OPENPUBLICA · PUBLIC MEETING RECORD
Record of Proceedings

Horry County Administrative Committee Meeting – February 25, 2025

County Council — Tuesday, February 25, 2025
BodyHorry County, South Carolina
SessionCounty Council
DateTuesday, February 25, 2025
StatusFILED
Video Record
0:00 / 40:03

Transcript — Verbatim
0:00

They didn't uh they they can't operate on the second floor because OSHA won't give them permission and so we have to reduce the square footage or something like that.

0:07

It's very rarely a difference of opinion, it's usually a difference of fact.

0:12

It's just something that we didn't know about the property that we became aware of through the process, and once we amended the value, the taxpayer accepted it and we moved on.

0:20

Umward, we will clean up the last of these appeals over the next 30 days or so.

0:25

We'll begin to use the appeals data to identify any potentially modeling issues that we had to create higher accuracy of the appraisals going forward with the ATIs, and then also indicate hot spots, growth areas, and use uh some of the tools that we've got with our new software to assist our appraisers visually.

0:43

I I brought a couple of things, I'll just let you guys uh take a look at these.

0:47

These are some of the maps that we are able to create now that we've got better integration with our data software, so we can visualize these.

0:54

So, what I did for y'all is I I put a couple of uh maps in here that are broken down by council district.

1:00

And if you look, the first map you've got there is is our new growth.

1:04

Uh so for the 2024 year any new construction, we took the the total new construction, placed it geographically inside those council districts, and then assigned a percentage of this is the percentage of the new growth that each district received.

1:18

So you can kind of see that, and then on the next page, you can see um the percentage that your district looked at for appeals.

1:26

And you can see just about everybody's somewhere between 0.2 and 0.3% of your parcel base.

1:33

Uh so uh pretty even and uniform, which is one of the goals that we are tasked with by the state law is to assess fairly and equitably uh across all political boundaries, which we certainly have done.

1:47

You can see by the reaction to and the number of appeals from each.

1:51

We don't have any hot spots, we don't want them.

1:53

Uh we want to make sure that we're doing things evenly.

1:55

So uh as we're going forward, and on the slide there, I just put that up for everyone to see.

2:00

That's uh an example of what we're gonna do.

2:03

Uh Shannon, since she has uh taken over the administrative division that's challenged us to try to be a little more creative and a little more innovative with some of the things that we're working towards.

2:12

So we're pushing the mapping side of our of our office uh to to begin to help these appraisers.

2:20

Staring at spreadsheets is is one way of of ascertaining things, but when you can take the data that's in that spreadsheet and visually represent it like this, uh it quickly helps you draw the conclusions.

2:32

You know, if if somebody says, well, where is the bulk of the growth coming from?

2:35

You can take a look at this and quickly uh ascertain that.

2:39

The third uh map that you've that you've got.

2:42

I hope.

2:43

No, I'm sorry.

2:44

So the next map that you would want to look at then is just okay.

2:47

Well, there's the growth, thanks, and there's the appeals, but where is it really located?

2:51

Is it in a major corridor?

2:53

Is it in a development district?

2:55

Why am I seeing an increase in growth?

2:56

So that'll be the next step for us is to continue to dig deeper and and map it more, you know, go from that 50,000 view to that 5,000 view to that microscopic view and really be able to see what we're doing rather than just sending out a spreadsheet and hoping everybody gets it.

3:14

A picture is just worth a thousand words.

3:17

So we're gonna work on expressing a lot more of our appraisal data in visual format, not only for our appraisers, but for the consumers of our product like like you guys.

3:28

So uh that's what we'll be working on going forward.

3:30

So I appreciate your time.

3:32

All in all, I would say that it was a ridiculously successful reassessment.

3:37

Um I'm sure that just by the number of phone calls that you did not get this year.

3:41

Um I think we we really did have good acceptance.

3:45

I'll give PIO a lot of credit for that.

3:47

They were pumping the information out to make sure that our media partners and our users of social media had the information in a timely manner so they knew what was coming, what to do if they weren't satisfied, and how they could best advantage themselves to to deal with the reassessment that was coming.

4:04

So I give them a lot of thanks uh for getting our message out there as well.

4:08

So thank you guys, appreciate your time.

4:10

I have to say it was a lot easier than I thought it would be going through the cause.

4:14

Man, I learned a lot.

4:15

Thank you.

4:16

We always do reassessment here.

4:18

We always do.

4:19

Thank you.

4:19

I appreciate it.

4:20

Thank you.

4:22

Brian, go.

4:31

Good morning.

4:32

Good morning, sir.

4:33

Appreciate the opportunity to come and uh chat with you all today.

4:36

Um I've got two two objectives.

4:38

One is to uh get uh approval of our revised FY25 budget, which um to say is in uh a dynamic state is a little bit of an understatement.

