Summer at Tybee is a time to relax, even for the island’s city council.
The downtime ended for the mayor and council members last week though, and issues piled up like sand along the beach dunes during their annual five-week summer break.
Members discussed a slate of items before a full — albeit socially distanced — public meeting on Aug. 12. Council heard updates on the city’s five-year comprehensive plan update, short-term vacation rentals (STVRs), beach crossover benches and department management.
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Shirley Wright from community watchdog group Forever Tybee voiced key concerns about the comprehensive plan. The nearly 110-page manual guides policy changes and physical development within the city.
Wright said that a survey of Forever Tybee’s 200-plus members revealed top issues of concern were over-tourism and traffic, infrastructure resources, and STVRs on the island.
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“In addition to dealing with those symptoms like litter, recycling, traffic, speed bumps noise and making more and more rules telling people how to have decent behavior, we have to address the root causes,” said Wright.
The group submitted recommendations on quality of life issues for the council to look over.
Crossover Benches
Council also revisited another quality-of-life issue: Benches on the beach crossovers. During the last council session in July, multiple residents urged the city to bring back the benches on some of the wooden crossovers, or walkways that extend from the street to the sandy shores.
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Earlier this year, the city renovated seven of the crossovers and, due to lack of proper permitting on the original structures, had to scrap the benches. The seats had long provided visitors, especially the elderly and disabled, a place to rest.
“When we found out the benches were gone, that was a shocker,” said Julia Pearce, a Tybee resident. “We didn’t even know the benches were in jeopardy. I didn’t know how much I enjoyed the benches until they were gone.”
City Manager Shawn Gillen updated the council on their discussion with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR), which regulates and balances manmade structures with the environmental growth on the beach.
Gillen said drafting new designs for the crossover benches is the next step once the city received direction from DNR.
“What Alan (city consultant on the issue) has proposed and I agree with wholeheartedly is having community meetings on this topic as we get some of these designs in place,” said Gillen.
The city manager forecasted having bench plans in place by the time the Shore Protection Act Committee meets next spring.
Ordinance coming on short-term vacation rentals
As part of the long, ongoing debate on how to regulate STVRs on the island, the city council discussed a draft ordinance amendment that seeks to establish occupancy standards and parking plans for STVRs.
The draft suggests STVR owners submit a parking plan as well as an occupancy rate with their permit application for the purposes of establishing a fee.
The current permitting fee for STVR owners is $100. Council previously proposed a possible $400 increase during budget discussions but ultimately tabled that for a later discussion.
During a previous council meeting, Gillen introduced a possible permit fee structure that includes a base rate and then a tiered rate based on number of occupants allowed in an STVR.
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Council debated the effectiveness of charging STVRs based on occupancy. Although the city has software to cross-check the occupancy rate based on applications, it is an imperfect process, said Council Member Monty Parks.
“The impact on our infrastructure is huge. If you’ve got a home that’s built with two bedrooms, one bath and … it’s filled with 15 people … it does matter how the occupancy rate is impacting this community,” said Mayor Shirley Sessions.
At the end of the discussion, council asked the city attorney to come back with numbers plugged into the draft ordinance so they can better envision how the potential ordinance would change things.
“We’ve been talking about this for a year and a half,” said council member Spec Hosti, “We have to put some teeth in this ordinance.”
Department management changes coming
Newer to the city council’s slate of issues was a discussion on government structure. Council talked about creating a path for department heads to bring up misconduct or ethics grievances against upper management.
“Department heads feel like they have nowhere to go with complaints,” said City Attorney Bubba Hughes.
Like Savannah, Tybee’s city charter is a city manager form of government and the city manager is in charge of daily operations and city staff.
Sessions remarked that Gillen is their fifth city manager but this is the first discussion they’re having on how department heads can report issues not related to management or difference of opinion.
“I think this is a good step in the right direction towards making sure everyone is being heard,” said Sessions.
Hughes expressed that they may consider a structure in which department heads report to someone within the existing government structure but have the grievance issue be mediated by an outsider. The issue will be revisited in a future council meeting.
The next city council session is Aug. 26.
Nancy Guan is the general assignment reporter covering Chatham County municipalities. Reach her at nguan@gannett.com or on Twitter @nancyguann.