About The Islander. (St. Simons Island, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 30, 2019)
Page 6, September 30, 2019, The Islander Planning commissions Continued from Page 1 downtown Brunswick in the former Gould Ford Company building on New castle St. On Saturday the 5th the consul tants will have a booth to answer ques tions at the Dept, of Natural Resources’ CoastFest event in Mary Ross Park from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Also on Saturday there will be a workshop session from 2:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. in Room 108 in the Casino build ing in the pier village on St. Simons. Planning commissioners consider this a major meeting. It will include a de tailed presentation and opportunities for in-depth public input on the policy questions. No other in-depth public meeting was mentioned. In his opening comments Giles said that he had heard a lot of public com ments about certain areas that he felt were of major interest to the public. They included population density, architectural design regulations and enviromnental regulations. For ex ample the environmental regulations would include sea level rise, flooding and tree preservation. Giles also commented at that point that they did not want to make the zon ing regulations more strict than they needed to be. Giles said TSW had reviewed all the county documents related to zoning including the ‘Envision Glynn’ compre hensive plan. He said they used ‘En vision Glynn’ as their guide book. He said the comprehensive plan identified areas that they needed to look at dur ing the ordinance project. Giles opened the discussion saying, “Tonight we are going to spend time on the policy questions. They need more discussion. They are the bigger issues on what development will look like in the future.” MPC member Gary Neville started the conversation with the first item on the policy question list, which was maximum building height. TSWs first policy question was, “Should maximum building height continue to be based on sea level, so that buildings at lower elevations can be taller?” Neville pointed out that building height is not currently based on sea level. He said it is based on the existing grade of the ground. Neville also said that changes to FEMA regulations af fected elevations based on flood zones. IPC member George Ragsdale noted that the priorities in ‘Envision Glynn’ included an island overlay regarding parking on St. Simons Island which was not in the TSW report. Giles said he didn’t remember it spe cifically but they could look into it. IPC member Patrick Duncan said that Neville was correct regarding the height measurements and that it need ed to be corrected. MPC member Sherrye Gibbs agreed with Neville and Duncan saying the height issue needed to be clarified. She said they do not want high rise build ings on the Island. 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Giles said there was not one answer for the entire comity. The same design standards do not have to apply county wide. MPC member Missy Neu used an example relating to design standards and setbacks, saying that some set backs may not be feasible due to tilings like power lines. Ragsdale asked if they needed to have design standards in regards to houses built in flood zones. Giles’s comment was the there would need to be a lot of back and forth conversation about design standards. Citing the Pier Village Preservation District, IPC member Joel Willis sug gested the IPC and MPC could develop and approve a set of design standards for things such as exterior colors and signage and let the Community De velopment Department handle the re quests administratively. If someone wanted a variance from the standards, they could come to the planning commission said Willis. Regarding the next topic, open space, Neville suggested their should be an incentive for developers to leave open space in their subdivisions. Ragsdale said open space should be “contiguous and usable.” When it came to Historic Buildings, Gibbs said they needed a definition of historic. Giles said to receive a ‘historic dis trict’ designation a survey of the dis trict would be required. MPC member Gene Lee said that just because something was old, did not necessarily make it historic. Neville mentioned the former Dart House on Hwy. 17 in Brunswick saying it had been called historic, but no one wanted to spend the money to renovate it. Community Development Direc tor Pamela Thompson said individual homeowners and neighborhoods could apply for historic status. Bringing up buffers, Giles asked if setbacks should continue to be count ed as part of any required buffers, or should buffers be required in addition to setbacks? MPC member Richard Stickland pointed out that the current ordinance already has a lot of buffer requirements. Giles said maybe they needed to have a more in-depth conversation about buffers. Willis noted that there are places on St. Simons that have been there for many years, that don’t have buf fers, like Longview Plaza on Frederica Road. “There’s other places on Frederica with no buffers,” said Willis, “Redfern Village has them, but there are no buf fers at the pier.” Next were fences and walls. Giles asked if fence and wall materials should be regulated in any areas of the county? 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