Double R Flo-Town

Double R Flo-Town: It's a Great Time to Live in Florence Country (With Kevin Yokim)

• Robert Thomas & Reeves Cannon • Season 1 • Episode 13

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Florence County is growing fast – and County Administrator Kevin Yokim joins Double R Flotown to reveal just how much is changing. From new park features, events, and activities to the $1.6 billion AESC battery plant and the FlyFlo airport, this episode dives into what makes it a great time to live in Florence County, SC.  

SPEAKER_00:

Double R, we're not seeing episode number anymore, October 16th. So we've got a guest today that embodies exactly what this podcast is all about. What's going on in Florence? Mr. Kevin Yocum, thank you so much for coming. All right, absolutely. Glad to be here. Yeah, we we can really let people know what's going on now.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, this is exciting. I think, Kevin, why don't we start? Tell us what your position is with the county and kind of your background with both the county and the city.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. Thank you, Reeves. Um, my name's Kevin Yocum. I currently serve as the Florence County Administrator, a position I've been back in for about two and a half years. Um I tell people Kim and I moved here in July of 1989, did know a soul, worked at Webster Rogers, uh, did the audit for the county for about seven years, um, and then in April of 96 had the opportunity to go on the other side of the desk as county finance director. Um, was in that role for about 23 and a half years. Uh, October of 2019 went to the city of Florence as one of their assistant city managers, and then the Lord opened the up the opportunity uh February of 23 to come back to the county in the role of county administrator.

SPEAKER_02:

So, so a breadth of experience, longevity here, city and county. Robert and I were at the Home Builders Association meeting, and you spoke, I believe it was last month, and and we were honestly taken aback by all of the things you shared that are going on in the county. So tell us a little bit about the opportunities that exist within the the county of Florence.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, thank you. My tagline I use kind of repetitively is it's a great time to be in Florence County. Um we've got so many great things going on, um, a lot of which people may be aware of, some of which they may not. Um I focus a lot on our recreation department, but there's some others. Um, you know, just taking a tour around the county, if I start in the Lake City area, um, you know, one of the knocks on Lake City, it's kind of the Wendy's Where's the Beef commercial. For decades, it's Lake City, Where's the Lake? Right. Well, now we have a multi-acre lake in Lake City. Um, it's got a boardwalk completely around the lake. Um, there's a pavilion, there's a playground, there's a gazebo that goes out into the lake. Um, so it's it's a gorgeous location for people to go visit. Um then over the past few years, people started using the gazebo as a wedding venue, but they had nowhere to go for reception afterwards. Um recently, with the help of the Drs. Bruce and Lee Foundation, who were the primary funders for the lake to begin with, um, they were the primary funding source for what we're calling the lake house at Lions Park. Uh it's a it's a small um venue building for you know family reunions, for small corporate meetings that's available and that's great. It's on a bluff that overlooks the lake. So if you get married to Gazeebo, you just walk around the lake and have your reception right there at that building. So it's it's a great, it's it's a great venue there in Lake City. Um moving north, um, about a little over two years ago, thanks to Open Space Institute, PD Land Trust, South Carolina Conservation Bank, Darling Moore Foundation, and I'm probably leaving others out. Um, we were donated 500 acres of land. Um it's north of 378, kind of between Lake City and Johnsonville. It's called Independence Farms. Um, it's out in the middle of the country. Um, it's bisected by a road, so 250 acres on each side, and um we're gonna use it for um you know recreational, for passive recreation. Um part of it borders Lynch's River. Um, but one portion, uh Nathan Dawsey, our recreation director and his staff and um the firm of Bolton and Mank, who we're working with as consultants, have laid out cross-country trails on that 250 acres, and we're gonna have a 3K, a 5K, and an 8K cross-country course. And Nathan has already been in discussion with not only high schools in Florence County, but the state high school coaches, the state high school league, as well as Francis Marion's Peach Belt Athletic Conference to start hosting in the next couple of years, start hosting true cross-country races in the country. Wow. That's cool. So so that's cool.

