Mount Pleasant council defers Patriots Annex zoning decision after hours of public comment

Mount Pleasant Town Council on April 8 moved to defer final action on a request to extend a development agreement and rezone a 30-acre portion of Patriot’s Point known as Patriots Annex to a planned development district (PD).

The council voted to defer consideration, 6–2, after roughly two hours of public comment and council discussion in which residents and civic groups raised concerns about public waterfront access, tree removal, traffic and flooding, and the level of detail in the proposed PD. The developer and Patriot’s Point representatives said the PD would not increase density or height compared with current Waterfront Gateway zoning and that key waterfront areas would remain publicly accessible.

The vote follows repeated public testimony urging the council to preserve public views and access to the waterfront and to limit residential density and tree-loss. “WGC was created to ensure civic and institutional uses on land for the public’s benefit. Now the same developer wants to undo their own zoning and rewrite the rules for their own benefit,” said Deidra Kennedy, a Mount Pleasant resident, during public comment. Supporters of the proposal, including Allison Hunt, executive director of the Patriots Point Development Authority, said lease revenue from private development helps support maintenance of the site’s World War II…