Spartanburg County Council approves funding for SPACE Glendale park project

Samantha Swann, Spartanburg Herald-Journal
·2 min read

Spartanburg Area Conservancy (SPACE) is one step closer to its goal of preserving over 1,000 acres in Glendale.

Spartanburg County Council unanimously voted April 15 to approve a resolution giving $2 million from the Spartanburg County Public Access Land Bank to the project.

If SPACE succeeds in acquiring the property, approximately 945-acres to the east of their Glendale Shoals and Glendale Mill properties, it will be leased and managed by Spartanburg County Parks and Recreation for 100 years and protected by a SPACE conservation easement.

This map shows the current Glendale Shoals Preserve, in dashed green lines, and the 945 acres SPACE and Spartanburg County hope to acquire outlined in yellow.
This map shows the current Glendale Shoals Preserve, in dashed green lines, and the 945 acres SPACE and Spartanburg County hope to acquire outlined in yellow.

"The easement that will be reviewed not only by the state, but by the county as well to make sure that it meets everybody's goals, and the language within that easement will have allowances for the creation of infrastructure for passive recreation," SPACE Executive Director Sam Parrott told council members. "Welcome centers, parking lots trails, bathrooms, the facilities that anybody would need to be able to use this space well for recreation."

County Council Chairman Manning Lynch called the project a "tremendous opportunity."

"The way this fits into our overall program for outside linear parks, which are our trail systems, this is right in the middle of what will soon be the Country Club Road corridor addition to the Mary Black Rail Trail, and it will eventually end up in Clifton in one direction," Lynch said. "So, this is just an exciting piece in that whole puzzle. A great opportunity, a generational opportunity."

One vote left to fund the park

The SC Conservation Bank voted to give $3 million towards the purchase last month, so Spartanburg County Council's decision brings space to approximately $5 million towards the $25 million purchase price for the land.

SPACE has requested $20 million from the South Carolina Office of Resilience, which was founded to help mitigate future risk of flooding in the state. That vote is set for May. Closing on the property is tentatively scheduled for June, pending a favorable vote.

Acquiring the property for a green space park would be a significant win for conservation in Spartanburg County, according to SPACE Board of Trustees President Laura Stille.

"Spartanburg is now the eighth fastest growing metro area in the nation, according to US census data. Additionally, Spartanburg County has one of the lowest percentages of protected lands in the state of South Carolina at 2.6 of our total acreage, this ranks us 42nd out of South Carolina's 46 counties. This proposed project will increase the percentage of protected lands by 8%," Stille said.

While the acquisition is not anticipated to change that ranking, Stille noted, "Protecting this property forever, helps ensure that future generations — my children, my grandchildren — hopefully, know the Spartanburg that we love today and want to return to live here one day."

Samantha Swann covers city news, development and culture in Spartanburg. She is a University of South Carolina Upstate and Greenville Technical College alumna. Contact her at sswann@shj.com or on Instagram at @sam_on_spartanburg.

This article originally appeared on Herald-Journal: Spartanburg County Council approves funding for SPACE Glendale project