30-04-2025
Charleston Co. council discusses priorities for ‘Housing Our Future' plan
NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCBD) – Charleston County council voted on priorities for their 'Housing Our Future' plan.
Staff members will focus on collaborating with municipal partners to align zoning and other land use regulations and expanding home repair resources for seniors and low-income homeowners. The third priority was tied with two strategies, continuing to explore and support housing authority coordination and providing capacity building and technical assistance resources to nonprofit and emerging housing developers.
Housing Our Future was enacted in 2023. Since then, county staff have accomplished two objectives including establishing a housing trust fund and securing land for future units. They have worked with the South Carolina Community Loan Fund and American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to implement both of these programs recently.
'So, council adopted the 'Housing Our Future' plan almost two years ago now, which is our plan and our commitment towards starting to resolve the housing affordability crisis in the county,' Eric Davis, director of housing development and land management, said.
The county has several affordable housing projects under their belt including the Archer School Apartments, Esau Jenkins Village, and the North Bridge Townhomes.
According to council member Jenny Costa Honeycutt, recent studies show that the county is thousands of units behind for the predicted population growth. She added the overall, the goal for this plan is to increase housing in the market to ensure affordability.
'So, in order to help stabilize the pricing, we just need more housing. It's sort of this blessing and curse where a lot of people want to be, but it's our challenge as leaders to balance that and to make sure that we are providing the appropriate response,' said Honeycutt.
Council is expected to debate and vote on their top three priorities out of the 25 strategies left. This is expected to determine what kinds of programs county staff put together to then bring back to leaders to consider and put in action.
'There's a whole slew of different types of strategies. There's ones based on partnerships, ones based on policy changes, others that require potentially some changes at state legislation, and then of course those related to resources,' Davis said.
Officials said some of these strategies may take six months or years to implement.
'But there are some low-hanging fruit, I would say, that we could accomplish. For instance, changing some of our zoning laws to accommodate or better allow for the goals we have in this area. Where density is appropriate – identifying those areas and making sure that folks are able to build in those areas,' Honeycutt said. 'As you know we have a housing shortage in the area, and it's a basic supply and demand issue.'
The meeting began at 6 p.m. They are expected to discuss the agenda item in the special finance committee and county council meetings.
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