Charleston County Council on Tuesday night voted 6-2 to pass a proposed half-cent sales tax referendum that will appear on the ballot in November.
Council members Joe Boykin, Jenny Honecutt, Kylon Middleton, Brantley Moody, Teddie Pryor and Herb Sass voted in favor of the measure. Council members Larry Kobrovsky and Rob Wehrman voted against it. Council member Henry Darby was absent during the meeting.
If the referendum, which would extend a current half-cent tax approved in 2016, is passed in November, it would fund the county’s share of the $2.3 billion Mark Clark extension project and more than $2 billion in other projects.
The controversial proposal, however, also would mean the county would borrow more than $600 million to pay interest costs on a $1.8 billion loan to pay its share of the road extension project from West Ashley across Johns Island to James Island. And to make matters worse for some sales tax opponents, the new tax would pay for millions of dollars of work that was supposed to be covered by the 2016 referendum.
About 5% of the revenue — or $282,223,000 — would go toward “carryover projects” from the 2016 sales tax which have stalled out due to insufficient funds, according to Charleston County Chief Financial Officer Mack Gile.
Members of county council have been divided on the issue.
“I think it’s fiscally irresponsible,” Kobrovsky said. “In the long term it will make things worse. … It will be a feeding frenzy of development of epic proportions. Those that have a financial stake in this project will be endorsing it massively, and we can’t stop it because we’ll be outspent a million to one.”
The proposal previously passed its second reading 6-3 on June 18. Council members Kobrovsky, Henry Darby of North Charleston and Rob Wehrman of North Charleston voted against the measure. If it passes its third reading, Charleston County voters will consider the referendum on Election Day in November.
“I strongly encourage everyone in Charleston County to reject it and reject it soundly,” Kobrovsky said.
The price tag of the Mark Clark extension project has ballooned from the original $420 million estimated in 1995. Later in 2019, the state of South Carolina’s infrastructure bank agreed to cover that $420 million for the I-526 extension project, but in the years since, the total cost has soared to $2.3 billion. It is expected to continue to grow.
If the new referendum passes in November, the county is projected to raise a total of $5.4 billion, with the rest of the revenue going to fund the ongoing costs of “highways, roads, streets, bridges, bicycle and pedestrian accommodations, mass transit systems, and the preservation of green spaces,” according to county council’s transportation committee.
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