Florence County planning officials warn of ground-level ozone issues

FLORENCE — As the summer comes to a close, Florence County officials are seeing the area is close to exceeding federally allowed amounts of the pollutant ground-level ozone.

“What you need to understand is that we’re at the limit now,” Florence County Planning Director Bill Hoge told the Florence County Planning Commission on Tuesday night.

In March, the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard for ground-level ozone decreased from 80 parts per billion to 75 parts per billion.

If an area doesn’t meet EPA’s standards, it will have a harder time recruiting industry that must receive state air quality permits — and ultimately could lose its federal highway funding.

An average of the area’s surface-level ozone figures for 2007, 2008 and 2009 will determine whether the county has met EPA’s new standard.

So far this year, the county is averaging ground-level ozone of 76 parts per billion, which is offset by last year’s average of 73 parts per billion, Florence County Planning Services Officer Scott Park said.

That means the county for now is in attainment with EPA’s requirements, but its 2009 average cannot surpass 76 parts per billion, Park said.

A molecule of ground-level ozone comprises three oxygen atoms. It forms when nitrogen oxide reacts with volatile organic compounds in sunlight. It increases as the area’s industry, population and number of vehicles grow, Park said.

Also on Tuesday, the planning commission voted unanimously to recommend the county replace 314 paper zoning maps with a single official digital map.

The paper maps will be archived and will no longer be updated if county council also approves the change.

The county ultimately plans to place the digital map online, Hoge said. The document is color-coded based on a property’s zoning designation and will feature zoning information in drop-down menus accessible by clicking on a parcel, Hoge said.

Hoge also gave the commission a report that shows the overall value of building permits in the county is down more than $32 million from this point last year, when the value of permits reached nearly $170 million.

At this point in 2007, the county had granted 97 permits for new commercial development. So far this year, however, the county hasn’t issued half that many permits. The permits’ value, however, is up nearly $2 million thanks largely to an H.J. Heinz Co. permit worth about $51 million, Hoge said.

Although only 248 houses have been built so far this year — 50 fewer than at this point last year — the value of the permits is up almost $400,000.

The commission also unanimously recommended approval of:

• An amendment to allow libraries in the densest residential zoning districts — R-4 and R-5 — a change that will particularly help in the construction of a new Olanta library, Hoge said.
  
• A sketch plan of the proposed Winterbury subdivision, off National Cemetery and Old Wallace Gregg roads.