By Ted Carter

Someone had to be the first to approach the new Tybee City Council for a land-use variance.

The task fell to attorney James B. Blackburn Jr. and the outcome hardly came as a surprise: denial by a 5-1 vote with previous council-holdover Paul Wolff joining new members Shirley Sessions, Bill Garbett, Kathyrn Williams and Frank Schuman Sr. in rejecting the request. Wanda Doyle, who served on the previous council, voted for the variance.

Blackburn had the misfortunate Thursday, Jan. 14, of an agenda placement that made his client the first to seek a variance. He went before a new council whose majority of members made a campaign issue in the fall of the previous council’s eagerness to grant the variances.

Later in the evening, consulting engineer Mark Boswell represented a client seeking site plan review approval. Knowing the new council’s attitude toward variances, Boswell made it clear he was not seeking one. “I’m not going to get fired by asking for a variance, he said.

Blackburn said he saw his variance denial as an instance of unfortunate timing.

“If only we’d done it two weeks ago,” Blackburn lamented in the hallway outside the meeting shortly after the newly convened council rejected his request for a setback variance for Pelican Landings, 26 Atlantic Ave.

Blackburn wanted the variance as a way to separate a commercial building from the 18-unit condominium complex. With a commercial use linked to a residential condominium use, buyers of units at Pelican Landings are unable to obtain mortgage financing from quasi-governmental lenders such as the Federal Housing Administration, and Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, according to Blackburn. He said the new lending rules went into effect in December and are creating problems for properties that have a mix of commercial and residential use.

Buyers of individual units can still get financing but in most instances the lender will have to be an entity willing to hold onto the note instead of selling it on the secondary mortgage market, he said. Those lending arrangements are becoming rare in this period of tight credit, he added.

Tybee City Attorney Bubba Hughes said the lending problem stems from the different set of lending rules that have been established for commercial and residential properties. “It’s made it difficult when you mix the two,” he said.

In the case of Pelican Point, buyers of the units can submit the condominium documents to the lender but if the lot still contains the commercial use, “all the lenders back way,” Blackburn said.

Blackburn said he’s unsure what client Natasha Wilhite will do with the more than three-decade old commercial building that sits on the property. She has the option of tearing it down, which might help the odds of the condo unit buyers receiving mortgage financing, he said.

Pelican Landings’ owners “might also build a swimming pool” where the commercial building is situated, Blackburn noted.

Mayor Pro-tem Shirley Sessions said she expects the new lending policies will create problems down the road developers who take part in the trend of building projects with retail on a ground floor and residential units on the floors above. But as a policy setter for Tybee, she said she is concerned about government “taking ownership of other peoples’ responsibilities.”

In her vote for the variance request, Doyle criticized her fellow council members for depriving the city of property taxes from what could be occupied condo units.  The result is a lost opportunity to help bring property to the city,” added Doyle, a member of the previous council targeted in the fall campaign as too lenient with variance requests.

“We need economic stimulus,” she added.

The 18-unit Pelican Landings had been built about three years ago. The new owners acquired the condo complex and adjoining property in a foreclosure sale, according to attorney Blackburn.