already been uh partially cleared. Uh a view across the road at the uh I2 heavy industrial zone across the road. And then looking north and looking southeast on the road as well in front of the property. Uh again, future land use map. Uh it's a little hard to see, but that red square there shows that the majority of the proper the future the majority of the property um the future land use is commercial. Uh planning commission voted uh 110 in favor of resoning. And due to the future land use map being uh commercial, uh staff also uh recommends approval for this one. I can take any questions you might have.

No questions. No discussion.

Thank you, Rob. So, I'll ask now if there's anyone here in the audience that is here tonight to speak in favor of this. If you so come forward, state your name and address of the record. Seeing none. Hearing none, is there anyone here to speak in opposition to this? Okay. Then what we're we'll we're going to stay in we're going to stay within the public hearing and we're going to move now to the to the next item. So that would be item G, ordinance 202613 to amend the Greenwood County zoning map as and if amended that one parcel of land totaling 1.28 acres at 2910 Highway 702 in Greenwood County changes from RDD Rural Development to C2 general commercial. Rob and the man with the nice St. Patrick's Day tie.

I do have some green socks on. I just want to make sure that everyone knows I did wear some green today. Ordinance 26-13, 1.2 acres, currently zoned RDD. Um, rural development district. Current use uh was residential with a few mobile homes on the property. Those mobile homes have since been removed. Um, the site has been cleared. Uh, I think we have a picture of that right there. The site has been cleared. Um some partial construction has started uh but uh applicant wants to locate their business on site. Um commercial is allowed in the RDD uh zoning district. However, it's conditional on having at least 2 acres. Since this is less than two acres at 1.28 acres, um they're asking applicant is requesting to reszone to C2 commercial. Uh partial is pretty much surrounded by RDD. uh in the area. As far as use goes around it, um the Harborlike grocery store is immediately to the west. You have some agriculture across street and there's some residential uh to the east and to the northeast. Um future land use, uh low density residential. There's our future land use plan. And then uh planning commission voted 11 to zero in favor of the resoning and staff's approval or staff's recommendation to planning commission uh was for approval. Um however, we're currently reviewing some of our um uh procedures in the office and how we recommend projects. So again, the future land use uh map is low low density residential. I can take any questions you might have.

Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Mr. Alson, if I'm correct, there is a commercial building right beside this propert. Yes, Harbor Light. This this parcel was split. I understand that the Harbor Light um grocery store was on the parcel. They split the parcel, putting Harbor Lightite on one with the remainder 1.28 28 acres left with the intention of putting this other business on the site. So, the historical use of the parcel as a whole has been has been commercial. Thank you, sir. So, I will now ask if you're here to speak in favor of ordinance 202613, please come forward, state your name and address for the record. Yes, sir. Please.

Good evening. And um I I want my green as well. Just don't want to show it. But um yeah, so my name is Ken Jurgens, 107 Port Royal Drive. Um this is my business I'm proposing to put on this property. Um I would like to add that this was it has been commercial based since 1952. It was part of that parcel that we bought together. Did not know when we split it that it was going to be that we needed two acres in order to have a commercial business there. Um there is residential around it. I did bring a flash drive with some pictures on. I'd be glad to install and show everybody if we need be. But the the home directly beside it is is a cinder block slum house and has been for 40 or 50 years. There's been lots of trouble there. The owner of that property has already approached me about buying that, which I intend to do when I can. Um either to tear it down or, you know, bring it back up to standard. Um of these seven lots, you know, three or four on each side going up and down. There's basically one residence which is the farthest from me. And then there are homes, but it is a barnaminium, a barnaminium, a barnaminium, and another business that are there. So what what I'm proposing to build is a engineered metal building that matches the motif of everything else that's going on in that area. And that I just hope everybody would give me the good graces of allowing us to do this.

Okay. Thank you very much, council. No questions of Ken before he sits down. Thank you. Okay. I will now ask if anyone here to speak in objection to this ordinance. Please come forward. Seeing none, thank you. will move to ordinance uh H 26-14 to amend the Greenwood County zoning map as and if amended so that portions of three parcels land totaling approximately 11.74 acres at 2056, 2070 and 2010 Monagu Avenue extension in Greenwood County changed from C2 general commercial to MPR master planned residential. Rob.

So, this is um there's actually three parcels here and the parcels are split zoned as you can see in that picture there. The front of the three parcels are zoned uh C2 commercial or general commercial. Um the rear of the three properties which totals 4.42 acres are zoned as R1. Uh this these three parcels were brought before council um back in uh 2022 to be reszoned at that time to multifamily residential. Council denied the application at that time. They have reformulated a plan now and have brought back a uh a different plan. The site is currently vacant and wooded. Uh the applicant has submitted a potential site plan uh for residential and the applicant is requesting to reszone the 11.74 acres which is the commercial part or the front of the these three parcels and leave the R1 zoning on the back of these three parcels. So again, it will still be split zone afterwards. the front of the of the um three parcels. Uh they're requesting to reszone to MPR master planned residential. And just to give some highlights of that particular plan, they are asking for a maximum density of four units per acre, a minimum lot area of 7,000 square ft, a minimum lot width of 52 foot. However, the majority lots in there will be over 60 foot wide according to their their conceptual plan. Uh minimum front setback of 20 feet, minimum side setbacks of 5T, and minimum rear set back of 30 ft. These uh designations roughly mimic an R3

zone with some tightening up of setbacks and the minimum lot area. So, um it is a fairly low density residential uh plan. Um again, the back of the lots would remain R1. Uh looking at the current zoning around it, you can see from the map up there, there is commercial across the street and to the north and to the south and then again the R1 uh to the rear of the parcels. Uh let's see what else. Uh current use around them is a mix of commercial and residential and the future land use is low density residential. So that would match uh their plan. Staff did recommend approval and it was approved by uh planning commission I believe 11 to zero. Uh there's a look up the street from in front of the property across the street. Um there's some residential and some some mixed use there. Uh parcel itself again is wooded. Looking north from the parcels, looking south up and down there. A little hard to see, but on the right hand side you can see the beginnings of what is the uh the uh former um plaza there as well as food line on the same side of the road. Um all the utilities are available to the parcel, water, gas and sewer. Um and again that future land use shows it as low density residential. Um there is a uh I guess conceptual plan of the um MPR with the front um in pink that what would been the the C2 commercial part and then again the rear of it remaining in the R1. Again, another 39 lots in the C2 zone portion uh with the rest of the lots in

the rear of the lot. Those are the setbacks. Again, the four units per acre, 7,000 square foot, 52 foot minimum lot width, 25 and 30 as the setbacks. Forgot I had that in there. And we'll go back here. Any questions you might have, Mr. Chairman? Yes, Mr. Rob, I just want to clarify a couple of things is that um the back portion is being proposed as as nine R1 lots and then the NPR portion is I think 39 MPR lots. Correct. Correct. according to

it's currently the the the front half that they want to reszone to NPR that's currently zoned C2 and if I read your notes correctly C2 allows for multif family apartments homes and could possibly if it were to could possibly hold up to 140 units. Is that correct? I I'm not clear 140 units, but I will tell you that the density that they're requesting is four units per acre. The potential density under their current zoning is 12 units per acre. So, they could develop with up to 12 units per acre. They're asking for four units per acre. So, they're asking for onethird of what it currently could be developed at.

That was what was that was my question. Thank you. I know you asked last time. I went back and researched a little bit more and wanted to give you the maximum density for what it could be at its current zoning. In its current zoning, it could be up to 12 units per acre. And Rob, I believe when I wrote down and took a look in the past week on the street that's on the northern end. So the larger homes in this in this proposal would be built nearest to the other existing homes behind it. Right. So, so in consideration of neighbors, I think that's a good plan. It would back up to Lockxley Hall, right?

Correct. The rear portion would be the larger lots, the presumably larger houses that would match uh the the residential development on the backside Lockxley Hall. Correct. Okay. Thank you. Any other comments? Yes, ma'am. I have an educational question for me. When something is splitzoned, if I look at a lot, how in the world did it become a splitzoned lot? What was it originally? two different lots and then somebody combined them. How did this actually create this scenario? It

it's a variety of issues. It could be a a taxing line they went down, a district line that went down. It could be a a a former property line. Typically see former property lines. Sometimes it's errors in maps when it was zoned. They just used a the wrong line to to set up the zoning. But a lot of times it is either combining or splitting of parcels previously. I don't know that this is the case here. I'm not sure what is the case here. Just curiosity. Yeah. Thank you. Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Mr. Alson,

if I may, u just looking at it and and and I think like other members of council, I have gotten some calls and concerns from the folks in Lockxley Hall about the development. And I noticed that you have done the larger lots leaving at R1, which should be the same as what Lockxley Hall is. Is that correct? I I would refer that to the developer. I believe they're here tonight uh and they can speak to that during the public hearing, but yes. Yeah, I believe the intention was compatible to what's there.

