| AIKEN COUNTY COMPREHENSIVE PLAN 2024-2034 COMMUNITY SURVEY Peter DeLorme Comments Executive Summary If you want to read the more detailed comments and recommendations they can be found here: http://www.cwdelorme.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Comprehensive-Plan-2034-Community-Survey-DeLorme-250205.docx |
It is important that the County hear from everyone concerned about how our quality of life has already changed, how you believe future growth will impact your life and how you believe more restrained future growth should be managed. The number of comments submitted does matter. Please make sure your voice is heard by submitting comments – now, while you are thinking about it!
The Comprehensive Plan provides a framework for how the County will change, through public and private investment, in the next two decades. It seeks to address the county’s future needs for housing, economic development, recreation and cultural resources, and transportation facilities. The plan seeks to balance the desire of some for growth and development with the wishes of the many who seek protection and preservation of our domestic tranquility and the county’s natural resources. Community input in the planning process is vital.
You can fill out an on-line survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/9SMMVD9 or submit comments directly to the Planning Commission in an email whose subject line reads: Comprehensive Plan Comments and whose address is: planning@aikencountysc.gov . The Plan’s more complete website is here: https://www.aikencountysc.gov/DspSvc?qSvcID=157 and the 2014 Comprehensive Plan is here: https://www.aikencountysc.gov/Reference/AikenCountyComprehensivePlan%202014-2024.pdf
The Survey has five sections, each with a free-form space for a response – the 5th section lets you add comments about anything not addressed by the other four sections:
1. a. Overall, do you believe population growth in South Carolina is Beneficial or Detrimental?
b. Overall, do you believe population growth in Aiken County is Beneficial or Detrimental?
c. Please tell us more about your answers
2. What do you think has been, and will be, the most important impact of population growth on Aiken County?
3. How can the following institutions or groups be better prepared for the population increases anticipated over the next decade? State, County, Schools, Businesses, Developers, Non-Profits
4. Please rank the following issue areas according to their importance: Infrastructue, Nature, Farms, Neighborhoods, Health, Recreation, Housing Traffic, Workforce
5. Provide additional concerns
Optional information: Live in Aiken, Live in Aiken City or N August, Zip Code, Age, Household size
Below is a summary of my key comments:
- Unprecedented Growth is DETRIMENTAL to Aiken County and its residents.
- I take no position on how growth affects the State. But am in agreement with the majority of County residents who turn out at public meetings about growth-related projects, be they related to usage of water or electricity, large housing developments or industrial-sized commercial enterprises. This anti-growth sentiment is true whether the meeting is of the County or City Planning Commissions, the County Council or the Legislative Delegation.
- The Rural District (RUD) allows almost any land use to be intermingled with any other land use, whether or not they are compatible.
- The County’s growth has caused disruption across the county, but despite the number of jobs being created, it has failed to improve the economic lives of its lower income residents. Data int the chart below,already collected for the update by an outside consulting firm, confirms this. About 30% of families are in the three lowest cohorts (which include families of four living below the poverty line):
Further, a recent school board presentation to the Aiken Legislative Delegation revealed that about 30% of our students graduate unprepared for the work force.
The new plan must have a focus on improving our school system’s performance, and economic development recruitment efforts must focus on increasing job opportunities for less educated persons.
2. Growth has impacts; what has been and will be, the most important impact.
- Quality-of-life will continue to decline for the general public.
- Natural environment will continue to be destroyed:
- Many land owners will see the value of their land decrease (while only a few others will see it increase)Large industrial/commercial projects, due to community opposition, will be crowded out by unconstrained and unmanaged growth of housing developments
- Prime agricultural land, in the two bands that run through the county, will be lost as non-agricultural development continues in the RUD zone.
3. How can the following institutions prepare for growth
- State of South Carolina
- Begin mandating that developers pay impact fees
- Begin charging for surface and ground water withdrawals by large industrial/commercial enterprises and agricultural users. Water is a limited, though renewable resource.
- Means test (i.e. gradually reduce the deduction as property value increases) tax deductions (School Prop Relief, Homestead Exemptions, etc.) available to homeowners and others.
- Revise tax laws to provide more education resources for school districts with the highest percentages of Pupils in Poverty
- Aiken County Government
- Abolish the RUD – Rural District – it is no longer adequate to the needs of the county.
- Replace RUD with, one of the other, already existing, Districts, listed in declining order of importance:
- RRC – Rural Residential and small Commercial – for a majority of county’s rural areas,
- Agricultural Preservation for the two distinct bands of the county with the most fertile soil and,
- Industrial Development (includes large commercial uses)
- Other Districts which preserve small-town look and feel of small commercial hubs surrounded by higher residential density
- Aiken County School District
- 1% sales tax just extended already prepares for some future growth
- Also prepare for other impacts of growth by building into its annual budget a larger infrastructure maintenance and improvement component.
- Revise budget process to increase funding allocations to selected schools with low performance scores on state tests so that minimally acceptable educational outcomes are achieved across all schools in the district.
- Local business Community
- The County should no be prescribing how businesses should be preparing for their growth.
- Local Development Community
- This group of businessmen should begin to include in their profitability calculations the costs of upgrading the infrastructure and providing buffers against light, sound and visual impacts.
- Local non-profit organizations
- Prepare for increased support and less governmental assistance to the approximately 1/3 of county families living in poverty
- Develop more ways to support workforce development by strengthening or developing volunteers to support job training and support activities.
- Plan for more creating more affordable housing and find innovative funding streams
4. Rank the following areas according to their importance
| 8__Adequate infrastructure | 5__Natural Resource Management |
| 2__Farmland preservation | 1__Neighborhood Preservation |
| 6__Health Care Availability/Options | 10_Parks and Recréation |
| 7__Housing Affordability | 9__Traffic Congestion/Delay |
| 3__Housing Availability/variety | 4__Workforce Development |
However, some require equal priority and simultaneous implementation. An alternative ranking would be:
1. Neighborhood preservation Farmland preservation Housing Availability/Variety
4. Workforce Development Natural Resource Mgt Housing Affordability
7. Health Care Availability/Options Adequate Infrastructure Traffic Congestion/Delay
10. Parks and Recreation
5. Additional Comments
- Bring more visibility into early planning for any large industrial or commercial project being recruited into the County. Failed Project Sunny (House of Raeford) shows how proper siting of projects is imperative, but also that such projects can provide jobs for our under-educated residents
- The impacts of growth have not been felt equally across the county. Create Opportunity-Zone-like areas, such as our hollowed out small town centers, where development can be encouraged.
- Retain our rural environment of pastural and forested areas
- Support small town commercial cores – Town centers that area walkable and have more dense residential development
- Integrate planning for large residential and industrial development to prevent dissonance
- Streetscapes should be preserved by requiring appropriate buffers for light, sound, and smells.
- Donut Holes in Aiken City should be eliminated, at least so there are not gaps in infrastructure such as sidewalks and curbs.
- Permeable gravel or grass pavers in driveways and parking areas should be required to ensure Aiken more effectively participates in the catchment basin for local and coastal aquifers.