Florence attorney Ben Zeigler told members of the Francis Marion Trail Commission on Thursday that he will step down as chairman Jan. 1.
Zeigler’s four-year term will be up and he said feels it’s time for new leadership at the helm.
“Four years is about as much as I want to do,” he said during the meeting at Francis Marion University.
The commission also approved an $86,925 fiscal year budget.
Zeigler said the General Assembly has cut the trail’s funding for the 2009 fiscal year.
“Along with almost every other local tourism project, we lost all of our funding in the General Assembly this year,” he said.
Potential bricks and mortar funding for Florence County also was reduced, Zeigler said, because of a change in the rules governing the use of public monies to match product development grant monies appropriated by the General Assembly to S.C. Parks, Recreation and Tourism for fiscal year 2008.
Although he described the Legislature’s actions as a “double whammy,” Zeigler said it wouldn’t significantly hinder development of the trail.
“It was a tough budget year,” he said, “so we should not be surprised to have lost our $200,000 annual appropriation. The retroactive changes in the grant-making rules are consistent with the state’s disinclination to fund rural tourism.
“However, we have been good stewards of the money we have received and have developed a lean budget that will allow us to operate for three years without any further revenue.”
Meanwhile, the Phase 1 archaeological report of the University of South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology will be presented in August.
Zeigler said the draft report contains “a number of exciting findings, conclusions and recommendations with regard to more than a dozen Marion sites that, along with sites that have been located and/or interpreted will form a core of developable tourism products.”
Commission executive director Bob Barrett said Jaeger Co. will present its findings of a master plan for the trail in August.
Zeigler said the completion of the archaeological report and master plan provide a good basis on which the commission can seek funding this fall from the private sector and local governments.
“With the completion of these two initiatives, we will move from the 30,000-foot conceptual level to the sites and communities that are actually on the ground,” he said. “Based on this perspective, we believe the time will be right to ask the private sector and local governments to invest in the development of the sites and infrastructure that will form the trail.”
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