Correct. My question is, and this is just me individually questioning, had there been any conversations of making those lots the same size as the C2 and putting a nice buffer between the two subdivisions? Has that been considered? Has anybody talked about that? Would that suffice some of the concerns with the existing neighborhood if if those lots back there were shallower and there was a nice wooded left buffer separating the two? That's the first thing I thought of when I saw it tonight. I don't know if there's been any conversations uh to that or if that would be something possible. I don't know. I'm just looking at the map. the the reszoning tonight, the NPR is on the front half of the of the project.

We're not talking about we're not talking about reszoning the the back half. It's staying as R1. Uh for the purpose of the resoning tonight, you're you're just looking at the front half of the of the project. The the conceptual plan of the entire neighborhood is being proposed as as part of the NPR, but again, we're reszoning the front half. I believe the developer's here tonight if you want to speak with tonight. I have not any had any conversations with the developer about that possibility. And the MPR is exactly what we're looking at or could that change for the

MPR is is exactly what you're looking at. What is those requirements in there? They'll be held to for the for the development of the properties. This is unlike your typical resoning where you're just changing the zoning and a conceptual plan really doesn't mean anything. This is actually a they'll be held to those standards in that MPR. Now the exact layout of the you can make minor changes to it. Laws doesn't come to a major change to that. They would not have to come back to you to make minor changes on the layout stuff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, ma'am. Miss Bishop, what type of homes would be going on this

property? I believe this plan is single family detached, but again I'll I'll let the developer speak to that. Okay. Because I did receive some calls too and that was that was a a question that you know the citizens had too. So I was just curious about that as well. Again, this the MPR if it's not listed in the NPR, they're not held to that standard. So um you know, we look at some concept plans from time to time. Again, those can change what's in the NPR as far as text goes is the is the overriding factor.

Thank you, council. Any further questions or comments? Thank you, Rob. Appreciate it. So, I will now ask if there's anyone here that is intending in uh to speak in favor of this, please come forward, state your name and address for the record. Danny Gettis, 100 Cottonwood Court, North Augusta, South Carolina. I'm the development manager with Keystone Homes. Um staff covered all the details of this, but I want to fill you in a little bit about our company for those of you that don't know us. Um we're Augusta based. We're about 25 employees. Primarily, we've built we built about 7,000 houses in our 30-year history. Um primarily in the Augusta area. We've been in Greenwood for about five years. Um, and have expanded down to South Georgia a little bit in the last five or 10 years as well. Um, we're currently building in two neighborhoods in Greenwood, Brierwood and Sagewood. Uh, we developed Brierwood and are and are building homes in there right now. Um, this development, the way we've laid it out, we feel like it's a much better fit for the adjacent subdivision, the adjacent neighbors. Um, it's going to be a good complimentary fit for for Greenwood County and and the neighbors. We will have a decorative entrance feature as shown on this plan here. We will have a homeowners association to maintain the integrity of the neighborhood which uh management company will manage under our control during the development period while we're building houses till it's substantially complete. um as we do in all of our neighborhoods. Um we wanted to keep that back R1 zone that way in the interest of the the Lockxley Hall neighbors uh to to allow a little more space, a little larger product potentially. Um the front um NPR portion that's currently C2, we intend

to have a little bit of a smaller product. Obviously with the lot sizes um that's that's all it will accommodate. Most of our homes range from 1,400 to around 3,000 square feet. Um, so we have a wide variety of of one-story plans and twotory plans in those square footage range. So I don't anticipate I being able to build these homes and sell them for the high less than the high 200s. Um, I we we would hope we could do better, but I just it's hard to tell at this point and you know being a year out from when we'd be to that point. Hopefully it's the market is what the market is and and calls are what they are. We don't know what that's going to be in a year. So um but this is not a inexpensive product going in here. Um unfortunately um uh we'd like like to make something as affordable as possible, but costs are what they are. But this is going to be a you know high 200 starting point more than likely. I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.

Council, any questions or comments from Mr. Dennis? I do have one question myself, Mr. Dennis. When I look at the aerial view of that on the backside, and I know we're not dealing tonight with the R1, and I do appreciate you're leaving it that way because I do think that serves best to the neighbors than the neighbors, but what is what generally is the vegetative buffer behind those R1 parcels? It's still I was out there today actually. It's still pretty wooded, a lot of pines from what it appeared. And our hope would be to maintain as much of that as possible and maintain a a buffer of some kind of the existing buffer. Obviously, what's there a lot of times is better than what we can plant. You know, something immediate and remains there is what we prefer. Um, but until we get into some engineering, further into some engineering and design, I can't say what that might be. Whether it's 10 ft, I don't know that number, but we would we would have every intention of trying to maintain a buffer through there.

Okay. Thank you, sir. Is there anyone else that is there anyone else that wants to speak in favor of this project? Okay, seeing none, is there anyone here tonight to speak in objection to this project? I walked through the slope. I had some rehab today. That's all right. Take your time.

I'm glad to see you council members here and I hope you have a St. Patrick's Day. A good one. Okay. My name is Jerry Robertson. I live at 604 Lockxley Drive in Lockxley Hall and I've talked to most of these council members this week. This is the third time I have been before council for reszoning or doing something to this property right here. The I want you to understand that just four years ago it came before county council and they decided to reject it. And I remember the council uh chairman then stood up and said, "Why do you want all this stuff to be in this one section of Greenwood and it's getting loaded right there?" And so they denied that thing. And I've looked at this right here and looked at the number of houses going in there. Uh it's going to badly affect Lockxley Hall. Where you think it won't, it will. When they build this up, I will standing in my backyard right now. I see trees and everything, but when they finish, I'm gonna see an asphalt jungle and I'm going to see a set of housings built up there that's going to affect Lockley Hall. And I can see problems with traffic there. I can see that you put that many housing developments right there opening up a probably 300 different cars will be running on that road every day different from what is now. I really see a problem on 25 with traffic. It's just seems like it's going to be a mess there. But what

I wanted to really say was I think I urge you to maintain the current C2 zoning or at the very least deny this high density R1 plan and until a more appropriate loader lower impact transition can be designed that respects the residents who are already there. I don't think we have anything against something being built there. It's just what is going to be built there and I want to be see something that won't affect this area of Greenwood that bad. I noticed the traffic in Lockley Hall already is real bad because you can't hardly get out. Those are some of the things I see and fundamentally it's going to change the character of Roxer Hall. It's a nice neighborhood and it's been there since 1969. Also don't want to remind you that the zoning of this property, not necessarily does it affect the property that much, but for 59 57 years, nobody has wanted to reszone or build anything on there. It has been the same zoning for 57 years. And evidently, I don't know about the council, but everybody involved can look at it and say, "For some reason, they have denied it up to now." And I can see why. If you take them yellow houses up there, the yellow area up there, they're going to be sort of real like a real house.

I don't see you renting those things no time soon. You're going to be facing a bunch of apartments. You've exceeded your time, but I think we understand what your concerns are. Okay. Um, uh, council, do you have any questions or comments to Mr. Jerry before he sits down? I do have one one question. You, Mr. Jerry. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Come back. Come back, please. You made a comment during your your three minutes there. You said it's going to create an asphalt jungle. The the resoning takes it from commercial to residential, as you've heard. Yes. So, am I to understand that you would prefer if a grocery store got built on that property?

No, not really. Because that would be an asphalt jungle. Yes. Yes. Yes. I just see in this area a lot of traffic in that neighborhood is going to affect Lockxley Hall. And another good point to bring out is they've got to construct all this. And the people on the back side of Lockxley Hall is going to hear big machinery, skill saws, and hammers for probably up to a year. And our major, all our electrical lines, and if they run on the back side of that, it's underground. I'm very skilled, we're going to be without the power and out internet and stuff for a good while.

All right, sir. Thank you. I understand. Appreciate you being here. Thank you. All right, council. That will end our Well, there may be ask if there's anybody else. Maybe more people want to speak. I'm sorry, Will. You want to speak? Yeah. Sorry.

So, I butt up to the R1. My name's William Co and I live at 612 L, Drive. There's six of us that border what y'all going to put nine houses on. So, I have I I know you got to build something on the piece of property, but that's what 50 houses on was that 16 acres. 48 houses on 16 acres. I just can't picture it. That's so just under 12 acres.

Okay. Just under 12 acres. They're going to have almost 50 houses on just over 12 acres. my lot which is right where that one is where it says R1 straight behind it is more than 3/4 of an acre. I don't it's it's unfathomable to me to see such small little lots that's going to that's going to kill our property value. That's what scares me. I'm not trying to be there forever, but I do want I don't want to lose money. That's that's that's why I'm here. Any comments, questions, will

Thank you, Will. All right. Anyone else?

How you doing? Good. How about you? Good. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, Robbie. I spoke with you. My name is Jimmy McCutchen. Yes, ma'am. We've spoken a couple of times.

