After years of environmentalists’ pushback, land for proposed Conway hospital may be sold
Horry County Council on Tuesday deferred final approval of a rezoning request for a new hospital in Carolina Forest so that Conway Medical Center officials can negotiate selling the property.
Horry County Councilman Dennis DiSabato said CMC contacted the county Tuesday to say it plans to negotiate with the state’s Department of Natural Resources to sell the land to the agency.
In March 2021, the state approved CMC’s plans for a 50-bed medical facility on a 353-acre plot located along International Drive across from Lewis Ocean Bay Heritage Preserve. Since then, an unrelenting argument has persisted over public health needs and environmental concerns.
At this time, CMC “no longer wishes to build a hospital on that tract of land,” DiSabato said Tuesday night. Council members unanimously voted to defer CMC’s rezoning request and its development agreement to an Aug. 13 council meeting. DiSabato said deferring the matter gives CMC six months to exclusively negotiate with DNR to reach a resolution.
It is unclear what other options CMC has to build a hospital in that area. CMC officials were not present at the Tuesday county council meeting and did not provide additional details regarding their decision.
“I’m tickled to death that we seem to have found ourselves in a position now where it’s going to be conserved altogether and hopefully not built on at all,” DiSabato said.
Environmental concerns
Until Tuesday evening’s announcement, CMC officials had persistently said a new hospital would provide “desperately needed” health care services for Horry County’s rapidly growing population. But environmentalists and state agencies contend that the proposed medical center’s proximity to the preserve would be detrimental to patients, staff and the environment.
Each year, the state Department of Natural Resources and state Forestry Commission conduct prescribed burns on at least 1,500 acres inside the 10,000-acre preserve. These burns are controlled fires intentionally set to maintain the preserve’s diverse ecosystem and prevent uncontrolled forest fires.
During the burns, gates close off access to International Drive because the smoke can impact drivers’ visibility. Under CMC’s proposal, the hospital was planned to sit behind those gates, meaning access to medical care could be impeded during the burns.
A hospital would be considered a smoke-sensitive area, a designation that prevents the state’s burn managers from sending smoke in that direction. Removing a direction in which to send smoke would affect the preserve’s distinct ecosystem, experts say.
The closer the burn site is to the hospital, the less vegetation can be burned, which could lead to an increased risk of wildfires, said Trapper Fowler, North Coast project manager for the Coastal Conservation League and certified prescribed fire manager.
Health concerns
After a prescribed burn is completed at Lewis Ocean Bay, smoke can waft in the area for days.
Environmentalists repeatedly raised concerns that despite burn managers’ efforts to avoid sending smoke toward the hospital, wind cannot be controlled. Smoke could still blow in the medical facility’s direction, potentially affecting hospital patients and staff, they said.
CMC spokesperson Allyson Floyd previously said the hospital would be equipped with a specialized HVAC system to keep out any smoke from a prescribed burn. In October, Mary Johnson, a principal research scientist in environmental health at Harvard University, told The Sun News that these types of specialized HVAC systems are a “reasonable solution” for maintaining indoor air quality during a prescribed burn.
To spare the tract from development, the state Department of Natural Resources offered to purchase the property from CMC to conserve it.
“We hope that you will consider this request to allow the first right of refusal should CMC decide to abandon the current site,” wrote Lorianne Riggin, DNR’s director of environmental programs, in a May 2022 email to Brian Argo, the center’s chief executive officer and president, and Bret Barr, CMC’s then-CEO and president. Barr transitioned to a role on CMC’s Board of Trustees in December 2022.
Barr responded to Riggin in 2022 that the center’s plan had not changed. Currently, the land is appraised at around $7 million and remains zoned for residential use.
In September, DiSabato said regardless of DNR’s offer, he didn’t think the state agency has the ability to pay fair market value. On Tuesday, he said he hopes there can be a “successful resolution” for DNR to purchase the property.
Other hospital projects fill needs
For years, CMC officials had never publicly wavered on their decision of where to build the $160-million hospital, asserting that the facility is necessary as Horry County’s population grows.
The population of Conway East — a county census division — is predicted to climb to 185,000 by 2040, according to a county document. That would be a nearly 92% increase from the 96,520 people who were living in the area in 2020.
CMC purchased the 353-acre tract for $5.5 million in 2021. In March that year, DHEC approved the hospital system’s plan. According to CMC’s proposal, the new hospital’s 50 beds were to be transferred from CMC’s primary 210-bed facility in Conway, where they are under-used.
In early 2023, DHEC approved three hospital projects in Horry County — McLeod Health’s Carolina Forest hospital, Tidelands Health’s Carolina Bays hospital in Socastee, and a combined effort to expand Grand Strand Health’s South Strand Medical Center as well as a new tower at its Grand Strand Medical Center facility.
Conway Medical Center’s planned facility was within 2 miles of the 48-bed McLeod hospital.
“For me personally, this matter has never been about whether (the land) should be conserved or developed. It’s always been about if it was going to be developed, how is it going to be developed?” DiSabato said Tuesday. “If it was going to be developed, I would prefer to see a hospital than, say 800 or 900 homes or 2,500 multifamily units.”
