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About iopobserver

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Ocean Blvd Source Document

. Parking .

Ocean Blvd source document

Open the above PDF file and you will find the document created by the Beach Company when they sold the lots on the ocean side of Ocean Blvd.

Several interesting things stand out, at least to this non-lawyer.  The document seems to indicate that the Beach Company owns the 10 foot easement on the side of the street.  They also own the paths that lead to the ocean.

It is for this reason they think they can prevent cars from parking on the side of the road.  It would be interesting to see what the city attorney has to say about this.

OK, fine.  Then let cars park on the landward side of the road.  There is little traffic on that street so it is not a big deal to cross it as compared to Palm Blvd.

Of course, the Ocean Blvd homeowners or the Beach Company may still threaten a lawsuit and the history of the city is to become a shrinking violet whenever a lawsuit is threatened.  Thus we see Plan C that has parking only on the side streets perpendicular to Ocean Blvd.

Because this will dramatically shrink the number of parking places on this end of the island, these cars will do what?  Pay to park in the crappy city lot?  Not a chance!  They will move up the island to Palm Blvd and congestion there will be even worse.

Why is City Council so concerned about the residents on the Breach Inlet end of the island and not at all about Wild Dunes?

If side street parking is good enough for the Ocean Blvd area why can’t the same thing be done for Palm Blvd?  No parking on Palm Blvd and the side streets are open for parking back to Cameron or Hartnett.  This would satisfy the beach management plan and relieve congestion on Palm Blvd.

One last interesting point.  The document says homeowners are forbidden from putting anything in the 10 feet easement.  But as you may have guessed, this is pretty much ignored.

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A Big “JimDaddy Welcome” to the New Councilmembers

. City Council .

Keenagers

Geez, Carol Rice and Ted Kinghorn don’t get sworn into office for another 4 months and JimDaddy Carroll is already taking shots at them!  Is it any wonder no one runs for a seat on City Council.  Who wants to put up with this crap for a whopping $1500 a year and the opportunity to sit through endless meetings.

Hey, JimDaddy, City Council meetings can be viewed online for like the past 10 years.  It is quite possible the “new ones” are watching the meetings online and quietly contacting Mayor Cronin so they don’t get assigned a seat next to you.

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No Rest at this Room

. Livability .

Public restroom exterior

Public restroom stall

Public restroom hallway

You might think this was a prison restroom as seen on MSNBC’s Lockup.  Nope.  It is the IOP public restroom at the front beach and attractive it is not.  In fact, it borders on awful.  In fairness, though, I have to say it is clean and tidy.

Every resident should “take a tour” of this grand facility.  There is no natural light, no ventilation and it feels very claustrophobic.

Given a choice, would you go here to pee or would you just go in the ocean?

The ATAX fund has over 2 million dollars in it.  ATAX stands for Accommations Tax and it is money generated from from taxes on rooms/houses rented and meals served on the IOP.  This money can only be used for projects and activities that in some way benefit tourism.  So, for example, it could be used to hire an extra policeman but it couldn’t be used to repair City Hall.

Let’s get city council working on putting in a nice restroom.  Give them 10 years to talk and plan and maybe this could get done before 2030.  Maybe.

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A Survey of IOP Blogs

. Uncategorized

Here is a list of the blogs/websites currently offering commentary on the IOP:

http://www.ioptoday.com  This is realtor and councilmember Jimmy Carroll’s website.  He usually posts the agendas of upcoming meetings and will, from time to time, write a nice concise summary of issues before council.  I find his summaries to be unbiased and informative.

The website invites comments and has a form to enter them but never posts them.  This editor has posted 2 comments (both reasonable and sincere) and neither was published.  I don’t believe any other comments have ever been published.

Of note, he does not miss an opportunity to let the reader know the island rental market is subsidizing our lifestyle (and, of course, much more so, his!).  Speaking only for myself, I don’t want or need someone to subsidize my lifestyle; I am perfectly capable of paying for the lifestyle I choose.

http://www.iopdaily.com  This blog is produced by former councilmember Tom Gear.  He turns a nice phrase and puts up some good photos, but only seems to do so about twice a year.  A contest he started last summer still has not posted any winners and losers.  The site is running out of gas and that’s too bad.

http://www.ryanbuckhannon.com  This site was touted as “The Conservative Voice of the Islands” later changed to “Your common sense voice of the islands.”  The site appears to have gone dead as there is no content listed.

Send the observer an email if you know of other websites or blogs and we will get them recognition.

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Pat Yourself on the Back

. City Council .

