Auto MechanicNear Isle of Palms, SC

ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (WCSC) - The Isle of Palms City Council in 2020 voted to make additions to the marina area of the island and that project is officially slated to be completed this year.

The project included the addition of a public dock, a boardwalk and a waterfront park and greenspace. The boardwalk and public dock have been completed, and, as of Jan. 11, the construction contract for the waterfront park and greenspace was officially confirmed.

The waterfront park will cover the 300 by 25 foot wide area along the marina facing the Intracoastal Waterway. There will be a 6-foot wide concrete walkway. The park will include a large lawn area with lush planting.

They plan to include a series of benches along the waterfront walkway so residents can enjoy views of the water and boating activities. There are plans for a circular seat wall near the public dock that would create an entrance to the dock area.

They plan to include a kayak storage area and a kayak launch area. There will be golf cart parking available as well as bicycle parking areas.

All of these plans did require collaboration and participation from the marina manager and restaurant tenants. Scott Toole, the general manager of the Outpost, a nearby restaurant, says he is very excited for this addition to the area.

“I think that it’s an added benefit to the island, to the residents, everybody, to have a space and to use the dock. Kayak launching is a big thing that I think people will take advantage of.” he says. “It’s really going to help make this area kind of a place of interest for people, sort of a destination so to speak, for people to be able to get some food, get some drink, watch the water and use the dock that’s right there.”

Toole says they very recently renovated the Outpost and he’s excited to see this new project bring more people to the area. He says he feels like this area of Isle of Palms is often overlooked as it is a little ways away from the main beach.

“We’ve kind of joked that it’s a small corner of the island and so, anything that’s bringing people down this direction is good for everybody. We’re excited to see this project take place,” he says.

The project is currently slated to be completed by May of this year. To provide City Council your input on this project you can click here.

Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.

ISLE OF PALMS — On this barrier island known as a vacation destination, full-time residents voted against a proposal to limit short-term rental licenses.

The hotly contested referendum was prompted by a petition signed by more than 30 percent of the city’s registered voters. It called for adoption of an ordinance with a 1,600-license cap on short-term rentals for homes taxed as commercial properties.

Full-time residents, who can legally rent out their homes for up to 72 days each year, would have no limit on short-term rental licenses.

With all votes counted, the referendum was opposed by 54.5 percent. Results are unofficial until certified.

Isle of Palms has traditionally had a mix of full-time residents, second homes and rental properties, each accounting for about one-third of the residential properties. The island adjacent to Sullivan’s Island and across the marsh from Mount Pleasant has about 4,400 residents and 3,740 registered voters.

Proponents of the referendum argued that with no limits, short-term rental properties could come to dominate the island.

For opponents, a key issue was that if there were a cap on licenses, anyone buying a property could not be certain it could be used for short-term rentals, and that could depress prices. If the number of licenses hit the proposed cap — as they did in the summer of 2023 — investment property buyers interested in short-term renting would have to wait until the number came down.

With quality of life and real estate prices in question, both sides pushed hard. Websites were created by pro-referendum Preserve Isle of Palms Now and by anti-referendum Isle of Palms United. Campaign signs supporting or opposing the referendum lined island streets.

COLUMBIA — South Carolina’s Supreme Court heard arguments Feb. 6 over the constitutionality of the firing squad and electric chair as death penalty methods with some justices indicating discomfort with the procedures, especially the firing squad.

Four death row inmates, all convicted murderers, are suing the state Department of Corrections arguing the electric chair violates the state constitution’s prohibition of cruel punishment.

They also contended the firing squad violates prohibitions against unusual or corporal punishment.

During the hearing, the justices additionally seemed to be seeking a middle ground on how much information the department must give to death row inmates, the courts and the public about the drugs used in lethal injection under a recently signed Shield Law.

Thirty-two men are on death row in South Carolina, the corrections department said.

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Though South Carolina now has the drugs to carry out a lethal injection execution, the dispute over the other two methods stems from the 12-year period after its last execution in 2011 when the state was unable to obtain them, creating a de facto moratorium.

Drug companies will not sell death penalty drugs to states if their identities could be revealed, fearing public backlash, though South Carolina moved to change that thanks to a 2023 law protecting a company’s identity.

Since 1995, the state’s default method of execution had been lethal injection, though inmates could choose electrocution. In 2021, the governor signed a bill that made electrocution the default death penalty method but gave inmates the choice of firing squad or lethal injection if the drugs were available.

