The Merriwether Community Coalition will be able to intervene in developer Blue Sky Properties’ case against Edgefield County, a circuit court judge decided Jan. 26.

Judge Walton McLeod, after taking the matter under advisement, ordered that the community action group may partake in pre-litigation mediation between Blue Sky and the county over the rejected application for Trestle Run subdivision. Trestle Run is Blue Sky’s proposed development of 254 new homes, set for 97 acres off Stephens Road across from Fox Creek High School.

The order granting intervention to the coalition states the coalition has a “substantial interest” in the proceedings — the legal benchmark for intervention, per South Carolina statute.

The coalition “has established a valid substantial interest and thus statutory right to participate in the pre-litigation mediation,” the order reads. But this right “does not change the fact that settlement success ultimately rests on an agreement between [Blue Sky Properties] and [Edgefield County et al].”