SPEAKER_02:

I think you mentioned at the luncheon we were at with the home builders that that's the only site like that in the state.

SPEAKER_01:

That's the only one, right, Reeves. That's the only site like it that we're aware of in the state. From what we understand, most of the cross country might be run on neighborhood roads that are near high schools or things like that. And so this will be one that'll be a cross-country race in the country.

SPEAKER_00:

I think we need Reeves to commit to the 8K.

unknown:

Okay.

SPEAKER_00:

What do you think?

SPEAKER_02:

I think that's not gonna happen. Maybe a younger Reeves would have done that, but not a 45-year-old.

SPEAKER_01:

Probably think about recreation, probably the best gym in our recreation portfolio um is Lynches River County Park. Yeah. Um when Kim and I moved here in the late 80s, it was a state park. Um, for those of you that remember that, um, thanks to Congressman Klyburn and some others, um, the state actually gave us that park in the early 90s. Um, if you go to the park, there's an environmental discovery center in the park where you can learn all about nature. It's a great place for kids. In the back of the Discovery Center, um, there's a what we call a canopy walk. It's actually swinging bridges that walk through the trees that's up above, you know, 15, 20 feet up in the air. There's a quarter mile boardwalk that goes along the river. Um, you can cut, we've got a canoe launch, you can kayak at the river. Um, some new things we've done at the park within the past 12 to 18 months. Um, recreation department and our public works department, Steve Allen's the director, they've cut six miles of equestrian trail through the park. So if you own a horse, um, we've actually established also a separate campground just for those people that have um horses and do equestrian type things. You can go there for the weekend, park your trailer, park your camper, and take your horse on a ride through the woods. Wow. So that that's pretty, pretty cool. Um, a lot of a lot of those people with families are aware of the splash pad that is in the back of the park where the old state swimming pool used to be. Um it's a it's a new this this season, this past season was the first season of our new updated, greatly enlarged splash pad. We had a lot more attendance than we have had previously. You know, so that was really well received. Um so that was an exciting addition to the park. Um then lastly, about that park, and this is something I should have known years ago, but a couple years ago, I realized if you go down old number four highway to the park, well, you turn right to go in the park. Well, on the left-hand side of old number four, we own property there as well. So we're in the finishing stages of installing what is going to be a 45-hole disc golf course. Um I wasn't aware, but we've got a fairly active three or four hundred-member disc golf association in the Florence County area. Um, and I told people when they started it, it was going to be 18 holes for people that knew what they were doing, and then nine holes for people like me.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

But then the company that we're using out of Charlotte actually approached us and said they want to use this for advertising for their company. Awesome. So they've donated the baskets for an additional 18 holes. So the original 18 holes will actually have two baskets on each set of holes. Um, so you can actually play it twice, you know, and play the different baskets. So when will that be? That's probably going to be. I think they're actually going to have a basket installing event later this month. Oh, cool. I think it'll actually, we're in the process of putting like a restroom building there, finishing out the parking lot. So certainly by the spring, it'll be up and running full bore. So that'll that'll be exciting. Before I leave Lynch's River, the other event that's starting to get there out there on social media, a lot of people are becoming aware of. Um, many people in the Florence area enjoyed going to the Lights for Paws event at Forest Lake for a number of years during the Christmas season. Oh, yeah. Unfortunately, the family that ran that event, and they did it for free. They did it by themselves and you know, did all the labor, um, they left the area after last season. Um, but Florence County worked with the Humane Society, and we have actually purchased all those decorations, and we're in the process of wiring uh Spine Road, which is the road in the back of the park that runs back to the splash pad. We're in the process of wiring that road, and recreation staff will be installing those decorations. So the Friday after Thanksgiving, we'll start Lights for Paws and it'll now be a drive-thru event.