The inmates sued, claiming that with no lethal injection drugs available, they would be forced to choose between two unconstitutional methods of execution. Circuit Court Judge Jocelyn Newman agreed with the inmates and found the electric chair and firing squad unconstitutional in September 2022 after a trial in Columbia.

The state appealed, and the Supreme Court heard arguments in the case in January 2023 but asked the lower court to investigate whether the state had done all it could to obtain lethal injection drugs.

Meanwhile, Gov. Henry McMaster signed the Shield Law in May, which barred the release of any information that would give away the identity of the companies from which the state purchased lethal injection drugs. In September, McMaster announced the state obtained pentobarbital, a lethal injection drug, and was ready to resume executing the inmates who have exhausted their appeals.

With lethal injection now an available option, the state Supreme Court again took up the question of the constitutionality of the electric chair and firing squad Feb. 6.

Grayson Lambert, a lawyer for McMaster who argued the case for the state, told the court the availability of lethal injection provided them an “off-ramp” to avoid weighing in on the constitutionality of the other two methods because the inmates now have the choice of lethal injection, which their lawyers have conceded is constitutional.

“I don’t think that someone should be able to elect an unconstitutional method,” countered John Blume, a lawyer from the Cornell Death Penalty Project who represents the inmates.

The justices did not skirt the constitutionality issue, pressing Lambert, the state’s lawyer, on how the firing squad would not be an “unusual” punishment as it has never been used in South Carolina and has only been used four times in the United States, all in Utah, since 1960.

Justice John Kittredge, who appeared otherwise skeptical of the circuit court decision — calling it a “scorched-earth order” that was “riddled with errors,” listed statistics about how rare the firing squad has been used in American executions during the last century.

Chief Justice Don Beatty asked pointedly whether it would be constitutional to bring back hanging.

The firing squad is a long-established method elsewhere in the U.S. and hasn’t been totally discarded, Lambert said. It’s gaining some popularity as some inmates across the country argue it’s less cruel because it kills almost instantly, Lambert added.

Lambert blasted the circuit court for finding that electrocution was unconstitutionally cruel.

In the 1970s when the Legislature last rewrote the state constitution, it included capital punishment, Lambert said. At the time, the only form of execution allowed was electrocution. That shows the legislature clearly intended to allow the electric chair, Lambert argued.

As to its cruelty, Lambert said the experts the inmates’ lawyers called in the trial never proved that someone being electrocuted would feel excruciating pain as their body is essentially cooked rather than being knocked insensate immediately. The inmates’ experts only proved that it was possible, which wasn’t enough to meet their burden of proof, Lambert said.

Blume said the reason the experts could not definitively prove inmates would suffer several seconds of intense pain was because scientists cannot ethically conduct lethal electrocution experiments on humans.

While the definition of cruel hasn’t changed, Blume told the high court, “it’s what we know about electrocution that has changed, and that means you have to reevaluate what’s cruel.”

Blume also asked the court to order the Department of Corrections make more information available to the courts and the inmates about the drug they plan to use to kill the inmates. Currently, the department has only revealed that the drug is pentobarbital and the dosage that they’ll use, citing the Shield Law.

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“If too much is disclosed or disclosed in the wrong way, it will thwart the efforts of SCDC moving forward to obtain the drugs, and lethal injection will once again become unavailable,” Lambert warned.

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The justices seemed to favor a bit more disclosure.

“Seems to me they don’t want to give you anything. Seems to me, even though you probably won’t acknowledge it, you want everything,” Kittredge told Blume. “Help us with a framework that would be somewhere in between.”

A decision is expected later.

ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (WCIV) — The Lowcountry saw its fourth highest tide on record Sunday after a Nor'easter hit the South Carolina coast.

Neighborhoods on the beach, like Isle of Palms (IOP), were hit hard by coastal flooding and beach erosion. Most spent Monday trying to recover.

IOP residents cleaning up after Sunday's storm hit harder than expected. Dec. 2023. (WCIV)

People living on IOP are in clean-up mode; they’re filling bags with debris and trash found all over their property. They say they weren't expecting Sunday's storm to hit them so hard, including those who remember dealing with much worse.

"We went through Hurricane Hugo here at the same location," said Mike Sottile, who has resided on the same IOP street for 46 years. "This was not as bad as Hurricane Hugo, obviously, but it was a lot of cleanup. It's probably the most cleanup we've had since Hurricane Hugo."

Read more: Nearly 100 residents in McClellanville trapped after road collapses during Nor'easter

The clean-up took an entire day. Sottile says he started cleaning at 5 a.m. and the pile of 10 of bags spilling over at the end of his driveway wasn't full until 3 p.m. And the debris scattered around his property wasn't all the storm left behind.