Yes, sir. I live at 106 to Faler Square. That's in a culde-sac that is a little bit further around our one there. I live if I look out my back door, I can see the trailer park. And uh when I moved there 33 years ago, they had built a big wood fence 8 foot high. Look lovely. Didn't take long. Those children just busted that sucker down. I put that thing back up again. Right back down. I couldn't keep affording to keep putting it back up. That's a lot of money. So, I point planted some shrubs that deterred them a little bit. But to this day, I have a path through my property where they came in and out, in and out, in and out. I didn't stop them because I didn't want retaliation. I didn't want these children stealing my things. said, "If I let them alone, they pretty much left me alone." But I'm older now. I let my dogs out at 2:00 in the morning. I don't want to have to go out in my backyard with a gun. I want to be a safe I want to feel safe where I live. Nobody's brought this issue up, but there will be traffic. There will be foot traffic. They will come through. And if you can't stop this project for the sake of our community, I'm asking for a concrete one, not a not a wood fence. I would love a concrete wall all the way down. And I would love at least 20 to 25 ft of woods between that R1 and my house because it's going to come right in my back my yard. I know. I've looked at these woods for 33 years. I know exactly where my property line is. You go over the dirt. I'm sure you were there today. You step over the dirt and there I am. And my my my I have an acre

lot. These lots in those little red, they're going to be less than a quarter of an acre. That That's absurd. That doesn't in any way to me show a county residence. It shows me a city residence, but not a county. We have a little yard. We could have a chicken if we wanted to. You couldn't have a chicken there.

You couldn't have anything there. You know, it's it's ridiculous to put this many houses in this small space. It It really really is. And I really feel like the fire, the police, the ambulance, the water, we already they've been sending me letters for five years to cut my power through peak hours. Well, no, I won't do that because I don't want to live in 90 degrees in my house. I'll pay for it. But Duke Power, they may say they have the resources, but they don't. Or why would they be asking me for the last five years to do this? They really don't. I guess that meant my time's up.

It is, ma'am. Thank you. I don't want I don't want to offend anyone. I don't want to take up any more time than necessary. No, I No, stay just one minute, Mrs. Gussian. I assure you you didn't offend anyone. Council, any questions or comments to Miss McCussen, before she takes her seat. Um, yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you, ma'am. Appreciate you.

Is there anyone else? Hello. Good afternoon. H my name is Athena Hagood. I live at 103 Trafalogar Square. Um I just have some of the same concerns that my neighbors have. I'm worried about That's a lot of homes. Uh I know something's going to go back there eventually and I mean I would prefer it to be a neighborhood definitely. um just not quite so many homes. Um I'm worried about the infrastructure. You know, we've got a couple of schools around the area with that many more homes. I mean, how is that going to affect, you know, the school, the police, the fire department? Um how is it going to affect the traffic in that area? Right there at North Side Drive in Calhoun, that red light right there, we already have a lot of traffic accidents. Um and how is it going to affect our property value? That's it. All right,

council questions. Any questions? Miss Hood. Miss Hood, thank you for being here. Um, Susan, um, I do want to go back, Miss McCuten, when you were talking about some of the things that you were interested in, I would encourage you to speak to Mr. Dennis, who's here, the developer who's here. Um, might be a good idea for you for that to do. Um, if there if there is no one else, I'll uh No one else speaking. I'm sorry. We do have an email that needs to be read into the record. Thank you, Miss McIntyre. Go ahead, please.

All right. This one is from uh Dana Gonzalez, and it's not in favor or opposition. Just a note. Um, I am not opposed to the reszoning of these parcels, but I would like to have certain concerns on record regarding potential water runoff during the after during and after development of the NPR. Next to the parcels mentioned in the ordinance is Wildwood Estates Mobile Home Park, Spring Lake subdivision, then Ponderosa Heights subdivision. The head the headwaters of Turner Branch are in Spring Lake and then the creek passes through Ponderosa Heights part of which is flood plane. Some residents of Ponderosa Heights have issues with flooding with runoff from the surrounding neighborhoods. There is an open pipe which collects runoff from the mobile home park and flows directly into Turner Branch. When we have heavy rain, the flow turns into a waterfall. Supposedly, this pipe is grandfathered in, so nothing can be done about it. The residents of Ponderosa Heights would like to make sure that there will not be any increase in water flow or silk deposits in the creek due to development on surrounding properties. We would appreciate being kept in the loop about our concerns. Sincerely, Dana Gonzalez on 215 Ronnie Drive, Greenwood.

Thank you, Miss McIntyre. I'll ask now for a motion, please, that we close public hearing. So move. Motion by Miss Griffin. Second. Second by Miss Miller. All in favor. We've exited our public hearing. So now council, we will we will vote we will vote these individually beginning with beginning with ordinance 2612, 1703 Calhoun Road. Council, what is your pleasure? I'm going to make a motion to approve. Have a motion to approve by Miss Miller. I second.

Have a second by Miss Bishop. All in favor of approval. That's unanimous and so ordered. Ordinance 202613. Council, what is your pleasure? That's 29 10 Highway 702. Motion to approve. Have a motion approved by the vice chairman. Second. A second by Miss Miller. All in favor? And that is unanimous. And so ordered. Ordinance 202614, 20 uh 56, 2070, and 2110 Monu Avenue Extension as was just presented. Council, what is your pleasure?

Offer a motion to approve. Have a motion to approve by Mr. Allison. I'm going to second it. Miss Miller is second. All in favor? Want to ask questions? Yes. Excuse me. Could if you if you would um I want to clarify for everybody. Maybe have Mr. Russian clarify. The R1 is not being reszoned tonight. It's already R1. That developer could come in today and do what he's asking to do on that R1 section. Is that correct? That is correct.

Okay. the section down below that is currently C2 and I think Mr. Tempton asked this earlier and I want everybody to hear it. The developer could come in today and put uh 12 units per acre. I think that's what I'm hearing. That is correct. And his proposal is to go in with four per acre. Correct. Okay. I just want maybe everybody to understand what's happening here.

Thank you for the clarification. So, so as you just stated, a third of the allowable density in what is being requested of us today if we approve this. And as I mentioned earlier to Mr. Jerry, you could build a grocery store there if you wanted to. I'm trying to put myself in the place of the Lley Hall residents. Any other comments or questions? Council, what it we have we have a motion and a second.

Motion is to approve. All in favor of approval? Any opposed? So that's approved 61. We'll move now in this segment of new business. Consideration of the authorization of the full amount of funding available for the North Greenwood Industrial Park from 2016 capital project sales tax to be applied toward the North Greenwood Industrial Park phase 2 site development and spec building project. Mr. James Baitman, our economic development director, will present that please. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening, members of council. Uh, we are asking council to authorize, as you read into, Mr. chairman, the the full amount of funding available for the North Korean Industrial Park and that funding comes from the 2016 capital project sales tax sale of your first speculative building built from uh that project and from grant dollars. And that full budget amount is approximately 11.4 million. And the current cost for the phase two site development and second spec building project is approximately $10.3 million. The full amount that we're asking to be applied leaves a remaining balance of approximately $1 million. We would also ask for your vote authorized for the the manager, attorney, and deputy manager finance to negotiating contracts and for manager to execute those contracts within that $1 million. that enables us to produce a cost-effective, high quality and marketable industrial product for future industries to locate.

Thank you, James. Mr. Chairman, I'll offer you a motion to approve. Yes. Have an off second. Motion by Mr. Allison, second by Miss Bishop. We've had conversation on this before. A motion to approve. All in favor? That's unanimous and so ordered. Thank you, James. Item B, discussion regarding the change of the county's waste tire policy to respond to new legislation at the state level regarding this issue. County manager, deputy county manager, Mr. Russian, please.

I appreciate council's time on this issue tonight. Um, as part of our normal budget process, we recently submitted uh changes to our fee schedule which prompted a discussion on our waist tire policy. Um the current tire policy is governed at the state level by a couple of state laws. Uh the first state law was established in 1993. So it goes back uh quite a few years. It was revised again in 2015 and then this past legislative session last year. Uh it was revised once again. So in 2025 they they changed some significant parts of the legislation which prompted us to start looking at our tire policy. Um but essentially since 1993 it's been illegal to dispose of a whole tire in a landfill. Uh this was meant to encourage recycling uh of those tires and we have been doing that for um the better part of a a couple decades I believe out there at the landfill. Um the state legislator said it they set a solid waste excise tax on on waist tires at $2 per tire. So essentially when a retailer puts a new tire on the car, uh they have to pay department revenue $2 per tire that they put on. And then the tire that they take off, uh they essentially can bring that out to the landfill. They've paid the solid waste excise tax. They show us a receipt for have having paid that tax and we let them dispose of it at no cost according to uh the program. I put up there the what that $2 per tire works out to. Tire is roughly the average passenger tires are roughly 22 and a half pounds. Uh so you come up with a cost of when the retailer pays that $2 per tire fee or that tax, they're roughly paying about $180 per ton of tires uh in in taxes. Uh part of this tax is returned directly to the county department of revenue makes a