SPEAKER_02:

That that is phenomenal because I know for my family, we've been to that over, you know, behind um Forrest Memorial Gardens in the neighborhood, Forest Lake, several years. And they that family did a phenomenal job. And now for the county to be able to do this and not only keep that event going, but also do it at a place that highlights some other features the county has, then county residents have access to is an excellent.

SPEAKER_00:

It'll probably grow from here, I would imagine. You probably should, and and we hope to.

SPEAKER_01:

Now we will have a charge per vehicle, but the majority of that money will go to the Humane Society. I know in the past they took donations. That's right. But because it's vehicle-based, um, we'll have a charge per vehicle. Um, and it'll be like Wednesday through Sunday um every week until like, from what I understand, a couple weeks before Christmas, and then it'll be every day. Um, and it'll also be in conjunction, I think it's the first Saturday in December, is Lynch Reserva County Parks um winter festival. So they'll still have that on that Saturday. So it'll it'll be a good combination of two events. So yeah, we're excited about that.

SPEAKER_00:

Is there a place to camp now out there?

SPEAKER_01:

Yes. Okay, we have we do great question. We do have, I mentioned the equestrian campground. We also have the regular campground, and there's also a couple of cabins that can be rented. Oh, really? Um, yeah, you can, if you wanted to go, even the people in the Florence area, you know, you want to get away for the weekend and God and nature. Um, one story I tell people when I became administrator back in 23, one of my goals was to meet every county employee, and I did it department by department. And given the size of some of the apartments, like the sheriff's office, I had to go multiple times to meet everybody. Well, Nathan uh set up a meeting with his staff. It was a Friday morning, about 8:30. Uh, it was kind of misty raining in March, a little bit cool. And I drove out, and it was at Lynch's River in the Environmental Discovery Center. And I drove out there, got out of my car. There was nobody else there other than the staff, and they were all inside the building. The river was up a little bit. You could hear the river. Ooh. And I'm like, I want to move my office out of here.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, why not? You felt like you were in Colorado.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, yeah. It was, I mean, it was just, it was quiet, it was peaceful, um, a lot of nature out there. And you just get away from you know all the all the noise of a city and then get out and enjoy nature. And it, yeah, it's a great time.

SPEAKER_02:

It is a great spot. I know my family, my wife and took advantage of that nature center several times as we were homeschooling our kids through elementary years. They they took advantage of that spot many times.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it's it's a it's a great facility. Um, but other things recreationally that we've added over the past couple of years, you know, pickleball's a big thing. So we've added, I think it's 10 total pickleball courts between Ebenezer Park on the west side of Florence, Greenwood Park on Pamplico Highway. I mentioned um, you know, Lions Park in Lake City, thanks to Representative Roger Kirby. Uh, he got his funding because there were two old tennis courts there that were kind of in disrepair. So we redid that whole thing and did two new tennis courts and three new pickleball courts. So we've added those amenities there. Um, we've done some walking trails. Uh there's a small walking trail at Ebenezer Park, another one at Greenwood, there's an exercise station um at Ebenezer Park. So we've we've added a lot of cool features. Um, one that probably a lot of people aren't aware of. Um, for those people that are fans of American Ninja Warrior, um, if you go to Brooks McCall Park and people are like, where's Brooks McCall Park? Well, if you go out North Cashwood Drive, uh, like you're going to Cracker Barrel, everybody knows where Cracker Barrel is. If you cross over 52, go through the light, cross over 52, and hang a right on Mechanicsville Road, not too far down on the right is Brooks McCall Park. And we've got a small version of an American Ninja course. Cool. Yeah. Don't ask me to do it, but somebody like Reeves probably.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, yeah. Well, no, I've got a story about that. It's and it is a legit Ninja Warrior course. And I I it was, I don't honestly remember. I think it was my oldest son, Talon, but it could have been Tate. But I, Talon or Tate and a few of his buddies, I I kind of was doing a little Bible study with them. And at the end of it, I took them out there and said, All right, boys, you want to be men? Go do this. And I just took videos of them failing all over the place, trying to do this Ninja Warrior course. But it's a legit course and a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_01:

Now, one last thing I'll mention before I leave Parks and Rec. One thing I would encourage people to do. Um, I've mentioned Greenwood Park a couple of times. Um, also at the Greenwood Park on Pampica Highway, we have the Miracle League of Florence County. This is a uh a baseball league for those that previously could not play ball. Um, thanks to Kevin and Vicky Elliott, Councilman Tony Moore, and some others, they got this started uh 10, 15 years ago. And we started with like 12 athletes. Now we're up to almost 300 athletes. They play, I think it's every Monday and Thursday night, like at 6 o'clock and 7 o'clock. They're they're winding up their fall season, the end of next week. Um, they're having their trunk or treat out there, I think, October 27th. But if you really want to bless your own heart, go out and see these athletes participate that would not have been able to participate previously. Um and as far as we know, speaking about amenities that we have that nobody else has, from what we understand, um, thanks to County Council and the Miracle League board, uh, we now have two Miracle League fields um at that site, plus a fully accessible Miracle League playground. Awesome. So we're the only we send we send a couple, two, three athletes every year to the Miracle League World Series. I think the last one was in Florida. Every site that we've gone to, from what I understand, only has one field. We're the only one that we're aware of that has two. So hopefully, maybe one day we'll have the World Series here. That would be a good one. Um, one of the best stories I heard uh when we were starting on this endeavor, um some of our people went to other locations just to see how it was set up. And people visited Spartanburg County and they told the story. Um they were playing ball, and this gentleman was out playing center field, and he was, I want to say in his 80s. And they said during the game they looked out there and he was just balling. And so the coaches got real concerned and ran out there. Is he okay? Is he okay? And he said, It's the first time I've ever had a chance to play ball at 80. At 80. So it's it's a great powerful. Oh, it's powerful, and we've got and it's all ages. Don't think just kids. We've got kids all the way up through, you know, senior adults playing ball. So it it really is uh a great, you know, we're we're providing opportunities for other people in our county.

SPEAKER_02:

The other thing I think about with that, Kevin, I appreciate the challenge for us to go out and watch and and see that and be encouraged and inspired. And certainly it's a great blessing to the athletes that are participating, but for the young people in our community who have some athletic ability, you know, um, to go and see that and to be more grateful and thankful for what God has blessed them with, you know, and being able to it it just gives a different perspective and and a greater appreciation to all people if you can watch that.

SPEAKER_01:

And and to your point, Reeves, as you were saying that, another thought I had is they're always looking for volunteers. Um, because some of these athletes are wheelchair bound.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

