Ethical Issues Linked to Local Environment and Development

Gordon Haist welcomed the audience, reminded everyone of the organization’s web site, which displays summaries of meetings, and introduced moderator for the day, John Gilbert.

Gilbert pointed out that ethics, the economy and leadership affect the challenges facing the communities of Hilton Head Island and Hardeeville and introduced the island’s mayor, Alan Perry, and Hardeeville’s mayor, Harry Williams, the program’s speakers. Hilton Head, he pointed out, has experienced surges in growth and down times over recent decades while Hardeeville is currently the fastest growing municipality in the state and one of the fastest growing in the country.

An island resident for more than 50 years, Mayor Alan Perry said that current land use issues began in the 1960s when developers began to capitalize on the island’s attractions – beaches, trees, beauty, then golf and tennis. The town’s incorporation in 1983 represented the local population’s yearning to manage unprecedented growth. Issues of tree removal, stormwater management and traffic continue to confront town officials to this day, he said. All involve money and way of life.

In the early days of the municipality, for example, Sally Krebs of the town staff became famous as the “tree lady” because of her strict enforcement of the tree ordinance in effect at the time. During the 2008-2009 recession, that ordinance was rescinded. “We are trying to correct that,” Perry said.

With a residential population of about 40,000 with 15,000 employees and a annual tourist population of 2.5 to 3 million, challenges abound to keep the town “safe, sound and secure,” he said.

Mayor Harry Williams, who moved from New Jersey to Hardeeville 10 years ago and has been mayor for nine years, said that as the poorest county in the state when serious growth began, the development in Jasper County has been welcome. “Just a few years ago, 65 percent of the students did not graduate from high school, and there were virtually no jobs in the county,” he said. The county is now working closely with the state board of education to correct some of the problems, and there are several recently developed charter schools and private schools improving the situation, he added. Growth has brought money into the county that never was there before.

About 20 years ago, local Jasper County officials gave developers zoning permits for 20,000 houses and 3,000 apartments, thus bringing on local jobs along with the problems of stormwater and traffic management and clear-cutting. In some cases, before the construction began on those properties, county and city officials have been able to negotiate down those permitted densities as well as require open space, sidewalks and money for roads. The negotiating continues, he said.

Exacerbating Jasper County’s growth problems, however, are the crowds of employees with long commutes through the community on their way to work on tourist-heavy Hilton Head. “It can take up to 25 minutes just for them to get through the Margaritaville light,” he said. In addition, I-95’s Exit 3 area is on the verge of growing by 10,000 jobs linked to Savannah River port expansion, a reality that will worsen that problem.

Perry would like to see changes that would lower the average age of Hilton Head Islanders, now at 60, and would like see a more affluent tourist population. Two recent town council decisions he said he is proud of the ordinance prohibiting the use of poisons for weed control and the painstaking work of removing abandoned boats from the island’s waterways.

Williams expressed pride in Hardeeville’s expectation of $376 million in local, state and federal money to improve roads.

Both mayors and members of the audience expressed pending anxiety over the next hurricane evacuation. The lead time to get out of the danger zone will continue to increase as populations increase.

At stake in both communities is desired harmony between people who live in them currently and people who want to live in them or want to vacation in them or want to build more in them in order to make money and further stimulate the economy.