quarterly dispers dispersement to us. Uh and then part is distributed in the form of grants through the county through dehack or currently named dees. So between those two um up until a few years ago that fully covered our recycling expenses. Uh the cost to recycle a ton of tires was less than $180 a ton. They had built a nice savings down there in Columbia, the grant programs and they were f completely funding our recycling activities. So our program essentially was a net zero operation. Over the last three years though um we started seeing shortfalls. The grant money has dried up. They weren't collecting as much. Costs for recycling tires went up. In fiscal year 24 we realized in our program a net loss of 39 almost $40,000. fiscal 25 that ballooned to $122,000. And then in for fiscal year 26, uh due to some of the way we did the grants, we we minimize some of those losses and it's projected we're going to lose about $57,000. So over the last three years, we have lost a significant amount of money on our waste tire program. Uh the reason why the law was changed last year is because the county started lobbying the state legislature that we had started losing money on these programs. No longer was this this program um supporting itself through the tax and counties were now bearing the burden of an unfunded mandate essentially that you couldn't you couldn't waste tires into a landfill. Um currently our cost to recycle tires is about $330 a ton. So the retailer is paying a tax that equates to about $180 a ton. It's costing us $330 a ton. So there's a huge difference there between them. Reviewing our current policy, if a retailer shows that they paid the solid waste tax on a tire, they bring receipts

out there. It's called an ST390 form. Our scale clerk has to go through it. How many tires you have, how many tires you pay, it it's a complicated process, but if they bring that paperwork out to us by law, we cannot charge them for dis anymore for disposal under the current policy. that was changed in the law last uh uh year, last May, I think it was. So, but currently if they bring that receipt in, the county accepts the tire at no cost. If the solid waste tax is not paid, meaning they they don't have their paperwork, they don't have the proper paperwork and they don't have paid enough tax for the tires that they bring out there, the county charges $150 per ton. That $150 was a capped cost set by the state law. We couldn't charge any more than that. So again, we were either charging nothing if they had paid their tax or $150 if they showed us they paid their tax. An exception to that policy is our residents. We do have a policy where they can dispose of small amounts of tires free of charge. Again, the division of state law allows us to charge even if the tax was paid. Our state legislators, while we had lobbyed them to increase the fee in the current program, they decided not to do that. What they decided instead it give us the option to increase fees at the county level. Didn't want to do it at state level, but they allowed us to do it at the county level.

Yes, I find that humorous as well. Um, however, so the revision state law essentially allows us to charge even if they have paid the tax up to $150 additional per ton when they come out to the landfill for disposal. Coincidentally, if they don't pay the taxes, we can charge up to $400 a ton. That is a huge number, but we're not proposing to use that number. So, um, we'll look at what our proposed policy to council will be. Regardless if the taxes are paid, we won't ask for receipts anymore. We won't ask for any type of paperwork. Essentially, what what our numbers show is that you bring tires out there as a retailer, will charge you $140 per ton. This would bring the program back into paying for itself. So the $140 a ton we'd collect at the scale house, the grants that we're eligible for from DHECK, and the automatic refund we get from the do from taxes paid within the county would bring us to a net zero amount in our estimation at this time. So everyone would pay. This is a change from what it's been because a lot of our retailers, they pay the tax, they get bring it to us free. Now, they will be required to pay the tax and then pay us at the landfill as well the balance of what it takes to recycle the tires, which in our estimation right now is $140 a ton. That's what we have submitted in our fee proposal. We'd also uh have a uh in the policy that residents can dispose up to four tires per month free of charge and those are our low volume users, those that pay the landfill fee out there. So, we believe this will bring us back to net zero. Just some quick pros of the policy change. Program goes back to paying for itself. Less paperwork for our scale clerks. No longer are we trying to count tires, trying to look at receipts,

trying to match up all that. Very clear for our retailers and everybody to, you know, as far as what exactly they'll pay when they come out there. Um, and then a clear understanding of our disposal rate in general. The cons of the policy. This is a substantial increase in cost to many of our tire retailers. They're going to have to pay both their tax and the amount when they come out to the scale house. Again, all we're doing is covering the cost. For the last three years, the county has bore that burden of the difference in cost and our retailers have been paying substantially less than what it takes us to recycle. This would bring us in line that we uh essentially net zero. The bigger question I think and our our litter prevention c uh coordinator has already you know had many discussion would this increase the likelihood of tires being dumped or stockpiled. It could but I think the retailers that are currently paying their taxes and bringing out um they're already doing the right thing. I think the smaller guys that are paying a lot of the smaller guys just pay the 150 already. It would actually be a break for them. Um many of their other counties are considering the $400 per ton uh which would cover uh the complete cost of their recycling and there a little way different ways they're doing things. Some of them don't have landfills and that affects their decision but again I think this is the best uh decision for us. Um I will bring back a policy a formal policy at a future meeting. Um but wanted to give council heads up what that policy is let you have input here on the front side. Um, if you don't support this or you want to see something else in the policy um that when we bring it back, tried to keep that short and simple. It's a complicated subject, but we'll take any questions you might have.

Well, you're just washing out your $150 a ton loss right now. I mean, you're you're just zeroing out roughly that $150 a ton loss right now. We've done a lot of calculations as far as what grant money we typically would be eligible for. We're just looking to get back to zero on the program. Now, that does not count the cost of the work our scale clerks do, equipment cost to move tires, the building that we house tires in. This is strictly just to cover our contractor cost, what we pay the recycler to recycle the tires. There's no other cost in there that we're looking to get to zero for except for that cost. Everything else is included kind of in our normal operations. This is just to cover the cost of the contractor cost to recycle the tires.

Understood. So, Dane.

Yep. Thank you. So, just an example, I go and get four tires changed on my vehicle, throw them in the back. I can go straight to the landfill. I'm not going to the scale or nothing. There's going to be a bin or so. All all tires go across the scales. We we record all all tires. We don't accept tires at any of our convenience centers. So, yes, you bring them out to landfill. You go across the scales. You tell them what your address is. I'm Dane Puit. here's my address. They look you up on on the system to be sure you're a resident of the county. You own the address you're at. You therefore pay a landfill fee and you can dump four tires for free per month. You as you pass the scales. Yes.

I just wanted to get an example of that um to make sure. Okay. Mr. Chair. Yes sir. M to Mr. Prut's question. That's exactly what's going to happen is the tire man tire stores going to tell you, I'll sell you these tires, but you take your old ones with you and you going to take them. That's what I would do, right? If I was the tire man, I would tell you, I'll put your tires on at this price, provided you haul them because you can take them there free. They're going to charge me, right? So, pay me extra money and I'll take them or you can take them. you're probably going to take them for free, right?

So, I don't think it's going to solve the issue. And I do have concerns with the stockpiling. I have a problem that what's going to happen as the litter coordinator apparently seems to have some concerns and and then my concern is John Doe go get some chain. He gets his tires chains. The tire man says, "You take them." And then he just throws them off on side the road. I I see this as becoming an issue. I understand the negative impact costwise, but I have some real concerns about this personally.

So, couple things in that example. First of all, the tire retailer has to pay the tax on the tires he sells. Then he'll have to pay when he comes out to landfill. He's not avoiding all the fees. He still has to pay the tax, but he's avoiding the fee. You have to pay the scale. If he gives them to the individual, individual can bring them out. The second thing is right now that loss that we're taking is being subsidized essentially by the individuals paying the landfill fee. If we if we can't solve this, eventually that ends up with the individual paying for it through, you know, your your normal landfill fees. to me that getting to the point where the people who are generating the waste or paying for the waste is the is the option here. You're right. We all have concerns about dumping tires um you know something that we've had to deal with when we went to, you know, this program of charging a fee. We thought it was going up for undocumented tires for um we haven't seen that increase. In fact, I think we've seen probably an overall net decrease in the amount of tires that are out there. We still get the onesies and twzies, but we don't see the large stock piles. Um, but yes, it's a concern that we need to we need to be aware of.

So, you're not asking us to vote on anything. You're just going to bring us a proposal. You're going to bring us a proposal for us to consider. I'm going to bring you a policy for you to for you to consider, for you to actually vote on. I've already submitted the fee for $140 for all tires. That's part of the the budget process. So, you know, if you have concerns, you want to see differences in that policy and what I've outlined here tonight, you know, that this is an opportunity for you to voice those concerns or have some discussions with us further to guide that the that policy. Thank you, Rob. Yes. Go ahead.

I was just going to offer a suggestion. Yes, you asked for. So, if and again, I can't speak for anybody here voting for or against. It's not that, but a suggestion would be definitely looking at a phased in approach. uh with the timeline with um Miss Abby being able to get the word out and make everyone aware whether it's 3 months, 6 months, whatever. I would I would definitely like to see if something is going in that direction to give, you know, a gracious amount of time to allow the vendors that it will affect um time to be aware and adjust.

Sorry. Yes, ma'am. And one last question. Could you go back two slides, please, Mr. Russian? I think it's where you talked about what it was then and what it is now. And it the people who were paying the $2 now per tire, the retailers, what I call them, then when they bring their load out, they're paying the $150 a ton. No, if if they they get it free.