So they need volunteers to push them around the bases. Oh, and I know there's been you know different high school and college sports teams or groups that'll go out there and help for a game or two. So that they're always looking for volunteers. And of course, if you talk to Kevin and Vicky, they're always looking for sponsorships as well. So but the Florence community has really gotten behind that, and that's that's a great thing. So that that kind of, from what I can think of, that kind of puts a wrap on parks and rec. But when I look at all the other um just quality of life things, I know, you know, when I went to the Home Builders Association, it's like, what do I need to talk about that really makes a difference to home builders? Um, and it's not just home builders, but it's a lot of people in the Florence community. Um, what can we do to help the quality of life? Well, obviously we've got a great thing going on recreation, but when I look, um I was someplace last night and somebody mentioned our Florence County Library and everything they do, um, unlike a lot of you know libraries across the state and all the programs they have there. Um, our Florence County Museum, a lot of people aren't aware it's free. Um, it's paid for totally by hospitality taxes, the 2% food and beverage tax. Wow. So not a dime of property tax dollars goes to pay for that museum. Um, of course, we appreciate Francis Marion, the Performing Arts Center. Um, you know, we've got the Florence Center, Rex Berman out there as the director, and of course, everybody's excited. We've got hockey back. Oh, yeah. Um, yeah, so we've got you know, we've got a lot of exciting uh quality of life type opportunities, events. Um you know, as I wrap up, probably this part of the uh the comments, um, you know, I said it's a great time to be in Florence County. I get an email last night from uh Mayor Pro Tim, George J'Bailey. Um he sent an email to about 15 of us. There's an article in Southern Living right now, I think it broke two days ago, all about the Pecan Festival. Oh, yeah, okay. And in the article, um, of course, they spent a long time talking about the Pecan Festival, interviewed Hannah Davis, our downtown development coordinator. Um, but the second half of the article has little blurb paragraphs about all the other different things in the Florence area, from the rail trail to the Bean Bar and Buddies and Naturally Outdoors to Palmetto Pedler, to you know, a lot of different things to just attract people to Florence. So, and uh then Dr. Fred Carter from Francis Marion hit reply all and said, Yeah, thanks to Darlamore and Lake City with art fields, that's every April, that's the biggest art uh festival in the Southeast. And now the Peccan Festival, which they're saying is the world's largest festival that's is surrounding pecans. Interesting. We've got two you know world-class festivals that are getting recognized throughout the Southeast. So, yeah, it's there's a when people say there's nothing to do in Florence, give me 30 minutes.

SPEAKER_02:

And I and I think that's what stood out to Robert and I when we you know heard you speak at the Home Builders Association is there is a lot to do, and people talk about green spaces and outdoor activity, and you just outlined a plethora of opportunities that exist in this county. Yeah, so that's that's really interesting. We don't have any excuse now. I think sometimes when you live in a community, your eyes become a little bit blind to what actually is out there for us to go do. Well, now we know, right, and let's go engage in it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yep, yeah, absolutely. I know we're I know you're super busy. I I I do want us to touch on property taxes a little bit while we've got you here. Okay. You know, I I know that can get a little sticky sometimes, but I really love to get your perspective and thoughts on that.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. I I appreciate the question. Um I become increasingly aware that there are comments being made in various arenas about, you know, we need to get rid of property taxes. Um I finally paid for my house, but I'm still paying on my house because I'm paying property taxes. Um and to me, not not being critical, but a lot of these people don't live in the world I live in. Uh property taxes are the main funding source for local government. And it's a stable funding source. It's not subject to the variations you see as a result of the economy that impact both income and sales taxes. But in addition to that, there's a direct nexus between the property taxes you pay and the local government services you receive for both your house and your vehicle. Illustration being, okay, you're at home one night in the middle of the night, all of a sudden you're woken up out of a deep sleep, somebody's trying to beat down your door to get in your house to do you harm. What are you gonna do? 911. Call 911. Well, guess what? The person that answers the phone is a Florence County employee. Okay, that employee answers the phone, they're gonna dispatch law enforcement. If you live in the county, it's a sheriff's deputy. If you live inside the city, it's a city police officer. Both of those are local government employees. If you get harmed and they have to have an ambulance, that's Florence County EMS, that's a county employee. If somebody sets your house on fire, you call 911 and it's either City Fire or one of our unified fire districts that are all essentially local government employees that are funded by property taxes. If the person is apprehended and taken to Effingham, somebody's got to watch them. That's a county employee, one of our corrections officers and detention center. If they wind up making it to court, the whole court system, the judge is a state employee, but Doris Poolis-O'Hara, clerk of court, all her staff, she's a county employee, she's a county elected official, she's paid by property taxes, all her staff are property tax funded. Um but then it even extends when you when you leave that, you say, okay, what about everything else? Well, when you leave the public safety environment, you know, you guys work with the Home Builders Association. So you think of the planning and zoning and building department and Sean Bashir and his team. Well, you know, we've got building inspectors. Well, why do we have building inspectors? Well, to make sure your home was built properly, in accordance with the International Building Code. Well, those building inspectors are funded by property taxes. Um, you know, we've got zoning, and there's a lot of people that I don't like zoning. Well, they like zoning when all of a sudden somebody's talking about building a convenience store or something in their backyard. Uh I was talking to one of our rural council members, and a lot of people in the rural area, they don't like zoning. It's like, no, let me do what I want to do. And he said, Yeah, until somebody decides they're gonna build a hog farm next door. Right. Um, I remember um it was about 15, 20 years ago in Florence County, um, there was an older subdivision on the western side of the county where there was gonna be a smaller, it was gonna be like a town home type, you know, real small lot um subdivision built right across the street. And the residents in that old subdivision were saying, we don't want that. Well, it was in the county, and guess what? It was unzoned property. And some of the responses to that neighborhood were we understand what you're saying, but there's a lot of worse things that could have gone there because it was unzoned. So zoning, you know, and that staff that does the zoning are funded by property tax dollars, and zoning effectively helps protect the value of your home. And in the same regard, I won't belabor the point too much. The same thing with your vehicle. You pay property taxes on your vehicle. Well, you get an erect, you call 911, law enforcement shows up, EMS shows up, fire shows up. Those are all local government services that property taxes you know pay for.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow. So Robert will tell you, I what, three, four weeks ago I got my property tax notices. Um, and I own, you know, maybe six rental properties or something like that. Residential home. Residential. And I went off on everybody in the office. Um and I quickly became a strong proponent of eliminating property taxes and having a county option sales tax that was commensurate with the property tax. And I thought it would be a great benefit to everybody because it would decrease rents, it would decrease the cost of ownership, it would allow people who've paid off their home to not have you know the potential for a lien against their home by by government. We had that conversation at a coffee shop a week or so ago, and and you and you just said it a minute ago, it's a stabilized economic, you know, force, or I don't remember exact verbiage, but it's different than Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And to your point, Reeves, you know, when the economy goes up and down, so do sales taxes, so do income taxes. So if local government was funded by variable tax sources like those two, it makes it very difficult to budget. Okay. Now, to your point about local option, we do have local option sales tax. The voters approved that back in the mid-90s. Um, if you look at your property tax bill, um you'll see a county tax credit. Um, if you live inside the city, there's a city tax credit as well that helps reduce the amount of property taxes you have to pay as far as the net property taxes. Now, I will say this there's been a lot of people complaining over the past couple two, three weeks because of the increase in property taxes. Um, some of that is because some of the local governments, including Florence County, went up on their millage rate, their property tax rate. Florence County went up four mills, but that was dedicated specifically to public safety. It funded 10 new Sheriff's Office employees. It it funded a pay increase we desperately needed for paramedics and a few other things. Um, but the other side of the equation, that property tax credit, if you take the local option sales tax that's collected and divide it by all the appraised value in the county, that dictates how much the credit is each year. Well, unfortunately, over the past, I don't know if it's fortunately or unfortunately, over the past couple, two, three years, the growth in the appraised value of the county, a lot because of all the new houses and new, you know, multifamily all that's being built, the growth of that property is outpacing the growth of the growth of the sales tax. So therefore the credit's going down. So your net property tax bill is going up. Now, probably a topic for another day that we could take 30 minutes and talk about. Um, you talked about rental property. Well, rental property and owner-occupied houses are taxed totally differently. Yes, they are thanks to Act 388 that was passed by the legislature almost 20 years ago. And we could probably at a later date have a much broader discussion about what Act 388 did and all the implications in the property tax structure that we now have to live with.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, that would definitely be a good conversation. The other question I guess I would ask is okay, I I would expect most reasonable people understand that the services, the county services are they're essential and they've got to be funded. And we the people fund those. How can we be assured that there's not bloat or gross mismanagement?

