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Given the general public perception of the man, you wouldn’t expect to see Hilton Head Island Town Councilman Bill Ferguson with a big smile on his face. But there it is, stretching his salt and pepper beard as he stirs sweetener into his iced tea. He chuckles, then hands over the Splenda packet.
“It’s sweet to be important, but it’s important to be sweet,” the packet reads.
“That about it sums it up right there,” he laughs.
It’s an ironic sentiment for Ferguson to agree with, given his somewhat combative reputation.
After all, the headlines on Ferguson don’t indicate a man known for his sweetness. But somewhere beyond the arguments with council members, the abrupt walkouts during meetings and well-publicized domestic violence charges is a guy who grew up on Hilton Head Island, a native Gullah. There’s a guy that has seen development pass by the people who were here first. There’s a guy who served in Vietnam, and who carries the weight of that service every day. But yes, there’s also the guy who has a bone to pick with... well, just about everyone.
We sat down for a brief Q&A and got to meet all these guys.
Hilton Head Monthly: You’ve been on record saying that a lot of what has happened has come from your service, your exposure to agent orange, and the medications you’re taking, Can you speak to that at all?
Bill Ferguson: Medications constantly change. Sometimes there have been conflicting medications and they’d affect me differently.
HHM: But have you got them sorted out now? Are you feeling any better?
BF: No. The Veteran’s Administration will never keep you with one physician. Every time you go there you get somebody different. I do have a main physician, but I only see him maybe twice a year. After so much time, the effects of the medication just wears out until they change until your body builds up a resistance to them.
I’m at the point now I’ve taken everything… that I could purchase over the counter prescription-wise. I’ve taken everything up to taking that leap over to narcotics. I’m right at that threshold.
HHM: Lately there have been calls for you to resign from town council. Is that in your plans?
BF: No. As long as I’m in the minority on most issues, things haven’t changed. I’m still gonna be the same, I’ll just try and get along with everyone behind the scenes. But what you see out there in the public and the way (the media) reports issues about me is quite different from the way they report about the other members of town council. So it’s obvious there must be some type of racism or prejudice... . It has to be. What else could it be? I’ve been here 18 years on the council, I’ve never seen them treat anyone they way they’ve treated me. Even our ex-mayor, Tom Peeples, used to storm out of meetings and you don’t even read it in the paper.
I’m also known as civil rights activist in the Native Island community, and when they see me get kicked around, they say ‘good grief, what’s in it for us?’
HHM: Speaking of the Native Island community, what are the biggest challenges facing Ward 1?
BF: The biggest challenge is town government... . We need to take into account that we’re dealing with tax-paying property owners who are not getting an equitable share in return for their tax dollars. That’s as frank as I can be.
The rest of the island is at or above build out. Ward 1 is not. Yet our primary focus right now is on Coligny and Shelter Cove. They’re throwing some breadcrumbs at us called Mitchelville to keep us pacified, I guess, but it’s not enough. We have plenty of unpaved roads, the rainy season is almost upon us, people will not be able to take their vehicles and drive up to their homes.
HHM: Does it really get that bad?
BF: Yes it does. As a matter of fact our fire chief said he had a situation in which he had to get up one of these dirt roads to get to a place where someone was illegally burning trash and he couldn’t get his SUV there through this road. And it was dry. Good luck getting a fire truck back there.
We still don’t have sewer systems. There are sewer lines running on the opposite side of the street. The Department of Transportation won’t let you burrow under streets anymore, especially S.C. 278.
But we’re still paying taxes to the public service district. And why do we have public service districts when we have a full-fledged municipal government here? I’ll tell you why.
The private communities are represented on town council by at least one individual from each of the the six wards. I’m just one. My area is basically still undeveloped. The other ones are at build-out. They just, purely out of selfishness, refuse to vote to put a higher priority on the areas of Ward 1 that need help. That’s as simple as I can make it. That’s how we can fix the problems, is if I can get a majority of town council to vote these things in, we’d have no problems. But they’re still in office, they’re still being elected, the same people with the same mindset are being represented on town council.
HHM: So it sounds like there’s still some friction with the rest of council.
BF: How can I not have friction with people that aren’t doing anything for my folks? And deliberately doing it? We’ve got the budget. We’ve got the capital improvement programs… to take care of these things. We need a public works department, to be honest with you, and get rid of these districts. These districts did a great service in the early years, but when we became a municipality, things should have changed.
HHM: What would it take to make that happen?
BF: Majority vote. Four votes from town council... . Everyone seems to give so much value to the LMO. The Land Management Ordinance is chapter 16 of the municipal code itself, so it’s just part of the code. And the code spells out our duties, our representation, how we are supposed to get along with each other and how we are supposed to interact with each other and represent the island as a whole. Why do we separate Ward 1 out and take care of the rest of the island? It’s a matter of four votes.
And I would say to you right now that the way we’ve been governing this island is illegal. We had a municipal responsibility and we are not carrying it out. And everyone on that council knows it and so do the powers that be on Hilton Head Island.
HHM: Who would you define as the powers that be?
BF: Oh the various organizations behind the scenes that are really calling the shots. Such as the greater island committee, chamber of commerce, property owners associations, across the board that’s about it. And when they speak, these people that represent them jump and ask “how high?”
And my folks are still asking why. It bothers me.
Folks behind the gates are fully aware of all this. It’s really the new people moving in here recently that aren’t aware. The real estate industry is quite in tune with the plight of Ward 1 and the Native Islanders. We’re losing people. They’re moving, they’re selling their property for less than market value.
You’re dealing with heirs property and that’s something that this government should solve. We should get rid of heirs property on Hilton Head Island. We don’t need them anymore. It served its purpose in the beginning, in the early days after the Civil War. Sure, there needs to be some kind of protective mechanism to keep other folks from stealing other peoples’ land and property. We lost an awful lot of land on Hilton Head Island, and I can tell you right now that we don’t even know how we lost it.
HHM: Time for closing thoughts. If you had one thing above all else you wanted to make sure got out there, what do you think that is?
BF: There isn’t one thing more important than the other. I just want to make sure that everyone’s aware that the same problems we had in 1983, we’re still having today. We put on a big front, but it’s all the same. I don’t socialize with council. I used to try to. But when you walk into a room and everyone suddenly becomes quiet… That happened too often and I’m just fed up with it. But I’m still gonna stay on the council and I’m gonna run again. There are people on council right now older than I am, so why not I?
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