City Council meets
December 2, 2015
By Temple Ligon
Columbia City Council last Tuesday, December 1st, held its work session in the afternoon and its regular meeting that evening, both in City Hall.
The big draw for citizens was the proposed rental rules, an ordinance to put Columbia on a par with all the other SEC towns. They have rental rules.
Clemson, ACC and all, is the town most cited by the City of Columbia for its workable and thereby desirable rental rules.
Several of the landlords in the audience at Tuesday’s work session complained the rental rules would boost rents by 10 percent or even 15 percent.
Local landlords voiced support, however, for the requirement landlords who live outside a 45-mile radius of the city register a local agent to handle the property.
Further discussion is expected at the city’s economic development committee meeting coming up on December 8. The public is invited.
The city’s financial shape was another topic at its work session, at least through August 31, 2015. The actual prior year, fiscal year 2014/2015 brought in revenue of $116,426,604, and the current year is budgeted for $114,816,953, about a two million dollar difference. However, the actual prior year (through August 2014) is recorded as $3,620,458, and that is more than two million dollars less than the actual current year (through August 2015), so we appear to be doing better so far.
During the regular council meeting, starting at 6 p.m., City Manager Teresa Wilson reviewed her presentation, an update on the floods in early October, to the House Ways & Means Committee, November 18, 2015. She noted that parts of Columbia experienced rainfall that exceeded once-in-a-thousand-year levels. Columbia took in two feet of rainfall in less than 48 hours.
Flooding caused damages to:
- almost 400 homes and 60 businesses – $65 million estimated
- multiple dam failures
- massive breach in the Columbia Canal
- more than 100 streets which were declared impassable
- a fire station which was a total loss
The canal breach led to a widespread impact to clean drinking water for 10 days among 375,000 people, requiring a systemwide boil water notice.
Long-term mitigation cost, for now, is estimated to be more than $132 million.
