HARTSVILLE, SC (WBTW) – City leaders in Hartsville are working to address housing and provide more affordable options in their Vision 2030 plan. One idea they’re exploring is whether a community of tiny homes would be a good fit in the area. 

Planning Commission Chairman Curtis Lee says tiny homes would offer residents a cost-friendly and environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional houses, apartments and condos, and would still provide the same quality of living. 

“People can live in high-quality homes and have very good lives. But they don’t need to be in these huge houses that we live in right now,” Lee told News13. He also believes it would create a tight-knit community. 

“If you have a bunch of tiny houses clustered together, I think they’ll form their own community of people that are really going to enjoy interacting with each other,” Lee said. 

According to Lee, the homes would be built either in Hartsville or just outside of city limits. Before the plan can further develop, there are some potential questions that the city will need to work through. Some of those include “how do you craft policies, regulations, ordinances that encourage the right kind of development?” and “what differentiates a tiny house from a mobile trailer home?” Lee says that’s something “a lot of municipalities are trying to figure out.”

And while the plan to develop tiny homes is just a mere concept at the moment, Lee says he is confident the people of Hartsville will be open to it when and if it gets approved. 

“It’s a community that does welcome some changes. Everything from us passing an ordinance for domestic chickens in the city. We just passed a food truck ordinance which is something a lot of cities struggle with. So overall, the community is pretty open to change which is very nice,” he said. 

Other plans featured in Vision 2030 include retaining old businesses and attracting new ones, improving entrepreneurship, promoting tourism, and expanding access to education. According to Lee, city leaders want to make Hartsville an economic hub by 2025. They hope to do so by filling industrial sites, improving job recruiting, and making it a tourist destination. And by 2030, they hope Hartsville will become a “smart city.” Their plan entails building sustainable infrastructure and drawing in more people from big cities. They’re also focusing on improving the quality of and access to education specifically for children. 

“So we have our own incubator called Startsville that has been very helpful for us in facts, a lot of new businesses that you see downtown went through that program. But we’d like to build a whole network and a pipeline so that, if a kid growing up has that entrepreneurial tendency, you can mentor them and coach them and lead them through to be successful in the future,” said Lee. 

Another focus is population. City officials expect the population to climb about 2% each year.