About The Islander. (St. Simons Island, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 11, 2024)
theislanderonline.com Published by Permar Publications ssislander@bellsouth.net November 11, 2024 Established in 1972 Vol 52 Issue 46 Mallery Park This aerial shot shows the north side of Mallery Park on St. Simons, which is one of Glynn County’s many ongoing SPLOST 2022 projects. The pond area will be filled and turned into an underground water retention area with 70 new parking spaces created on top. The Holy Nativity Episcopal Church is shown in the top right corner, with Mallery St. to the upper right and portions of Anne Ave. and Bartow St. visible at the upper left. Photo by Glynn County IT / GIS Dept. SPLOST QRE update County denies Mallery St. residential By Matthew J. Permar After three trips to the Is land Planning Commission (IPC) and two to the Glynn County Board of Commission ers (BOC), the owners of 115 Mallery St. and 121 Mallery St. on St. Simons were turned down for Conditional Use Per mits (CUP) that would have allowed residential units on the second floors of the two buildings. CUP applications for both buildings were on the agen da for the BOC’s October 17 meeting. After hearing the applica tion and holding a public hear ing for 115, the BOC deferred it to the November 7 meeting. They also deferred the appli cation for 121 without hear ing it or holding the public hearing. Both were on last week’s November 7 meeting agenda, however only one public hear ing was held for 121 Mallery. According to the applica tions, 115 Mallery, the for mer Blue Water restaurant, is owned by Charles Harris of Siesta Key, Florida and 121 Mallery is owned by Gilad Shrem of St. Simons. The plan is to turn the exist ing second floor of 115 into one residential unit and build a second floor on top of 121 with three residential units. CUPs are required for residential use in the Village Mixed Use (VMU) district along Mallery St. The primary issue for the BOC was the parking. According to the agent for the owners, architect Charles Day, the design includes eight parking spaces behind 115 that would have to be ac cessed from Floyd St., which is a block to the west of Mal lery St. After parking the ten ants would then have to walk Turn to Page 6 Mallery residential The Glynn County adminis tration and Board of Commis sioners (BOC) hold quarterly execution reviews (QRE) to update the BOC and public on the SPLOST projects and on the County’s Strategic Plan. Last week (Wednesday, Oct. 6) was the SPLOST update. Currently, five projects (21%) have been achieved, 14 (58%) are underway and on track, two (8%) are underway and off track, and three (13%) are not started. The five projects that have been achieved (completed) are: Demere Park improve ments, Ballard Park improve ments, East Beach sidewalk repair and replacement, North Harrington (St. Simons By Matthew J. Permar Island) drain pipe replace ment and three pieces of new heavy equipment for the Pub lic Works Department. There are various reasons for projects not being on track including third party involve ment such as permits and cooperation needed from the Department of Natural Re sources, Army Corps of En gineers, the Department of Transportation or in some cases a railroad company. All of these entities move on their own time table. After some discussion last week about the $1 million St. Simons fiber network con nection project, which is on track, Program Management Director Jason Hagen opened the floor for Assistant Fire Chief Scott Cook to give an update on equipment for that department. Note: Information Technol ogy Department Chief Infor mation Officer David West told the BOC that using Live Oak Fiber’s resources has saved the county about $2 million. Regarding the fire depart ment, Hagen said staff was recommending the same ar chitectural firm, Jericho De sign Group, LLC., for both the new fire station, which will be located at the inter section of Hwy. 17 North and Chapel Crossing Rd. and the new, multi-use Public Safety Turn to Page 3 SPLOST update County-Wide News - Read County-Wide Page 2 - County finance okays Frederica Rd. study ~ GIDA honors local industry Page 3 - Vols needed for Rivers Alive cleanup Page 4 - D.A. King - Looking for a Better Life Page 9 - Port City Page Page 10 - Ernest DeWitt obit / Pew News Page 11 - Rotary Students of the Month Page 12 - Back Talk City to undergo public safety needs assessment By Pamela Permar- Shierling The Brunswick City Com mission will consider a con tract for a public safety study at their next meeting. However, last week dur ing their regular meeting, the commission heard a presenta tion from Architects Design Group (ADG) president Ian Reeves on the upcoming study which will be performed by ADG for the city. ADG is an architectural de sign firm specializing solely in the design of public safety, law enforcement, fire-rescue, EOC / 911, public safety train ing, criminal justice, and civic facilities. Turn to Page 5 Safety assessment School board considering weapons system By Pamela Permar- Shierling The Glynn County Board of Education will vote Tuesday, Nov. 12, on an $858,358 weap ons detection system which will be put in all Glynn Coun ty Schools. The Opengate® system from A-3 Communications is manufactured by Ceia USA. The information was pre sented to the BOE during their Nov. 7 work session. It was also set up and demon strated to the board members during the meeting. Mike Blackerby, Deputy Superintendent of Opera tions for the school system, described the system as simi lar to a metal detector but one that is designed to pinpoint weapons; even unassembled Turn to Page 8 Weapon detection 0 94922 29970 3