5:03

Uh the county council's efforts and staff's efforts uh to get us into that uh program, and that's gonna help us out a lot.

5:11

I'll just jump right into our budget.

5:14

Um, first of all, uh the the current budget, which is in the left hand column, um, actually had a service cut in it of about 20 percent under our current uh revenue stream.

Discussion Breakdown — Share of Meeting
Public Transportation██████████████████████22%
Capital Improvement Planning████████████████16%
Public Safety███████████████15%
Property Tax Assessment███████████11%
Budget Equity Analysis████████8%
Zoning And Land Use████████8%
Transportation Safety███████7%
Personnel Matters██████6%
Workforce Development████4%
Summary of Proceedings

Horry County Administrative Committee Meeting – February 25, 2025

The Horry County Administrative Committee met on February 25, 2025, to discuss property tax reassessment results, Coast RTA budget revisions and transit plans, employee health assessment changes, congressional funding requests, an interfund loan for a special tax district, community funding allocations, and a proposed trial of wind-driven shading devices on county beaches.

Reassessment Update

  • The County Assessor reported a "ridiculously successful" reassessment with minimal appeals. Appeals per council district ranged from 0.2% to 0.3% of parcel base, indicating fair and equitable assessment across political boundaries.
  • New growth data was mapped by council district for the 2024 year, showing the percentage of new construction each district received.
  • The office plans to use appeals data over the next 30 days to refine appraisal models and use new software for visual analysis of growth areas and hot spots.
  • The Public Information Office was credited for effective outreach, reducing the number of constituent phone calls.

Coast RTA FY25 Budget Amendment & Transit Development Plan

  • Budget Amendment: Coast RTA Director Brian presented a revised FY25 budget that restores a 20% service cut that would have been necessary if the Ride 4 sales tax had not passed. The revised budget increases expenses by approximately $500,000, while revenue from the sales tax (starting May 1, 2025) will provide about $3 million for the last five months of the fiscal year.
  • To bridge the gap between the end of road use fees (June 30) and the first sales tax payment (October), Coast RTA will need to borrow between $1 million and $1.4 million, with full repayment expected by the January 15, 2026 sales tax payment.
  • Federal formula funds (75% cap on operating use) will be reallocated: $533,000 from FY21 shifted to capital for a technology RFP covering rider app, fare collection, and automation.
  • Capital Program: The Grissom Parkway facility was acquired via eminent domain with $4.38 million in escrow; a transit center and new bus operating maintenance facility are planned. Total capital needs are about $70 million, including 17 buses at $10.6 million. Ride 4 includes $25 million for facilities.
  • Transit Development Plan (TDP): A five-year plan will be delivered soon. Priorities include increasing frequencies on Routes 7, 15, and 77 to hourly (requiring 3–4 additional buses), improving bus stop ADA compliance (currently only a handful of 410 stops are compliant), and expanding van pools and microtransit. Van pools cost $700/month per vehicle and can cover 6–12 riders; one bus investment can fund 45 van pools. Four van pools are already operating.
  • Georgetown County: Their contribution is about $400,000/year (road use fees), but ridership from Georgetown is proportionally higher. The director noted the need for additional Georgetown funding for a proposed new route.
  • The committee passed a resolution authorizing the budget amendment and loan acquisition.

Employee Health Risk Assessment Changes

  • A resolution was proposed to change employee health risk assessments (HRAs) from mandatory annual worksite events to voluntary PIBA screenings available year-round. Currently, over 90% of eligible employees participate, but the worksite events strain the wellness center's capacity for acute visits and incur rising costs from the medical vendor.
  • The PIBA screening includes the same tests but offers a more comprehensive panel, with a vendor able to visit worksites monthly. Pilot results showed easier scheduling and faster results.

Congressional Directed Funding Requests

  • Executive leadership identified five projects for U.S. congressional funding consideration, selected for their progress and alignment with transportation priorities from the Ride referendum. Projects include U.S. 701 widening north of Conway; funding requests reflect escalated costs since the referendum.

Eagle Trace Special Tax District Interfund Loan

  • A resolution authorized an interfund loan of approximately $600,000 to the Eagle Trace Special Tax District for road, drainage, and public improvements. The loan is amortized over 15 years at 4.63% interest and will be repaid through tax bills within the district. The committee approved, noting that banks have little appetite for such small loans.

Community Funding Requests

  • Four allocations from council district funds were presented:
    • $1,824 to Horry County Parks and Recreation for North Strand Football all-state team transportation (district 9).
    • $1,500 to Forever Home Cat Sanctuary for a wellness shed (districts 6 and 9).
    • $4,000 to Grand Strand Christian Church for townhomes for elderly and less fortunate (district 8).
    • $2,599 to Green Sea Floyds Athletic Booster Club for a baseball pitching machine (grades 7–12).

