About The Islander. (St. Simons Island, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 21, 2024)
Page 6, October 21,2024, The Islander Manager Stefanie Leif explained that the parking spaces were located off the alley behind the Mallery St. buildings and would be accessed from Floyd St., which is a block west of Mallery. Both the alley and Floyd St. run parallel to Mallery. Leif said the four residential units would share the parking spaces and that the residences would be accessed from the rear of the buildings. This means residents will have to cross through the alley to get from the park ing lot to their units. Leif said the IPC voted 5 - 1 on Oct. 15 to recommend approval of the CUPs. Member Patrick Duncan was the sole vote to deny. At the earlier IPC meetings Duncan had expressed his concerns about the parking spaces. Leif also mentioned there were con cerns at the IPC meetings that the new residential use would generate noise complaints from the people staying there. She checked with the police depart ment and found there were 26 noise complaints last year along Mallery St. and almost as many this year. Note: There are two buildings on Mallery St. residential on hold for now By Matthew J. Permar During last week’s Glynn County Board of Commissioners (BOC) meet ing (Thursday, Oct. 17), the seven voted unanimously to defer two Condi tional Use Permits that would have al lowed four new second floor residential units at 115 and 121 Mallery St. in the pier village area of St. Simons Island. This zoning application has an in teresting and lengthy history going back to the June 18 Island Planning Commission (IPC) meeting when the applicant, architect Charles Day, sought design review approval for the project under the village preservation district for the demolition of a portion of the structure at 115 Mallery Street and the addition of a second story at 121 Mallery St. Along with the design review and demolition permit, Day would also need a Conditional Use Permit (CUP) and site plan approval for the two sep arate buildings. Note: Residential property use on Mallery St. requires a CUP. Concerned about the lack of design details and communication with ad jacent business owners, the IPC de ferred the application to its next meet ing which was in August. After hearing from Day again in August, the IPC discussed wanting to consider all required zoning applica tions for the project at the same meet ing and deferred the application a sec ond time with no specific meeting date named. The design review application re surfaced on the IPC’s agenda for their October 15 meeting. In addition, the applications for the residential CUPs for both 115 and 121 Mallery St. were also on the agenda. Interestingly, the two CUPs were also on the BOC’s agenda two nights later at their Thursday, Oct. 17 meeting. Generally there is a two-week pe riod between items being on the IPC agenda and the BOC agenda. There was no clear explanation dur ing the BOC meeting of how the CUPs made it on two different meeting agen das within two days of each other. What makes it unusual is the fact that agendas are set several days be fore a meeting takes place, and in this case it was on the BOC agenda before the IPC meeting took place. One of the issues that was discussed at all three IPC meetings was parking for the four proposed new residential units. One residential unit would be on the existing second floor of 115 Mal lery, which is the former Blue Water restaurant. The applicant is also proposing building a second floor on 121 Mallery St. that would house three residential units. For parking, according to Day, the plan is to demolish the rear of 115 Mal lery, which was a more recent addition to the original building, and turn that space into eight parking spaces - two per residential unit, which meets the county ordinance for parking. During the BOC’s meeting last week (Thursday, Oct. 17) Planning GOLDEN ISLES & Gourmet Market Restaurant, Full Bar, & Gourmet Market Monday 10 a.m.- 5 p.m. • Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Happy HourTuesday- Friday4 p.m.-6 p.m. Join us for Sunday Brunch 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. Frederica Road • St. Simons Island, GA • 912-602-9736 • donna@goldenislesoliveoil.com Mallery St. with existing residential uses, both of which are north of Beach- view Dr. on the east side of Mallery. The ones on the second floor of the Kent building on the corner of Mallery and Ocean Blvd. have been there since the 1950s or 1960s. Commissioner Cap Fendig (Dist. 2) spoke first last week saying he had received a lot of phone calls about the proposed residences. Noting the IPC had just taken action two nights be fore, he wanted to look into the issue further. “People just heard about this,” he said. He also wondered if it was le gal to bring it to the BOC from the IPC so quickly. Leif said they don’t often move items from the IPC to the BOC so quickly, but she said this started in June. She said it was heard twice at the IPC and the applicant wanted to move forward. She added that she had updated the report from the IPC meeting. County Attorney Aaron Mumford agreed with Leif saying there was no time frame in the county ordinance, or state law, for getting applications from one commission to the other. Commissioner Bo Clark (At Large #1) asked where the residence’s gar bage cans would be located. Leif said, “I don’t know, we can ask the applicant.” At this point, BOC chairman Wayne Neal (Dist. 3) opened the public hear ing on the issue. Three people spoke in opposition to the CUP applications and three spoke in favor, one of whom was the archi tect Charles Day. The main focus of the opposition was that residential is incompatible with the commercial nature of Mal lery St. and the pier village. Brad Proctor said the intent of the village mixed use (VMU) ordinance was to discourage encroachment of things that will harm the small busi nesses. He noted the limited parking and poor access to it. “This is a tightly condensed area with limited parking,” he said, “that will harm business if the residential is allowed.” He noted that the alley residents would have to use has grease traps in it and is used by delivery trucks. He said drivers will have to back out of the eight parking spaces onto Floyd St. which will be difficult. “Folks won’t want to park back there and will park in front of the businesses on Mal lery St. where there is no time limit on parking.” Turn to Page 8 Mallery St. Not all hearing loss requires a hearing aid. If you think you are experiencing hearing loss, see Southeast Georgia's only licensed Doctors of Audiology. we went to a hearing doctor. Trust the Doctors at Advanced Hearing & Balance Center. HEAR BETTER-NO RISK Free 30-Day Test Drive on all hearing devices we recommend Make an Appointment: (912) 267-1569 Physician-Referred ADVANCED HEARING & BALANCE CENTER Southeast Georgia Health System, Brunswick Campus 3025 Shrine Rd, Suite 490, Brunswick, GA 31520
