Boiling Springs Incorporation

[Spartan]

The issue of Boiling Springs incorporating has come up once again.

Boiling Springs is a significant suburb of Spartanburg, with over 16,000 residents- About the size of Greer.

Their reasons are usual:

• local law enforcement

• basic municipal functions like streetlights, planning, police and waste collection

• protecting itself from the eventual annexation by Spartanburg

The article emphasizes that there seems to be more support this go around. If James Island and Taylors are successful it will probably help their effort out tremendously.

The article also mentioned that Spartanburg is stepping up its annexation efforts to increase its tax base, but not to Boiling Springs.

I think that this is just a matter of time. Eventually we will see a Town of Boiling Springs.

Article

[vicupstate]

It's looking more and more like the upstate will soon be a huge beltway of 25,000-50,000 population cities with no dominant urban area. Rivalry and competition between them will be common and counter-productive. Remember the competition for a baseball stadium? expect more of that.

I see Boiling Springs incorporation as more legitimate than Taylors'. Taylors is trying to prevent annexation. Boiling Springs is in need of services and no other city is close enough to provide them currently. I doubt the outcome of James Island will have much weight on the Boiling Springs situation, but the Taylors vote certainly will.

I guess Piedmont (Anderson Co.) will be the next to take up the incorporation banner.

[UrbanSoutherner]

Watching this "movement" for suburban incorporation in SC with James Island, Taylors, and now Boiling Springs, as well as in Fulton County GA where I live (Sandy Springs and maybe two more to come), I am really rather amazed by it all. The suburbs are so anti-tax and anti-government in theory, yet they are voting a new layer of government into existence with inevitably higher taxes and duplication of governmental administrative structures (as opposed to annexing into an existing city). It is really weird to me. This is where NC cities are so lucky with the state's supportive annexation laws.

My first choice would be for these areas to annex into existing cities. If they must incorporate on their own, I at least hope they create decent-sized cities so it does not get ridiculously balkanized with tons of small municipalities. I do think suburban areas by and large are better served by a municipal government than a county government in terms of basic services.

One more point--this really sucks for the Upstate. At least Charleston has annexed enough to be a decent sized city for the foreseeable future with its arms out through Daniel Island and Cainhoy and across the Ashley. Greenville and Spartanburg are really far smaller than they should be even with SC's restrictive laws. The apparent increased willingness of suburbs to incorporate is yet another impediment to changing that situation. I also think additional municipalities pretty much kills any chance of city-county consolidation since it would create huge turf battles in any merger.

[hub-city]

I agree. In the article one of the reasons for BS incorporating was to prevent Sptbg from annexing. First, I don't think that Sptbg. can get that far, and second I don't understand the thought of "Hey, we don't want to be part of the city, so let;s make ourselves a city" Duh.

BS needs to consider ways to improve traffic flow on hwy. 9. It is a wreck. Drove it coming home today and WOW it is slow.

[Spartan]

Watching this "movement" for suburban incorporation in SC with James Island, Taylors, and now Boiling Springs, as well as in Fulton County GA where I live (Sandy Springs and maybe two more to come), I am really rather amazed by it all. The suburbs are so anti-tax and anti-government in theory, yet they are voting a new layer of government into existence with inevitably higher taxes and duplication of governmental administrative structures (as opposed to annexing into an existing city). It is really weird to me. This is where NC cities are so lucky with the state's supportive annexation laws.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Actually, that is the reason that the BS incorporation keeps failing. Most people in that area are heavily anti-tax, and they know that a new town would just be more taxes.

I agree.  In the article one of the reasons for BS incorporating was to prevent Sptbg from annexing.  First, I don't think that Sptbg. can get that far, and second I don't understand the thought of "Hey, we don't want to be part of the city, so let;s make ourselves a city" Duh.

BS needs to consider ways to improve traffic flow on hwy. 9.  It is a wreck.  Drove it coming home today and WOW it is slow.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Exactly. Spartanburg couldn't annex that far if it wanted to. It doesn't have the means to provide municipal services that far out yet. The city iwll probably focus on areas that basicly have the city functionality, but that are not in the city to work on annexing.

[krazeeboi]

It seems like the Upstate, as well as the Lowcountry, is beginning to resemble the Hampton Roads area of Virginia with a handful of similarly sized towns. Columbia is lucky to be THE dominant city of the Midlands.

[Spartan]

This topic has come up yet again. This article in the Herald-Journal discusses at length what the status is of this process. It sounds as though they business community in Boiling Springs wants to propose incorporation again in 2010.

Its more interesting this time partially because there is more information. Depending on the boundaries they use, an incorporated Boiling Springs could have upwards of 35,000 citizens, which would make it one of the largest municipalities in SC almost overnight, and it would be a few thousand shy of Spartanburg's population of about 38,900.

The proposed boundaries vary, but include the Middle School attendance zone, the Fire District, or the local business association area. The print edition had a good map to illustrate the various areas... all of them were quite large.

