Plans forming as growth goes on
March 04, 2006
By KEITH LAING and MARY STARR
The Brunswick News
The Golden Isles is home to more than sun and fun.
For the past half century, growth has also been a Glynn County hallmark.
The county’s population has increased by nearly 20,000 people since 1980 - swelling from 54,981 to more than 74,000, according to recent U.S. Census figures - and leaving officials struggling to keep up with the demand on the community’s infrastructure.
The reason for the growth is simple, says Glynn County Commissioner Cap Fendig: People want to live here.
“Glynn County has a very sound and balanced economy,” he said. “It’s a pretty recession-proof economy. It’s part tourism, part ports, part commerce from interstate traffic and part real estate. If one segment takes a hit, the others are able to hold steady.”
Because of that, it is important that Glynn County continue to work to meet growing demands, he said. With that in mind, Fendig created an infrastructure committee in 2005 during his tenure as commission chair.
The committee, Fendig said, is supposed to address Glynn County’s most glaring needs: More water and sewer lines beyond the city limits and road improvements.
“The county is investing in (infrastructure),” he said. “Half of the next SPLOST is dedicated to water and sewer and roads.”
The fifth Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, which voters approved this past November to take effect in 2007, is expected to generate $124 million. More than three-fourths of it - more than $93 million - will go to the county, with the remainder to the city and Jekyll Island.
In addition to re-paving roads and repairing aging water and sewer facilities, the money will be used to create infrastructure west of Interstate 95 . . .
Other concerns include health-care and education, Fendig said. The school system is already planning to build two additional schools and is looking at the possibility of constructing others.
Southeast Georgia Health System is also on the move.
“The hospital is expanding to meet the needs of being a regional hospital and the county is a partner to make sure water and sewer is available to new schools,” he said.
Glynn County Commissioner Tony Thaw, who serves on the infrastructure committee, added that managing growth is important because it is not something that is going away. He said that Glynn County population grew by 9.2 percent last year.
“I hear people say that, in big cities, construction is starting to slow down, but not in Glynn County,” he said. “Growth’s here and I think it’s going to be here for the next 10 years. The south, the north, and the west are wide open, and there’s even growth downtown with Liberty Harbor.”
Liberty Harbor is a large residential development proposed for the waterfront in the south end of Brunswick.
The growth that has occurred so far is easy to track. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of housing units in the county jumped to 33,985 in 2002 from just 17,308 in 1990.
Thaw said the county has its work cut out for it trying to keep up with the demands of a burgeoning population.
“It’s going to be a challenge for us to keep up with the growth,” he said. “We’re behind, but we’re dealing with it in an aggressive manner, trying to catch up.”
One thing that would help is to have a unified water-sewer system by merging the two services now offered by the city and the county.
“That’s the heart of the community,” said Thaw, who serves on the committee working to complete the merger. “It pumps the blood and does everything we need. It’s the most important thing in the whole community that’s going to move Glynn County forward.”. . .
Residential growth is particularly noticeable in subdivisions along Harry Driggers Boulevard and those south of Jekyll Island, along U.S. 82 and U.S. 17, said Sharon McClellan, a mortgage lender with Somerset Mortgage on St. Simons Island.
Tony Sammons, chair of both the Brunswick-Glynn County Economic Development Authority and the Southeast Georgia Joint Development Authority, echoed Thaw in noting that a strong water-sewer commission is necessary to stay abreast of development.
“We’ve got to get the water and sewer infrastructure in place before all these projects really take off,” he said. “There needs to be some long-term planning in place.”
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