North Charleston should build on sustainable success
By KURT TAYLOR
Saturday, December 26, 2009

We are blessed to live in the Lowcountry. Each of the cities and towns in the area is special, as are our rural areas. Collectively, we have created a quality of life of which the world is increasingly aware.

We are also working hard to maintain that quality of life through green space preservation, responsible transportation projects, economic development and environmental sensitivity. Recent economic successes in the form of Boeing’s decision to stake its future here, as well as the Clemson University Restoration Institute’s wind turbine research grant award are a tribute to the tenacity and talent of our political, educational and community leaders.

This past week alone, North Charleston received a national award from the Home Depot Foundation and was honored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency with a 2009 Environmental Justice Achievement Award. A month ago, the MetLife Foundation recognized Metanoia and the North Charleston Police Department with a national award for a successful crime reduction partnership in the Chicora-Cherokee Neighborhood.

Common denominators? The residents of North Charleston’s historic city center and The Noisette Company. Recent information has presented an incomplete picture which paints the successes of The Noisette Company in a negative light, perhaps to soften our resolve against the ill-advised idea of rail yards on the former naval base. The simple fact is that the vast majority of significant real estate developments in the area are stalled as a result of worldwide financial problems.

In contrast, here are the underreported community development and investment successes of Noisette. Noisette’s property, known as The Navy Yard, has had an investment in excess of $50 million to date, with 80-plus companies occupying almost one million square feet and employing 2,300 workers. There are currently six pending contracts for new enterprises that will add two new restaurants and several business headquarters to North Charleston. Noisette recently leased office space to People Matters, a new human resource software company that has bought two other firms in Columbia and is relocating to the Navy Yard. The Navy Yard now has significant clusters around software, security and biotechnology as well as the built environment, the arts and the non-profit sector.

Noisette-created nonprofit entities have attracted and invested in excess of $10 million in this city. More importantly they have created some of the most innovative and recognized programs in the nation with the Civic Justice Corps, HUB (Historically Underutilized Business) Academy, and The Sustainability Institute. The Institute’s energy training program alone has saved Noisette-area residents on average $800 a year in energy bills.

Noisette’s Prison Re-entry program has graduated 76 members and had only one re-arrested in the last four years. A regional Americorps Center has been established at the Noisette Foundation that now has 22 full-time Vista volunteers, leveraging thousands of other volunteers. The Vista program has provided thousands of mentors and community volunteers supporting the area’s schools.

Outside the gates of the naval base, the 3,000-acre Noisette Master Plan area now boasts the first historic overlay district in the city’s history. A vibrant business district features stalwart traditional restaurants and shops alongside trendy new restaurants and clubs. Property values nearly quadrupled from 2000 in the Park Circle area, and have held steady. Oak Terrace Preserve (OTP), The Charleston City Paper’s “Best New Development” for 2009 and recipient of national press recognition, has sold new homes continuously, even in this downturn. As a city-owned project, OTP establishes the City of North Charleston as the leader in sustainable living and redevelopment in the state.

The first LEED-certified school in South Carolina was constructed at North Charleston Elementary, as a collaborative effort among the school district, the city and the Noisette Company. East Montague is also host to the first LEED Platinum building in the state.

The point? The Noisette Company and Project, far from just a real estate deal and far from a failure, is to be celebrated by its city. It is to be championed by all of us who have benefited from it for the immeasurable good it has done, and for our unlimited future together. To that point, North Charleston pressed from Day One for the State Ports Authority to use rail for the naval base terminal, as a means of reducing the flood of trucks which will clog Interstate 26 from the day the terminal opens. We insisted in our negotiations that rail traffic access the new port from the south. The SPA agreed.

This agreement was ratified by the Legislature and the State Budget and Control Board when the naval base land transfers were approved. In reliance on this approval, seven years later we have an international award-winning Riverfront Park, home to the largest Fourth of July celebration in the region. We have development plans in place, and numerous buildings on the north end of the base have been refitted and occupied. Clemson University’s Restoration Institute finally has its first grand success in the wind turbine grant.

Who would put a rail yard on top of this — the promise of our state’s economic and energy future — particularly when better options to the south of the base have been presented and stand ready to be constructed?

With these successes, our best days lie ahead as even more grand dreams are realized. We are not interested in bartering away the hard-fought victories and quality of life we have obtained. Why should we turn our backs on such success after such hard work and community involvement?

We are receiving awards for the years of implementation we have put into our sustainability plans. The entire Lowcountry, not just select portions, has an unmatched quality of life. The world knows. North Charleston residents know. We shouldn’t pretend otherwise.

Kurt Taylor is a North Charleston city councilman.

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