Here is how you pat yourself on the back and take a veiled shot at your opponents:

JC on FB re July 4

As Paul Harvey used to say, here is the rest of the story.

The IOP Fire Department needed to replace its rescue truck.  The replacement was originally budgeted at $229k.  The department submitted a request for a truck upgraded with the capacity to pump water, making it more versatile in responding to a variety of public safety incidents.

The cost of the pumps added $24k to the cost.  Because of inflation and new regulatory requirements, the truck would now cost $352,528.  Fire Chief Graham and the department felt this upgrade was needed to keep us safe.

This was discussed and voted on at the Ways and Means meeting on Feb 17 and at the City Council meeting on Feb 24.

Only 3 councilmembers voted against the truck.  Yep, you guessed it, the hot dog cookers.

Jimmy Carroll

Sandy Ferencz

Jimmy Ward

I could be wrong, but I bet our public safety personnel would rather have the equipment they need to keep us safe rather than someone cooking them some hot dogs one day a year.

The councilmembers who did not show up to cook some dogs voted to give the department the equipment they needed.  The final vote was 6-3, with one hot dog chef, Ryan Buckhannon, voting with the majority.

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Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

. Livability .

At which of these two places would like to spend an evening:

Freshfield 1Freshfiield 4

Front beach 1Front beach bench

Question:  Does anyone reading this ever spend an evening at the IOP Front Beach Business District (also known as North Charleston at the Beach.)  Why not?  The answer, of course, is obvious.  There is one nice restaurant and a nice pizza place and that’s about it.

The top 2 photos are from Freshfields Village at Kiawah.  The bottom 2 photos are from the IOP front beach business district.

Here is the really sad part.  Had previous city councils had a vision and worked to implement it, we could have had something similar to Freshfield.  But all city council wanted to do was see how many parking spaces they could put on the street.  This, of course, was after they bowed to threatened lawsuits and permitted the front beach BUSINESS district to be built out with  condos instead of actual businesses.

Think for just a moment how nice it would be if there were shops and restaurants and nice pubs with outdoor seating and a large green space where all those cars are parked.  Would non-IOP residents come across the connector in the fall, winter and spring to spend an afternoon or evening there?  Of course they would.

The point is this:  Had city council been proactive instead of reactive, we could have had a really, really nice business district where residents could spend time with each other while their kids played in the greenspace.  Think about this as the election approaches.

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Put the Cheese on the Cracker*

. City Council .

There is a city council election coming up in November of this year.  If you would like to see some changes, here is your opportunity to find out how sausage is made.

The incumbents up for re-election are:

Ryan Buckhannon

Jimmy Carroll

Mike Loftus

Jimmy Ward

All have picked up petitions to run again.  If you would like to challenge one of them, pick up the voter petition from at City Hall on the second floor.  Your petition must contain the name, address, signature and voter ID number of at least 5% of the registered voters on the IOP.  This will come to somewhere a bit over 200 signatures.  City Hall will be able to give you the exact number.

Most signers will not know their voter ID number.  City Hall has a master list of voters and you can look up the numbers there.

These petitions must be turned in by August 24, and just like that, you will be on the ballot.

If you are tired of city council’s inability to deal with parking, quit kvetching and do something about it.  There are a lot of talented people with some great ideas on this island.  Sitting on your tookus in front of the TV and complaining changes nothing.  Get out there and make IOP a better place to live.

*If you can name the source of this quote without resorting to Google, you will be prominently mentioned in a future iopobserver posting.  Or not.

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The 4 Million Dollar Marina Question

. Livability .

Marina Boat Ramp

Riddle me this Batman:  Why do IOP residents have to pay to use a boat ramp they own?

A little background.  The marina property was bought by the city in January 1999 for $4,100,000 and financed with a 20 year bond.  That bond has been refinanced several times and will be paid off in February 2019.

The city currently owes $1,175,000 on the property.

So this property was bought and is being paid for by the residents of IOP.  Why, then, do we have to pay to launch a boat and park the trailer at a city property that we are paying for?

Charleston County operates 19 boat ramps, 14 of which are large enough from which to launch a boat from a trailer.  As far as I know there is no fee to launch your boat or park your trailer.

I doubt there is a lot of maintenance required for the above ramp, but any maintenance that may be needed could be financed by boaters who do not live on the IOP.

It is past time for the residents who live here to reap some rewards in return for the other inconveniences we cheerfully tolerate.

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Explain This “Fiscal Conservative” Thing to Me Again

. Fiscal Issues .

