North Myrtle Beach Times Serving our Community and the Grand Strand for over 50 years
By Ben Freda
North Myrtle Beach residents attended a Public Engagement Drop-in in the gymnasium of the South Carolina FFA Center on Wednesday, October 1. It was the third opportunity for them to provide input to the Comprehensive Plan Update Survey. The City of North Myrtle Beach will use the survey to guide decisions and development of the vision and priorities for the next five to ten years.
“Counties update their comprehensive plan every ten years,” said Gianna Forbis, multimedia coordinator of North Myrtle Beach. “Cities, every five years. Basically, we’re asking the question to residents what’s one specific change can we implement in the next ten years that would make North Myrtle Beach a better place to be. This is kind of preparing us for that updated plan. We want to make sure that we are getting all the residents’ input and making sure everyone’s voice is heard.”
The gymnasium had stations, in which people balloted on many issues regarding the city. One station allowed people to put monopoly bills in boxes choosing categories of where they would like to see improvements. Options included parks and recreation, which involves landscaping, maintenance, trails, accessibility, and recreation centers. Another box had a streetscape improvement category, which includes pedestrian walkways, biking paths, signage, and safety. People also got to vote on community facilities such as libraries, museums, cultural resources, and hospitals.
Since flooding often occurs in North Myrtle Beach, especially in the Cherry Grove Beach area, residents input strengths, weaknesses and opportunities regarding resiliency. They also wrote threats they face when flooding happens in the area.
Another station gave residents the opportunity to write comments about transportation safety. They got to come up with ideas to improve the safety of bikers and pedestrians.
The information from the survey will be given to MRB Group, a consulting firm in Charleston. MRB Group will in turn analyze the data and draft a five-year plan for the city to review.