This time, though, they are being up front about the realities of becoming a municipality. The incorporation would mean higher taxes because they would have to be able to provide water, sewer, garbage collection, fire, police, planning, and zoning. This situation is different than the James Island incorporation because its not possible for Boiling Springs to exist as a paper town. The community will have to levy taxes to provide the appropriate staffing to oversee these needs. The police force would not be easily managed by Spartanburg County.

The other interesting thing that I learned from this article is that County Council Chairman Jeff Horton 1) appears to be in favor of zoning at the County level, and 2) based on the statement below, has a poor understand of the state of SC's struggles with municipal government.

"Just to be a municipality for a municipality's sake, that leads to another layer of government," Horton said. "If it was so great, most of our municipalities would be enjoying more prosperous times. I hope county council would move in the direction that Boiling Springs could have a land-use plan that they desired

[alias007]

On November 2nd, Boiling Springs had put a 2 million dollar bond to vote to finance a new fire station. It passed with 4405 votes for and 1974 against. That's a landslide approval and possibly puts incorporation as a necessity. I'm very pleased with this vote. I should be, the wife and I voted FOR it. lol

The biggest reason I'm happy about this, incorporation aside (I'm for that too), is just because we needed a new fire station. According to the Boiling Springs Sentry, "the current station house has suffered numerous mold problems in recent years, causing illness to some firefighters." The article had a quote from Fire Chief Leroy Searcy. "The Board of Commissioners will meet Monday night {Nov. 16 2008} and sign the resolution, and as I understand it, then it is filed by our attorneys and put out for bids to the banks. We are already in negotiations for a 3-acre parcel of land on Rainbow Lake Road..." Earlier in the article, Searcy pointed out that "the station house we are in now is over 30 years old and just does not meet our needs anymore."

So they seem to be moving really fast here. They hope to be IN the new fire house by February 2010. That's just a little over a year!

The complete article is available online here:

http://www.hometown-news.com/the-boiling-s...nt-moves-ahead/

On a side note, I hope I never need their services. lol *knock on wood*

[roads-scholar]

On November 2nd, Boiling Springs had put a 2 million dollar bond to vote to finance a new fire station. It passed with 4405 votes for and 1974 against. That's a landslide approval and possibly puts incorporation as a necessity. I'm very pleased with this vote. I should be, the wife and I voted FOR it. lol

The biggest reason I'm happy about this, incorporation aside (I'm for that too), is just because we needed a new fire station. According to the Boiling Springs Sentry, "the current station house has suffered numerous mold problems in recent years, causing illness to some firefighters." The article had a quote from Fire Chief Leroy Searcy. "The Board of Commissioners will meet Monday night {Nov. 16 2008} and sign the resolution, and as I understand it, then it is filed by our attorneys and put out for bids to the banks. We are already in negotiations for a 3-acre parcel of land on Rainbow Lake Road..." Earlier in the article, Searcy pointed out that "the station house we are in now is over 30 years old and just does not meet our needs anymore."

So they seem to be moving really fast here. They hope to be IN the new fire house by February 2010. That's just a little over a year!

The complete article is available online here:

http://www.hometown-news.com/the-boiling-s...nt-moves-ahead/

On a side note, I hope I never need their services. lol *knock on wood*

[alias007]

I've only been here since 2004, but from what I understand, there hasn't been enough support for it to go through in the past. So historically, residents have been against. It's my (perhaps naive) hope that the hwy 9 widening, old furnace rd (future) widening, new fire station, a lot of new businesses in the area and things like that are a good sign for incorporation.

So what the current sentiment is, I don't really know. I'd love to see a poll about it though.

[Spartan]

I think people who both live and work in Boiling Springs understand the need for it. The business community definitely does. The problem is that because its a bedroom community, most people commute to places in Spartanburg and beyond. They moved there for country living and low taxes, but now the subdivisions want city amenities nearby so they don't have to drive to Spartanburg. Thats fine, but I think they refuse to acknowledge that even suburbia has to be paid for some how. Taxes, no matter how much we hate them, are necessary for cities to function, which is why Boiling Springs does not function well.

[alias007]

*snip snip* Thats fine, but I think they refuse to acknowledge that even suburbia has to be paid for some how. Taxes, no matter how much we hate them, are necessary for cities to function, which is why Boiling Springs does not function well.

[roads-scholar]

Representation without taxation? That's funny!

[Spartan]

The problem is that people don't want change. They want it to be exactly like it was. They're ok with growth as long as you don't try to tell anyone how they can use their property... then the same people go and complain about how we're loosing our rural character and it needs to be protected. They want better schools, but not without pooling resources to allow it to happen.

I think that people really don't understand how limited governmental resources are in SC. People want more than their government is able to pay for (I'm specifically talking about infrastructure and regulatory services that are the primary function of government).