SPEAKER_01:

Uh great question. Um, I've got two answers to the question. One regarding the bloat and mismanagement. Um I would encourage you to develop a relationship with your county council member. Um, you know, a comment was made to me um after the county council meeting this morning, you know, about the job I'm doing as the county administrator. Um, but the council member that's making the comment, you know, encourage county council, be aware, and the county council does a great job, but be aware of the budget and how it's being managed. And we go through a process every year. Um, you know, we're getting ready in a couple of months to start the process because our our fiscal year is July 1 to June 30. Um, by state law, we're required to adopt. To balance budget by June, by July 1 before the fiscal year starts. And so we go through, you know, I do some revenue estimations with our finance staff. We also send out budget packets to all departments to have them submit their requests for next year's budget. I go through those with our team members and have to go through. Obviously, there's never been a year when the requests are more than the revenue. I mean, are less than the revenue. They're always more. They're always more. So you've got to go and cut the request to balance the budget. And then council has to have three readings of the budget ordinance. There's a public hearing. We typically have at least one budget work session with council to go through kind of the high points of the budget. You know, do we need a tax increase? Do we not? What will that fund? Are we going to do a cost of living increase for our employees that are our most valuable asset? But to your point, Reeves, the second answer would be you know, you talked about the various um county services. Um one of my many mantras, um, county governments are a subdivision of the state. Um actually, a lot of people aren't aware of this. In state law, all the functions that we currently provide, with the exception of recreation, are mandated by state law. So if we decided we're not gonna have a library anymore, we can't do that. State law requires us to have a library. Wow. Okay, interesting. So yeah, we are subdivisions of the state, so a lot of what we do, we're beholden to the state as far as what we do. Wow.

SPEAKER_02:

So I think Robert has one more hot button, maybe not hot button, but community interest question for you.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so as we're, you know, we're always looking at Florence developing and getting new people in. One section coming into town, and I think you guys have a plan for this, is the airport section there. And isn't there a beautification plan to kind of do some landscaping and some things as people are coming in and try to make that corridor look a little better?

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, I'm a great question. Um, Sean, I mentioned Sean Bashir earlier. He and his team, um, they've done a lot of zoning efforts, and we talked about zoning previously, along the Highway 76 Palmetto Street Corridor from downtown Florence out to the intersectional highway 327 and then 327 north from there. That's all been completed. Um, now they're coming back with, like you said, a landscaping and a beautification plan and working with a consultant to try to figure out what kind of landscaping will be put out there and how that will look. Um they're looking at a establishing a TIFF district, which is a maybe a conversation from the other day, a tax increment financing district where we kind of what we would collect from property taxes from that area would be frozen. But as the place as the area develops and more property taxes are collected, the increase in the taxes would be set aside to fund some of those improvements in that area. Um and then for those of you that haven't met Brad Beatles, the new airport director, you really need to meet Brad. Yes. Um, he's he was a great hire by the the commission out there, uh, came to us from Florida. He's got a lot of great ideas, and and the Florence Airport is it's on its way for great things over the next three to five to ten years.

SPEAKER_00:

I love the new sign they put at the Florence Airport. That looks cool.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, the the the flow, the flow fly flow and the billboards both coming to Columbia, leaving from the beach, they're all over. Fly flow. You could be home.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, you could have already you could have already been home by now. They've been very powerful.

SPEAKER_02:

So maybe we need to have him on the podcast.

