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Compromise may calm political storm
By KATHY SAUNDERS TREASURE ISLAND -- Opposition to tall buildings on this city's beachfront has inspired: -- Thousands of voters to participate in a petition drive and referendum. -- A 3-2 majority of commissioners to hastily pass development laws that usurped the voters' will. -- Lawsuits and countersuits, judicial rulings and ethics complaints, newspaper ads and airplane banners, the threat of recall of a public official. -- Eleven candidates running in next month's municipal elections who seemingly must answer only one question ... are you for or against LDRs? Now a compromise threatens to quell the drama. In a statement gushing with collaboration, opponents and supporters of the land development regulations last week called for a new law that would allow a simple majority of votes cast -- rather than a majority of all registered voters -- to decide height and density increases. The coalition of six residents and businessmen are asking commissioners to rescind the LDRs that were passed two weeks before the November election and to appoint eight citizens, including themselves, to an advisory committee that would review the existing regulations and make suggestions for changes. If the city complies, Sunset Beach residents Ray Green and Mike Daughtry say they will drop their lawsuit. Treasure Island currently is under a judge's order not to enforce those regulations. They plan to make a presentation at Tuesday's commission meeting, 7 p.m. at City Hall, 120 108th Ave. "If implemented, this proposal, we believe, would end much of the controversy and negative feelings that have plagued Treasure Island for many months," they said in a news release. Green and Daughtry signed the proposal, as did businessman Bill Edwards, who paid for television ads to oppose their referendum campaign. Other signers were businessmen Ken Brown and Harry Black, manager of the Island Inn, and Isle of Palms resident and City Hall watcher Ed Gayton. Daughtry said the citizens have spent weeks negotiating the proposal without the input of city officials. "We all live in Treasure Island and we all want the same thing," Brown said. "We want the business community to survive and the residents to be happy." Commissioner Mary Maloof said she believes the latest proposal will "clean up most of the stuff that's going on in Treasure Island. I think it's very promising; these are two sides that were so angry and they have been able to come together and agree on something." Maloof and Commissioner Stephanie Lavino voted against the LDRs. Mayor Leon Atkinson, a strident voice in favor of the regulations, is not ready to compromise. "I don't see that they are offering us anything," said Atkinson, who is not running for re-election. Atkinson believes the opponents of the LDRs should have waited until the laws were passed before initiating a referendum to overturn the document. The mayor also said he is upset about the petition -- signed by some of those same men -- to recall Commissioner Barbara Blush. "They are totally destroying the life of one of my fellow commissioners and her family," Atkinson said. "These are people that want to negotiate? I'm sorry." Blush received a certified copy of the recall petition last week and is expected to file a response on Monday. To continue the recall effort, organizers then will have to circulate another petition that includes Blush's position. Ultimately, her fate will be decided by Sunset Beach's voters. Blush said she was "thrilled to death that there's an effort going on to come to some kind of compromise," but she would not like her decision on the compromise proposal to impact the recall effort. "That would infuriate me," she said. "My recall should not be considered a bargaining chip." Meanwhile, the silent majority in this continuing narrative remains the voters. On March 4, they will select a new mayor and two commissioners.
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