LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Johns Island Threats Published on 09/29/08

When a downtown resident starts to paint a shutter an "army" of city do-gooder preservation police swarm the premises and stop all activity until their color is forced on the owner.

Yet when the wholesale destruction of acres and acres of rural landscape is threatened (not to mention the lifestyle of those affected), what do the city planners and "preservationists" do? They join with the developer and approve yet another mega-development, which encroaches into residential areas and will be the death knell to many grand trees.

The proposed and apparently now permitted development on Johns Island adjacent to the Angel Oak is not only inappropriate because of its proximity to the old oak but also because of the project's massive size and density (600 residential units). The city states that this development is part of their "plan" and will stop "sprawl."

This is the same rhetoric the city used when it laid waste to James Island. Its "plan" included permitting a Wal-Mart, a Kmart and hundreds of vinyl-sided triplexes on the once beautiful Dill Sanctuary property. Its "plan" included multiple rezonings to allow apartment complexes and commercial development on two-lane roads. Its "plan" was to allow an expansion of the Wal-Mart and the destruction of 30 grand trees on property that the city agreed in writing would be preserved forever.

Johns Island is now in the same position as was James Island 15 years ago. The city is on an annexation and development rampage, and the residents' desires and input are ignored. (No city council person lives on Johns Island.) The city has allowed Fenwick Hall Plantation to be bordered by apartment complexes and continues to permit developments that the road system is incapable of handling.

The city has a "plan," and it is to grow at any cost, regardless of how it affects those in its path. The "plan" for the Angel Oak is sprawl and it should be scaled down and moved away from the oak, or stopped in its entirety.

It is time for all to realize that the city of Charleston is not as much interested in preservation as it is in tax dollars. That's the bottom line. Other than the city and the developers, does anyone else really like what has happened to James and Johns islands?

I have spent the past seven years speaking out against the travesty and the illusion of the city's "plan" and will continue to do so. This type of activity by the city validates the effort by James Island to become a town and implement its own land-use plan.

Johns Island needs help, and I assure you, it won't be coming from Broad Street.

Joe Qualey, Town Councilman

Town of James Island

Clearview Drive, James Island