SPEAKER_00:

So we'll lose subscribers if we don't talk about the one last thing. And we don't have to go deep in it, but you know what it is. We're feeling good about the the battery plant, right? Yes, we're feeling good about that. Yeah, no.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. Great question. I mean, as those of you aware, we had a huge event December of 22 at the Performing Arts Center. Um, Greg Robinson, our economic development, um, the president of the partnership, you know, was instrumental in getting uh AESC to locate a battery plant here. Um and they made us uh more than one announcement, and they now have committed to$1.6 billion of investment and 1,600 employees. Um unfortunately, um back in June, as a result of the big beautiful bill, they paused construction. Um now I saw some things on social media as you know as recent as this morning, talking about um, you know, the the impact and the federal mandate for electric vehicles and those going away and the impact on that. No, what specifically affected AESC is when President Biden's team had the Inflation Reduction Act passed in 2022, there was a very specific credit, an advanced manufacturing credit, including that bill, that was for solar, wind, and battery production to help incentivize that. That credit made a company like AESC financially possible. Um, well, the big beautiful bill that the House passed in June, um, when the House passed it, it basically ripped out that credit. So AESC paused and said, we can't, it doesn't make sense for us to go forward. Well, thanks to Senator Tim Scott and others, they pretty much got that credit put back in.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01:

Um that was one of three hurdles that had to be overcome. And and Greg can give you a lot of good details. The second hurdle was uh they have to do a financial global reset. This company is actually building five plants across the globe. And so they have to re-engage with those banks and other institutions that are financing them to say, okay, let's reset the table, how do we go forward? And they are working on that hurdle. The third hurdle is re-engaging the general contractor. I mean, when you went out there, when the building was under construction, you saw these construction trailers. They're not there anymore. Um, so we need to, they need to re-engage either the original contractor or another contractor. And of course, once those hurdles are overcome, of course, the overarching issue is what are the impact of tariffs gonna be? And we don't know because the the word right now is uncertainty. Right. You know, it changes every day. We saw it change potentially this week. Announcements come out of the current administration about what they're gonna do with tariffs and whatnot. But to your point, yeah, I am fairly optimistic about the future of the battery plant for two reasons. One, like I said earlier, AESC committed a$1.6 billion investment. They're not backing up from that investment. Plus, they've already invested$1.3 billion. Okay. Are they gonna walk away from that? They could, but I don't see how. I mean, they've got they've got to keep going forward. So that that's one factor. The other factor is they've got a contract with BMW to supply batteries. They've got to honor that contract. Um, those the batteries produced here will go to a plant that BMW built in Woodruff. And of course, these batteries are like everybody talks about a Pepsi can. They're like a Pepsi can. They're gonna be produced here, shipped to Woodruff, and the plant in Woodruff is gonna put them in racks, and then those racks will be shipped to the the plant, the main BMW plant in Greer and be slid into the X5 and X7 vehicles. Um and then, you know, those vehicles will be produced. What a lot of people are unaware of, because some people see the electric vehicle market and see the the U.S. automakers, General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, whatnot, Fiat, backing up from electric vehicles because of demand. Well, about 70% of the production that BMW makes in Greer goes to Charleston, goes to Europe.

SPEAKER_00:

Right.

SPEAKER_01:

And they're probably five, 10 years ahead of us on the EV adoption rate. So I'm I'm fairly confident that probably inside of 12 months, we'll see some movement out there from what we're hearing. Probably by the end of the calendar year, we'll know a little bit more definitively uh where we're going and kind of the timeline. So, yeah, it's you know, it's it's gonna come. Um now two, three years from now, will 100% of the production be car batteries? It may not. There is a similar plant in uh Bowling Green, Kentucky that are producing batteries for Mercedes-Benz. They've already pivoted part of the production of the plant to energy storage batteries because there's so much solar and wind being produced, you have to be able to store it someplace. So they're making these larger energy storage batteries to connect to the grid. So, yeah, it's a great time to be in Florence County. We've got exciting times on the economic development front. So, yeah, hopefully inside of a year, we'll see positive progress out there.

SPEAKER_00:

That is that is encouraging. Thank you so much for coming. Absolutely. That was awesome. We appreciate all you do. Yeah, appreciate the invitation. Anything we can ever do to help, please let us know. I'll do it. Thank you. All right, thanks, Kevin. Thank you.