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Residents in certain areas of Beaufort County, South Carolina, may soon experience changes regarding where they can legally fire a gun.
On Tuesday, the Beaufort County Community Services and Public Safety Committee advanced a new firearms ordinance to the county council for additional consideration.
The proposed regulation would prohibit firing a weapon within 500 feet of any building, residence, park, or playground in specific unincorporated regions of Beaufort County.
If enacted, the ordinance would impose penalties including fines of up to $500 and potential jail sentences of up to 30 days.
While county officials continue to debate the precise wording and specifics of the ordinance, many concerned residents are pushing for a swift resolution, expressing that their safety is at stake.
“There are other people who are frightened by this. I am frightened,” said a resident of the Lakes at New Riverside neighborhood in Bluffton.
Another resident who attended the meeting had differing views.
“There is no proof that the bullets are entering our neighborhood, nor is there any imminent threat,” they said.
Though residents from the Lakes at New Riverside neighborhood battle over the seriousness of their reported gunfire and alleged property damage, it was their meetings with county officials last year that pushed for a new ordinance to be proposed.
In one of those meetings, County Councilmember Joe Passiment urged that something be done, saying his neighborhood has dealt with the same gunfire problem.
He brought it forth again Wednesday during the committee meeting.
“It’s happened in my neighborhood several times,” Passiment said.
County officials learned that several local communities backed up to unincorporated county properties are dealing with the same issue.
Neighbors from the Shadow Moss neighborhood in Port Royal also brought forward their concerns.
They also had evidence of bullet damage to a property and support from the town police chief.
“My house is the house that got shot up,” said a Shadow Moss resident whose home interior and exterior were damaged from gunfire. “There are currently seven bullet holes in my property right now. One entered through my master bedroom, struck the wall next to me, right next to my four-year-old daughter. My wife and my two-month-old at the time were probably less than ten feet away.”
Port Royal Police Chief Jeff Myers also spoke to the committee, thanking them for bringing forth the ordinance. His department, along with the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office, assisted in the response and investigation into the Shadow Moss home damaged by gunfire.
obtained photos of the bullet damage taken by law enforcement.
Chief Myers said there was nothing in Port Royal’s ordinances or under state law that gave them the ability to charge the person discharging the firearm into the resident’s house because of the circumstance.
The circumstance being that the person firing the gun was on unincorporated property, and the home damaged by gunfire was in the Town of Port Royal.
“It’s something unusual,” Chief Myers said. “I’ll tell you right now, being there firsthand, it’s a miracle somebody didn’t die the way the bullet holes are in that property. If somebody was standing there, sitting on a couch, we would be having a totally different conversation right now.”
County officials are also debating whether to expand firing distance from 500 ft. to 1000 ft.
Officials with the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office said 500 feet is what they recommended for the ordinance. They said anything more than that distance becomes difficult to enforce.
County council will have three readings and a public hearing to make a decision before anything becomes official.