As we move into campaign mode over the next few months in anticipation of the city election in November, we are going to hear the accomplishments of the “Fiscal Conservatives” who are running for re-election.

So, I spent the weekend pouring over the old city budgets.  They are all available online at www.iop.net under the City Services tab.

A bit of background before getting to the numbers.  The fiscal year for the city runs July 1 to June 30.  So, city council started working on Fiscal Year 2015-16 in January of this year. In the interest of clarity, I am going to call the current budget we are operating under Fiscal Year 2016, but realize that it started several weeks ago on July 1, 2015.

What follows is total city expenditures budgeted by city council for each fiscal year.  That is, this is what city council planned to spend.   Spending could, in fact, be more or less because of all kinds of circumstances, but what these numbers represent is the fiscal intent of city council.

Here are the numbers in dollar amounts:

2009                                    8,066,663

2010                                    8,067,982

2011                                    8,347,497

2012                                    8,511,235

2013                                    8,472,581

2014                                    8,914,839

2015                                    9,529,908

2016                                   10,331,061

From 2009 to 2012 the budget grew by $444,572, or 5.51%.

This is pretty much right in line with inflation, maybe even a bit less, depending on whether you are using the CPI (Consumer Price Index) or the Federal Reserve’s preferred PCE (Personal Consumption Expenditure) which is usually lower than the CPI.

From 2013 to 2016 the budget grew by $1,858,480 or 21.9%

Whoa!  What happened to the budget in 2013?  The citizens elected two new members to city council, Jimmy Carroll and Jimmy Ward when they defeated the incumbents Brian Duffy and Ralph Piening in the November 2011 election.  Jimmy Ward, in particular, campaigned incessantly as a “fiscal conservative.”  Carroll and Ward joined Ryan Buckhannon and Mike Loftus who also call themselves “fiscal conservatives.”  Upon joining city council in January 2012 they began work on the 2013 budget.

Then, for budget year 2015, the city added two more new city councilmembers in Patrick Harrington and Sandy Ferencz who replaced Sandy Stone and Doug Thomas when the latter two decided not to seek re-election in November 2013.  Lo and behold the budget for 2015, for which work began in January 2014 got even worse.  This budget cycle now had 5 “fiscal conservatives” on city council, a majority! They could have worked together and controlled the spending, but instead the spending ramped even higher!

Here’s the point: the city is not growing and there have been no disasters but the budget is exploding. Maybe the “fiscal conservatives” could tell us just what fiscally conservative measures they have taken and what “fiscal conservative” means to them.

I am not sure the city can afford much more “fiscal conservatism”.

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Parking Plan C – Moving in the Right Direction, but Still Not There

. Parking, Wild Dunes . ,

By now you have probably read about “Parking Plan C” in the newspaper.  After 6 six years of intense planning and soul searching, city council has started to move in the right direction, albeit to begin a year from now.

To recap, Plan C permits free daytripper parking from 3rd to 9th Avenues on the sidestreets between Ocean and Carolina Boulevards.  It also permits free parking on all of Palm Blvd.

Several observations immediately come to mind:

This is good news for the folks at the lower end of the IOP where congestion has been a nightmare.

Ocean Blvd will continue to keep its Sacred Status.

So, where are all those cars that previously parked on the lower end of the island going to go?  We already know they don’t want to pay to park, that is why they are not parking in our “beautiful” city lot.  Yep, you guessed right.  They will go up the island to Palm Blvd.

Every bit of space on Palm Blvd will soon by filled.  It will be massive gridlock.  What did Wild Dunes and the middle section of the island do to deserve this treatment from city council?

Since parking on side streets is just fine for the lower third of the island, why isn’t it fine for Palm Blvd?  This would dramatically decrease the congestion and still keep the city in compliance with the Beachfront Management Plan.

But daytrippers and their children would still have to cross Palm Blvd where the speed limit is 35 mph.  So why not do the logical thing and permit parallel parking only on the ocean side of Palm Blvd up to 41st Avenue and then on the other side of the street to the end of Palm Blvd?

One of the busiest areas of the island is Wild Dunes with all of its condos.  You know, folks who come to vacation here and actually pay their way and contribute money to the city’s coffers.  Why must we so inconvenience these people who, as JimDaddy always says, “pay to support our lifestyle”?

I just don’t get it. If there is something I am missing, please feel free to respond.

Otherwise, it seems it is time to put some people on city council who have some common sense.  And for the record, Councilman Mike Loftus has pushed for this plan for several years and could never get any support from fellow council members.