Acreage Rule up for Vote Wednesday

Mount Pleasant's Planning Commission on Wednesday will consider repealing town code that bars commercial structures over 70,000 square feet from locating on property smaller than 50 acres.

The discussion isn't anything new. The town actually voted to repeal the restrictions in July 2011, but somehow the old regulation stayed on the books.

But the proposal is throwing fuel to an ongoing debate over whether to allow a massive big-box store development on Hwy. 17. That project would have added more than 300,000 square feet of retail space to just a 40-acre parcel.

The town discovered the law was still on the books during an internal review, said Christiane Farrell, director of the town's planning and development office.

"This amendment is a result of a staff review of ordinances," she said.

But the amendment's timing, just three months after a developer temporarily shelved plans for three big-box stores on Hwy. 17, has some residents crying foul.

"The reason the developer deferred their (zoning application) was because of this rule, not because they wanted to get in the good graces of the community," said Mike Tyson, a resident of Wando Lakes, the community that abuts the planned retail development.

, the developer said it was deferring its application to review the plans in wake of public outcry.

“As a result of the public concern voiced … over the last few weeks, these additional efforts to further study the overall impacts of the project are expressly warranted,” Henrich Properties, the developer, wrote in a statement to the town and to local media.

Tyson, who has been a vocal opponent of the project on Twitter, said residents feel like town leaders are bending over backward to accommodate the developer.

"We are actively being stabbed in the back," he said. "It's tough sitting back and watching the town go through all the paces, changing all their laws and rules, to give this developer everything they want."

Currently the Gregg Tract, the parcel on which the developer wants to build, is zoned for apartments. The town must rezone the property for the proposed retail use.

"When Charleston was in its big growth phase, this 50-acre rule saved Mount Pleasant from looking like Rivers Ave.," Tyson said. "Now if that protection is gone, what will replace it?"