Hilton Head to boost stormwater fees; town officials hope it's enough

A Hilton Head Island committee recommended the town raise its stormwater utility fee by more than $32 for an average-sized home, but some aren't sure that will be enough.

Tuesday's recommendation to raise the fee from $50.76 to $83.23 heads to the full Town Council, which could raise it even more.

Town engineers have suggested the fee be increased to $100.43, an amount they say would be sufficient for the next several years.

If the fee is raised only to $83.23, councilmen must either delay projects or pass another increase next year as infrastructure ages and the town takes on more responsibilities in gated communities, said director of public projects Scott Liggett.

"Having the higher fee allows us to be a little more responsive and flexible," he said, noting that stormwater emergencies can crop up without warning, as happened a few days ago in Hilton Head Plantation. A 15-inch diameter metal pipe collapsed along Royal James Drive over the weekend, threatening to undermine a nearby bike path. The town will spend $4,000 to $6,000 to fix it.

In the case of Hilton Head Plantation, the town has taken responsibility for maintaining 12 miles of metal pipes that are more than 30 years old, said town stormwater administrator Cary Gaffney.

As they age, the pipes become like "egg shells" and buckle under the weight of the soil above them, he said. "There are multiple places on the island that have that potential, not only in Hilton Head Plantation."

Ponds and lagoons gradually fill with dirt and have to be dredged for stormwater systems to work properly, an even more expensive endeavor, officials said.

The town is taking over drainage projects inside all of the island's gated communities.

Previously, residents of those communities paid the stormwater fees to the town and also paid assessments to property owners associations that were responsible for any work within their neighborhoods. The fair thing to do, the Town Council decided, was to take over drainage issues islandwide.

It recently took on Sea Pines, Hilton Head Plantation, Shipyard and Port Royal Plantation. Other neighborhoods soon will fall under the town's jurisdiction, including Palmetto Hall and Indigo Run in 2011, and Wexford in 2012.

The costs could be so high that some now question whether Hilton Head should have taken on the work.

"I did not anticipate or understand the financial significance of what we were talking about," said Councilman George Williams, who represents Sea Pines and is opposed to raising the fees. "It just seemed like the right thing to do. Shame on me for not asking more questions."

During the Public Facilities Committee meeting Tuesday, Councilmen John Safay and Drew Laughlin agreed to recommend the lower of the two proposed increases, $83.23.

"This is a number that needs to be evaluated annually, just like we do with everything else in our budget," Safay concluded, brushing aside the amount the engineers initially recommended.

"If we raised it to $100, I'd bet that in two or three years, you would be back to raise it again."

Both proposed amounts will come up when the matter reaches the full Town Council, probably in August.

Bluffton doubled its stormwater fee in 2008. Fees there now range from $49 to $147, depending on the size of the home.

Councilman Laughlin isn't convinced the town can meet its obligations by charging $83.23.

"I'm not sure it's going to be enough to carry out the projects we've already said we intend to do," he said.

Neither is Mayor Tom Peeples.

"We're just going to be back here next year considering an increase for what we should have already been doing," he said last month. "Drainage issues aren't going away ... and an extra $17 per household isn't going to break anyone's back."

But Mary Amonitti, host of a television talk show on WHHI and a member of the S.C. Commission on Minority Affairs, said she's heard from a lot of people struggling financially.

"There are people who are hurting, I mean really, really hurting in this community," she said.