Monday, Sep. 15, 2008

JOE DEFEO | HORRY COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION

This past week county council allowed International Paper to build Carolina Station, the next Carolina Forest. It seems that few lessons were learned by the mistakes made when Carolina Forest was nothing more than a plan on paper.

Make no mistake about it I have no problem with development. Businesses do have a right to develop their land. The construction business provides thousands of jobs here in Horry County. But make no mistake about this: New developments left unchecked by government, have put strains on our taxpayers and our schools that we are still paying for 20 years later.

Our schools were given two small parcels of land and the "right to buy" the largest parcel of land from the developers. Let's turn this around Could you imagine if Carolina Station gave the county all the lands for the roads unpaved. With free land and only roads to build it seems like a deal right? That is not even close to a good deal. The county would have to raise all of your taxes to pay all the roads, and it would not be cheap.

So here we are with about $100,000 worth of land given to the schools, but no money for the $110 million dollars of schools that we (or I should say you) will have to pay for.

I will admit that it is not county council's job to build schools but more cooperation with the school board would have went a long way to helping the children and taxpayers of Horry County, Myrtle Beach and Carolina Forest.

It is unfair that we in Carolina Forest and Myrtle Beach will pay - and pay dearly to support these new developments. But no matter how you slice it, by law (and out of a desire to do what is right) we will pay to educate these children. After all it is not their fault that 10 years ago (looking into the future) our government did not do "the right thing."

There is a solution to the problem

Our state legislature can give school boards the right to levy impact fees. You read that right - impact fees for new construction This would spread the cost of development and growth to all new houses and buildings, not just on individual developers. And the fees would not be negotiable. It would also allow school boards to impose these fees without putting the burden on county councils to make voluntary agreements with different developers.

I have discussed this with several of our state representatives and it has been well received. So well received, that I have been asked to put together new legislation for our state representatives to look at. It may be a long shot but at least there is a chance.

If successful I believe it would transform Horry County into the number one school district in the state (and one of the best in the country) And (along with the 1 percent sales tax) eliminate school property tax in Horry County for all construction.

Imagine that, having schools far above everyone else and no property tax. It may be a long shot but we thought JFK was crazy when he said we would put a man on the moon and we did. Let's not wait another 10 years to start the process.

Joe DeFeo is a member of the Horry County Board of Education. He represents District 3, which includes part of Carolina Forest and Myrtle Beach.