They they bring it for free. They dump for free at the landfill if they have proof of pay taxes. So on the ST9 on the forms that the do has when you pay your tax, some of them pay monthly, quarterly. I think they have to pay monthly now, but they bring the form in that shows they paid the taxes. On that form, it shows how many tires they pay tax for. So if they pay taxes on 100 100 tires at $2 a tire, that's $200 that they've paid. They bring that form to us and when they hand that form to us that we allow them to dump 200 tires free of charge. So, we we don't go out there and count the tires, by the way. We take a look at and say, "Yeah, that looks like about 200 tires." I mean, it's it's not feasible to count.

But the people who were not paying the $2 per tire, they could be paying the $2 per tire. They don't have proof. And by law, they have to pay the $2 per tire, but not all of them keep good records and not all of them produce those records to us. Okay? And some of them just choose to pay the $150 a tire with no proof of paid of taxes. So your your proposal is to reduce that to 140 for for those pe well the 140 is a strict calculation for what we think we need to break even. We thought about charging everybody $150

but by those calculations we'd actually have an excess and we didn't want the program to generate more money than what we had. So when we did all the calculations it comes out to 140. And the reason why it comes out to 140 is because between the do numbers and the grants, we actually probably get back a little bit more than what is paid in. But on the proposal, I'm understanding what we do now. The proposal is to do what? $140 for everybody who comes out there regard and they don't show us any receipts at all. Okay. So, the guy who has his receipt for $2 is going to be charged the 140. And the guy who doesn't have a receipt for $2 per tire is going to be charged the 140. We're rewarding bad behavior. Is that what you're saying?

I'm kind of getting to Is that what we're saying though? It's I don't understand why we're giving the people the same rate when this guy has proof that he paid his and this one doesn't. That would be my concern before we proceed.

The the the receipt taking the receipts, figuring out the receipts and giving proper credit is an absolute nightmare. Um it's not tracked very well by the retailers. um the information they give us is is hard to verify and um we spend a lot of time sitting there uh explaining the program to people, especially your smaller retailers, what they should have, what they don't. Um and we don't feel like we're doing a job verifying it. What we want to get to is something simple and easy. And the 140 is the number that is a strict calculation for us to break even. After a couple years or phase in approach, it might be 150 or 130, but it's it's our calculation for what it actually costs us. And that is that is assuming that they pay the $2 and the and the revenue comes back to us through the programs and that they're also paying the 140 at the scales. But if I understand correctly, the state is giving us that $2 to do just that.

Correct. If we participate in the program, we get the money from the department of revenue. If we don't participate in the program, we do not get the money for So the recommendation is we don't participate in the program. No, we we participate in the program by accepting tires. Okay? You either accept them or you don't. If you don't accept tires for disposal, then you're not eligible for the DOR funds or the grant money. So, by accepting tires at the landfill, we're eligible for the program. We get the do money, we get the grant money, we balance it out with what at scale house.

Rob, I understand we don't have to take any action on this tonight, and I know we've kind of talked this to death, but I do absolutely agree with Mr. pro it that at at such time whatever the decision a council is that we need we need a good communications plan on this Abby for getting this out now I'm going to ask a question that you're probably going to hate me for asking but since clearly this makes our work easier at the landfill saves a lot of time people can do other things should there be some consideration to the to the payee that if it is creating that benefit for us that maybe we go a a little less on these fees.

I I'm open to any again the 140 was a calculation. If council wants to go lower, we take a hit on part of the program, we can do that. But again, that hit comes from some other revenue source. It's either coming from understood. You know, the individual paying the fee or the or the retailer coming across scales. Mr. Chairman, real quick, I'm promise done. Do you have any data that you could give us on how many of these retailers there are and how many I mean is is is see how many people we're talking about how many tires are we talking about? Yeah, it it's a couple dozen.

It's not hundreds. It's a couple dozen that we deal with out there. um I can provide a list of um accounts that uh people who are who are doing it and bringing you the receipts and you know I'd like to I would like to see that just kind of see who they are and and because I do agree that kind of what what you said but anyway I know we're going to thank you for your time and all right Rob next item C consideration of proposed road list for CTC funding please sir

so every here. Uh we come to you with a list of CTC roads um for consideration uh to submit to the county transportation committee to consider funding for resurfacing. Uh the county transportation committee or CTC is traditionally um when I first got here um to Greenwood County, they were giving us about $400,000 a year um due to some one-time money from the legislation over the last several years. uh and we've gone anywhere from 1 million up to 2 million back to 1 million back to 2 million. Uh this year we expect less than 1 million in funding just from the available funds that they have. They didn't have the onetime money or as much of the onetime money from the state legislature. So we're expecting somewhere around a million dollars uh probably a little less than a million dollars total in funding from the CTC. Of course, the CTC allocates these funds. They get from the state um state gas tax. A certain percentage of the funds that they get has to be go to DOT roads. Uh but the rest of those funds go to uh local governments, ourselves, the city, 96 where Scholes have all received and the town of Troy has all received funds from the CTC in the last five or six years or so. Um we're we put together this list every year as kind of a um it's a little bit of a worst first, but it also considers where the road is at type of traffic gets that sort of thing. Um this is the list in the priority that we are recommending this year. uh while we submit it to CTC in prior in priority wise uh when we bid the work uh we'll go by that priority but from time to time we may have a road that we move up and down on this list just in the amount of funding that we get. So say we we end up with right at a million dollars. We can't get number 14 on our list, but we can squeeze in number 16 on our list because it's a little bit less. We may make some minor changes, but pretty much

we try to stick to this priority uh when we're funded by CTC. So that's the list there. It's a working list. Most of these list roads you have seen previous years. We take what's off the top. We move everything up. We re-evaluate the list. What's gotten worse? What's gotten can still wait? Um that sort of thing. And we adjust the list on an annual basis. But a lot of these list, most of these roads are on previous lists. Um we've worked down to um these particular roads and would ask your consideration for funding. Mr. Chairman, I make a motion to approve. Second. Have a motion by Miss Bishop, second by Mr. Templeton. Any comments or questions? I have one.

Mr. Wait, Mr. Manager. I wait for council. When council's done, I like before you take a vote to say Okay, Mr. You want to go first? Thank you. I'd ask Mr. um I'd ask Mr. Russian and Mr. Chapel this question and because it's something I brought up before I want to bring it up again. The CTC is comprised of how many members? Uh currently six members but can have up to seven. Uh their charter says seven members. Yes. Okay. There's one vacancy currently.

Right. And Mr. Chapel confirmed for me that that is not a position that we recommend but the legislative delegation recommends. I think at all times we should do our best to have representation because we have seven districts and I just think we need to ask the delegation to fill that spot because I think it's been vacant for a little bit of a time and considering you know we always put on here which district is represented um I think it's only fair to have the best representation we can for our county to discuss these roads. as they come up. That's just my opinion.

I have a question, Mr. Chairman. Yes, ma'am. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yes.

Um, do you do any analytics or does the committee do any analytics on Let's just take the first two projects here, uh, priority one and two. Uh, so about $450,000. How how many people are impacted by that? And you said you did traffic studies to see the look at traffic situation condition of the road that's all opinion of staff there was no formal analytics done we have looked at doing um I I came from a pavement evaluation background I spent almost 10 years with DOT doing pavement evaluation ranking roads putting numbers to it unfortunately it's expensive we've got a couple of verbal quotes on doing that to our system it's on the order of 40 50 $60,000 to do that eval valuation. I' I'd rather take our people's opinion than put that money towards actually paving roads.

So, how were they ranked? What was the ranking criteria?

By opinion of of staff, particularly the road superintendent and then the deputy director of public works. They look at a lot of times it's what roads are we spending the most time and money on patching, taking care of. Um it is looking at um groups of roads like subdivisions when they were um installed, what the condition of the roads are there in general. Uh also what are heavily more heavily trafficked roads also you know number of houses on roads we also consider as well. The first two priorities here are very rural roads that took a beating from hurricane Elen and then subsequent logging. We've been spending a lot of time on them patching and stuff. The further we put off paving, the worse the roads will get. The more time we'll have to put into them just to make them safe to pass. Um, particularly Flint Hill Church Road uh has a covert that has a grant with the Upper Savannah Land Trust. They are replacing that covert with a grant from Fish and Wildlife. As part of that grant, um, they're actually replacing cover that's a problem to us. Frequently backs up, washes the road out. They're going to replace it and we'll come back right after and pave it as part of this project. So, that has a little additional um, uh, item we're considering there. Uh, but that has been on the list for in previous years.

Thank you. Any other comments, questions, Mr. Chairman? Yes, ma'am. So, I'm happy to see that some of my roads are coming up because the past couple of years, I mean, I've been asking. So, I am really excited to see some of my roads because I get a lot of questions. So, I I'm really happy to start to to see that some of my roads are coming and I know it takes a while, but and just for reference, we we set this list without looking at districts. We put the districts on it afterwards just for your information, but we do not pay attention to districts when we're setting the list.

And I appreciate that. I mean, but when we in prior years when I've seen this list, I'm like, where is three? You know, where is three? But I am so excited about seeing some of the roads that my, you know, the people I represent. Yep. And that call me. I'm happy to see some of these roads are starting to come onto the list. So, yes, ma'am. Thank you. Do we how often do we actually ride and inspect the county roads?

Do a full inspection front to end every mile. It rare forever. This is out there what we're working on, when we're working on them, when we're out there mowing the roads, that sort of thing. Condition, um, and all that. I I will tell you this that when a road starts to get bad, we get calls. I mean, you you you know, potholes alone, um you know, edge of the road coming off, that sort of thing. We get those calls, we respond to those calls, we assess the conditions, and and that helps us formulate this list. Managers, go ahead, Mr. Chapel. I'm waiting patiently, Mr. Chairman. Yes, you have been. Can I see Can I see your pointer?

Yes. Thank you. I'll go ahead while he's while he's pointing and say that Miss Miller and I didn't fare very well in this process. No, you did not. You were absolutely. And I'm going to talk to you about Miller Road before I leave tonight.

So, to Councilwoman Miller's point, I don't need $40,000 to do this analytics. I've done it for free in about 10 minutes. So, go to the next one if you would. Well, it's fine. We'll start on Jordan Road. This is Jordan Road. This is number project number two on the list. You are going to serve a whopping three houses with this. It deadends down here. There's three houses from here to there. That's what you're going to pay 400 and $23,000. Yep. To go to the next one. Is that in my district? Yeah. Uh probably. So you want to take two I got off. So they're not two. One.

There's one. Go to the next one. The other one. one of the two I got. Okay, hold on. I got Mark. This is the second one. This is Flint Hill Church Road, which has a whopping one house and a church on it. So, you're going to spend, if you follow this proposal, half of your annual CTC budget, paving two roads that's going to cover a total of four houses and one church. Regardless of whose district it's in, I would tell you there's a better way of spending your money countywide.

But you don't know how many people travel that road. Just because four people live on it, they may be a thousand lives down here in this subdivision that travel that road. Apparently, my understanding is is these roads are picked by the condition they're in. Correct. So, I think there has to be I I would tell you there should be some consideration to their usage. If the if the condition is bad and no one uses it, why would you spend half of your budget for the whole county on these two roads? Well, I agree with what Miss Miller said. I would hope or I would think if we're not, that should be some consideration, a traffic count or something. I mean, you we could He just told you there is no traffic count, though.

Yeah. I mean, there's no traffic count. It's simple condition. and how much time and effort we spend on these roads. Not how many people use them, if any, but very clearly it's not that many. It's a house and a church. I live on Conor Road in in 96, which is considered a rural road, but the traffic is heavy. A lot of people come from Saluda. Sure. I work in Greenwood and that is a heavily traveled road.

Uh, right. And there not a lot of houses on my section of kind of road. So, you know, I see what you're saying, but I don't know. I'm not convinced that that road don't need the condition of that road. I mean, a road can be in a condition that it could be dangerous, severely dangerous for someone if they hit a pothole or something. If it's Well, correct. But all things could be possible, but we haven't heard any evidence that any of them are possible. I mean, I think what we've heard is we spend a lot of time out there.

And again, it's half of your county mudging for the entire year. If you want to spend it on two roads that I think are are questionable, that's y'all's decision. So, so I'm real curious. Did you and Rob have this conversation before tonight? Oh, yeah. We did. Yes. Oh, yeah. This is not a surprise to Rob. That's why he's smiling. I'm waiting till he's finished and then I'll rebut. This is a recommendation from staff or from the CTC committee? The CTC. Both. Well, this this is staff. This is my staff's recommendation that we will put in front of CTC for their approval. Okay. Pending council's approval of the list. Okay. So, it hadn't been to CTC. It has not yet.

What happens if we don't approve it? Well, we cannot submit a list to CTC and then just forego that we lose the money funding. We don't pave any roads. No, Mr. Chairman, to answer your question, we don't pave any roads. No. Whenever he gets done talking, I'll answer his question. Yeah. Stop. Mr. Chairman, the answer to your question is you would submit a list that you approve to CTC. It does not have to be this list. It does not. That's the answer to your question. You you can you can if you tell me I want this road if you decide as a whole, I want this road up, this road down, that's what we'll do and we'll put it out there. If you tell me you want a road that's not on this list, I mean, it's council's decision. We'll put it on there.

These two roads are in the middle of nowhere, but they have they are in they're in terrible condition. They are county roads. We have an obligation to maintain them. They are county roads. We have an obligation to maintain them in safe condition. We feel that at some point they have to be paved. We feel that that point is now. That's our opinion of staff. It's not shared by everybody. And that's fine. I can I can debate. We have to pay them met sometime. We have to take care of them. We public works staff believe the time is now. We understand that it's a lot of money and we understand that there are rural roads, but they are still part of our system.

Mr. Chairman, I I would say that you could you want a compromise. Here's something you may consider. Maybe do one of these roads this year and one of them next year and pick up something that's heavier traveled further down on your list and maybe try to take them a bite at a time because if you add $250,000 back to the list assuming you're going to get a million dollars like Rob says you are, you're going to pick up project 16 which is Pullm Hill Road and Puckets Ferry Road which are I would argue two roads that are infinitely more traveled than the two you're looking at now. Strays need love, too.

I can hear. I said strays need love, too. We we submit this list during the April uh CTC meeting. Um so, we we won't have another council meeting before that time, but again, if if you want to find some changes to list, we'd be more than happy to do that. We currently have a motion in a second. So we would have to

we do I do have one question. So the the top two were they on the previous list? Is did was there a change from the previous list? Let me I have the previous list with me.

Let's see here. Uh Flint Hill Church Road was number 23 on the previous list. We got through priority number 22. So we it moved up to first place based upon its position on the list previous year. Jordan Road Jordan Road was not on the list last year. It moved up to number two based upon its condition. We had again, Hurricane Helen did a job on it. We've recently done a bunch of full depth patching on Jordan Road. The bridge on Jordan Road was damaged during the storm. We did get some We have a FEMA application on it. Um, but the roads um itself, we also had a we had a major logging operation on Jordan which damaged it considerably which caused a lot to fold that patching.

Is it still going on? No, the the the logging operation the logging operation stopped fat. We wait till log operation over before we went out there and patched what was tore up. But yes, that the logging operation is over with. But I would tell you in any of these any of these rural roads, patches of trees get logged all the time. You know, it's it's this partial this time, it's that partial next time. So trying to wait till all the logging is done before you do it is a little it just it that doesn't normally work out. All right, we have a motion and a second to approve as presented. All in favor of approving as presented.

All opposed? Passes 61. Thank you. I appreciate your time. Yeah, he was eager to sit down. I don't blame him. Item D, the consideration approval of results of the RFQ for professional engineering services environmental due diligence for the Hajes Corporate Park. Hopefully this takes less time than the previous two.

I hope so. So uh we had a need for professional engineering services and due diligence as a hodgees corporate part. Uh this services were bid through a formal RFQ. Uh we received four qualified submitts from firms. Those submitts were rated by a threeperson evaluation committee. Uh Davis and Floyd was the highest rated firm based on their qualifications. Uh, as far as funding goes for this project, 75% of the funds are coming through a locate SC grant from the South Carolina Department of Commerce. The remaining 25% is funded by Greenwood County, and that estimated match is budgeted for this current fiscal year. Uh, exact amounts will depend on the price negotiated after the selected vendor. Um, and council approves the vendor. Uh, the evaluation committee recommends approval. Davis and Floyd is the highest ranked firm. Committee recommends authority be granted to the county manager and attorney to negotiate and execute all required documents to employ Davidson Floyd for the services stated in the RFQ. We have the rankings there in the next page I believe.

Mr. Chairman, offer a motion to approve before that. They're in they're in your packet page 92 in your packet. Any questions or comments before we vote? We got to have No, I'm going to second it too, but you go ahead. We have a motion by Mr. second by Miss Bishop. Any comments or questions? I do have a question. When I looked at the rating scale, it was curious to me and I spoke to the manager about this that that the firm that was rated most qualified and did most similar work and I forgot what the

from what I saw lost a scored real well until they lost a lot of points for not submitting a schedule was my understanding. That is correct. One of the higher ranked firms did not fully complete did not submit part of the

requirement which really knocked them out from a high rating it appeared to me. So, and you may not have been working with this long enough to know, but I guess what was curious to me is that firm I personally know to be one of the bigger firms in the state that does this a lot. How do you think that happened? Because that just seemed very out of character for that to me.

We look back at our our procurement, the package and all. Um, I don't think it is was an issue with the package, although in future ones, I would suggest we we state a few things a little differently. I'm we'll talk to James about that. We have since done another RFQ for another one. A lot of the same firms submitted um and that issue from that particular firm was corrected in the next one. But just an oversight on their part. Whoever submitted it did not either read it, read our solicitation completely, how they were going to be ranked and the criteria they'd be ranked on. It omitted a key section of it.

