Mount Pleasant Magazine May/June 2018

51 www.MountPleasantMagazine.com | www.ILoveMountPleasant.com | www.BestOfMP.com feature John Wright, below left, and Richard Habersham at the site of what eventually will be a two-building complex: a community center and a museum. West, Dunes West, RiverTowne, Planter’s Pointe, The Colonnade, Brickyard Plantation and Horlbeck Creek. One lane each way simply isn’t enough to get all those people where they want to go in a reasonable amount of time. The town of Mount Pleasant, Charleston County, the state of South Carolina and the federal government have developed a possible solution to the problem: adding two lanes to the road all the way from Highway 17 to the bridge over the Wando River in Berkeley County. That plan, according to Habersham, could be the death knell for the Phillips Community. He pointed out that the width of a four-lane road would force at least 20 homeowners to find a new place to live, adding that the government probably would not give them fair value for their property. “It would be more a hindrance and a hardship than anything else. It would destroy the community,” he stated, citing other black communities whose demise he said can be chalked up to growth in the Mount Pleasant area. “Look at 4 Mile. That’s gone. 7 Mile is gone. 8 Mile is gone.” Habersham has a plan he thinks will help alleviate the traffic issue on Highway 41 and at the same time keep the community intact. He would like to see the project, which isn’t scheduled for completion until 2025, consist of one lane each way and a turn lane for approximately a mile north of Joe Rouse Road. He has no problem with a four- lane road north and south of the Phillips Community. “If we had a center lane, traffic wouldn’t be held up when people are turning,” he said. “We want to be able to use the road without destroying the community. Four and five generations have lived there, and now people will have to get out. The community will be destroyed if the town and county don’t do what’s right.” Phillips, around 550 acres of land at one time but now smaller, consists of around 300 houses and is home to roughly 750 people, according to John Wright, who heads the African-American Settlement Community Historical Commission, an organization launched in 2016 to “protect and preserve the existing characteristics of African-American Settlement Communities and enhance the quality of life for current and future generations of residents of the African-American settlement communities.” Wright, whose ancestors arrived in Phillips in the 1890s, said the group he leads is “100 percent with the community.” “I have family that will be affected. We all have a stake in this,” Wright pointed out. “We will raise so much hell. I’ll stand in front of the bulldozers if I have to. We’re going to fight tooth and nail. If I have to go to jail, I’ll go to jail.” It will be a while before Wright must decide whether to risk his safety by blocking construction equipment with Photos by Brian Sherman