Beach Umbrella Ordinance Amendment (Wind-Driven Shading Devices)

  • An amendment to the county’s umbrella ordinance was introduced to allow wind-driven shading devices (e.g., Shibumi shades) on a one-year trial period. The temporary status can be amended, extended, or canceled by resolution.
  • Discussion: Kevin Lark, Beach Patrol Supervisor for Myrtle Beach, opposed the trial, citing public safety concerns: these devices are large (up to 144 sq ft in off-season), obstruct views of the water, and complicate enforcement of the simple "umbrella-only" rule. Myrtle Beach and North Myrtle Beach restrict them to off-season; Surfside Beach allows them year-round.
  • Council members expressed mixed views. Some noted the conflict when Surfside allows them but county beaches do not. Others referenced prior public safety committee opposition. The committee decided to move the amendment to full council without a recommendation, allowing council to debate the time frame and specifics.

Key Outcomes

  • Approved: Coast RTA FY25 revised budget amendment and loan authorization.
  • Approved: Change to employee health risk assessment process (use of PIBA screenings).
  • Approved: Interfund loan to Eagle Trace Special Tax District ($600,000 at 4.63% over 15 years).
  • Approved (forwarded to full council): Beach umbrella ordinance amendment for a one-year trial of wind-driven shading devices, without committee recommendation.
  • Noted: Community funding requests were presented; no vote recorded (likely administrative approvals).
  • Next Meeting: Scheduled for March 25, 2025.

Meeting Transcript

They didn't uh they they can't operate on the second floor because OSHA won't give them permission and so we have to reduce the square footage or something like that. It's very rarely a difference of opinion, it's usually a difference of fact. It's just something that we didn't know about the property that we became aware of through the process, and once we amended the value, the taxpayer accepted it and we moved on. Umward, we will clean up the last of these appeals over the next 30 days or so. We'll begin to use the appeals data to identify any potentially modeling issues that we had to create higher accuracy of the appraisals going forward with the ATIs, and then also indicate hot spots, growth areas, and use uh some of the tools that we've got with our new software to assist our appraisers visually. I I brought a couple of things, I'll just let you guys uh take a look at these. These are some of the maps that we are able to create now that we've got better integration with our data software, so we can visualize these. So, what I did for y'all is I I put a couple of uh maps in here that are broken down by council district. And if you look, the first map you've got there is is our new growth. Uh so for the 2024 year any new construction, we took the the total new construction, placed it geographically inside those council districts, and then assigned a percentage of this is the percentage of the new growth that each district received. So you can kind of see that, and then on the next page, you can see um the percentage that your district looked at for appeals. And you can see just about everybody's somewhere between 0.2 and 0.3% of your parcel base. Uh so uh pretty even and uniform, which is one of the goals that we are tasked with by the state law is to assess fairly and equitably uh across all political boundaries, which we certainly have done. You can see by the reaction to and the number of appeals from each. We don't have any hot spots, we don't want them. Uh we want to make sure that we're doing things evenly. So uh as we're going forward, and on the slide there, I just put that up for everyone to see. That's uh an example of what we're gonna do. Uh Shannon, since she has uh taken over the administrative division that's challenged us to try to be a little more creative and a little more innovative with some of the things that we're working towards. So we're pushing the mapping side of our of our office uh to to begin to help these appraisers. Staring at spreadsheets is is one way of of ascertaining things, but when you can take the data that's in that spreadsheet and visually represent it like this, uh it quickly helps you draw the conclusions. You know, if if somebody says, well, where is the bulk of the growth coming from? You can take a look at this and quickly uh ascertain that. The third uh map that you've that you've got. I hope. No, I'm sorry. So the next map that you would want to look at then is just okay. Well, there's the growth, thanks, and there's the appeals, but where is it really located? Is it in a major corridor? Is it in a development district? Why am I seeing an increase in growth? So that'll be the next step for us is to continue to dig deeper and and map it more, you know, go from that 50,000 view to that 5,000 view to that microscopic view and really be able to see what we're doing rather than just sending out a spreadsheet and hoping everybody gets it. A picture is just worth a thousand words. So we're gonna work on expressing a lot more of our appraisal data in visual format, not only for our appraisers, but for the consumers of our product like like you guys. So uh that's what we'll be working on going forward. So I appreciate your time. All in all, I would say that it was a ridiculously successful reassessment. Um I'm sure that just by the number of phone calls that you did not get this year. Um I think we we really did have good acceptance. I'll give PIO a lot of credit for that. They were pumping the information out to make sure that our media partners and our users of social media had the information in a timely manner so they knew what was coming, what to do if they weren't satisfied, and how they could best advantage themselves to to deal with the reassessment that was coming. So I give them a lot of thanks uh for getting our message out there as well. So thank you guys, appreciate your time. I have to say it was a lot easier than I thought it would be going through the cause. Man, I learned a lot. Thank you. We always do reassessment here. We always do. Thank you. I appreciate it.

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