Just a quick question if I may. Was that the only firm that didn't do what we asked them to do? That was the only firm in that spittle that didn't That makes it pretty simple for me. Yeah. Yeah. No, it is. And the winning firm is a local firm. Correct. Also makes it pretty simple for me. Davis employed. Yeah. Correct. Okay. Have a motion and a second to approve as presented. All in favor? That's unanimous. And so I appreciate a little quicker. A little quicker. Yeah, that was a lot quicker. Item E, consideration of the approval of variance for procurement policy for the purchase of a truck for the sheriff's department. Miss Dorne.

Thank you, chairman and councel. Um, the sheriff's department asked that I present this for them. They uh would like to purchase a vehicle, a truck at the cost of $58,625 for their drug enforcement unit. They have u $50,000 available in what was already allocated to them in the capital asset fund and they uh intend to use their um equitable sharing fund for the remaining $8,625 for this purchase. Just for your information, the equitable sharing fund comes from uh when our sheriff's department assists a federal agency on some type of criminal case and then as a result of that there are assets seized and those assets are forfeited and then the sheriff's department receives a share of those funds. And so those funds specifically have to be used for law enforcement activities. In addition to that, because this purchase is using some of those funds, there's other requirements uh because they're technically federal funds that any um vendor has to be registered uh with a particular website sam.gov um has to be re registered and that registration is maintained annually. The uh normal policy for a purchase over $50,000 under our procurement policy would be to do a formal RFP, which is a little cumbersome for a vehicle. Uh they did obtain three quotations. Uh one, the the u the best price came from OC Welch, which is not a local vendor. Um our local vendor Ballentine Ford was within 5% of the bid. However,

they are not registered with SAM.gov. So, we cannot use this combination of funds uh to make the purchase with Valentine Ford. So, the request uh of you all tonight is to allow the variance in the procurement policy by not having a formal um RFQ or RFP, excuse me, uh for this price over $50,000. Um, and we would recommend that you approve the request. Mr. Chairman, I'll go ahead. Go ahead. Thanks. Just couple things to make sure I'm recapping this correctly. It's coming to council because it's above $50,000. That's correct. And it's a variation of the procurement policy

based on what you went through. The funds are available and this was the recommendation from the sheriff's department based on their three bid research. Yes, sir. Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, I was going for a motion to approve. I have a motion by Mr. Templeton, second by Miss Bishop. All in favor, and that's unanimous and so order. Thank you, Stephanie. Item F, quarterly update from the county treasurer's office. Miss Stephanie,

thank you. I think you probably all know right now, um, our primary focus in the treasur's office, uh, other than our day-to-day operations is working on the budget. U plan to have a a draft budget to the county manager in a couple of weeks. Uh we're shifting through the departmental request at this point and then we should have a draft of the budget u recommended through myself and the county manager by about the third week of April and we will get that to council as soon as we have it um put together. Our reorganization is going well. Um, I think the ability of meeting having the assessor, auditor, and tax collector together in group meetings, um, is very beneficial because of the way that those work together. Um, and they've they've been productive to this point. Uh, beginning with your next council meeting on April 7th, you'll see your quarterly CPST updates return to your agendas. Uh, we'll have those scheduled for that first um first meeting of each quarter. And then um we're also conducting interviews this week for the new position in the treasur's office and hopefully we'll have a person on board um well before the end of April. Right now our general fund has currently collected 75% of what we budgeted through the end of February. We've collected about 97% of current property taxes. uh they all rolled delinquent today and so everything that comes in after from today on uh we consider to be delinquent taxes when when we categorize it on our financial statements. Um we believe the current property taxes are going to be a little bit under budget. However, our motor vehicle taxes are much stronger and will balance um any of those shortfalls out. So there's no concerns at this point related to our

revenue um projections for the end of the year. and through February, our expenditures are a little bit under where we expect them to be, and I do expect us to finish under budget um at the end of the year with with our expenses. We are still working on FEMA reimbursements related to Helen. Uh we have received just over half a million dollars of reimbursement from FEMA and South Carolina EMD. We have about one and a half million of pending reimbursements. Uh these are primarily for the debris removal and disposal at the county landfill and the remaining projects are related to some bridges and coverts which um are in various stages of bidding and u work being completed. Our hospitality tax collections uh through February 26 are um are strong. They're 13% higher than the same period in last fiscal year. And just as a reminder, that's uh representative of June through January um receipts. Our local accommodations tax collections are continuing to kind of even back out. Um you know, we had about a 12-month period where we had higher than expected numbers as a lot of people uh were were in hotels after um in the aftermath of Helen. Uh so we've seen those numbers now are declining. uh but for comparative purposes I thought it would be more useful to look at FY24 uh period and our revenues for this um this eight months compared to those eight months um are about 7% higher so we are seeing some some growth um when you look at it trying to even out and take out the impact of Helen our October through December quarterly payment for our new 2025 capital project sales tax was received at just over $3.6

million. Uh that quarter quarterly collection was about 6 and a half% higher than we estimated uh when we made our projection for the for the tax and it's uh just over 6% higher than the same quarterly period in 2024. So those are um positive things for our economy. At this point, we've collected 78% of the first project, which is the career center at Pedmont Technical College. Um, we should receive our next quarter during the month of April, and that should fully fund that project, and then it'll start the um funding of phase one of our master plan. Our transportation trips have decreased by about 11 months. Um, I only have seven months of data available on that uh from our contractor uh McCormack area transit. If you recall, we did have to make some changes to the program to adjust to our reduced funding from DOT. Uh, so that that's what we attribute that decline in trips from, not necessarily from demand. Building permits continue to be strong. I don't think it takes much to to look around town and see what's kind of going on. Um, our uh residential permits consistently have grown over the last four years. Our new residential uh permits continue to make up most of that by being about 73% of total permit residential permits. Uh we've also seen a a large spike in our commercial permits. Um for for this first eight months of the year, we have uh $62.3 million of value in those permits compared to 14.2 million in the same period of last year, which is about three times um as much in this year. And again, new construction is a big part of

that at 35% of total commercial permits that were issued. Happy to take any questions that you all might have. Mr. Chairman. Yes, ma'am. Miss Bishop. So, with Matt, is there any way to increase the service area? I I know we but I'm excited about us increasing the service area

and I mean because I I hear that from many people because it is a great service. Um I'm I'm enjoy you know a lot of people enjoy using it but I would love to see it grow. I think it that depends on two different things. Um, one is obviously us being able to get additional funding from DOT, which I I don't think that possibility exists. Um, the the way that most of that funding comes to them is is from the federal government

and then it's obviously split across the state. And so when we began participating in the program, there was a loser somewhere else in the state because they had to reallocate funds. Um it would it would take more money coming from the federal government most likely to see that increase. So the only other option would be uh for us to increase our share. Currently our commitment is 150,000 each year. That comes out of the special appropriations. Um I don't think you were on council at the time we started the program. I wasn't.

Uh but we did increase our millillage by one meal to be able to make that $150,000 commitment. Um so when we talk about the special appropriations fund um we have allocated 8.9 meals and that goes into that fund and we use those funds to um pay for our commitment with the um humane society to provide our animal shelter um the solicitor's office the public defenders office um and then we have some smaller amounts that go to Clemson extension um soil and water conservation and then we also use that fund to balance the EMS fund

to cover what we need in there. So um and medical indigent fund is also in there. So um if you if you want to do more and we're not able to get more more grant funds then we would either have to look at increasing millillage or cutting some other place that we're that we're funding. I see. Thank you. You're welcome, Mr. Chairman. Yes. Ask a question, sir. On that same topic, Miss Dorne,

uh the the report says that it decreased by 11% and you noted that you believed it was due to the changes that we have made to control cost uh in that program due to the reduction of the SCOT. What changes did, can you refresh my memory? What changes did we make? Well, and and I and I may have uh phrased it wrong in here, but um or I wasn't specific, but Matt made the changes in the in the program because if you remember this year, we changed the first three years. We were the recipient of the grant.

Um and then we contracted with them and then it had to change because those were startup funds and those funds weren't going to be available to us any longer. And so we basic we had to change our methodology in order to continue to receive the funds. And so now now Matt receives the funds directly and then we we pay them our our match on those. Um but the the some of the changes that they made is they um reduced the hours. So there were um they were basically from roughly 8 to 5 and they reduced the availability over like a lunchtime period where they had less traffic uh so that they could reallocate some of their resources. Um they also were pushing back on uh Medicare trips. So, um, if you are on Medicare, I'm pretty sure, not Medicaid. I get Medicare and Medicaid sometimes, which one's which of of what they're talking about, but I'm pretty sure with Medicare, if you need transportation, um, you can call and they have a provider that has a contract to provide that transportation. And it's it's a little it's it's kind of cumbersome to to get those trips arranged. And so what people will do is they'll call Matt instead because they can just pay Matt a dollar each way and and the arranging the trip is a lot easier. Um but then now we're picking that up when really Medicare should be continuing to fund those trips. And so, um, they were working on trying to push back and make sure people were were going through the Medicare system rather than trying to use our system, uh, taking away trips that we could be providing to to other people that don't don't have those um,

choices. And so, um, I I don't know. I haven't talked to Becky for a little bit. they had some personnel changes and and getting information out of her has been a little bit tough because they're um struggling to adjust to that. But um I can definitely get some feedback from her on how how the trips have changed and how successful um they've been at getting people to go where they should be going for their the trips. Thank you. Thank you. You're welcome. Stephanie, before you sit down, um I did want to ask you, you're going to you mentioned you're going to post a job soon in your department. It's already been posted already.

