06-02-06: Counties Take Close Look at Communities

Coastal issues front and center:
Counties take a close look at problems in their communities

HARKERS ISLAND – It was 1976 and a meeting was held at the Carteret County Courthouse regarding a proposed county land use plan.

Carteret County had been the only coastal county to refuse to prepare its own land use plan under the newly authorized Coastal Area Management Act.

David Stick, who was the first vice chairman of the Coastal Resources Commission, presided at the meeting, and he recalled the courtroom was jam packed with people who were yelling at him. He was a little relieved, he said, when he looked around and saw there were police officers there.

“Then I realized they were leading the shouts,” Stick said.

Things have changed a lot since then, at least as far as the way CAMA land use plans are viewed.

If nothing else, Stick said, land-use planning has forced coastal counties to sit down and take a real look at the problems in their communities.

“Other than that it seems to me it has not fulfilled the overall goal as I had hoped,” Stick said.

He had not been to Harkers Island in several years before Thursday, when he came to give the keynote address at a North Carolina Coastal Federation event where the group released its 2006 State of the Coast report.

Driving over the bridge, he noticed all the development that had taken place.

“The problem is that so many bad things have been done that can never be changed,” Stick said.

People must now concentrate on preserving the few untouched coastal areas that are left while looking at the best ways to redevelop areas that are already urban, Stick said.

This year’s State of the Coast Report, “Saving Our Coastal Heritage,” features people and groups who are doing just that:

The residents of Brunswick County, the second-fastest growing county in the state and 29th in the nation, have joined with the Coastal Federation to find ways to maintain and restore the Lockwood Folly River as the area develops.

Carteret County residents of the Down East communities are asking county commissioners for a moratorium on high-density development to give them more time to work on the county land-use plan and ordinances.

In Onslow County, residents of the Georgetown community on the New River have packed pubic meetings to express concerns about how a new waterfront subdivision might cause water pollution and affect their way of life.

“We are witnessing unprecedented redevelopment of our coast,” said Frank Tursi, the report’s editor and lead writer.

The family beach that generations of tourists visited is disappearing as fishing piers and modest bungalows are replaced by condominiums and mansions, Tursi said. And that development is now spreading from the barrier islands to the mainland.

“It’s really a struggle now to save a way of life,” Tursi said.

Retirees fear that they may have to sell portions of the land that have been in their family for generations just to pay the property taxes, he said.

Coastal Federation Executive Director Todd Miller listed things that can be done:

1. We can protect the environment. If we don’t enforce the environmental rules that are on the books now, doing other things will not help the traditional communities survive, Miller said.

2. We can take advantage of the land-use planning processes that are available. There have been some cases where the land-use plans have been useful in preserving coastal environments and cultures, Miller said.

3. We can provide access to the waterfronts. Local governments can require private investors to maintain some public access as they rebuild, Miller said.

4. We can invest in our communities through such programs as the Clean Water Management Trust Fund. It will take money to buy land for preservation purposes, Miller said.

5. We can make housing affordable. Some resort towns in Northeastern states actually require a certain number of affordable homes to be built as part of new developments, Miller said.

6. We can bring tax relief to those who do not wish to sell, Miller said.