Bulldozer Work in Blue Ridge Area of Greenville County Sc

A state law has given an unincorporated region of northern Greenville County a title and a defined area - a move that leaders say is a step toward protecting the area from urban spread.

The newly designated Blue Ridge-Greenbelt encompasses such communities as Tigerville and Blue Ridge. Landowners there have been fighting to preserve and protect the area's character and setting.

Article 3.1 of the Greenville County Land Development Regulations was intended to help in that effort. Instead, the controversial law has sparked legal battles and is being replaced by county leaders.

More:Greenville County committee moves forward on changes to problematic land development rule

During a recent community meeting in Tigerville, state Senator Tom Corbin, whose District 5 represents the Blue Ridge-Greenbelt community, encouraged landowners and officials to continue to pursue the best version of an Article 3.1 replacement they can get.

But, he said, "unless a miracle happens," it's not going to be the tool that fixes Tigerville.

"We can't look at Article 3.1 as being our savior because we're not going to get everything that we want for our community," he said. "I don't like the word zoning. I never have. I've never liked government telling me what to do. But if I have to take a little bit of zoning and if it's something I can easily live with, then I'm OK with zoning.

"It's the route the community will probably have to go, he said, and having an outlined and defined area "makes it very easy for county council to give us zoning."

Corbin, state House Representative Mike Burns and Greenville County Council members Joe Dill (District 17), Steve Shaw (District 20) and the Tigerville Executive Community Committee shared updates and successes in the efforts to keep unwanted and incompatible residential growth at bay.

It's a battle that northern Greenville County rural landowners have been encased in since 2018.

The Tigerville Executive Community Committee was organized after ReWa bought land off State 414 with plans to build a wastewater treatment facility. Landowners feared the project would lead to unchecked future growth.

Corbin and Burns worked together on a state law that prohibits ReWa from providing sewer in Tigerville beyond North Greenville University and the Cherokee Valley subdivision.

The Greenville County Council is expected to have a public hearing and second reading on a proposed replacement for Article 3.1 on July 20.

The proposal, which was approved in a 7- to-5 vote in the council's June Committee of the Whole meeting, is not consistent with what the community wants, said Heather Collins, a generational farmer in Tigerville and a member of the Tigerville Executive Committee.

Dill, whose District 17 includes the Blue Ridge-Greenbelt Community, said the current proposal "is the worst thing there ever was. It does murder to our community."

Corbin said the community's battle over Article 3.1 seems almost impossible. It's time for the community figure out which battles they will and will not win, he said.

"We have to put our resources into the ones we can win to accomplish our goal," he said.

To accomplish a goal of zoning, the community needed a defined area and a name, he said.

"I've lived up here for years and years and years and people will ask me, 'where are you from?,'" Sometimes I'm from Tigerville and sometimes I will say I'm from the Blue Ridge area," he said." There's a lot of different names. If we want to accomplish our goal, we have to know what we're talking about."

More:Rural character. Country lifestyles. These northern Greenville County natives say growth is ruining that.

The community needs the support of county officials who ultimately decide on zoning and subdivision requests.

Corbin said he had meetings with Shaw, who represents District 20 on the council, seeking help.

Shaw, who represents District 20, said he and Dill have been trying to get the county staff and the county attorney to give them proposals of what an agricultural zoning might say so that they'd have something to share with the community.

Agricultural zoning is available in counties in the state, but not Greenville.

If the community can get some zoning language they all can agree upon and that's only applicable to the Blue Ridge-Greenbelt, the entire Greenville County Council should defer to Dill when the request is put to a vote because it applies only to his district, Corbin said.

"This is how it works in Columbia," Corbin said. "Most of the time, if a law comes through and it basically just affects my district, the rest of the senators will defer to me. It works that way in the House and I know it works that way on County Council.

"If we can come up with some zoning language we all like, then Joe and Steve should be able to get the Blue Ridge community zoned," Corbin said.

A proposal emailed from the Tigerville Executive Community Committee to county leaders in June included a request to make agricultural zoning an option.

Represented in the email and on copy were the landowners of 2,319.1 acres of continuous agricultural rural land in Northern Greenville county, specifically within the Tigerville Community, the email said.

In the mix of those landowners are multigenerational farming families, approximately 1,000 head of cattle, sustainable share and row crop productions, honey producers, active agritourism and educational farms, a farm to table county store, an agriculturally certified recycle yard, and conservation easements, the email said.

S711, signed into by Governor Henry McMaster on June 15, establishes the Blue Ridge-Greenbelt Community. Its territory includes areas represented by Dill, Burns, and Corbin and a portion of State Rep. Tommy Stringer's District 18.

It's a region with boundaries spanning from the South Carolina-North Carolina state on U.S. 25 to S.C. 290 eastward to S.C. 253 in the Sandy Flat community. It cuts back toward the Lake Robinson area and outside of the Greer city limits and the Spartanburg County line.

The map is not a dead-end, said Travis Collins, also a member of the Tigerville Executive Community Committee. It's a start and more properties can be included.

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Source: https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/news/2021/07/20/northern-greenville-county-gets-new-designation-tool-fight-sprawl/7964724002/

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