We're doing interviews this week. This week. And what what job title did y'all put on that? So what we did is we had uh a person that's was an accounting specialist accounts payable that we promoted to um a staff accountant. And so we were filling that accounts payable position. Filling this the accounts payable position. Right. Okay. Thank you very much. You're welcome. Um I like that six and a half% growth on CPS2. I'm sure that surprises you then. I would It It does, but it also makes me feel good because, you know, I got a lot riding on those numbers coming in.

Okay, that requires no action. Item G, resolution 20268 designating April 26 as fair housing month. And I have a resolution uh that I will read in to the record and then ask for council to approve as soon as I get my glasses on. resolution designating April 2026 as Fair Housing Month. Whereas the Greenwood County Council desires that all of its citizens be afforded the opportunity to have a decent and safe living environment. And whereas the Greenwood County Council rejects discrimination on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, national origin, disability, and/or familiar status in the sale, rental, or other provisions of other housing services. And whereas the state of South Carolina enacted the South Carolina fair fair housing law in 1989. Now therefore be it resolved by the Greenwood County Council on behalf of the citizens of Greenwood County that the month of April 26 be designated as Fair Housing Month in Greenwood County. Done and passed on the 17th day of March. Greenwood County Council. I'll ask you for a motion to approve.

I make a motion to approve. A motion by Miss Bishop, a second by Mr. Puit and all in favor and that is unanimous and so ordered. Thank you very much. That concludes our business. Uh we have no pending items. We'll move now please into district reports. Miss Griffin, district one. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Like to say good evening to everyone. Um all is well in district um one. And also would just like to um say that we will have a district cleanup um on April the 11th. And so ends my report. Thank you, Miss Griffith. District 2, Mr. Allison.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, just to let my colleagues on council know that prior to me coming to this meeting tonight, I went to the voter restoration office and registered to run for another term of county council. So, uh, if it's the choice of the people of district 2, I plan to be here for a little longer. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That is my report. Good to hear, Mr. Alison. District three, Miss Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to say thank everybody for coming and I hope that you have a wonderful evening. And I want to say happy birthday to the chairman. He told me before I before the meeting, so I had to tell him happy birthday.

Thank you very much. Yes, that ends my report. District 4, Miss Miller.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, two things I wanted to share. One was I saw a post on Greenwood County's Facebook page. Um, Greenwood County is proud to announce that the Stone Crest Farm Rail site has been officially designated as a CSX select site, one of only 12 in South Carolina and the only one in the upstate. This designation recognizes the property as a top tier industrial site with direct rail access, exceptional logistics, and strong development potential. So, um, for whoever made this happen, thank you very much. I feel like Jason Uh James probably had a hand in this somehow or another, but thank you so much for that. And the other item uh in addition to happy birthday wishes, again, those glasses, we know what happens when you hit that milestone. Um is that the sheriff's annual deer supper is Thursday night as well. So for everyone that likes to attend those, I don't myself eat deer, but go out and socialize either way. That concludes my report.

Thank you, Miss Miller. District five, Mr. Puit. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Happy birthday, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, sir.

Um, just more general than anything else, I've had uh multiple meetings and email correspondence with constituents concerning uh reasonzoning and developments. And I I will say those are good, cordial um discussions for the most part. I would just urge this council that we start with um I hate we didn't get the formal introduction to Mr. Vincent. I know he probably had to take off, but with Rob in the room, um, start talking about the comprehensive plan, start gathering all the information. I actually ran across someone in my district who came from another area that had some, um, ideas from a planning perspective. So, I'd like to see us coordinate that and and involve folks of all walks to help us with that. Um, as usual, I would like to end my report with a Bible verse. Uh, Proverbs 3:5 and 6, two verses says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways, submit to him and he will make your paths straight." That ends my report, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Puit. Mr. Templeton, District 6.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um couple of weeks ago, uh myself, Miss Miller, and and you um met with uh the developer for the pro project out on um Woodlon Road and Old Labville Highway along with some of the concerned citizens from that area. At that meeting, there were four or five things that the individuals in the room asked the developer to consider. Um and the developer has come back and he has uh he let us know that the traffic study had already been ordered. Uh we'll be and u it's it they're going to conduct it during the busiest times of day obviously 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m. to 6 pm. Um he he one of the things they asked for was a an enhanced burm buffer. He agreed to that. um they asked that he change some of the lots at the entrances to make them more accessible. He agreed to that and um and those adjustments. Matter of fact, he agreed to he and um he said that he would personally handle the soil erosion along with his director of construction and uh that they're all field certified. The only thing he didn't didn't agree to was uh one resident asked that they keep the lot sizes similar to those in Folly Ban and he they could not do that. My point is to share all this with you to let you know that he more than met them halfway. Um he agreed to four of the five things that they asked for. uh and he's asking us to uh as a show of good faith to put this back on the agenda and try to move this forward. So um I'm going to ask Mr. Chairman if you will to put this on our next agenda. Um hopefully by then the traffic the at least the stuff will already be laid out

for the traffic study. He's also agreed to send us a copy of the report as soon as he gets it. So I thought it was a very good meeting. I appreciated you two in attendance. I appreciated the the the input from the residents. Um I do think it's not um I do think it's completely reasonable for us to show as a show of good faith uh to the developer to put that back on the agenda to at least move it past second reading. We don't have to complete it until we see the traffic study, but I I do think we should should do that. And um that ends my report.

I agree, Mr. Champ. Thank you very much. Um, I was very pleased. I had a meeting in Weso's uh end of last week. Uh, the county manager and I were involved with them a few months ago in in in helping them make some recommendations on some problems they had in their police department. I'm happy to report that I think they're getting back on a good footing. Uh, they have they've hired some more officers. They're sending one officer to the police academy, I think, beginning next year. That was actually hired kind of a star guy that was hired uh through through the school district. So, that was that was very pleasing to me. Um, Miss Nicholson contacted Toby and myself a couple of weeks ago and today Rob was kind enough to join me. Uh the Self Family Foundation is considering I would say right now kind of just dipping their toe into the water of um of the affordable housing issue. So we had a I thought a good meeting Rob today uh with some key stakeholders. uh the mayor and Julie were there, Toby um self family foundation board members there and my facilitated basically the meeting and we just really shared ideas and and tried to target on what we what we thought the real problems in regard to housing were and then we will we'll convene again probably in a couple of months to to basically just share some ideas. There's a conference that's going to be held in Colombia. I think Rob, they said during the month of April, there will be attendees from Greenwood there to uh to try to bring back some some ideas that we might could implement. Um, Robbie, I will say that um your comments and and and the success that you achieved with the old Abbebyville um road development

is evidence, I think, of of what can be done when we encourage our residents and our developers to sit down and talk. And I think that's that was a really good outcome. So, great job with that. Um so, thank you. Wow, it was a group effort. So, it was a group effort. Well, your district. So, uh that ends my report. Um manager, do you have anything for the good of the order? Against my better judgment, Mr. Chairman, I'm going to have Rob Rushian come back to the podium. Tubby and I going to have to take a ride tomorrow somewhere.

Yeah, I'm I'm gonna have to get the two of y'all in a room together, I'm afraid. Go ahead. real quick. Uh this past Saturday, Key Cream County Beautiful hel held their annual lake cleanup event. Uh wildly successful. It's the first time that all three counties that contacted Lake uh Greenwood, Lawrence, and Newberry County participated uh in cleaning up. I'm happy to announce that there were over there were right at 220 volunteers that we had signed up, recorded their names, and they picked up 5,140 pounds of uh litter in just a couple hours Saturday morning. Uh we do appreciate all the work that Keep Greenwood County Beautiful does. We support them in this effort every year. And again, they had a great uh pickup on uh on Saturday morning. Thank you.

Thank you, Rob. Thanks for that, Rob. I forgot to mention that. And feel good. first one I've missed in few years. So, thanks for Where did the attorney go? Did she escape? Had all the fun she could stand. Miss McIntyre, I would just like to recognize the students here. Thank you. You you you beat me to the punch. Young man, come up front if you will. We've been here all night. We can stay a few more minutes. I love to see our student. So, you're a Lander student, correct? I go to GHS high school. Oh, high school senior. I'm a junior. Junior. So, and to what's I think you were here. Weren't you here a few weeks ago? I don't know. I know. This your first time?

First time. Well, I'm 0 for three. Um, so tell us tell us why you chose to be here and we're happy to have you visit with us anytime. Uh well, I needed to get this for my attendance and then I also just wanted to get an experience for the county council meetings as well. Well, you come back anytime and the mayor's youth council. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And what's your name, young man? Uh Max Workner. Max. Well, thank you for coming. We appreciate having you here, man. Come back anytime you'd like to. All right. Thank you. If there is nothing else, we'll stand adjourned. Thank you.