James Island tries 4th incorporation effort

JAMES ISLAND, S.C. (AP) — Organizers from James Island are again trying to incorporate the Charleston County town.

A group called Free James Island says the South Carolina Office of Statistics and Research has certified that a new town of James Island will have nearly 12,000 residents.

The island on the edge of Charleston Harbor is a collection of subdivisions, shops and strip malls in unincorporated areas of Charleston County that fall within proposed town limits. Each time the town has incorporated, the city of Charleston has sued and won, and the town was ordered dissolved.

Bill Woolsey was James Island’s mayor when the state Supreme Court rejected the town’s appeal in June. He says he is delivering a petition to the secretary of state Monday in hopes of a fourth incorporation effort.