"I had water in my garage that was probably two feet deep," Sottile said. "My backyard was in knee deep water and it was just a combination of storm surge and seven inches of rain."

Those two feet of water filled his garage while destroying the family's washer and dryer. The family says they're now in a hurry to replace those appliances during the busy holiday season, with Christmas festivities quickly approaching for them.

Read more: Edisto Beach feels impact of Sunday Nor'easter

According to Sottile, people living on IOP are used to flooding every year, but the recovery from this storm is taking longer.

"We normally don't have this kind of cleanup," he said. "When I say we've had storms in the past, usually it's just what you see in the street and it drains off as soon as the tide goes back out."

Most of the flood waters have receded from the streets. Still, Sottile said his work is far from done. His cable television service is out, but the heat is working. He feels lucky the damage wasn't worse, like the kind he's experienced in the past.

Read more: Flooding continues after Nor'easter causes record rainfall, 4th-highest tide level in Charleston

Neighbors say they're now waiting for the city to come and collect the trash before they can get back to normal life.

"I put in a call to the public works, let them know it was here," Sottile said. "I'm sure they're inundated by a lot of people on the island, so hopefully it'll get picked up before Christmas."

ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (WCBD)- Erosion on the Isle of Palms continues to be a big concern for IOP city leaders and property owners.

Council members, the mayor and coastal engineering experts met Tuesday afternoon to discuss short term solutions.

The issue is so urgent that city leaders took action, approving more than a million dollars to fund short-term solutions for the erosion.

Beach erosion has long been a problem on the Isle of Palms

“There’s a lot of concern,” City councilmember Rusty Streetman said.

However, the city says it’s starting to get worse.

“Some of our residents down there have hit the critical line of 20 feet, water within 20 feet of their structure,” Mayor Phillip Pounds said.

The city has no control over one of the major causes of the erosion, king tides.

“Tides were supposed to be 6 and a half feet and with the winds and waves, it was about 8 and half, so pretty significant difference than what we were expecting,” Pounds said.

However, what leaders say they can control, is their response to the issue.

Pounds said, “We need some immediate relief and some immediate guidance to our residents down there on what they can and can’t do.”

“Beach erosion will always be here, it’s a fact of life. We live with it so we just have to try and plan as well as we can to handle that,” Streetman said.

The city approved about one and a half million dollars to continue digging sand from the shoreline for dune renourishment.

It’s a project that has been ongoing since tropical storm Idalia hit in August.

They also say they’ll use that money to bring in more sand if needed and provide sandbags for residents who need them.

Streetman said, “We also have a beach renourishment fund that is taxed onto the accommodations tax, that is targeted just for beach renourishment.”

In January, a long-term renourishment project in partnership with the Army Corp of Engineers will begin.

They’re going to rebuild some of the beach in hopes of mitigating erosion for years to come.

ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (WCSC) - Isle of Palms city crews are working diligently to restore the beach after it experienced heavy erosion during Tropical Storm Idalia.

The loss of tons of sand to erosion means the drop off between the access points and the beaches can reach several feet, making it dangerous for people to reach the beach from these points.

Until the restoration of the beach is completed, Public Beach Access 1B, 2A, and 3A will be closed until further notice.

“The cleanup will happen over the next couple of days and then next week we’ll start doing scrapping at low tide to bring some of the sand back up,” Isle of Palms Mayor Phillip Pounds said. “And build a dune in front of these people’s houses to protect them for the rest of the hurricane season.”

Not only is it hurricane season, but it’s also sea turtle nesting season. Inclement weather can leave turtles exposed, but Pounds said the city is doing all it can to keep the turtles protected.

“You’re not in the dunes and hopefully not disturbing the nest,” Pounds said. “Our turtle team does a great as far as marking the nest or moving them when they feel like they’re in harm’s way. So, it’s very coordinated with our local turtle team as well as the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources to make sure they’re aware of what’s going, you know?”

Despite the city not receiving federal funding, city leaders have managed to receive an emergency permit from the Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management to begin restoration work Tuesday.

Pounds stresses the importance of maintaining safety before heading into Labor Day weekend.

“So, we just ask folks to be respectful of the workers that’ll be coming in and out of here. There’s going to be trucks and bulldozers and all kind of stuff going on. So just watch out and be careful,” Pounds says. “Our guys will be out here next week with the bulldozers when most of our summer crowd is gone. So, the timing is decent from that standpoint, we just need to get protection on the beach for these folk’s home as soon as we can.”

Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved.