Reprinted from a Feb. 25 Carteret County News-Times report

Nearly two months after crews and equipment began arriving, a contractor for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has started dredging Barden Inlet inside and outside Cape Lookout National Seashore.

“The Cape Lookout National Seashore dredging project is currently underway with Next Generation Logistics (NGL) on site,” Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Ryan Davenport said Thursday. “According to NGL, dredging has begun, but progress has been impacted by recent weather conditions, including high winds and low tide cycles in the area.”

Davenport said Next Generation Logistics is prioritizing the safety of workers and closely monitoring weather conditions and adjusting its approach as needed to ensure the project’s successful completion by April 1, which is when federally protected sea turtles generally begin arriving in the area.

But Cape Lookout Superintendent Jeff West said even if the work is still incomplete at the deadline, officials are fairly confident the Army Corps could get an extension.

Dredged material will be placed to slow erosion of the beach at the Cape Lookout Lighthouse site and in other strategic areas in the national seashore.

At some point after the sand is in front of the iconic lighthouse, the National Park Service plans to put in a living shoreline to help keep it in place. A living shoreline uses rocks or shells, along with vegetation, and is an increasingly popular and often more effective erosion control method than seawalls.

The whole project is a joint venture of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, the National Park Service and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

In November, Army Corps announced the more than $6 million contract had been awarded to Next Generation Logistics LLC for $6.9 million. The company is based in Metairie, Louisiana.

Related: Dredge firm to begin $6.9M project in Cape Lookout waters

Fishermen and other boaters have been clamoring for the project for many years. The last time the inlet was dredged was in 1977-78, and significant shoaling has occurred since then, making passage to the seashore difficult for many years. 

The federally maintained Barden Inlet includes not only the inlet, but also the “drain” and the “S turns.”

Shoaling in Barden Inlet became a serious problem in late 2017.

It was a complicated process to get to this point.

Due to the majority of the channel lying outside Cape Lookout, the National Park Service needed partners to get Barden Inlet dredged. The park service formed a cooperative management agreement with county commissioners and the Carteret County Shore Protection Office in 2019 with the purpose of establishing and maintaining waterways to various areas in the park, according to West.

County and NPS officials then negotiated with state officials and the Army Corps for the dredging effort. In the process, they found the last environmental assessment for the Barden Inlet channel was in 1975, which West said was “way out of date.”

It took a lot of time, including a public comment period, to get the environmental assessment approved.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times.

MOREHEAD CITY — The North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries has scheduled a daylong symposium on the southern flounder fishery, which is in such bad shape that the spring season was canceled in 2023 and the fall season was only a couple of weeks long.

The event will be Wednesday, March 20 at the Riverfront Convention Center in New Bern and will begin at 9 a.m.

The symposium will provide an opportunity for stakeholders, researchers and division staff to discuss various topics related to southern flounder, which up until the last few years has been one of the most valuable finfish species harvested by commercial and recreational fishermen in the state.

Everyone – the state and commercial and recreational fishermen – want the officially overfished stock rebuilt, though they disagree on who’s to blame for the decline and how it should be done.

In 1994, the North Carolina commercial southern flounder season was worth more than $8 million, with a catch of 4.8 million pounds, but it’s been steadily declining since then. In 2022, the last year for which statistics are available on the fisheries division website, it was worth only $934,187 million for a catch of about 364,000.

Commercial fishermen have traditionally used trawls and pound nets to harvest summer flounder, fishing offshore in the winter and inshore in the summer. Recreational fishermen use hook-and-line and gigs.

Though southern flounder range along all of the South Atlantic Coast, the symposium will focus on North Carolina-centric research and management.

The goals are to allow stakeholders to engage with each other, as well as researchers and NCDMF staff, on topics related to southern flounder and to provide stakeholders the opportunity to learn about and contribute to ongoing flounder research.

Topics include the following:

• Life history.
• Movement and migration through tagging work.
• How habitat and water quality influence southern flounder.
• Citizen science and involvement: What can the public do to help?
• Southern Flounder Management Plan Amendment 3.
• Carcass collection program.
• Tagging program/Volunteer Tagger Program.

The 2023 recreational flounder season this year opened at 12:01 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 15 closed at 11:59 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 29.

The possession limit was only one flounder per person per day, and the minimum size limit was 15 inches.

The commercial season was equally harsh on the watermen, with low limits on harvest that differed by region.

At the time it announced the seasons, division officials said the goal was to begin to end overfishing and to begin to rebuild the stock within the timeline set by the management plan.

The state fisheries division, in collaboration with other states, including South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, is updating the southern flounder coastwide stock assessment.

While North Carolina data shows an improved abundance of flounder, the coastwide assessment will provide a science-based approach to determine the stock’s status. Assessment results are expected to be presented to the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission, the policy-making arm of the division, this year.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

ATLANTIC BEACH — The Atlantic Beach Town Council, during its monthly meeting in the town hall, voted Monday to further protect the natural and nourished oceanfront dune system, which protects property from hurricanes and other storms and provides natural habitat for wildlife.

The amendment prohibits crossing of dunes outside “an established walkway or defined path.”

Specifically, the amendment states that:

“It shall be unlawful for any person to traverse or travel upon any frontal dune at any location other than a designated walkway structure or established sand pathway. Examples of unlawful activities include playing on, climbing on, and allowing pets to traverse upon the frontal dunes, the removal of frontal dune vegetation, and other activities that reduce the stability of the frontal dune system and potentially decrease its storm protection, wildlife habitat, and aesthetic values.”

Exemptions are made in the ordinance for regulatory, contract, and research activities conducted by government officials, and storage of small sailboats out of the public trust beach area and the tidal zone, provided permission is granted by the oceanfront property owner.

GIS agreement

Also during the meeting, the council authorized Town Manager John O’Daniel to execute an interlocal agreement with Carteret County to provide and share geographic information system, or GIS, data to the county.

O’Daniel said the agreement calls for the town to pay the Carteret County GIS Department $60 per hour to set up and provide the service.

The council had discussed the idea during its 2022 planning retreat, and the county recently made the offer to work out an agreement to partner with the town in the administration and setup of GIS data.

“The partnership will further the goal of streamlining technology as discussed in the retreat,” O’Daniel said.

Under the agreement, the county will administer GIS data for the town. The county, through its GIS Department, will direct personnel to perform this function on behalf of the town.

The agreement is for one year but will be renewed annually if either party does not submit in writing to the other party its intent to terminate the agreement. In the event of either party’s desire to terminate the agreement, a 30-day notice must be given from one party to the other.

Atlantic Beach staff, by way of the agreement, will have access/license to use software under the county enterprise license.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

Carteret County residents got the chance to ask questions and express concerns Tuesday about announced plans by the N.C. State Ports Authority to construct a new multi-use terminal on Radio Island.

The authority and its representatives held a public information event Sept. 26 at the Crystal Coast Civic Center in Morehead City.

There was no formal presentation and no typical public comment session. Instead, there were tables with maps and documents on the wall for people to look at, and port representatives were behind the table to answer questions.

According to a flyer available to the public at the meeting, “the proposed project is to support new industry opportunities to the State and the authority” and “for the generation of jobs and the labor income to improve employment, increase median income, decrease the poverty rate in Carteret County and the region and transition N.C. to a clean energy economy. Additional actions include roadway and rail improvements and a natural gas line from Morehead City to Radio Island.”

According to the flyer, the project will:

• Improve the port’s ability to expand its customer base.
• Introduce new growth opportunities for automotive and wind power industries.
• Allow the port to serve as an offshore wind hub.
• Support North Carolina energy and economic development goals.
• – Help the state transition to a clean energy economy.

For the automotive industry, there would be a 100,000-square-foot warehouse/office space building on the northern end of the port property, and a 4,000-space parking lot.

Landside access could be from car carriers accessing the lot from Radio Island and/or new rail spurs that would tie into the existing rail along Radio Island Road.

For the wind energy industry, there would be a 300,000-square-foot fabrication building, a new rail spur along Marine Drive, approximately 60 parking spaces for private vehicles, and a 60-acre gravel pad in front of the fabrication building.

Residents speaking to port representatives expressed some concern about polluted stormwater runoff into the estuarine waters from massive amounts of paving and large new buildings but seemed especially concerned about traffic.

“I just don’t see how you can improve our roads enough to support all these trucks that would come and to accommodate all the employees,” one man said. “There’s no room to expand Arendell Street.”

Another man said the trains that run through Morehead City to the port already cause traffic bottlenecks, and wondered how many more trains there could be.

Jane Youngblood, who lives on Radio Island, said it’s already difficult to get on and off Radio Island and is concerned the project would make it even more difficult, especially with the high-rise bridge between Morehead City and Radio Island only one lane in each direction.

Michael Braun of HDR Engineering in Raleigh, working with the Ports Authority on the project, said the process to develop an environmental impact statement for the project has begun and the document should be available for public comment fairly soon.

The Ports Authority anticipates a public review period in the first and second quarters of 2024, followed by final design and permitting in the third and fourth quarters of 2024.

Braun said the property for the facility could be sold or it could be leased, and who it’s leased or sold to would determine how it is used and how much traffic to the facility would come by ships, trains or trucks.

The Ports Authority owns 154 acres of undeveloped land on the island, and development of it for a multi-use facility for the automotive and wind industries has been around since at least 2021, when then Carteret County Economic Development Director Don Kirkman pitched in May 2021 during a Morehead City Council workshop meeting.

The land is within the limits of Morehead City and is zoned for port-maritime use.

“Radio Island is uniquely positioned on the east coast of the United States for this type of project related to port development,” Mr. Kirkman said to the council at the time. “The property is already publicly owned, it’s on deep water, there’s a minimal amount of dredging required, the infrastructure is all in place, including Morehead City water and sewer utilities, the zoning is in place.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

OCEAN — The North Carolina Coastal Federation this month received a $1.6 million grant from the North Carolina Land and Water Fund Flood Risk Reduction Program to design and implement the restoration of 1,100 acres of ditched and drained timberland to wetlands within the Newport River watershed.

Located east of Newport and north of Morehead City, North Carolina Coastal Land Trust recently purchased the 1,400 acres that are adjacent to the Croatan National Forest.

The land will be transferred to the nonprofit Coastal Federation later this year. The tract includes 1,100 acres of timberland and 300 acres of high-quality wetland habitat. It had been owned by Weyerhaeuser, the timber and paper company.

The restoration will include blocking the flow from the drainage ditches to decrease the amount of water moving to the river during a storm. The project also will restore the floodplain area along the tributary running through the center of the property to allow for floodwater storage.

Once the work is complete, according to Coastal Federation founder and Executive Director Todd Miller, it’s estimated that the property should be able to retain approximately 165 million gallons of runoff during a large storm, significantly reducing the volume and flow of polluted runoff entering the Newport River following each heavy rain.

The North Carolina Land and Water Fund was appropriated $15 million in the North Carolina 2021-22 state budget for projects that protect and restore floodplains and wetlands for the purpose of storing water, reducing flooding improving water quality providing wildlife and aquatic habitat and providing recreational opportunities.

The federation has done similar, even larger projects, before. In December 2022, after more than 20 years of planning and work, the nonprofit announced it had completed restoration work that transformed North River Farms in Down East Carteret County into a wetlands preserve.

The 6,000-acre restoration project was among the largest of its kind in the nation.

The North Carolina Coastal Land Trust last year was awarded a $1.65 million state grant from the North Carolina Land and Water Trust Fund to help pay for the purchase and preservation of the property.

The land includes about 4 miles of frontage along the river and Little Creek, according to Janice Allen, the trust’s director of land protection. It has a rare coastal estuarine fringe forest, and it’s across the river from property the trust already owns.

There are loblolly pine trees and maritime oaks, and the marsh is in good shape, Allen said last year.

Allen said Monday the land trust has bought the property with the grant from the Land and Water Trust Fund and another from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, plus some loans, which need to be paid back before the property can be transferred to the federation.

“We’re working on it,” she said, and “hopefully” it will happen soon.

The N.C. Land and Water Fund, formerly known as the N.C. Clean Water Management Trust Fund, gets money from the state budget, and since its creation in 1996 by the state General Assembly, has conserved well over one-half million acres and protected or restored 3,000 miles of streams and rivers.

At the time the land trust announced its grant in October 2022, a news release said the trust would likely turn the property over to the N.C. Coastal Federation.

The N.C. Coastal Land Trust is headquartered in Wilmington. It conserves lands with scenic, recreational, historic and/or ecological value. The mission of the organization, which is supported by grants and donations, is to “enrich the coastal communities of our state through conservation of natural areas and working landscapes, education and the promotion of good land stewardship.”

Since its inception in 1992, it has protected more than 85,000 acres in the state’s 31 eastern counties, including Carteret.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

CAPE CARTERET — Cape Carteret commissioners Monday night voted 5-0 to authorize Town Manager Frank Rush to apply for a $100,000 grant application from the North Carolina Recreational Trails Grant Program to build the remaining 1.2-mile segment of the Cape Carteret Trail.

The vote came during the board’s monthly meeting in the town hall on Dolphin Street.

“The N.C. Recreational Trails Grant Program expects to award a total of $1.5 million later this spring, and the maximum grant award is $100,000,” Rush told the board. “I have had extensive conversations with state staff about the potential grant application, and I believe the town has a reasonably good chance of being awarded grant funds for the remaining segment.

Rush said the grant would augment $408,000 the town already has in hand for completion of the asphalt and concrete trail along the triangle formed by N.C. 24, N.C. 58 and Taylor Notion Road.

These funds are from a state Capital Infrastructure Grant, nearly $350,000 remaining from the $500,000, and town funds derived from fundraising and donations, totaling about $60,000.

“A conservative estimate of the construction cost for the remaining segment is approximately $500,000, and I am hopeful the town can fully complete the remaining segment along Taylor Notion Road from Ardan Oaks Drive to N.C. 58, and along N.C. 58 from Taylor Notion Road to MacDaddy’s, for this amount or some lesser amount,” Rush said.

The remaining segments would be constructed to the same specifications as the existing 2.3 miles on N.C. 58, N.C. 24 and Taylor Notion Road and would be located along the edge of North Carolina Department of Transportation right of way on Taylor Notion Road and N.C. 58.

Rush said the path, at this point, would extend all the way to the “point” of Taylor Notion Road and N.C. 58, just beyond Star Hill Drive, but he is investigating the potential acquisition of a vacant parcel just south of the ‘”point” that would reduce the length of the new segment by about 0.2 of a mile.

If the town is able to acquire this parcel, the new multi-use path would likely traverse the southern boundary of this property across from Hickory Hills Road, with the remainder of the property available for other town uses in the future. Rush said he expects to present a recommendation on the ultimate route for the multiuse path and potential property acquisition to the board once the design phase is complete this spring.

He said he hopes to go out for construction bids by early summer, with construction occurring this summer and early fall.

“I am anxious to complete the full loop around the triangle this year and focus the town’s efforts on other beneficial improvements in the future,” he said.

After the meeting Tuesday, Commissioner Steve Martin said he is thrilled the end might finally in sight for the long trail project.

Commissioners approved the project unanimously in February 2015 with the goal of finishing by 2018. It was supposed to be funded by grants and donations, but donations dried up and grants were small until the state legislature approved the aforementioned $500,000 grant allocation in the 2021-22 budget, thanks to efforts by state Rep. Pat McElraft, R-Carteret, of Emerald Isle.

Martin said when he first came on the board, he wanted nothing to do with the project, then as time went by saw the lack of completion as an embarrassment and became an advocate for finishing it as soon as possible.

“I think the end is finally near,” he said. “Frank Rush came on board (in July 2022), and he has gone above and beyond” to complete the project.

The trail, similar to one built along N.C. 58 and other main roads in Emerald Isle, while Rush was manager there, is supposed to be a triangular loop for walkers, runners and bicyclists, linking high-visitation sites, such as the Western Carteret Public Library, White Oak Elementary School, the Carteret Crossing Shopping Center and MacDaddy’s Entertainment Center.

But Martin said Tuesday the long and winding saga of the Cape Carteret Trail should serve as a cautionary warning for future Cape Carteret boards of commissioners.

“Don’t start anything until you can see the finish line,” he said.

In other business, the board went into closed session at the end of the regular meeting to discuss potential land acquisition but took no action after returning to open session briefly before adjourning.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a tri-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times 

All five Emerald Isle commissioners expressed support Tuesday night for maintaining the 30-acre McLean-Spell Park in its current state: dense maritime forest with walking trails.

Commissioners spoke after Town Manager Matt Zapp presented the results of a monthlong online survey that showed an overwhelming majority of respondents wanted no development in the park, which is behind the town recreation center and along Archers Creek.

The board’s monthly session was in its meeting room beside the police department.

“No bulldozing and no cutting,” said Commissioner Jim Normile, who led off the comments. He noted that a $500,000 grant the town received from the North Carolina Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, or PARTF, to help pay for the property in 2017 requires recreation on the site but does not require development. Walking is recreation, he said.

Normile also said the town should not even put a bathroom in the park, since there is one nearby, beside the basketball courts behind the police department and town meeting room.

Commissioner Jamie Vogel agreed. “I share the sentiments of the results of the survey,” she said. She added one suggestion, which came to her from resident Trevor Brownlow: putting up some educational signs about the trees and other plants in the park.

Commissioner Floyd Messer said Summit Design and Engineering of Hillsborough, the consulting firm that the town hired to develop a master plan for the park, is going to make three “concept” sketches based on the public input.

“I sincerely hope one of them is what I have in mind, and if it is, you will be happy,” he said to the audience, most of which was at the meeting to support conservation of the forest.

Commissioner Steve Finch said he had likely spoken to 150 people about the park in recent weeks, and the overwhelming majority didn’t want any clearing of the forest. Some suggested benches and picnic tables, ideas he supported, but without clearing.

Finch suggested that the town add some “personality” to the park by naming the trails and suggested one could be named for state Rep. Pat McElraft, an Emerald Isle resident who helped get the money to buy the land.

The final commissioner to speak was Mark Taylor. “I think we’re all thinking the same way,” he said.

He said the town could put bird houses and deer feeders in the park “to bring more animals in” to the safe spot in the middle of the town government center.

Taylor also noted that while Bogue Banks Water Corp. is leasing a small site in the park – 200 feet by 220 feet – the new well is essential to the town.

He suggested that the town put a fire hydrant in the park so if a fire broke out, the fire department could quickly access water to douse it.

Other than that, Taylor said, “I’m all about trees.” But he suggested the town clean up the trails a bit.

Zapp called the response to survey the best he’s ever seen. He said 78% of the 1,238 survey respondents were Emerald Isle property owners and 68% were residents of the town.

Although the sentiment was clearly to keep the park natural, he noted there were some respondents who favored some development, such as a dog park of swimming pool.

The town bought the 30-acre property, which was then zoned for multifamily residential development, for $3 million in 2017, with the idea of protecting it from development and to maintain water quality in Archers Creek, a tributary of Bogue Sound.

In addition to the PARTF grant, money for the purchase came from the town, through an internal loan, the North Carolina Land and Water Trust Fund and the U.S. Department of Defense, which was interested in precluding dense development in the flight path of plans that come and go from Bogue Field, an auxiliary landing strip and training facility for U.S Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point located on N.C. 24 between Morehead City and Swansboro.

Most of the land – about 20 acres – was to remain forever as a natural, maritime forest under terms of a state grant that paid much of the cost of purchase, but town officials have always said about 10 acres could eventually be used for such things as a dog park and possibly a ballfield.

Summit is expected to deliver concept sketches for the park and a cost estimate to the town in September, and a final report is to be submitted by the end of November.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — Two years and slightly less than one month after it went up for sale, Bogue Inlet Fishing Pier owner Mike Stanley confirmed Tuesday that a sale is pending for his iconic property at the end of Bogue Inlet Drive in the rapidly growing resort town.

“We have an interested party,” he said Tuesday afternoon. “That’s all I’m going to say. We hope it goes through, and we hope they find the same value in it that we have always found.”

Stanley declined to name the potential buyer. He said the word got out recently because he listed the property for sale on the Multiple Listing Service, and the status recently changed from “for sale’ to “pending.”

“They have the ball,” he said of the potential buyer. “It’s OK. We’ve had a lot of people kick the tires.’”

When the property first went up for sale in July 2020, Stanley said he wouldn’t sell it for less than $18 million.

The sale, if concluded, will include the pier, parking lots, Surf’s Up Restaurant and Beachfront RV Park.

The pier was built in the late 1950s and has been in the Stanley family for 49 years.

“It’s just time to do it,” he said of the sale when he first put in the market.

The pier and other businesses on the property have been all-consuming, and Stanley has been hands-on, showing up for work and talking to customers, generally enjoying every minute.

The pier has been repaired, almost rebuilt, many times after hurricanes, and Stanley said he’s enjoyed keeping the whole thing running.

The business has grown with Emerald Isle, which was chartered as a town in 1957, and the Stanley family and the town have often been partners. For example, the town’s Fourth of July fireworks show has been launched from the pier for years, attracting thousands of visitors on a day the pier is not open for fishing, until he finally pulled out of the event this year.

Stanley last tried to sell the pier in 2006 when a developer from Raleigh was trying to put together a mixed-use project. The town was interested in taking over the pier as part of the plan.

Then the economy crashed, Stanley said, and “we almost lost it all.”

But he and his family persevered, making needed repairs, renovating the pier house and adding the restaurant. They’ve since greeted new generations of anglers, observers, surfers and beachgoers, who have used the parking lots and beach access ramp.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper based in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

Carteret County commissioners Monday night cleared the way for the next major development in the western part of the county.

During its monthly meeting in its chambers in the administration building on Courthouse Square in Beaufort, the board voted unanimously to rezone 82.31 acres of property off West Fire Tower Road and Amphitheater Drive near Peletier from B-1 (General Business District), R-15 (Single-Family Residential District, and R-20 (Single-Family Residential District) to R-10CZ (Single-Family Residential Conditional Zoning District).

West Fire Tower Road is off Peletier Loop Road, which connects to N.C. 58.

The county planning commission meeting had recommended approval of the rezoning request during its meeting in May.

There was little discussion and no debate before the vote to rezone the waterfront property for Dirt2Dreams LLC. County Commissioner Jimmy Farrington of Emerald Isle is a principal in the LLC and was recused from voting. The North Carolina Secretary of State’s office lists Keith Byrd of Emerald Isle as manager of Dirt2Dreams. 

Commissioner Robin Comer, who like Farrington represents a portion of western Carteret County, praised the plan for the project, which is known as The Hamptons on the White Oak. It is proposed to include 167 single-family homes, townhomes, bungalows and cottages with possible amenities of a tennis court, chapel, dog park, bocci ball, pickleball courts, walking trails and a marina.

“I like the open space,” Comer said. “It looks like a great plan.”

The site was formerly known as the “Worthy of the Lamb” area after a long-running religious play performed in an amphitheater.

Engineer Ron Cullipher of Morehead City, who represented Dirt2Dreams at the meeting, said he is working with the State Division of Coastal Management to obtain the necessary Coastal Area Management Act, or CAMA, permits for the development.

Comer made the motion to approve the rezoning and got a second from Commissioner Chris Chadwick, who represents Down East on the board. The vote was 6-0.

Dirt2Dreams is the same development company that in August 2021 got county commissioners to rezone more than 67 acres of land off N.C. 58 near Peletier for business use, despite some residents expressing concern over the impact of increasing development in the area.

That property is across N.C. 58 from a 156-acre parcel the board of commissioners agreed to rezone to recreational camper park district for Dirt2Dreams in May 2021.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper based in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Co-published with the Carteret County News-Times

Carteret County commissioners Monday night agreed to support the concept – but not yet the details – of a Carteret County Mariculture Hub at the county-owned and operated boat ramp at Straits in North River off Harkers Island Road.

Todd Miller, founder and executive director of the North Carolina Coastal Federation, pitched the idea to commissioners during their monthly meeting in their chambers in the administration building on Courthouse Square.

Basically, Miller told the board, the idea is to use an unused acre at the boat ramp to build a dock and a 50-by-50-foot building with refrigerated storage so shellfish farmers, mostly oyster growers, can bring their products to shore and store them until they can be picked up for distribution elsewhere.

The Coastal Federation is seeking grants to build the facilities. Miller said it would not be a retail operation and agreed that his organization would try to site the facility in such a way as to help county commissioners find a way to still put in two additional boat ramps at the facility.

Commissioner Chris Chadwick, who represents the Down East communities, said that was an important consideration, as the existing ramp is overcrowded and chaotic at peak usage times.

The Coastal Federation for many years has been engaged in a long-term effort to increase oyster production in coastal North Carolina, in part to buoy the economy but also to protect and improve water quality.

Oysters filter pollutants as they feed.

Miller told commissioners the North Carolina General Assembly is strongly supportive of growing the oyster farming industry and believes growth would be a public benefit. The legislature has set a goal of increasing production from an economic benefit to the state of $6 million in 2018 to $100 million by 2030.

Carteret County, he said, leads the state in oysters grown in leases approved by the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, and many of those are in North River, making the Straits site a good choice for a hub. The Division of Marine Fisheries is also supportive, he said.

In 2010, statewide, there were 10,000 bushels of farm-raised oysters, and by 2021, there were 60,000 bushels, so the industry is already growing. After a dip following Hurricane Florence in 2018 and during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of applications for leases is also growing.

A recent study, Miller said, identified training, water access and refrigerated storage as hurdles to growth of the industry.

But, he said, the aquaculture program at Carteret Community College is already doing a great job with training, so with improvements in those other two areas, there is a lot of room for expansion of the industry.

He said he believes there is room on the Straits site, with re-permitting from the state, for the proposed facility and additional boat ramps.

Commissioner Jimmy Farrington of Emerald Isle, who represents a portion of western Carteret County, noted that the county, through its Shore Protection Office, had worked successfully with the Coastal Federation on several projects, including dredging and a living shoreline with a rock sill and planting of wetlands vegetation, at Atlantic Harbor in Down East.

The main thing, he said to Miller, is for the growers to work together with the federation and the county to make the idea feasible and successful.

Chris Matteo, president of the North Carolina Shellfish Growers Association, also spoke at the meeting Monday and said he believes that will happen.

“I’m committed,” he said.

As a result of the discussion, Carteret County Manager Tommy Burns is to write a letter in support of the concept, at the direction of the commissioners.

Miller is to return to the commission at some point with more details. He noted that there is a long way to go, as permits must be obtained for the building and for the dock.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

The Carteret County Beach Commission voted unanimously Monday to elect Atlantic Beach Councilman Danny Navey as its chairperson and learned of the resignation of newly appointed member Ronnie Watson of Emerald Isle.

The meeting was in the Emerald Isle town commission board room and online via Zoom. The commission advises the county shore protection office, which plans and oversees beach nourishment and dredging projects, among other things.

The shore protection office manager is Ryan Davenport. This was his first meeting since the county hired him to replace longtime manager Greg Rudolph, who resigned late last year.

Watson, a resort business owner and former mayor of Emerald Isle, was appointed to one of the two Emerald Isle seats on the board in January by county commissioners, although the town had nominated Jim Normile, a former town commissioner, for reappointment. Normile was chairperson of the beach commission when his term expired.

Tuesday, Watson said he didn’t realize when he sent in an application for the beach commission – because he wanted to get involved in public service again – that he would knock out Normile if appointed.

He also said after reflection since his appointment, he’d realized resignation was the best thing to do considering comments he has heard.

“I hope I’m respected in Emerald Isle,” he said “There were 10 people living here when my family moved here. I love Emerald Isle and I love the county.”

But, he said, since his appointment to the commission, he’s heard “some people have some issues with it. I don’t need any controversy. I don’t want any.”

In the end, Watson said, he realized it was “better for the town” to pick its beach commission representatives rather than the county.

“I love the county commissioners,” he concluded. “This isn’t about them. I just thought it (resigning) was the right thing to do.”

He said he’d called Normile but hadn’t heard back from him.

Watson was the third beach commission member to resign in recent weeks. Longtime member Larry Baldwin, who held a county at-large seat, resigned Jan. 7, and Mike Fiorini of Salter Path, appointed by the county commission at the same time as Watson, resigned as well, citing other obligations.

Monday, the beach commission also reelected John Brodman, mayor of Pine Knoll Shores, to remain its vice chairperson and discussed the vacancies. Brodman told the newspaper he did not want to chair the commission.

The Emerald Isle commission, at its January meeting, nominated the town’s mayor, Jason Holland, to fill Fiorini’s Bogue Banks at-large seat.

But beach commission member Jimmy Farrington, who is a county commissioner, said during the meeting Monday he had talked to Darryl Marshall of Salter Path about taking that seat and Marshall had applied.

Farrington said he spoke to him because that seat has traditionally gone to someone from Salter Path.

“He was born and raised there,” Farrington said of Marshall.

If county commissioners make that appointment, the move would leave Holland to possibly fill the now vacant Emerald Isle seat. Tom Rule holds the other Emerald Isle seat.

The commission is made up of two representatives from Emerald Isle, two from Pine Knoll Shores, two from Atlantic Beach, one from Indian Beach, one from Bogue Banks at-large, one from the county at-large, one from the county commission and one from the Carteret County Tourism Development Authority, or TDA.

That TDA seat is also vacant. It had been held by Woody Warren, an Emerald Isle realtor.

The beach commission agreed during the meeting to think about who to nominate to replace Baldwin, who in his resignation letter said, “The last few months have made it apparent that my participation and majority commission votes are of little to no value.”

Tuesday, Baldwin, a soil scientist who had been on the commission for 12 years, said he resigned because of the county commission’s increasing involvement with the panel, such as rejecting the beach commission’s endorsement of Normile for reappointment after Emerald Isle commissioners nominated him. He said he knew the county board had that right, but believed it made his participation a waste of his time.

“To overturn that (Normile) endorsement, well, I just thought ‘why should I stay on this,’” he said.

He hopes the commission, with its many new members, and the new shore protection office manager will get up to speed fast because the beaches are so important to the county’s tax base and economy.

During the meeting, Navey thanked the board for electing him as chair and said he would do his best to lead the panel in a professional manner.

He acknowledged there has been a lot of turnover on the commission, but added, “We’ll have plenty of time to get to know each other.”

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast. 

From a Carteret County News-Times report

Rep. Pat McElraft, of Emerald Isle, who has represented Carteret and Jones counties in the North Carolina General Assembly for eight consecutive two-year terms, said Dec. 28 she will not seek reelection to the state House of Representatives in November.

McElraft’s term expires on Jan. 1, 2023.

Before being elected to the state House in 2006 to replace Rep. Jean Preston, who successfully ran for the state Senate, she served three terms as an Emerald Isle commissioner and part of a term as a Carteret County commissioner.

 “I think it’s time to let someone younger and with new ideas come in,” the soon-to-be 75-year-old Republican legislator said in an interview. “I’ve done more than 20 years in public service and had a sales job for 30 years. I think it’s time to spend more time with my husband, children and grandchildren.”

McElraft said she has enjoyed “every minute” serving the people of Carteret and Jones counties and is proud to have represented them and helped them during often hard times, including hurricanes and the COVID-19 pandemic.

McElraft said she’s proud of her record of good constituent service and credited her great staff for that.

“I’ve always stressed how important constituent service is,” she said.

McElraft said she’s also proud that while she’s been in office, the state has lowered taxes and yet dramatically improved its financial situation.

“When I came in, our ‘rainy day fund’ had never been more than $100 million,” she said. “Now it’s $4 billion. We all worked hard to do that. That’s how we’ve been able to help local governments with money for things like (climate) resiliency and dredging and beach nourishment and water access.

“I’ve tried to balance the environment and economics,” she continued. “If they’re not balanced, then you lose jobs, and if you lose jobs, then you can’t pay for the ecology. There has to be a balance.”

She’s especially proud of this year’s 2021-23 budget, which was passed by a bipartisan majority and included millions of dollars for specific projects in Carteret and other coastal counties.

This term, McElraft has served as vice chairperson of the House Appropriations Committee, chairperson of the House Environmental Committee, and co-chairperson of the House Environmental Review Committee.

“I think our coastal legislators have been able to show those inland legislators how important the coast is to the state and get their support,” she said.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast. 

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

With $3.5 million in hand from the state budget, Carteret County is gearing up to start work as soon as possible on a major boat launching facility off Highway 24 next to the Morada Bay subdivision in Ocean.

Carteret County planning director Gene Foxworth said in an email Wednesday the county is in the permitting stage of the project.

“Once permitting is complete, our construction schedule should be approximately 18 months,” he said.

Of the $3.5 million allocated for the project, $2.5 million is for actual construction and $1 million is for dredging a channel in Bogue Sound to the site.

State Rep. Pat McElraft, R-Carteret, helped put the money in the state budget.

The plan is for the county and the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission to construct 170 parking spaces and six boat ramps, although those numbers could change during the permitting process.

“The acquisition and construction of this facility will certainly enhance the water access on the western end of Carteret County,” Foxworth said. “We know, both from what we see at our local ramps and from data we have collected during this process, that the need is there.”

He thanked McElraft for her efforts to get the money in the state budget, and said Robin Comer, who represents part of western Carteret on the county commission, has been a big advocate for the project.

McElraft said last week she agrees the facility is much needed and was happy to be able to provide the money. It comes from the North Carolina Shallow Draft Navigation Channel Dredging and Aquatic Weed Fund, which gets money from sales and transfers of boat titles and from the boat fuel tax.

Normally, McElraft said there has to be a one-third local match for money from that fund, but by placing it in the budget, no match is required.

There was $60 million in the fund last year, and McElraft noted it is similar to the Powell Bill, or gas tax, fund which pays for road maintenance. The navigation fund pays for activities to improve and maintain channels, which she called “coastal highways.”

The new facility, she said, will relieve pressure on boat launches in western Carteret County, such as the relatively small one off Highway 24 in Cedar Point and the large one in Emerald Isle, which has four boat ramps and 160 parking spaces.

There are often waits to use those in the peak tourism season, McElraft said, and with the heavy motor vehicle traffic on Highway 58 in Emerald Isle, it’s difficult for mainland residents pulling boats to get over the bridge to the facility, which is off the highway east of the municipal complex.

The new facility is going to be on part of 76.25 acres of property the North Carolina Coastal Federation and the county partnered to acquire in March 2020.

The federation plans to build its new Center for Coastal Protection and Restoration and its new headquarters on 10 acres at the site.

The acquisition cost was $7.4 million, with funds from the coastal federation, the state legislature and two state grants, including one from the North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund – now known as North Carolina Land and Water Trust Fund – and the North Carolina Parks and Recreation Trust Fund.

The U.S. Navy also provided funds and acquired a restrictive easement over the entire property to prohibit incompatible development near Bogue Field, a training site for the Unites States Marine Corps. Bogue Field is an auxiliary of Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in Havelock.

At the time of the purchase, the federation said, “The coastal federation plans to build a new Center for Coastal Protection and Restoration on its 10 acres on the southwest side of property. Carteret County will manage the remaining acres, including the protected conservation areas as a county nature park offering natural trails and recreational opportunities.”

“The Center for Coastal Protection and Restoration will be a special resource that will support the federation’s work coastwide,” Federation Executive Director Todd Miller said in a statement in March 2020. “It will embody the mission of the Coastal Federation, bringing the community together around shared educational and recreational resources and providing an example of sustainability for our coastal communities.”  

Local leaders also commented on the land acquisition.

“The boating access area and other public recreation opportunities afforded by this acquisition will be a true asset to Carteret County and all of Eastern North Carolina,” Comer said at the time. “The county appreciates all of the support we have receive from our federal, state and local partners to bring this project to fruition.”

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast. Some information in this story came from a past report in Coastal Review.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

Carteret County officials announced Dec. 21 they have hired Ryan Davenport of the state Division of Coastal Management as shore protection officer manager.

Davenport was chosen from a pool of more than 20 qualified applicants, according to a news release from the county. He will begin his new role Jan. 18 as manager of the office that plans and oversees beach nourishment and dredging projects as well as responses to state and federal environmental regulations and proposals.

Davenport is replacing Greg Rudolph, who resigned in November after 20 years in the job in order to pursue new opportunities. Doug Huggett, based in Morehead City with Moffatt & Nichol, the county’s beach engineering firm, has served as interim manager of the county shore protection office since Rudolph’s resignation.

“We are proud and excited to have someone of Ryan’s caliber join the county and help lead the Shore Protection Office through the current challenging issues and those that are on the horizon,” said Ed Wheatly, Carteret County Board of Commissioners chairman. “He has an excellent background which is well suited to take on the responsibilities of this position.”

Davenport has more than 20 years of local, state and federal coastal management experience. For the past 14 years, he has been employed by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality as senior environmental specialist of the Division of Coastal Management.

His experience includes work as environmental planner for the Department of Land and Natural Resources for the state of Hawaii and field representative for the North Carolina Division of Coastal Management. His expertise includes leadership, resource regulation, project management, strategic planning and community outreach, according to the release.

“We are excited to welcome Ryan as our Shore Protection Manager and lead the charge in managing the 50-year beach master nourishment plan,” Jim Normile, Carteret County Beach Commission chairperson said in the release. “The recent increase of lodging occupancy tax dollars has nearly replenished funds expended post-hurricane Florence. This will afford Ryan a keen opportunity to begin 2022 in our scientific search for future offshore sand resources to position Bogue Banks beaches and infrastructure for a healthy, sustainable future.”

Davenport, a 1999 graduate of North Carolina State University with a bachelor’s degree in environmental science, said he was excited to take the position.

“Carteret County and the beach commission (which advises the shore protection office) have a long history of successfully planning and managing complex beach nourishment and dredging projects,” he said a statement.  “I am excited to join the team to help move the County Beach Commission forward in its goals and appreciate the opportunity to serve the citizens of Carteret County.”

In his resignation letter to county manager Tommy Burns in November, Rudolph wrote, “While there’s always the next storm, the next shoaling hot spot, or some regulatory/policy issue to contend with, I’ve come to a place in my career where there’s a sense I’ve accomplished all that I can for the county and it’s time to move on and pursue new opportunities and challenges.”

During his 20 years as Carteret County Shore Protection Office manager, Rudolph has been responsible for planning and guiding numerous beach nourishment projects to fruition, placing more than 20 million cubic yards of sand on Bogue Banks beaches at a total federal, state and local cost of nearly $223 million. He now works for Geodynamics, the county’s beach surveying firm.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted From Carteret County News-Times

Carteret County hired last week an engineer from Moffatt & Nichol Engineers to provide temporary services to the County Shore Protection Office.

The move will keep the office running until a permanent replacement can be found for the office manager, Greg Rudolph, who resigned earlier this month, effective Nov. 12, after nearly 20 years of service.

Jim Normile, chairperson of the County Beach Commission, which advises the shore protection office, said Wednesday the temporary hire is Doug Huggett, a senior environmental permit specialist and project manager with 30-plus years of coastal and water resource experience. Moffat & Nichol has long served as the county’s go-to engineering firm for beach projects. The goal is to start work in January.

“These on-call services include such activities as answering phone and emails, keeping projects moving in a management, regulatory and financial sense, serving as staff to the Beach Commission,” Normile said in an email.

The temporary position is funded with occupancy tax revenues, which have soared for the last 15 months, as was Rudolph’s salary. The tax is 6% on all rental accommodations, half of which goes to the county’s beach nourishment fund. The cost of the temporary position is not to exceed $30,000.

Normile said the county has advertised for a permanent replacement for Rudolph on the county website and it will run at least through Nov. 14. The ad says the salary is dependent upon experience. Rudolph’s salary this year has been $113,275, which, including benefits, totals $154,470, and the county gave him a one-time, $5,000 bonus this year at the request of the beach commission.

Rudolph, 51, is a geologist who graduated from East Carolina University.

Huggett, already based in Morehead City, “has extensive experience in permitting and mitigation under … the (U.S.) Clean Water Act and … the (U.S.) Rivers and Harbors Act and is an expert in both the North Carolina Coastal Area Management Act and the North Carolina Dredge and Fill Law following more than two decades with the North Carolina Division of Coastal Management,” according to his company biography.

Huggett earned his bachelor’s degree in biology at the Florida Institute of Technology and his master’s in biological oceanography from the College of William and Mary’s Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

Huggett said Friday he and Moffatt & Nichol realize with Rudolph leaving, there “are some huge shoes to fill.”

“I and Moffatt & Nichol are honored that the county asked us to help in the interim, and we will do everything in our power to make sure that the organization continues to operate effectively, he said.

In his email, Normile said the beach commission will work in concert with the county’s human resources office to hire Mr. Rudolph’s permanent replacement.

Rudolph has been responsible for planning and executing all of the county’s beach nourishment and dredging projects during his two-decade tenure. Normile said he hopes the county will split those duties, at least to some degree.

“It remains the spirit and intent of the Beach Commission to budget and hire a future Water Resource & Resiliency Manager” during the next couple of years, Normile said. “This new position will have conjoined beach/shore, some waterway resiliency duties and monitoring coastal policy issues. Interestingly, there are more square miles of water (834) in Carteret County than land (506). The Beach Commission recognizes the importance … of our 834 square miles of water and coastal shores for the future.”

Among his accomplishments, Rudolph has been responsible for planning and guiding numerous nourishment projects, placing more than 20 million cubic yards of sand on Bogue Banks at a total federal, state and local cost of nearly $223 million, plus many dredging projects in area waterways.

He exits with one major project left in the wings: dredging east Taylor’s Creek and using the sand to nourish the public beach and other areas on Radio Island.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a news outlet based in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — After nearly 20 years working to place sand on beaches and get inlets and creeks dredged, Carteret County Shore Protection Office manager Greg Rudolph has resigned, effective Friday, Nov. 12.

In a letter Thursday to county manager Tommy Burns, Rudolph, 51, said, “While there’s always the next storm, the next shoaling hot spot, or some regulatory/policy issue to contend with, I’ve come to a place in my career where there’s a sense I’ve accomplished all that I can for the county and it’s time to move on and pursue new opportunities and challenges.”

In an interview Monday, he said he couldn’t yet say what he is going to do next.

“You will not see me becoming shore protection manager for any local government in this state or another. The Shore Protection Office was a newborn baby when we started in 2001 and it’s been to college, got the first real job, married, etc., and you come to realize that it will be OK and it’s time to let go.”

When he started as head of the newly created office in 2001, “I’m not sure the beach commission or the county quite knew what exactly a Shore Protection Manager was supposed to do, and to be honest I wasn’t quite sure what a Shore Protection Manager was supposed to do either,” Rudolph said in the letter.

He learned on the job. In two decades, the office has been responsible for planning and guiding numerous beach nourishment projects to fruition, placing more than 20 million cubic yards of sand on Bogue Banks at a total federal, state and local cost of nearly $223 million. Much of the money has come the county’s beach nourishment fund, which receives half of the revenues generated by the 6% occupancy tax on rental accommodations.

Rudolph, a geologist by training at East Carolina University, called the tax a crucial decision.

“I can’t thank the county leadership enough for having the foresight in the late 1990s and early 2000s to develop the occupancy tax legislation that not only designated a portion for the purpose of beach nourishment, but to also codify the beach commission into the law,” he said in the letter. “That was the singular best thing to happen to Bogue Banks from a beach and inlet management perspective and I was incredibly fortunate to serve the beach commission since day one.”

He thanked the County Beach Commission chairpersons, Buck Fugate, Trace Cooper and Jim Normile, along with all beach commission members he’s worked with. The commission serves as the advisory body over the shore protection office.

“Working with them and the Town Managers was one of the best aspects of my tenure here,” he said. “It was good to learn from them and make friends along the way.”

Normile, the current chairperson, said the beach commission has begun the human resources process to locate and hire a new shore protection office manager.

“Rudi has been a blessing to work with and his brilliance will be sorely missed,” he said in an email Monday morning.

Normile also noted Rudolph’s efforts for the county “as a steward of natural resources” and said the manager “served as a subject matter expert” on U.S. Endangered Species Act listings, offshore oil and gas exploration, the National Flood Insurance Program and its rate maps and sea level rise.

Finally, Normile cited Rudolph’s liaison work with the state legislature and with the state’s congressional delegation.

Rudolph said his decision to move on had nothing to do with the county, the government or staff.

“It’s purely a life decision, and at the same time, the County will be well served by getting a set of fresh eyes and perspectives for beach/inlet management and waterway dredging moving forward,” he wrote in the letter.

He said he is committed to doing everything possible to ensure the next manager and the beach commission have continued success. Rudolph said he feels he’s leaving the program in good shape.

“Our beaches are in unquestionably better shape than they were subsequent to the spate of hurricanes that impacted us in the 1990s,” he said in the letter. “We also developed one of the most comprehensive beach survey programs in the entire country, which serves as a foundation for the Bogue Banks Master Plan we finalized not that long ago.”

That plan will serve as the county’s guiding engineering and permit “vehicle” for beach and inlet management over the next 45-plus years.

The office under Rudolph also became an important resource for planning and dredging waterways from Emerald Isle to Down East.

Rudolph exits with one major project left in the wings, dredging East Taylor’s Creek and using the sand to nourish the public beach and other areas on Radio Island. The estimated $1.9 million project is to be paid for with a $1.3 million grant from the N.C. Shallow Draft Navigation Channel Dredging and Aquatic Weed Fund, with a $650,000 U.S. Department of Defense grant to use as the local match for the state grant. The goal is to start work in January.

Rudolph also leaves with what he called in the letter “a very heavy heart.” The county, he said, “has great leadership and an amazing staff. I will miss working with … everyone.”

Rudolph told the News-Times he plans to stay in the area, even if it’s kind of a “home base” with more travel. His family “needs to keep our gills wet and there is absolutely no better place to do that than Carteret County,” he said.

He had a salary this fiscal year of $113,275, which including benefits, totals $154,470, and the county gave him a one-time $5,000 bonus at the request of the beach commission.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a tri-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — Carteret County’s proposed project to dredge east Taylor’s Creek and use the sand to nourish the public beach and other areas on Radio Island is almost surely a “go.”

Greg Rudolph, manager of the County Shore Protection Office, said Tuesday the county already had a $1.3 million grant from the North Carolina Shallow Draft Navigation Channel Dredging and Aquatic Weed Fund for the estimated $1.95 million project and now has a $650,000 U.S. Department of Defense grant to use as the local match. The DOD approved the grant last week.

The state fund, which gets revenue from boat title fees and the boat fuel tax, pays two-thirds of the cost of such waterway projects.

“We’re super pleased,” Rudolph said. “… It’s a great project for all involved.”

Several years ago, the county began planning a project to dredge and realign east Taylor’s Creek to match the rest of the waterway along the Beaufort waterfront. The idea at the time was to deposit the spoils on the Atlantic Veneer property on Lennoxville Road in Beaufort.

However, Rudolph earlier this year pitched the idea of using the dredged material instead on Radio Island, where erosion increased after Hurricane Florence in 2018. The County Beach Commission that advises his office agreed and also endorsed applying for the DOD grant, which it did in July.

In addition to the public beach on the north side of Radio Island, material will be placed along Marine Road, which the U.S. Navy uses, and where erosion threatens two power poles. That was key to getting the federal grant, as was the fact that the county’s beach access is heavily used by military families.

The next step, Rudolph said Tuesday, is to get the state Division of Coastal Management to amend the permit to switch the deposit site of the dredged material from Atlantic Veneer to the island. He doesn’t anticipate that being a problem, but said it could take some time. In addition, the county needs to go out for bids and approve one before work can begin.

Rudolph said he hopes to kick off the project before the end of the year, but said a January start should be soon enough to enable the dredging to be complete by the April 1 environmental deadline.

The goal is to use a 3.5-mile-long pipeline dredge, instead of a bucket dredge boat and barge, to carry the material from the creek to the island.

“The project would move much faster that way,” Rudolph said.

The spoils are to be spread roughly from Old Town Yacht Club southward, parallel to Marine Road to the land craft utility ramp and bulkhead, around 2,800 linear feet.

Rudolph said the Navy has been trying for some time to put rock along Marine Road to protect it from erosion, and the additional sand would be more room for the rocks.

“(The erosion) is very bad,” he said.

In announcing approval of the grant, the DOD said “the project will carry out shoreline and infrastructure protection measures on Radio Island. The project …will include restoration of a beach and dune system to mitigate erosion problems.”

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a news outlet based in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A small shorebird might eventually pose new challenges for beach nourishment, dredging and other activities on beaches in Carteret County.

On July 15, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed establishing critical habitat on all oceanfront Bogue, Core and Shackleford banks beaches for the rufa red knot. An online public meeting on the proposal has been set for later this month.

“We have been waiting for roughly five to six years for the US Fish and Wildlife Service to designate red knot shorebird critical habitat subsequent to listing the species as ‘threatened’ in late 2014,” Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Greg Rudolph said in an email Monday. “Our position, in written comments, focused on the fact that wedo not possess major spring stopover areas and (we) contended the county should not be included in the critical habitat designation.”

The rufa red knot is a robin-sized sandpiper with a wingspan of about 20 inches and a ruddy head. The bird is known for its 10,000-mile migration from the southern tip of South America to the Arctic and back each year, generally visiting North Carolina in the spring.

The red knot’s U.S. coastal range overlaps with those of loggerhead sea turtles and piping plovers and the USFWS noted a major factor in the recent decline of the red knot was reduced food supplies in Delaware Bay due to commercial harvest of horseshoe crabs, Rudolph added.

“If the county’s shorelines are designated as critical habitat for the red knot, then we requested the exact overlays already in place for the piping plover as meeting the red knot’s critical habitat needs, as the piping plover overlays have yet to cause major permitting or land-use issues,” he said.

The only piping plover critical habitat in the county is at The Point at Bogue Inlet in Emerald Isle, he said.

But, Rudolph said, “USFWS ignored our comments and factual arguments and are proposing to designate all of Bogue Banks oceanfront and Core Banks/Shackleford Banks as critical habitat.”

Other North Carolina areas proposed as critical habitat for the rufa red knot are beaches of Hatteras Island in Dare County, Ocracoke Island in Hyde County, Topsail Beach in Pender County, Fort Fisher in New Hanover County and Sunset Beach/Bird Island in Brunswick County.

“We’re very concerned,” Rudolph said last week in a meeting of the County Beach Commission, which advises his office. “At the least, (critical habitat) is another thing to deal with.”

He said the county might engage legal representation to fight the designation.

But this year, according to an email from the National Audubon Society, the number of rufa red knots visiting the Delaware Bay beaches during this spring’s northbound migration was the lowest since counts began almost 40 years ago. A New York Times article referenced by Audubon in the email, published June 2, states the survey found only 7,000 of the rufa species of the red knot this year, less than a third of the number spotted in 2020 and less than a quarter of the number identified in 2018 and 2019.

Audubon for years has made saving the red knot from extinction one of its top priorities.

Lindsay Addison, a Wilmington-based coastal biologist with Audubon North Carolina, said in an email Tuesday that, given the declines in the population of the bird, “we are supportive of the USFWS’s decision to list rufa red knots under the Endangered Species Act and to designate critical habitat for them.

“When knots stop over on migration, it’s critical for them to find abundant food,” she continued. “They feed on coquinas, mole crabs, and other intertidal invertebrates. It’s like when you’re on a long road trip and you need to find a gas station and a McDonald’s to keep going. That’s why barrier island beaches in NC are part of the proposed critical habitat units.”

Addison said critical habitat designation helps ensure the knots’ habitat requirements are taken into consideration when projects are evaluated by regulatory agencies.

“Anytime a project takes place where a listed species occurs, the USFWS does an evaluation and recommends modifications as needed, but having critical habitat designated helps to focus evaluation on the habitat features the species needs most,” she said.

According to USFWS, critical habitat designation habitat “does not affect land ownership or establish a refuge, wilderness, reserve, preserve or other conservation area.” However, it requires all federal agencies, in consultation with USFWS, ensure “any action they authorize, fund, or carry out is not likely to result in the destruction or adverse modification of critical habitat.”

The USFWS is proposing critical habitat in Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. In its Federal Register posting of the areas, USFWS states the birds “depend on multiple foraging and roosting habitat areas on local, regional, and range-wide scales.

It also states the birds’ shore habitat is threatened by rising sea level and shoreline stabilization, and its food supply has been diminished by a decline in the population of horseshoe crabs, as a result of the commercial harvest for use of their blood in pharmaceuticals and their bodies in fertilizer.

The public comment meeting on the critical habitat designations for the rufa red knot, a subspecies of the red knot, will be held virtually Aug. 18.

To attend the public hearing virtually, visit zoom.us/meeting/register/tZAqc-yhqzMqE9PUvFbQ6JyhrJ1Rl4kmtS62.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper based in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE ­— The Carteret County Beach Commission unanimously agreed Monday to let beach engineering firm Moffatt & Nichol develop a fee estimate and proposed contract for a study to look for additional sand that could be used in future nourishment projects on Bogue Banks.

The board’s action came during a meeting in the Emerald Isle commissioners’ meeting room and on Zoom. The board will likely consider the contract and proposed fees at its next meeting, which most likely will be in August.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, proposed the move. It will be what he called an “initial reconnaissance/desktop-level examination” of existing literature about where significant deposits of high quality sand are located close to the island, other than at the long-used dredge disposal “borrow” site in the ocean just off Atlantic Beach.

Once the study has determined where those significant deposits are, it could be followed by an effort to take core samples to verify amounts.

The goal is to find enough sand to supply beach nourishment needs for the 47 remaining years in the county’s 50-year beach nourishment master plan.

There’s not an immediate need for sand to augment the existing site, Rudolph said, but it would be good to identify cost-effective deposits of sand to ensure there will be enough for years to come.

It’s estimated there are 12 million cubic yards or more of sand left on the borrow site, and it grows a bit whenever the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers deposits sand there, so in a sense it’s a renewable resource. However, Rudolph said to the commission, the county has put close to 5 million cubic yards of sand on Bogue Banks beaches in the past three years, and no one knows what future needs will be. Strong hurricanes have increased in number in recent years.

Strong hurricanes, such as Florence in September 2018, can strip hundreds of thousands to millions of cubic yards of sand off the island in a single event, and much of it moves out of the “natural” cycle that returns sand to the beaches on prevailing southwest winds in the summer.

Basically, Rudolph said, “We need a plan B.”

In addition, he said, it takes time to do the research, and to work with state and federal agencies to get permits to “harvest” sand.

For example, it’s known there is a lot of high-quality sand in the ocean south of Cape Lookout, as a result of erosion there over many years. However, in addition to the state, the county would have to work with the National Park Service to be able to use it for beach nourishment.

It’s also believed there is a lot of sand in the ocean near the mouths of rivers, such as the White Oak and possibly the New, both in Onslow County.

Another possible source is nearshore ocean berms at various locations off the island. Again, though, plenty of study and permits would be required to change the profiles of those berms.

“We need to work with Moffatt & Nichol and go through the process … and narrow out … what to target,” said Chris Freeman of Geodynamics, the county’s Newport-based beach monitoring and sand surveying firm.

He added Moffatt & Nichol and the county, after the initial study, could rank potential sand sources to target for field work with core samples.

Rudolph said the county can use accumulated funds in the beach nourishment fund, which receives half the revenue from the county’s occupancy tax, to pay for studies. He added that the nourishment fund is flourishing from record levels of tourism in the county over the past 10 months.

However, he added, “We  will  also look  to  augment  the  funding  pool  with  state  and/or federal   grants   and   other   funding streams. We had some very good preliminary conversations with BOEM (the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) in this regard already and feel positive about future opportunities.”

Beach commission members Larry Baldwin, Mike Luther and commission chairman Jim Normile said they all think the effort is worthwhile.

“It’s all worth looking at,” Baldwin said of the various sources of potential sand.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a twice-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

CAPE CARTERET — The long awaited Old Ferry Channel/Deer Creek dredging project is nearly complete, Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Greg Rudolph said Monday.

“We’re looking really good here,” he said in an email. “Our contractor has completed all the reaches (segments) except for the Old Ferry Channel and Deer Creek South, where we are conducting some cleanup work.”

Cleanup work entails addressing and redredging any high spots the surveys revealed as problematic as the project proceeded. The cleanup is common practice for a dredging project, Rudolph added.

Work began Jan. 14, so it’s taken a little more than two months to do the $1.4 million project.

He praised the contractor for the fast job to get the waters ready for spring boating and fishing season.

“T.D. Eure has been down maybe one or two days, total,” he said, despite several extended periods of bad weather.

The Old Ferry Channel in Bogue Sound runs from Cape Carteret to Emerald Isle and was the only passage for people and vehicles between the two towns until the high-rise bridge was opened in 1971.

Other segments of the dredging project were the main stem of Deer Creek, the connector from Deer Creek to Old Ferry Channel, Deer Creek North Extension, School House Creek and Deer Creek North.

Deer Creek and its tributaries are the main way boaters in Cape Carteret get to the deep water of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway and the ocean, and town residents and visitors have clamored for dredging for years as portions have been badly silted.

The state paid for two-thirds of the work, while the county, Cape Carteret and residents along the creek and its tributaries split the other third.

The dredge spoils are temporarily on privately-owned sites nearby, drying and awaiting sale or permanent disposal.

Meanwhile, Rudolph said Monday work to dredge channels at the North Carolina Port of Morehead City and put the material on the strand at Fort Macon State Park west to The Circle Development District in Atlantic Beach is complete. The state park and Atlantic Beach receive the free sand every third year when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredges the port channels.

The work was done by Weeks Marine of New Jersey at a cost of about $18 million, all paid by the federal government because of the port’s strategic and economic importance.

Under a longstanding agreement with the corps, the town gets the sand free because it is the closest disposal site for the dredged material. It’s piped across Bogue Sound to the beach.

Rudolph said the work was supposed to be done in 2020, but was delayed because of funding constraints.

“It was a big relief to have everything come together this year for the east end of Bogue Banks,” he said.

In the other two years of the three-year port dredging cycle, the material dredged is dumped offshore.

Once the cleanup work is complete in Deer Creek and Old Ferry Channel, that will leave one major, ongoing dredging and beach nourishment project, encompassing most of the strand in Emerald Isle, with material furnished from a borrow site in the ocean off Atlantic Beach.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a news outlet based in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

The Coastal Cohorts will breeze into homes beginning Wednesday when they stream a recorded Public Broadcasting System version of their timeless-as-the-tide, beloved, down-by-the-sea musical, “King Mackerel and the Blues are Running” to raise money  for area environmental and coastal culture organizations.

Although anyone can stream the music live for free, the Cohorts are urging folks to buy the music or video online, and the proceeds will benefit the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center on Harkers Island Wednesday; the Wilmington- and New Bern-based North Carolina Coastal Land Trust Thursday; the Durham-based North Carolina Nature Conservancy Friday; and Coastal Review Online publisher the North Carolina Coastal Federation, based in Ocean near Newport Saturday.

It’s the 35^th anniversary of the first performance of “King Mack,” which writers Jim Wann and Bland Simpson debuted with Don Dixon in Rhythm Alley in Chapel Hill in 1985.

They first performed the musical in Carteret County as a fundraiser for the Coastal Federation in June 1986 and it has since been performed live on Broadway and in the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., among countless other locales up and down the East Coast.

Numerous Carteret County performances have sold out over the years at Carteret Community College as fundraisers for the federation, for which Simpson has been a board member.

Dixon, who’s also known as a solo rock artist, producer and as one half of a performing duo with his wife, Marti Jones, grew up in South Carolina, near Charlotte.

As a producer, Dixon crafted REM’s early records as well as others in the booming college rock genre in the 1980s and ’90s. He grew up visiting and reveling along the North Carolina coast, and preserving its natural environment remains dear to his heart, despite his now longtime Ohio residency.

He spent summers at an aunt’s house in Bath on Pamlico Sound, and soaked in the feel of the Outer Banks and the inland waterways, as well as the nearby ocean.

“It still means a lot to me,” Dixon said of the coast, “and so does the show,” which is near and dear to the hearts of many coastal residents who’ve seen and heard it.

“Jim had success with Broadway musicals (including the Tony-nominated ‘Pump Boys and Dinettes’),” Dixon said. But none of the three expected “King Mack” to catch fire and become a cultural touchstone.

Dixon understands why. It celebrates coastal values and preservation, he said, “and it’s just fun,” with songs in a variety of styles, ranging from rockers to sentimental, heart-wrenching love ballads and crazy tales to which many can relate.

It’s rollicking and roots-ish, with a screen behind the trio showing footage of hurricanes and other things familiar to coastal denizens. The show features songs about fishing trips that turned into disasters, devastating hurricanes, ghosts, lost loves, wild ponies, bad-outcome joyrides on the beach in “borrowed” cars and life “on the soundside.”

A recorded version isn’t the same as being there, but Dixon, whose musical career dates back to the seminal Chapel Hill-based band Arrogance, is happy new folks will get to see it, and especially happy to help raise money for worthy coastal groups.

Simpson, a northeast North Carolina native, long a member of the famous Red Clay Ramblers and a UNC professor of creative writing, recalled its accidental origins.

A lawyer who represented the beach music band the Embers had seen Wann’s “Pump Boys” show and wanted to see if Wann and Simpson could write something beachy that his clients could turn into a show.

“So,” Simpson said, we just started making a list of coastal things, like pier fishing, night fires on the beach, things that were kind of universal experiences at the coast. Then it turned out the Embers couldn’t do it, so Jim and I kept going anyway.”

After the debut in Chapel Hill, UNC graduate Todd Miller, founder and executive director of the Coastal Federation and a fan of the show, called and asked the Cohorts to perform it live as a fundraiser in Carteret County in 1986.

That was the start of its climb to cultural phenomenon status on the coast.

The Cohorts performed it numerous times through about 1988, but Wann and Dixon moved out of the state. It kind of died.

But Miller, Simpson remembers, wouldn’t let it remain buried.

Finally, in spring 1994, Miller called and asked them to perform the show at then-Gov. Jim Hunt’s “Year of the Coast” convention in Wilmington.

“King Mack” was reborn, Simpson said, and he’s happy it was.

“We love each other and we love doing it,” he said.

It was amazing, he said, to play it for more than a month in the Kennedy Center, where the show’s lighting director lived on a houseboat and arrived for shows on a 14-foot boat after a long run down two rivers to the famed theater in Washington, D.C.

“It was so “Cohort-ish,” Simpson said. “That’s an adjective we use a lot.”

The last live performance was in January 2019 on Tybee Island, Georgia.

Simpson said that for the show’s 35^th anniversary, they wanted to raise money for their usual good causes. But with the coronavirus pandemic raging, staging “King Mack” live and touring as planned weren’t feasible.

Streaming the classic PBS show at no charge gives everyone a chance to see it again, and the Cohorts hope folks will net some copies to bring the organizations some cash at the end of the year, a traditional time of charitable giving.

The show’s plot is that a hurricane blew down Miss Mattie Jewell’s pier and guest house at North Carolina’s Corncake Inlet, which hasn’t existed in decades. The Cohorts set out to save the business so she wouldn’t have to sell to the “Greedhead” developers.

The show opens with the rousing theme song, “King Mackerel and the Blues are Running,” which features Simpson talk-singing the weather forecast.

“I thought that would be fun,” Simpson said. “It was. But it was hard to do it at speed, over chord changes. I think I probably rehearsed it a thousand times before I got it.”

From there the show unfolds with more songs and tales, spoken and acted.

Wann attributes “King Mack’s” continuing appeal to the lure and beauty of the coast — and to timing.

“When we started writing it, I guess in ’83 or ’84, there really hadn’t been any major hurricanes to hit the Carolinas coast in a long time,” he said. “Then there was Hugo, and after that, they started picking up.”

That’s still the case, and coupled with concerns about climate change and its impact on the coast, the theme remains relevant.

And, of course, there’s the timeless, universal nature of the songs about things people have always done along the shore.

People care about the coast, Wann said, because of those memories, but also because it’s always beautiful and always changing.

As for the Cohorts, Wann said music brought them together as friends in the early 1970s, and it keeps them together.

“In the beginning,” he said, “the music made the friendship, but now the friendship makes the music. It’s been a great way to walk through life.”

Wann also cherishes the connections they’ve made to people through the Coastal Federation, the Core Sound Museum and other organizations “King Mack” has helped support.

He hears from fans.

“People will tell me they lost their cassette tape of the original recording and ask if we can send them another one,” he said.

They obviously can’t do that, but “King Mack” lives on CDs and increasingly in digital form for download.

But it’s great, he said, that people who first had the music on a cassette tape still love it and want it.

It’s been remarkable,” he said of “King Mack’s” longevity, but also of his friendship with Dixon and Simpson and the connection to the state’s coast and its culture.

Emerald Isle Commissioners Tuesday night authorized Town Manager Matt Zapp to negotiate a contract with engineering firm Moffatt & Nichol to develop a comprehensive stormwater management plan.

The 5-0 vote came during the board’s monthly meeting, conducted on GoToWebinar.

Moffatt & Nichol is a global infrastructure advisory firm with an office in Raleigh. It has long been Carteret County’s beach engineering firm, designing and monitoring multi-million-dollar Bogue Banks beach nourishment projects for the county’s Shore Protection Office. The company also subcontracts to Geodynamics, a Newport firm, for the county’s beach sand measurement program.

Zapp recommended Moffat & Nichol to town commissioners after reading proposals from the company and six others that responded to the town’s request for proposals to develop a stormwater plan.

The others that submitted proposals were The Wooten Company; McGill, Morris, Ritchie and Associates; American Engineering; LDS; and McConnell & Associates.

Zapp told the board he got input from Carteret County officials before recommending Moffatt & Nichol, and said he is confident the company has the resources and expertise to develop a good stormwater plan for the town.

Commissioner Jim Normile, who serves on the county beach commission, said he concurred with Zapp’s recommendation and thanked the town manager for his “thoroughness” in the review of the proposals and his recommendation.

Normile made the motion to allow Zapp to negotiate the contract. The manager hopes the board can approve a contract at its 6 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 8,meeting.

The town’s request for proposals stated, “Recent flooding events have highlighted the need to address stormwater drainage issues on a comprehensive town-wide basis.”

According to the request for proposal, or RFP, the company that does the plan is expected to evaluate existing stormwater runoff conditions, existing system capacity and identify areas with frequent flooding; evaluate existing capacity of stormwater infrastructure, pumping stations and identify additional capacity needs; identify capital stormwater improvements to reduce flooding risk, reduce damage to public and private property and improve access and safety; quantify the capital and ongoing maintenance costs for implementing the stormwater infrastructure projects; identify permitting pathways to implement stormwater system improvements; and prioritize stormwater system improvements.

Although the town already has an extensive stormwater drainage system for the flood-prone Coast Guard Road corridor, and there are private systems in some developments, town Planning Director Josh Edmondson told the board earlier this year too much flooding occurs even after thunderstorms, not just tropical storms and hurricanes.

Without a plan and some tougher, but fair, stormwater rules, the town, he said, would likely see more flooding from smaller storms in the future, as redevelopment replaces smaller old homes with larger new ones, impervious surface area increases and remaining vacant and more marginal properties are developed.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

Former state Rep. Ronnie Smith of Morehead City, who died Wednesday at Carteret Health Care at age 80, was described this week by friends as an overwhelmingly nice man who cared deeply about improving infrastructure and looking after the elderly.

Smith, a Morehead City native who also spent many years living in Salter Path, served in the North Carolina General Assembly’s House of Representatives serving District 3, now District 13, from 1992-2002.

He is survived by his wife, Betty Smith of the home, three daughters, a son, a brother and extended family.

A lifelong ardent Democrat, he ran for the state Senate, but lost to the late Republican Jean Preston of Emerald Isle.

One of Smith’s close friends, John Creech of Morehead City, owns a video production company and shot many of Smith’s television advertisements for his campaigns. He remembers one time he was at home shooting an ad for Smith when Ms. Preston pulled into the driveway, also for a possible ad shoot.

“I thought, ‘Oh, no,’ Creech said, “but they were very cordial to each other.”

In fact, Creech said, while they were in the state House of Representatives, Smith and Ms. Preston sat beside each other in the chamber. Smith was the veteran, Ms. Preston the newbie, Creech said, and Smith told him “she’d ask me questions.”

It was, Creech said, a different time, when elected officials in the legislature weren’t so partisan, and the representatives of coastal areas consistently tried to work together to get things done for a region often forgotten by the rest of the state.

“Ronnie was like that,” Creech said. “He was a very partisan Democrat, but he’d work with anyone on the other side to help our county and the coast.”

Other than that, Creech said, “Ronnie was just a nice guy. He’d give you the shirt off his back. He had a great family and he loved them. I can’t really say much more. I’ll miss him. He was always fun, always happy, and treated everyone nicely.”

Smith was a 1958 graduate of Morehead City High School, according to his obituary, and served in the U.S. National Guard from 1963-69. He coached youth baseball, and sports were a passion for him, it continues.

State Rep. Pat McElraft, a Republican from Emerald Isle who currently represents District 13, also remembered Smith fondly.

“Ronnie was a very kind man who worked hard for his constituents,” she said in an email Friday. “He did a great job for all of us here in Carteret County, regardless of party affiliation. I want to thank him and his family for his service to our state. He will be missed.”

Holly Lawrence, another ardent Democrat, worked as a county magistrate, but was one of Smith’s neighbors in Morehead City. He could always be counted on, she said, to help with problems in the neighborhood, and she, too, recalled his desire and willingness to work with his Republican counterparts in the General Assembly to get things done.

“I will miss him, and I miss the way things were then,” she said. “He was just a good man. He did everything he could for Carteret County.”

Creech was a member of the Morehead City Planning Board, and also remembered Smith as a developer. He called him ethical, and said he was interested in developments that would benefit the community and not destroy the environment.

George Parrott, a close friend who lives in Morehead City, also recalls Smith as gregarious and attentive to constituents.

Even in the last months of his life, Parrott said, Smith would walk up and down the halls in the hospital and look at the name tags on the doors. If one seemed familiar, Parrott said, he’d knock, walk in and say, “Are you related to so-and-so?

“He just loved people and wanted to help them,” Parrott said. “If I have to sum Ronnie up, I’d just say he loved people. He was just a great man.”

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

The final bill for Carteret County’s massive Atlantic Harbor improvement project Down East came in at a total of $2,199,910.23, including engineering fees, Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Greg Rudolph said Thursday.

That’s only slightly higher than the original $2.115 million budget set for the project. That’s close, Rudolph said, given that the project involved dredging and construction of a granite sill that is 1,700 feet long and used 9,545 tons of stone along White Point, a Core Sound land formation just outside the harbor.

The sill, which includes fish passageways and wave attenuators that are intended to further limit wave action that leads to sedimentation in the harbor, was funded by the North Carolina Coastal Federation, a Carteret County environmental organization that was interested in the project because the sill provides habitat for many marine species.

The federation was particularly interested in oyster habitat, because shellfish clean water of pollution as they feed and once provided many jobs for state watermen.

“It was hard,” Rudolph said, to know exactly how much granite would be needed for the sill.

“The total county cost at the end of the day is $247,820.83,” for the project, he added in an email. “We filed for our first reimbursements from the County and Coastal Federation back in June and they have been received.”

The federation is paying for roughly half of the project through a $1.1 million grant it obtained in 2018 from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to build living shorelines, which are considered by many to be an environmentally friendly and cost-effective alternative to sea walls in combatting erosion and sedimentation. The state also chipped in money.

Rudolph early in the project estimated the county’s cost for the work would be about $200,000.

All that remains to do now is for the coastal federation to plant marsh vegetation along the constructed granite sill around White Point.

“Awesome project,” Rudolph said. “The Coastal Federation plans to plant in the spring when the survivability rate will be much improved. They have well over $150,000 to put towards this effort and we will be assisting them with logistics and whatever else they will need.”

The dredging portion of the project, completed in the spring, removed close to 8,000 cubic yards of silt material from the entrance channel to the harbor, which for many years has been crucial to Down East commercial fishermen and other boaters.

The county has an option with the overall contractor, T.D. Eure of Beaufort, to dredge the harbor itself, if necessary. Officials have not yet determined if that will be necessary.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times.

The massive Atlantic Harbor improvement moved into its penultimate stage last week.

Contractor TD Eure of Beaufort began the process of installing attenuators to limit the energy of waves that go through fish passages left in a rock sill around White Point in Core Sound, just offshore from the harbor.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, said in an email Friday, “construction of the granite sill is complete, and TD Eure is working on grading the dredge spoil at White Point.

“It’s all looking really, really good,” Rudolph added. “The first piling (for an attenuator) has been sunk as a test run.”

Eventually, there will be five attenuators at each of the six fish passages through the granite sill. The attenuators fit like lollipops into a circular sleeve and are clamped into place.

Once that work is complete, the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which is paying for much of the project through a $1.1 million grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, will put in thousands of marsh grass plants to further impede erosion of White Point, which protects the harbor from sedimentation and wave energy.

The federation, an environmental group based in the Ocean community on N.C. 24, funded about half of the project because the rock sill and marsh grass — cordgrass and possibly needle rush — will provide habitat for juveniles of many marine species, including oyster larvae, which attach to rocks.

The granite sill is 1,700 feet long and the contractor used 9,545 tons of stone.

The shore protection office has sought permits for the complicated project and guided it through planning stages and years of discussion of what should be done to make the Down East Carteret County harbor safe and usable by commercial fishermen and other boaters for the foreseeable future.

Rudolph said the budget for the project is $2.115 million, and since the state also contributed funds, the county’s share of the total cost should be about $200,000. The county has a contract option and a grant extension to dredge the harbor itself, but officials have not determined whether that is necessary.

The county awarded the contract to T.D. Eure in March and work began in mid-April.

This story has been updated to correct the source of funding.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a newspaper based in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

Cape Carteret Commissioners voted 4-1 last week to authorize Manager Zach Steffey to establish a process to address potential local financial participation in a county plan to dredge creeks and canals in town.

Carteret County is planning to dredge the Old Ferry Channel in Bogue Sound between Cape Carteret and Emerald Isle and is also looking at dredging Deer Creek, which connects to the channel and provides boating access to five different neighborhoods in town.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the County Shore Protection Office, discussed the projects with commissioners during the Aug. 10 meeting held on the GoToMeeting platform.

Commissioner Mike King voted in the minority, in part because while he favors dredging the ferry channel, he believes much of Deer Creek is in relatively good shape and some property owners already pay for periodic, private dredging. Starting a process that includes town financial participation, he said, would “open a can of worms” that could lead to more demands on the town.

Commissioner Don Miller disagreed.

“I don’t think if we do this one we have to do every other one,” he said.

Rudolph told the board the county is attempting to get necessary state permits to dredge waterways throughout Cape Carteret, but the initial focus will be Old Ferry Channel, then its connection to Deer Creek and Deer Creek Main South.

However, Steffey told the board, “There is discussion about adding the Deer Creek Main West to the proposed project scope.

“This may or may not require a financial contribution from the town to make dredging this section feasible,” he added. “If the town takes action to organize property owners and collect funds necessary to dredge this segment, then the town may want to consider establishing a process for how each body of water in Cape Carteret is evaluated and prioritized.”

Finally, Steffey said, the town might want to establish a minimum participation percentage rate to ensure there is adequate financial support for a project.

Commissioners have already expressed support for dredging the ferry channel, which, before the B. Cameron Langston Bridge was built, was home to ferries that provided a way for people to get from the western Carteret mainland to Emerald Isle. It’s now used by recreational boaters, who say navigation is tricky.

The board is also very interested in getting Deer Creek dredged, in part because of a siltation problem that increased when a stormwater management project constructed by the North Carolina Coastal Federation in 2016 failed during and after Hurricane Florence’s torrential rains in September 2018. The flooding rains eroded a berm that separated two stretches of engineered wetlands, one at Cape Carteret Baptist Church and the other at the adjacent Cape Carteret Presbyterian Church on Highway 24.

The federation, an environmental group based in the Ocean community, said the wetlands still serve their primary function of filtering pollutants that flow in from stormwater runoff from adjacent Highway 24, but has acknowledged the problem.

Although the federation has been working with the North Carolina Department of Transportation to fix the berm, the effort hasn’t started and siltation has increased dramatically in the segment of Deer Creek east of Yaupon Drive, according to town officials.

It’s gotten to the point where there’s a sandbar, which, particularly at low tide, makes navigation difficult if not impossible for all but the smallest boats. Water is sometimes virtually stagnant, town officials continued.

Commissioner Don Miller during the meeting called it a serious environmental issue.

“Something needs to be done,” he said, “and this (county project) is a unique opportunity.”

The county has already spent about $180,000, with two-thirds of that from a state grant, on engineering and planning for the Old Ferry Channel/Deer Creek project.

Rudolph said dredging Old Ferry Channel and Deer Creek adequately under the county’s latest plan could cost close to $1 million, with one third of that paid by the state, one third by the county and one third from “local participation.”

The county, he said, “is committed to the project” in one form or another.

“We went big on it (the effort to get the permits),” Rudolph said, but can narrow it to whatever everyone involved thinks is most needed and affordable.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

The Atlantic Harbor improvement project is moving into a phase not normally observed in this area: installation of wave attenuators.

The devices, intended to limit wave action that causes erosion and siltation, are to be installed beginning this week, according to Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office.

The office has sought permits for the complicated project and guided it through planning stages and years of discussion of what should be done to make the Down East harbor safe and useable for the foreseeable future.

The structures are designed to deflect wave energy back out to sea. There will be 30 of them, placed waterward of gaps in a granite sill constructed around White Point, in Core Sound, just offshore from the harbor. The gaps were left to allow fish to pass through the rock sill, which, along with vegetation planted, will provide habitat for juveniles of many marine species, including oysters.

“There are six areas with five attenuators each,” Rudolph said. “It might take a week or two to install all of them. Installation will be (this) week’s sole focus.”

The attenuators fit like lollipops into a circular sleeve and are clamped into place.

T.D. Eure of Beaufort, the contractor for the multi-million dollar harbor project, will do the work.

Once it’s done, the dredging and construction phases of the project will be complete, and all that will remain is the planting of vegetation around the rock sill by the North Carolina Coastal Federation, an environmental group based in the Ocean community on N.C. 24 in western Carteret County.

The most likely plant species, Rudolph said July 21, are spartina alterniflora, or smooth cordgrass, spartina patens, or salt meadow cordgrass, and possibly juncus roemerianus, or black needle rush.

“T.D. Eure and our engineers at Moffatt & Nichol have done a fantastic job so far estimating and monitoring the quantities of all the materials (number of old sandbags to be removed, filter fabric, bedding stone and armor stone),” Rudolph said in an email. He said that was very hard to do “on a job this big … and can easily bust the budget, but we are so on point it’s almost uncanny.”

In fact, he said, it appears the final cost will likely be within $20,000 of a projected $2.115 million overall budget.

The federation, he added, will have the funds to purchase and install all the plants, “so … it couldn’t be progressing any better.”

The dredging portion of the project, completed weeks ago, removed 8,800 cubic yards of shoal material, mostly from the entrance channel, which was the main choke point that has kept many vessels from using the harbor in recent years.

The county has a contract option and a grant extension to dredge the harbor itself, “but we can’t dredge until October anyway, and the harbor proper is really ‘shoaled in’ with a loose, almost floating type of mud so we need to (determine) whether or not the shoaling is really inhibiting the vessels, and (we) are going to give this some more thought,” Rudolph said. “We’re hoping the shoreline stabilization will work for a very, very long time. We have a good solution out there.”

The granite sill is 1,700 feet long and used 9,545 tons of stone. The contractor dredged and removed 8,800 cubic yards of shoal material, placed on White Point, though some of it must still be leveled. The county did tests to make sure the spoils were safe to keep on White Point, Rudolph said.

The county’s final share of the total project cost is expected to be about $200,000. The coastal federation is using a $1.1 million grant from the National Wildlife Federation, and the state kicked in a grant, as well.

The county awarded the contract to T.D. Eure in March and work began in mid-April.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — It’s been about two months since the last Bogue Banks beach renourishment project ended April 29, but Carteret County officials are moving to go out for bids for the third phase of what’s known as the post-Hurricane Florence project.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the County Shore Protection Office, said Thursday he hopes to release the bid document for the project to potential contractors Thursday and have a bid opening by July 30.

If the county gets bids from three companies, they can be opened that day, but if there are fewer bids, the project will have to be readvertised for a week.

“Our (engineering) team at Moffatt & Nichol is furiously preparing the plans and contract documents,” Rudolph said. “The bid solicitation schedule isn’t quite set in concrete yet,” but the idea is to get the bid documents out and award a contract as soon as possible, as that generally results in lower bids and a more favorable contract.

The phase three project is to include the last stretch of western Emerald Isle. Most of western Emerald Isle was included in the project that wrapped up April 29.

In addition, Rudolph said, the project is to include central Emerald Isle, which has not had its beaches nourished in years, and maybe a small portion of eastern Emerald Isle nourished in 2019 but considered a “hot spot” for erosion.

Without going into detail, Mr. Rudolph said engineers at Moffatt & Nichol are “exploring different beach-fill geometries” for eastern Emerald Isle in an effort to find a way to address the hot spot.

“We have a great opportunity here to try something different than the continuous berm-width that is commonly used,” he said.

Rudolph has estimated phase three could cost as much as $45 million. The project is to begin late this year or early in 2021.

Although the length of beach to be covered and the amount of sand to be discharged is similar to the $28.2-million phase two, it’s farther away from the sand dredge site off Atlantic Beach, so it costs more to move the material.

Phase one covered almost all of Salter Path, all of Indian Beach and eastern Emerald Isle. It was completed in 2019 and cost $20.2 million. Phase two covered western Atlantic Beach, all of Pine Knoll Shores, the remainder of Salter Path and a portion of western Emerald Isle.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

Work on the dredging portion of the Atlantic Harbor improvement project wrapped up this week, according to Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Greg Rudolph.

Despite several periods of windy, stormy weather since contractor T.D. Eure of Beaufort began work in mid-April, “everything progressed nicely,” Rudolph said.

As a result, the entire contracted amount, about 8,000 cubic yards of material, was removed before the Friday deadline imposed in the county’s state Coastal Area Management Act permit.

The project to make the harbor more accessible to commercial fishermen and other boaters will move on soon to construction of a living shoreline around White Point, in Core Sound just offshore from the harbor.

“White Point shelters most of the dredging (area) from waves that develop across the fetch of Core Sound so the weather we’ve had hasn’t really caused too many delays,” Rudolph said.

The dredging focused on a critical choke point in the area of the channel that connects the harbor to the entrance channel and the entrance channel itself, Rudolph said.

The county also has an option in the contract with T.D. Eure to dredge and remove an additional 5,200 cubic yards from the harbor in the fall, after the end of the period in which the state prohibits dredging.

“We’ll start making more concrete plans for that scope in the future,” Rudolph said.

The 1,720-linear-foot living shoreline will be built in conjunction with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which promotes such projects as an environmentally friendly method to combat erosion.

The contractor will use about 9,545 tons of granite, with gaps left for fish passage and for wave attenuators, which are designed to limit wave energy into the harbor and further reduce erosion and siltation.

The federation will plant marsh vegetation, which will become habitat for oysters and other marine species. Oysters clean the water of pollutants as they feed and are a valuable seafood product. The state and the federation have pushed recovery of oyster habitat and the oyster fishery for years.

The project is intended to be as close as possible to a permanent solution to the sedimentation that has made the harbor difficult to use for the past couple of decades.

The material dredged from the waters in a bucket on a barge is being stored at White Point. When the project was in its early planning stages, there was some concern the material would be toxic and would have to be trucked away. However, Rudolph said this week, the county took seven core samples from the areas to be dredged in order to characterize the sediment texture – whether it was mostly sand or mostly mud, as well as shell content – and performed chemical analyses for pollutants. That was done even before the county requested permission to use White Point as the storage site.

“Any pollutant levels detected were very close to ambient (native to the area) levels,” Rudolph said. “We voluntarily performed the chemical analyses just to be extra sure, and to remove any uncertainty about the shoal material.”

Officials determined there was no need to haul away the material.

Rudolph said it will be contoured to meet the Coastal Area Management Act permit specifications, and once that is complete, the site will almost be ready for the granite for the living shoreline.

Before construction can begin, the county will have to remove the old sandbags along White Point and install the filter fabric on which the granite will be placed.

The project contract is for $1,949,188. Much of the money is coming from a $1.1 million grant the federation received from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. The state is also kicking in money, and the county’s share of the cost is expected to be about $200,000.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

CEDAR POINT — Commissioners voted 4-0 Tuesday to adopt a rewrite of the town’s flood damage prevention ordinance for residential structures.

In some cases, maps included in the rewrite will adversely affect property owners by placing their land or homes in classifications that imply higher flood risk.

The board acted during its monthly meeting conducted via Zoom after none of the handful of residents virtually attending the meeting commented during a public hearing.

Town Administrator David Rief explained to the board the town couldn’t change the lines on the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s 2020 flood insurance maps, which will go into effect June 19.

“There’s nothing we can do about those,” he said.

In particular, he noted some properties in low-lying areas will be required, if destroyed or damaged beyond 50% of their values, to be elevated higher than would be necessary before the new map goes into effect.

Rief said the new map moves some Cedar Point properties into zones that would require elevation of as much as 3 to 4 feet more than the zones they are in now. Others under the new map will move into zones that require elevation by an additional 1 or 2 feet.

For example, he said, some will move from FEMA’s AE-7 zone to the AE-10 zone. AE-7 means a structure must be elevated so its first occupied floor is above the base flood level, which is 7 feet. Base flood elevation is defined as the elevation to which a flood is anticipated to rise during a base flood event. In the AE zones, that is a flood that has a 1% chance of occurring in a given year.

Structures on land that were in FEMA’s AE-7 zone under the current map but are changed to the AE-10 zone under the upcoming map would have to elevate the first habitable floor an additional 3 feet, based on the map changes, if rebuilt or repaired at a cost beyond 50% of value. Similarly, any new structure built in the AE-10 zone would have to be built so its bottom occupied floor is at least 10 feet above base flood level.

“This would affect a lot of residences but there is nothing we can do,” Mr. Rief reiterated.

In addition, the map adds a new FEMA Coastal A zone.

“This will probably have one of the biggest impacts on properties in the town,” Rief said Thursday.

The new zone is an area of “moderate wave action,” according to FEMA. Anything on the water side of the line will have to follow the same restrictions as properties in the VE or high-velocity wave zone, which prohibits solid-wall construction for foundations.

Also, he said, “the elevation requirement (in the Coastal A zone) applies to the bottom of the lowest horizontal structural member, usually girders under floor joists, rather than floor level.”

The town planning board earlier this year recommended the commission approve the new ordinance because if the town did not do so, it could not participate in the National Flood Insurance Program, which gives residents the ability to purchase flood insurance.

What this means, Mr. Rief told commissioners is in some places, especially near the water, new homes will be taller than before and old ones will be taller if they must be rebuilt.

He told commissioners they had discretion on a few items in the new ordinance, most notably the height of the “freeboard,” which is the elevation of a building’s lowest floor above the minimum base flood elevation during the initial construction process.

Cedar Point currently requires a freeboard of 2 feet, but FEMA and North Carolina now recommend 4 feet, Mr. Rief said. Towns that adopt higher freeboards can get savings for residents on flood insurance, he said, but it costs more to build or rebuild.

If the town adopted a 4-foot freeboard, he said, that would push the top of some new single-story homes to 26 feet or higher, which he called very tall for a single-story home. It could be especially problematic for new two-story homes since the town has a 40-foot building height limit.

Commissioners stayed with 2 feet, which Rief called a conservative approach.

The board also agreed to an option to require residents to sign agreements not to convert ground-level space to occupied space.

Finally, the town had the option to completely ban the use of fill material on lots but chose not to.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

ATLANTIC — The contractor has begun dredging on the long-awaited project to make Atlantic Harbor and its entrance channel safer and more usable for commercial fishermen and other boaters.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, said in an email Thursday the contractor for the project, T.D. Eure, “began bucket and barge dredging Tuesday.

“There was a lot of surveying and disposal site preparation work that needed to be completed first,” he said of the project, for which the contract was awarded March 23.

He said the work has gone well so far, and preparations are also underway for the living shoreline portion of the project, which will involve placement of granite, interspersed with openings for water flow and wave attenuators, around White Point, seaward of the harbor.

“Our engineers (Moffatt & Nichol) also went to Wake Stone in Nash County last week to inspect the granite that will be used for the living shoreline,” Rudolph added. “They had a productive visit. The size and weight of the granite is important.”

The dredging must be completed, under the county’s state Division of Coastal Management permit, by Friday, May 15. That is 45 days past the state’s usual April 1 deadline. The permit also specifies dredged material be transported to shore by barge.

The living shoreline project, in conjunction with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, is set to begin and end during the summer and fall.

The federation suggested the shoreline project when the county envisioned the effort as only a dredging project.

Plans call for the 1,720-foot living shoreline around White Point to use about 9,545 tons of granite, with gaps left for the attenuators, which are designed to limit wave energy into the harbor.

The goal, Rudolph has said, is to implement a solution that’s as permanent as possible for the shoaling problems that have plagued the channel and harbor for decades, especially after hurricanes.

The organization uses marsh grass and other marine vegetation in the created shorelines to provide new habitat for juvenile fish and shellfish. It’s been particularly interested in reviving the state’s oyster industry and often uses bags of recycled oyster shells in the projects.

Rudolph said in his Thursday email his office will hold conference calls every Friday with the federation, engineers and contractor to plan and track progress, as it routinely does with beach nourishment projects.

T.D. Eure, based in Beaufort, is also the contractor for the living shoreline. The whole contract is for $1,949,188, and T.D. Eure beat out one other bidder to get the work.

County officials have for months said they expected the project to cost as much as $2 million, although the county’s share is likely to be in the $200,000 range.

Much of the money is coming from a $1.1 million grant the federation obtained in 2018 from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to build living shorelines. The state is also kicking in money from its Shallow Draft Navigation Channel Dredging and Aquatic Weed Fund, which receives money from boat fuel taxes and boat license and title fees.

 Hiring a local contractor to help the local economy was a goal specified in the federation’s grant.

County Commissioner Jonathan Robinson of Atlantic, who represents Down East, has pushed for the project and praised the federation and the county for making it a reality after years of piecemeal, emergency measures to keep the waters safely navigable.

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — Bogue Banks’ next beach nourishment project is ready to roll, with dredging and pumping of sand set to begin the first week of February, a little earlier than originally planned.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, met Wednesday with town and county officials, representatives of county beach engineering firm Moffatt & Nichol and dredge contractor, Great Lakes Dredge and Dock Co., of Illinois, for a preconstruction session.

He said everything went well, and “kicked off” the $28.2 million Phase 2 Hurricane Florence sand replacement project in western Atlantic Beach, all of Pine Knoll Shores, a small part of Salter Path and a part of western Emerald Isle.

“The one caveat is that when you hear a date, you have to remember that it’s kind of like building a house,” he said. “You can know a lot of things, but you can’t know, for example, exactly when the electrical contractor is going to show up and wire the master bedroom.”

Rudolph said an area at The Circle district in Atlantic Beach will serve as the “main staging area for the land-based pipe that will move the sand east-to-west down the island as it is pumped ashore from the borrow site” in the ocean off the town.

The company’s smaller dredge, the Liberty Island, will arrive onsite first and will generally progress and “leapfrog” east to west from Atlantic Beach and continue into Pine Knoll Shores, Rudolph said Thursday.

“At some point in mid-March the larger hopper dredge, the Ellis Island, will relieve the Liberty Island and continue leapfrogging down the beach to finish the effort in west Emerald Isle before the (Thursday) April 30 environmental window closes for the sea turtle nesting season and other biological resources,” he added.

Rudolph said Great Lakes should begin mobilizing land- and water-based pipe, heavy equipment and personnel this month.

Once things get underway, the dredges will travel and discharge sand through a buoyed pick-up pipeline offshore that transitions to the preconstruction dry beach via a submerged pipeline assembly, Rudolph said.

 A secondary elbow connection is used to transport material in one direction (east), then the other direction (west) along the beach to complete approximately 1- to 2-mile sections as lengths of pipe are added and subsequently broken down.

Heavy equipment spreads the sand and shapes the constructed beach.

The project will involve 1.995 million cubic yards of sand. Western Emerald Isle, Salter Path, Pine Knoll Shores and western Atlantic Beach will receive 345,000, 140,000, 990,000 and 520,000 cubic yards of sand, respectively, along 9.5 miles of beach.

A conventional dump truck holds about 12 cubic yards of wet sand, Rudolph said, so the total sand involved equates to about 167,000 dump truck loads.

The Liberty Island has a maximum capacity of 6,540 cubic yards and the Ellis Island has a capacity of 14,800 cubic yards under optimal conditions.

In a post on the Carteret County Shore Protection Office website, Rudolph added that project engineers will use prepositioned stations along the beach to monitor progress and verify volumes of sand added in those locations.

Regarding the financial aspect of the project, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has approved $34 million to reimburse Bogue Banks towns for sand lost during Hurricane Florence in September 2018, and that money will be available if needed to pay for this project when bills come due at completion. Alternately, it could be used in a future project.

The county completed Phase 1 of the Hurricane Florence sand replacement project in April 2019, placing about 1 million cubic yards of sand on beaches in eastern Emerald Isle, most of Salter Path and all of Indian Beach.

The project to begin in February will be funded largely by about $12 million from the beach nourishment fund, which gets half of the money from the county’s occupancy tax, and $15.3 million from $18 million the North Carolina General Assembly set aside last year to help local governments nourish beaches after Hurricane Florence, which robbed Bogue Banks of about 3.6 million cubic yards of sand.

Unlike in the past, the towns will not have to pony up money for the February-through-April project. The towns will, however, reimburse the county for money the county “up-fronted” for the project last year. All that reimbursement money to the county will come from funds reimbursed to the towns by FEMA for the cost of replacing sand lost during Florence.

In recent years, Ron Sutherland, chief scientist for the Seattle-based Wildlands Network, has seen increasing numbers of coastal and warm-weather species of frogs and anoles around his home in Durham and in the Research Triangle Area.

“They’re moving (from the south and east) as the winters get warmer,” he recently told Coastal Review Online. “It’s fairly obvious if you look.”

In particular, he’s noted an increasing abundance of squirrel frogs and green anoles, which have long lived in warmer and more coastal, even tropical, climates.

“They didn’t use to be here in nearly such large numbers,” he said, and the latter are now widespread at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.

But the change in the geographic distribution of critters isn’t limited to amphibians and reptiles. Some fish species are showing up in more northerly waters than in the past, said Sutherland. Manatees, famed in Florida, are making more appearances in North Carolina coastal waters, to the point where it’s almost normal to see them.

Armadillos – synonymous with Texas, according to the familiar song by Gary P. Nunn – are moving north and east and have been spotted in western North Carolina.

If they are moving, so are larger animals, like bears and wolves and foxes, not only because of climate change, but also because of rampant habitat loss as cities and towns sprawl into areas that once were wild, said Sutherland.

But the questions arise, how to protect these species? How to connect old habitats to potential new ones, across countless ever-growing ribbons of highways that serve hordes of pedal-to-the-metal motorists east of the Mississippi River? How, indeed, to preserve what’s left of wildlife in the East?

The Wildlands Network recently released a map, called the Eastern Wildway, which it announced Oct. 22 as “a bold vision for reconnecting and restoring wildlife habitat across eastern North America.” It’s a counterpart to the organization’s existing Western Wildway Map.

The new map covers much of the eastern North America, which the organization says is “home to a broad diversity of wildlife, including red wolves, Canada lynx, cougars, martens and other native carnivores. Many resident plants, birds, fish, salamanders, and butterflies are found nowhere else on Earth.”

The map is among the first large-scale conservation plans to show an ecologically prioritized, cross-section view of an entire continent, specifically the populous yet biodiverse eastern side of North America.

The map, Sutherland said, is intended to be “inspirational,” a way to encourage people and organizations to voluntarily protect existing habitats and find ways to connect them. He recently handed out 350 copies at a national land trust rally sponsored by The Nature Conservancy in Raleigh. Among the trusts represented were the North Carolina Coastal Land Trust, based in Wilmington and New Bern, which works to protect the state’s coastal habitat.

The dream, Sutherland said, is simple, the ambition big and the difficulty of achieving it high. But the need is great. A 2015 report by the Center for American Progress found that one in five species in the United States is threatened to become extinct because of habitat loss, fragmentation and climate change.

“Wildlands Network’s Wildway concept offers a solution for protecting native plants and animals by connecting the wild spaces these species need to survive, and supports renowned Harvard Biologist E.O. Wilson’s vision of designating ‘Half-Earth’ for nature in order to safeguard our planet’s biodiversity,” according to the announcement.

The goal, simply put, is to find ways to connect cores – large areas of intact natural habitat – through corridors, which wouldn’t be off-limits to people, to other cores.

The idea is to use existing parks, national forests and other protected areas, as well privately owned lands, and to get wildlife organizations, land trusts and conservancies and other environmental groups to help find ways to connect those. There’s also the chance, Sutherland said, of getting government funds.

“We’re proud of the way we’ve used the best available science to map out a robust vision for saving 85% or more of the biodiversity of the East Coast from extinction,” Sutherland said in a statement. “If protected, the Eastern Wildway habitat network would allow almost all native species to survive the ravages of rapid climate change and habitat destruction.”

Sutherland said he knows the federal government, as presently configured, and some state governments won’t be amenable to spending money. But, he said, there is bipartisan support in Congress for better funding of wildlife protection, noting as examples Reps. Don Beyer, D-Va., and Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., and Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M. In May, they introduced the Wildlife Corridors Conservation Act of 2019.

Sutherland also has hope that state governments will eventually see the wisdom of the idea and goal and commit more funds to habitat protection.

Finally, he said there are possibilities to induce substantial incentives for private landowners to participate voluntarily in protecting natural habitats and to encourage “significant ecological restoration, such as replanting native vegetation to establish wildlife corridors and expand core natural areas to sufficient size.”

Sutherland may be best known for his efforts to reintroduce and save red wolves in North Carolina and his successful efforts a few years ago with North Carolina State University’s forestry and environmental resources professor Fred Cubbage to keep the university from selling and allowing development of its Hofmann Research Forest in Jones and Onslow counties. Sutherland said he knows the challenges ahead.

“But there are,” he said, “a lot of people who believe in this concept.”

The key will be getting those people to work together, to commit to making it eventually happen, he said. Even under the best of circumstances, he said, it will take “a few decades, or more.”

But it’s not an impossible dream. Sutherland said he’s buoyed that conservation and environmental groups in North Carolina, ranging from those dedicated to protecting scenic rivers in the mountains to those in the east protecting coastal waters, believe in habitat protection for wildlife.

The groups have, he said, seen “large-scale development coming in” for decades, and understand the risks of not responding quickly.

“Once it’s gone,” he said of habitat, “it’s harder to get it back” than it would have been to protect it initially.

That problem is often particularly acute along the coast, he said, because as coastal cities grow, they can’t go farther east – the waters stop them. To expand, they must go west, tearing into habitat between their existing boundaries and those of towns farther inland.

It’s clear, Sutherland said, that time is of the essence to protect habitat. The longer it takes, the less land there is to protect and the less chance there is to make the crucial connections between them.

He said it will be important to mitigate barriers to animal migration, such as highways, using proven techniques like wildlife overpasses and underpasses. Fencing can also be used to keep wildlife off roads and funnel animals to the crossings.

There are, Sutherland said, plenty of examples where those things have worked. Examples include Canada’s Banff National Park, which is separated by the Trans-Canada Highway; along Interstate 75 in Collier and Lee counties in southern Florida; and in southern California.

The Florida crossings are largely intended for endangered Florida panther, but also benefit bobcats, deer and raccoons. In California, crossings work for bobcats, coyotes, gray fox, mule deer and long-tailed weasels, in such places as Orange, Riverside and Los Angeles counties. In Banff National Park in Canada, they aid deer, elk, black bear, grizzly bear, mountain lions, wolves, moose and coyotes.

Advocates say the crossings also reduce the incidence of dangerous and sometimes deadly – to humans and wildlife – vehicle-animal collisions.

The Eastern Wildway map, Sutherland said, serves as a blueprint for how and where all of this could work.

“The biggest challenge,” Sutherland said, is “to identify the species most at risk,” and begin, as soon as possible, steps to protect them.

He said the Wildway map is a tool to help that process.

Wildlands Network Eastern Program Director Christine Laporte put it this way: “This is a unique and high-value resource for anyone working on conservation in eastern North America. We invite partners to contact us to see how it can provide inspiration and robust scientific information for your work.”

Sutherland said the Wildlands Network staff had been talking about the wildway concept even before he arrived, but got serious about the Eastern project in early 2017.

To create the Eastern Wildway Map, Wildlands Network used a wide range of existing datasets and feedback from conservationists across the region. Data sources include Wildlands Network’s own connectivity models, as well as state and federal agencies, other groups, such as The Nature Conservancy and The Wilderness Society, and academic researchers.

“It took a lot of work by a lot of people,” Sutherland said. “We’re proud of it.”

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

CEDAR POINT — After months of delay caused mostly by tree damage from Hurricane Florence, the town’s park along the White Oak River will open to the public for the first time at 8 a.m. Friday.

Commissioner John Nash made the announcement during the town board’s monthly meeting Oct. 22 in town hall off Sherwood Avenue.

Speaking during commission comments, Nash said the 56-acre, heavily wooded park will temporarily be called Boathouse Creek Walking Trails in Cedar Point.

Boathouse Creek leads to the river and park land abuts both waterways. However, Nash said the town will seek a permanent name for the park in the future, with input from residents.

“Don Redfearn (public works director) and his team have worked diligently to get the park ready for public access,” Nash said.

Workers for a contractor also had to get rid of dangling branches, remove some fallen trees from the hiking trails and mark trails so people won’t get lost in the dense woods.

There’s a gate at the entrance to the park on Masonic Avenue, and it will be opened daily at 8 a.m. and closed at 7 p.m., Nash added.

There are five to eight “semi-delineated” parking spaces inside a small area to the left beyond the gate. There are also two handicap parking spaces.

Initially, the park will be for walking, enjoying nature and fishing, Nash said. There is abundant wildlife and a cornucopia of native flora.

One of the trails is a mile long, another is 0.8 miles and a third is 0.4 miles. Each is marked with reflective signs of a different color. There is a dock, but it will remain closed to the public for safety reasons.

The town is seeking a $150,000 state Parks and Recreation Trust Fund grant to buy and build a kayak launch, dock and permeable parking lot.

The town bought the 56-acre waterfront tract for $2.8 million in April from the North Carolina Masons, with the intent of offering passive recreation and providing a stormwater runoff buffer between nearby residential development and the river in order to protect and enhance water quality. Passive recreational uses such as wildlife observation, walking and hiking are considered the least damaging to wetland ecosystems.

Cedar Point had partnered with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, North Carolina Department of Transportation, University of North Carolina and East Carolina University on various water quality projects intended to help improve the White Oak River.

The property had previously been zoned for multi-family development.

The park includes all of the remaining undeveloped Masonic property in town except the historic Octagon House and its grounds.

Nash said for now, there will be no restrooms on park property and no trash receptacles. He said anyone who hikes should pack out what they bring along.

All state laws are applicable within the park, and the property will be patrolled by the town’s sheriff’s deputy, Kurt Nokamura, and others from the sheriff’s department when needed. There will be no town staff on site.

Nash urged anyone who uses the park to “be aware of your surroundings,” and said if someone calls 911, law enforcement or the Western Carteret Fire and EMS Department, located nearby on Sherwood Avenue, will respond.

“We hope you enjoy the park,” said Nash, who added that the town has a long-range plan developed by a consulting engineering firm for the property.

Features in that plan, which Nash said will take shape in “baby steps” as the town can afford them, include a parking lot with a restroom and shelter, paved and natural trails, a nature play area, three water view platforms, a fishing pier, kayak and canoe launch with a drop-off area away from the water, a single-stall waterless bathroom, a bench, swing and hammock area close to the water, an open space, a picnic area and a living shoreline to protect against erosion.

The town took possession of the property in April, about five months after voters in November 2018 overwhelmingly approved a bond referendum to pay for it.

Officials have told taxpayers the town will seek grants to help defray the 3-cent property tax hike that went into effect July 1 to pay off the bonds, which were bought by Sterling National Bank of New York.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Marine Fisheries Service in August released its 2018 annual report on the status of U.S. fisheries to Congress, and the good news is that the total number of stocks on the overfishing list remained near all-time lows and one previously overfished stock was rebuilt.

In addition, new information became available last year for several stocks, which resulted in first-time status determinations with only one of the stocks subject to overfishing as well as being overfished.

The bad news, though, is that, “The total number of stocks listed as overfished increased, due to a number of factors, including those outside the control of domestic fisheries management.”

More recently, North Carolina’s fisheries director said neither of the federal lists includes two of the state’s most important species in need of rebuilding.

Understanding the report requires defining terms used by the National Marine Fisheries Service, an office of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “Overfishing” means a stock has a harvest rate higher than the rate that produces its maximum sustainable yield, or MSY, which is the goal of U.S. management plans and represents an average long-term catch that can be taken from a stock under prevailing environmental and fishery conditions without damaging it for the future. “Overfished” means a stock has a population size that is too low and jeopardizes the stock’s ability to produce its MSY. “Rebuilt” means a stock was previously overfished and has increased in abundance to the target population size that supports its MSY.

“As a population size,” the report states, “‘overfished’ can be the result of many factors, including overfishing, as well as habitat degradation, pollution, climate change and disease. While overfishing is sometimes the main cause of an overfished stock, these other factors can also play a role and may affect the stock’s ability to rebuild.”

“At the end of 2018, the overfishing list included 28 stocks, and the overfished list included 43 stocks,” according to the report’s summary.

Gulf of Maine smooth skate was the fishery rebuilt in 2018, according to the report, “and the total number of stocks rebuilt since 2000 has increased to 45.”

NOAA, through its system of regional fishery management councils, which regulate waters from 3 to 200 miles offshore in the oceans, assesses 479 stocks or stock complexes in 46 fishery management plans. Stock assessments are the “backbone of effective fisheries management,” according to the report.

According to NOAA, sustainable fisheries, “play an important role in the nation’s economy.” U.S. commercial and recreational saltwater fishing generated more than $212 billion in sales and supported 1.7 million jobs in 2016. “

In North Carolina, both recreational and commercial fishing are important to the economy. The state Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries pegged the dock value of all commercial landings, shellfish and finish, at about $77.9 million in 2018. The division doesn’t have a value figure for recreational fishing, although estimates by recreational fishing groups peg related economic activity in the billions per year.

Steve Murphey, director of the fisheries division, said the state is doing a good job managing commercial species – also caught by recreational anglers – for sustainable yield in state waters, out to the 3-mile mark, although he conceded there are “problems and challenges.”

Because of their value, blue crabs and southern flounder, neither of which are on either of NOAA’s lists, are among the biggest problems in the state’s fisheries, Murphey said.

Based on North Carolina’s most recent stock assessment completed earlier this year, the state listed the southern flounder as overfished and undergoing overfishing. As a result, the state Marine Fisheries Commission, the policymaking arm of the fisheries division, on Aug. 23 gave final approval to controversial changes to the state management plan, using commercial and recreational season closures and other measures in an effort to end overfishing and rebuild stocks.

Recreational anglers, effective Sept. 4, weren’t allowed to catch and keep them, and the season won’t reopen until sometime next year at the earliest.

Commercial southern flounder fishermen are under new gear restrictions, and inshore commercial fishermen have a significantly restricted season that won’t start until fall.

In 2018, according to division statistics, southern flounder landings in the state totaled about 903,000 pounds, worth about $3.8 million, making it one of the state’s most valuable catches. But that was down from 1.4 million pounds, worth $5.6 million in 2017.

Murphey said he hopes the restrictions can lead to a recovery of the stock within four to five years, but the “quicker the better.” He said it’s a problem for fishermen, but explained that proper management is essential for the long-term health of the stock and the future of the fishery and the fishermen.

As for blue crabs, the division’s 2018 stock assessment determined that it is overfished and that overfishing was occurring. The state determined that at least a 0.4% reduction in the number of crabs harvested, compared to 2016, is needed to end overfishing. At least a 2.2% reduction in the number of crabs harvested in 2016 is needed to achieve sustainable harvest within 10 years.

Public comments were accepted until Oct. 3 on Draft Amendment 3 to the state’s Blue Crab Fishery Management Plan, which is also under fisheries commission advisory committee review. The amendment includes several options for achieving the harvest reductions. The Marine Fisheries Commission is scheduled to consider public comment and advisory committee input and select its preferred management measures for departmental and legislative review at its November meeting and give final approval of the amendment in February 2020. Approved management measures will be implemented shortly afterward by proclamation.

Murphey said the crab stock will likely recover more quickly than the southern flounder stock, in part because much of last year’s harvest reduction was because of Hurricane Florence, which ravaged the North Carolina coast in September and halted a lot of harvesting. Landings in 2017 totaled about 18 million pounds but that dropped to about 16.4 million in 2018. Both years, according to division statistics, the value of the harvest topped $17 million.

“I think we should see a return relatively quickly,” Murphey said, referring to expected positive results from management measures on crabs.

Murphey said there are no simple answers when managing fisheries stocks along the entire North Carolina coast.

“It’s tough to explain (restrictions) to fishermen,” he added, noting that management measures had produced results and would continue to do so.

In the federal waters, based on fisheries service 2018 assessments, seven stocks were removed from the overfishing list and five were added, but the status of one stock was previously unknown, according to the report. The additions resulted from stock assessments or data showing catch was too high. Eight stocks were added to the overfished list, of which one stock’s status was previously unknown.

In federal waters off North Carolina, Atlantic bigeye tuna were added to the overfished list, as were Atlantic mackerel from the Gulf of Maine to Hatteras.

In the western Atlantic, bigeye tuna can be found from Southern Nova Scotia to Brazil. Atlantic mackerel are found on both sides of the North Atlantic Ocean, including in the Baltic Sea. In the western Atlantic, they’re found from Labrador, Canada, to North Carolina.

In the Mid-Atlantic region, from New England to the North Carolina-Virginia border, summer flounder remained on the overfishing list but were not on the overfished list.

And in the South Atlantic region, from the North Carolina-Virginia border to the tip of Florida, red snapper, Warsaw Grouper, red porgy, snowy grouper, red grouper, hogfish, speckled hind, tilefish and blueline tilefish remained on one or both lists. Red grouper were removed from the overfishing list but remained on the overfished list.

The other species added to or removed from one or both of the federal lists were from the Pacific, Puerto Rico or the Gulf of Mexico.

“By ending overfishing and rebuilding stocks, we are strengthening the value of U.S. fisheries to the economy, our communities, and marine ecosystems and providing sustainable seafood for the nation,” the NOAA report states.

“In 2018, in conjunction with the councils, we reviewed all of our fishery regulations to identify those that should be removed or revised to further reduce regulatory constraints and optimize fishery benefits. As a result, we finalized 10 deregulatory actions that resulted in $695 million in cost-savings,” according to the report.

NOAA’s report adds that, “Many of the stocks added to the overfishing and overfished list have been impacted by environmental factors or international harvest that the United States has limited ability to control.”

The report states that, “The eight stocks added to the 2018 overfished list illustrate numerous challenges inherent in fisheries management. Environmental change, habitat degradation, and international fishing contributed to the status of the eight new overfished stocks.”

The report cites as an example that relatively warm water conditions may be affecting the growth and reproduction of the cold-water Saint Matthew Island blue king crab, which has never been subject to overfishing, and fishing for the crab had been prohibited since 2016.

In addition, the report states that warm ocean conditions had reduced the number of spawning coho salmon returning to their natal rivers, and both Chinook and coho salmon have been impacted by habitat degradation caused by drought and lack of sufficient water for spawning.

The report adds that during the past five years, several of the salmon fisheries were declared fishery disasters “due to factors beyond the control of fishery managers.”

The agency also released in 2018 a new plan to improve the agency’s stock assessments.

Reprinted with permission from Carteret County News-Times

PINE KNOLL SHORES — The Carteret County Beach Commission voted unanimously Monday during its meeting to accept a $28.2 million bid for a Bogue Banks beach nourishment project to begin early next year.

The county opened bids for the beach project Friday in Emerald Isle with Great Lakes Dredge and Dock Co. of Illinois submitting the low and winning bid,  nearly $2 million below the projection of Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office.

Work will start in western Atlantic Beach in February. After completing that work, the project will move into Pine Knoll Shores and a small portion of Salter Path, then western Emerald Isle near the beginning of April.

Initially expected to begin work in November, the change in the schedule was needed because Great Lakes had other commitments. Rudolph said the anticipated project should be finished before the beginning of the 2020 tourism season.

Rudolph said that the price was especially gratifying because more sand is involved in this project than in the winter-spring 2019 project, which totaled less than 1 million cubic yards of sand and cost $20.1 million. The coming project is to be about 2 million cubic yards.

Rudolph said Monday that Pine Knoll Shores and Atlantic Beach won’t have to contribute funds for the work but will be funded by the county’s beach nourishment fund, with state and Federal Emergency Management Agency money.

Rudolph said that Indian Beach will repay the county for the last project with more than $6 million from FEMA soon, contributing to the county fund.  In addition to FEMA money, the project will be funded by about $12 million from the county nourishment fund and $15.3 million from the $18 million the General Assembly set aside last year to help local governments nourish beaches after Hurricane Florence, which robbed Bogue Banks of about 3.6 million cubic yards of sand.

Reprinted with permission from the Carteret County News-Times

CEDAR POINT — The North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund awarded the town a $1,011,756 grant Friday to help pay for 56 acres it purchased in April for a park on the White Oak River.

The town worked with the North Carolina Coastal Federation to get the grant from the state organization, which gives nonprofits and local governments money for projects and acquisitions that protect or enhance water quality.

The Cedar Point grant was one of the largest of the 34 the Clean Water Management Trust Fund board approved in a 2019 package that totaled more than $14 million.

The state Clean Water Management Trust Fund was established by the state General Assembly in 1996 as a nonregulatory organization. It receives money from annual appropriations by the legislature and the sale of scenic river license plates.

Mayor Scott Hatsell said Saturday he was “floored” when he got the news.

“I’ve always thought this project was deserving, and it helped to have the Coastal Federation working with us,” he said. “But you never know what the people who control this money are thinking, what they think is worthy. Evidently they were thinking right, and we’re very grateful.

“I’m excited, really pumped, and so is Jayne (Calhoun, town clerk and interim town administrator who worked on the grant application),” Hatsell, an avid kayaker and hiker, added. “We really want to get the water (adjacent to the property) cleaned up the best we can.”

Already, the mayor said, he’d reached out to Todd Miller, founder and executive director of the Coastal Federation, for a list of things to do – like planting oysters and creating living shorelines – that will help in that effort.

Hatsell knows these projects can work and cited the city of Jacksonville, which has worked for many years to clean up the New River.

On Jacksonville’s Facebook page, officials state that the river was so polluted in 1995 that a “massive hog waste spill did not have significant negative effects because the river was so organically dead.”

Jacksonville officials, scientists and volunteers led efforts to restore the New River with water-filtering oysters, aeration, bolstered wetlands and stormwater mitigation efforts. Now it’s a magnet for fishing and other water-based recreational activities.

Hatsell said the White Oak, adjacent to the town’s property, isn’t nearly as bad off as the New River was, but there’s room for improvement.

He and other town officials have stressed the purchase was intended not just for a park, but also to maintain and possibly improve water quality in the river.

The Cedar Point grant is listed on the Clean Water Management Trust Fund website as a “military buffer” acquisition project, because the town’s purchase of the land off Masonic Avenue will preclude development of the property, which is within the flight path of jets that use Bogue Field, an auxiliary landing facility for U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point in Havelock. Bogue Field, in the town of Bogue, is 2.6 miles east of Cedar Point on N.C. 24.

The land had been zoned for multi-family development, which could have put residents at risk if a jet crash occurred.

It also would have dramatically increased impervious surface, which would have increased the flow of polluted stormwater into the river.

The town closed on the $2.8 million purchase from the North Carolina Masons after a more than yearlong process that led first to a successful $2.5 million bond referendum.

A 3-cent property tax increase, from 6.25 to 9.25 cents per $100 of assessed value, went into effect July 1 to help pay for the purchase.

Town officials told residents they would try to use grant money to reduce or eliminate the tax increase, which had to go into effect before the fate of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund grant application was known.

The town already received one grant for $250,000 from the North Carolina Coastal Land Trust, and used that money as a down payment on the purchase, reducing the amount borrowed. The town has also applied for a $500,000 grant from the North Carolina Parks and Recreation Trust Fund and should get word on that soon. That money could be used for park development.

Sterling National Bank of New York bought the bonds, and the town is scheduled to pay the bank back over no more than 20 years with four payments each year.

Hatsell said he knows property owners in town will expect some kind of a tax decrease next fiscal year and he’s convinced it can be done.

The bank that bought the bonds allows two “buy-downs,” he said, “and you want to make sure that when you do that, it’s a big chunk of money.”

The land is to be used mostly as a passive recreation area. It has existing trails, which the town has already marked, and a master plan developed for the town by The Wooten Co., a Raleigh-based engineering and planning firm, calls for an entrance off Masonic Avenue.

Other planned improvements include a parking lot with a restroom and shelter, paved and natural trails, a nature play area, three water view platforms, a fishing pier, a kayak and canoe launch with a drop-off area away from the water, a single-stall waterless bathroom closer to the water, a bench, swing and hammock area close to the shore, an open space events lawn, a picnic area and a living shoreline to protect against erosion.

There are also proposals for a kayak and canoe storage area, boardwalks, an outdoor classroom and shelter, a pond and a vegetative buffer between the park and nearby residences. Wetlands, which are scattered through the site, will be protected, and the project is designed to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

None of this will happen right away.

The goal for now is to get the natural trails open to the public. Hurricane Florence in September 2018 downed many large trees and left other trees with dangling branches. The town hired a contractor to remove the trees and branches.

Hatsell said Saturday the town is “getting really close” to opening the land to the public.

Reprinted with permission from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — Carteret County Shore Protection Office Manager Greg Rudolph said early Friday morning Bogue Banks beaches appear at first blush to have fared well during Hurricane Dorian.

“So far it’s looking good,” he said after making his way through part of Emerald Isle, in the Ocean Oaks area, which was not nourished as part of a sand project completed this spring. Ocean Oaks is off Coast Guard Road in the western end of town.

“I’ve passed through part of the nourished area, too, and it looks really good; it held up well,” Rudolph said.

The nourishment project in Emerald Isle was from the border with Indian Beach to the “dogleg” of Ocean Drive. Most of Salter Path and all of Indian Beach also received sand in the project.

Mr. Rudolph said he expects the rest of Bogue Banks, down to Atlantic Beach at the eastern end, probably fared as well as what he had seen Friday morning in Emerald Isle.

“The storm was remarkably reminiscent of Hurricane Matthew (in 2016),” he said. “Same path, pretty much the same forward speed.”

Matthew was a Category 1 storm transitioning to a tropical storm, while Dorian was a Category 2 storm that transitioned to a Category 1 as it approached the county. Neither made a landfall in in the county, but were not far offshore when they passed by.

Although county officials in 2016 at first feared Matthew might have eroded the beaches, the county’s survey after that storm, by Geodynamics of Newport, showed it actually pushed sand up from the nearshore waters of the ocean to the flat beach, resulting in a net gain, or accretion, instead of erosion.

Rudolph said Friday it’s too early to say if Dorian resulted in accretion because it’s hard to tell what happened to the sand in the nearshore waters. But he said the county will almost surely get Geodynamics to do a survey as soon as possible. He contacted the firm earlier this week and its crews are ready to work.

He’ll also complete his own so-called “windshield” survey of the island as soon as possible and should have more firsthand observations to report.

Earlier in the week, Rudolph said he wasn’t sure if the county would do a full survey after Dorian, in part because of the similarities between its path and that of Matthew. But, he said Friday morning, he feels like people will want the survey to know exactly what happened in case sand was lost.

A survey is necessary if the county wants to apply for Federal Emergency Management Agency funds to reimburse the cost of replacing the sand. The survey includes 122 beach “profiles” from the eastern tip of Atlantic Beach at Beaufort Inlet to the western tip of Emerald Isle at Bogue Inlet, a distance of more than 25 miles.

Hurricane Florence last September robbed Bogue Banks of millions of cubic yards of sand, and Emerald Isle alone is seeking more than $40 million in FEMA money for the cost of replacing it in the project this spring.

The county is planning another nourishment project for this fall in western Atlantic Beach, all of Pine Knoll Shores, a small part of Salter Path and western Emerald Isle, and officials hope FEMA money for the Florence nourishment will help pay for it.

The bid opening for that project is scheduled for 5 p.m. Tuesday at the shore protection office in Emerald Isle.

Reprinted from Carteret County News-Times

CEDAR POINT — The master plan for the new park on the White Oak River is taking shape, and officials hope to have it posted on the town website soon for public comment.

Town Administrator Chris Seaberg, whose last day with the town was Tuesday, said last week he’s pleased with the work of The Wooten Co., a Raleigh-based engineering and planning firm the town hired earlier this year to lay out a plan for the 56-acre site, with input from staff and commissioners.

“They did a great job,” said Seaberg, who is set to begin as Swansboro’s town manager Sept. 3. “We want to get a big map up in the town hall, and we want to get the map on the website so people can see it there, too, and leave comments.”

Once the public has had a chance to comment, commissioners will finalize the plan for completion by The Wooten Co., Seaberg said.

The park is intended for passive recreation – picnics, viewing wildlife and hiking – and to serve as a buffer to protect and enhance water quality in the river. The town bought the land, off Masonic Avenue, from the N.C. Masons for $2.8 million.

So far, the plan shows an entrance off Masonic Avenue to a parking lot with a restroom and shelter; paved and natural trails throughout the property; a nature play area; three water view platforms; a fishing pier; a kayak and canoe launch with a drop-off area away from the water; a single-stall waterless bathroom; a bench, swing and hammock area close to the water; an open space/events lawn; a picnic area; and a living shoreline to protect against erosion.

There is also a kayak and canoe storage area, as well as boardwalks, an outdoor classroom/shelter, a pond and a vegetative buffer between the park and nearby residences

The plan shows 2,000-foot road, 2,350 feet of improved multi-use trail, 4,025 feet of natural trail and 1,730 feet of boardwalk. It also shows a future boardwalk connection across water and marsh to the 2-mile Tideland National Recreation Trail in the Cedar Point Recreation Area, which includes a campground and a launch for shallow-draft boats, in the Croatan National Forest.

The plan shows 60 parking spaces, with 40 of them away from the water at the entrance to the park.

Wetlands, which are scattered throughout the site, will be protected, and the project is designed to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

None of the improvements are set to happen immediately, and officials have said some features are a good way down the road.

The goal for now is to get the natural trails open to the public. Officials hoped to get them open sooner, but Hurricane Florence last September downed many large trees and left other trees with dangerously dangling branches. The town hired a contractor to remove the trees and branches.

In addition, the town public works department has been putting up small metal signs to mark the trails so hikers won’t get lost.

“Great strides have been made in the cleanup efforts,” Seaberg wrote on the town’s website. “Paths are cleared and trail heads are marked. Town staff is working furiously to get this place open for … use and enjoyment.”

There are three major trails through the property, each to be marked with different signs to make them easy to see in the sometimes deep and dark woods, which are replete with wildlife and coastal and woodland vegetation. There are plans for educational signage, as well.

Most of the property is under a conservation easement, so development must be limited and in specific areas.

The land, originally zoned for residential development, includes all of the undeveloped property formerly owned by the N.C. Masons, with the exception of the site of the historic Octagon House.

Voters approved a bond referendum in 2018 to purchase the property and the town raised taxes this year to 9.25 cents per $100 of assessed value to cover the cost. Officials are also seeking grants.

Sterling National Bank of New York bought the bonds, which the town will pay the bank back over no more than 20 years with four payments each year.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a tri-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

MOREHEAD CITY — Analysis of nearly 120 years of tropical storm and hurricane landing data and associated rainfall in coastal North Carolina shows that climate change is creating a feedback loop that suggests increasingly frequent flooding and economic damage are likely along the coast.

That’s a general conclusion of research led by Hans Paerl, Kenan Professor of Marine and Environmental Sciences at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Institute of Marine Sciences. The research findings and conclusions were in the paper, “Recent increase in catastrophic tropical cyclone flooding in coastal North Carolina, USA: Long-term observations suggest a regime shift,” published July 23 in Nature Research’s Scientific Reports.

The study’s authors stress that officials and stakeholders “need to better prepare for the acute as well as cumulative water quality, fisheries resource and overall socio-economic effects of this recently-documented rise in catastrophic flooding associated with elevated tropical storm activity.”

The rainfall data, compiled by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, show that six of the seven highest precipitation events since 1898 have occurred within the last 20 years, Paerl said in a recent interview.

Those events include hurricanes Floyd in 1999, Matthew in 2016 and Florence in 2019. Those three resulted in abnormally large floods, Paerl said, and the chance of that happening such a short time frame is less than 2%.

As he writes in the paper, “… either North Carolina has been very unlucky, or the historical record used to define the storm statistics is no longer representative of the present climatic regime.

“This analysis suggests that the occurrence of three extreme floods resulting from high rainfall tropical cyclone events in the past 20 years is a consequence of the increased moisture carrying capacity of tropical cyclones due to the warming climate.”

More CO₂ washes to sea, escapes to atmosphere

So, what are the ramifications for our estuarine and coastal ecosystems? Paerl said that receiving ecosystems are becoming overloaded by the frequency of the rainstorms and the sheer amount of rainfall, as well as the nutrient- and organic matter-laden runoff from the watersheds of the Neuse River estuary and Pamlico Sound.

Although the study was not meant to be predictive, he said, the increased runoff means more organic, carbon-based materials enter from the watersheds and are broken down into carbon dioxide, or CO₂, by aquatic microbes. As a result, he said, “more CO₂ is generated and reenters the atmosphere.”

The process adds to CO₂ levels that already are in part responsible for heating the planet and resulting in the likelihood of even stronger and more frequent tropical storms and other rainstorms. It’s a major “feedback loop,” Paerl said. And since the effects can last for months, there is less time for ecosystems to recover — a scenario of increased frequency of storms with higher rainfall content.

“Evidence is accumulating that we may also be seeing changes to the ‘system state’ of coastal waters in terms of their ability to capture or release CO₂,” Paerl writes. “Such changes caused by an increased frequency of extreme storm events are ostensibly reorganizing coastal carbon cycles.”

Paerl cites as examples flood waters reaching the inner shelf of the Gulf of Mexico that have resulted in extensive degradation of terrestrial organic matter and the return of that carbon as CO₂ to the atmosphere. This bio-geochemistry is linked to water quality.

“Floodwater-associated nutrients have been shown to promote harmful algal blooms in these systems,” according to Paerl. “Floodwaters contain contaminants and runoff from urban and agricultural land use, and due to their high organic load, flood waters often lead to hypoxic (low in oxygen) conditions when they enter an estuary. This is evident in the low (dissolved oxygen) values in the upper (Neuse River estuary) following each storm.”

Also, the big flows of freshwater lead to an “oil and vinegar” situation, with the relatively light freshwater sitting on top of the denser saltwater. “This reduces vertical mixing and organic matter is ‘trapped’ in the denser, salty bottom water, causing extensive hypoxia in bottom waters extending throughout the estuary. These hypoxic events can last weeks to months and provide the ingredients for massive finfish and shellfish kills, as well as an abrupt increase in fish disease.”

All of these things – fish and shellfish kills, floods and more frequent and stronger tropical events – pose serious threats to coastal North Carolina residents and the economy, the study finds. That includes severe economic and societal implications for fisheries, tourism and real estate, in addition to increased concerns about coastal resiliency and sustainability.

In North Carolina, Hurricane Floyd in 1999 caused fisheries losses of $6 million and tourism losses, property and business damage and losses in agriculture and forest management losses amounted to $2 billion.

Analysis of Florence’s longer-term impacts are continuing, the study finds, and while the hydrologic, nutrient and carbon inputs attributable to Florence are yet to be fully tallied, the rainfall associated with the storm was roughly equivalent to Matthew in 2016.

As with Floyd and Matthew, Hurricane Florence’s floodwaters led to “freshening” and expanding hypoxic zones in the Albemarle Pamlico system, with “massive pulses of carbon” overflowing into adjacent coastal waters, as was observed from space. The effects can linger for months after a storm, Paerl added.

“Rather than attributing a particular event to global warming, we should consider whether a warming climate made these events more likely, which our records suggest is the case for coastal NC.”

Paerl, et al.

And, he noted in the interview, none of these storms were classified as “major” hurricanes – Category 3, 4 or 5 – when they made landfall and affected North Carolina. Floyd was a Category 2, while Matthew and Florence were both Category 1 storms, yet they carried enough rainfall to cause massive flooding.

“Rather than attributing a particular event to global warming, we should consider whether a warming climate made these events more likely, which our records suggest is the case for coastal NC,” Paerl writes in the report.

Examples of this change include the increased precipitation in other coastal areas, including the Texas coast during Hurricane Harvey in 2017. Increased hurricane activity since 1970 has also been attributed to global warming.

Factors driving the increased precipitation include hotter ocean waters, a condition that not only fuels storm intensity but also increases precipitation, and slower forward movement of tropical cyclones, which means heavy precipitation lingers over a particular area, as seen on the North Carolina coast during Florence. Also, an observed poleward migration of tropical cyclones could make coastal North Carolina more vulnerable than in the past. Increased tropical cyclone intensity is another factor.

Ocean temperatures in recent years “have broken all sorts of records” in both the Atlantic and Pacific basins, Paerl said.

Additionally, the world’s population – and North Carolina’s – is growing, further increasing use of carbon-based fuels that contribute to climate change and increasing the amount of hardened surface on land, fomenting more runoff. North Carolina’s population in 1990 was 6.6 million, and by 2018, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, it was 10.3 million.

So what, if anything, can be done?

Paerl said it has become increasingly evident that we need to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. Also, as individuals, he said, we can reduce the harmful effects of flooding by “not developing” properties “down to the water’s edge,” instead keeping or putting in vegetative buffers that help filter out pollutants before they reach creeks, rivers and estuaries.

Farmers, he said, have done a better job in recent years of maintaining riparian buffers, but city planners and state leaders need to increase their efforts along those lines as well. If we must use them, fertilizers need to be applied at rates just enough for crop production, while avoiding excesses.

“We should minimize fertilizer application during hurricane season; one wet storm can lead to major losses of fertilizer to downstream, nutrient-sensitive waters,” he said.

To limit property and economic damage when floods occur, Paerl said, we should cease building in flood plains.

“There’s a reason flood plains are called ‘flood plains,’” Paerl said, noting that the term refers to areas more likely to flood often. Rebuilding in flood-prone areas should be carefully considered and at least limited, he said.

The extreme precipitation and the resulting effects are clearly unparalleled in the past 120-plus years of recorded tropical cyclones in coastal North Carolina, Paerl writes. “The potential exists for receiving waters globally to undergo unprecedented perturbations to nutrient and carbon cycling, fisheries habitat and sustainability due to increasing frequency of extreme precipitation events; all of which are still to be determined.”

And with roughly 40% of the world’s population within 100 kilometers of the coast, development inland, as well as along the coastline, will exacerbate the problems, Paerl writes. “We stress that stakeholders, state and federal governments need to better prepare for the acute as well as cumulative water quality, fisheries resource and overall socioeconomic effects of this recently-documented rise in catastrophic flooding associated with elevated tropical storm activity.”

Others listed as authors of the report are Nathan S. Hall, a research assistant professor at UNC-IMS; Alexandria G. Hounshell, a UNC-IMS grad student; Rick Luettich, UNC-IMS director and professor; Karen L. Rossignol, a research specialist in the Paerl Lab; Christopher L. Osburn, a researcher and professor at N.C. State University; and Jerad Bales, chief scientist for water at the U.S. Geological Service.

Funding for the research came from the National Science Foundation, the state Department of Environmental Quality, the Lower Neuse Basin Association, North Carolina Sea Grant and the UNC Water Resources Institute.

Learn More

• Neuse River Estuary Modeling and Monitoring Project 

Reprinted with permission from the Carteret County News-Times

EMERALD ISLE — Carteret County officials hope to begin a beach renourishment project on Bogue Banks by mid-November for western Atlantic Beach, Pine Knoll Shores, the far western end of Emerald Isle and a portion of Salter Path left out of the last project completed this spring.

Greg Rudolph, manager of the Carteret County Shore Protection Office, said Monday he believes bids will go out to potential contractors in the middle of August and work should be finished no later than the end of April. The price tag could be as much as $30 million.

The cost of the last project, which included eastern Emerald Isle, Indian Beach and most of Salter Path, was about $21 million.

Phase one of the new project would be paid for – if bids are within range – with a combination of local funds, including town money, the county beach nourishment funds and state money.

If all goes as expected, the county would then tackle a second project, Phase 2, to include central Emerald Isle, roughly from the Ocean Drive dogleg to the Western Ocean Regional Access, next fall or winter. That would be bid separately to contractors next year.

Initially, the county hoped to bid the entire project as a base and an option, even though they might have been conducted over a two-year period.

But, Rudolph said, that optimistic plan was in large part predicated on the towns involved receiving Federal Emergency Management Agency funds to reimburse the costs of replacing sand lost during Hurricane Florence last September. That now appears very unlikely to happen before the bids go out in mid-August for Phase 1.

Rudolph said the county went back to the drawing board and decided not to bid phase two as an option. The county should have all the funds available for phase one in time to award a contract and have construction begin in November.

“We should have around $15 to maybe $16 million in the beach nourishment fund by then,” he said. That money comes from half of the occupancy tax revenue the county generates. The rest of the money – as much as half of the cost – will come from the state.

The state General Assembly, Rudolph said, last year set aside $18 million to help local governments with beach renourishment projects after Florence. Luckily for Carteret County, only one other local government, Oak Island, applied, and the town’s project is expected to cost $3-4 million. That leaves Carteret County with the rest.

“It’s official,” Rudolph said Monday. “It is ours.”

Initially, he added, the county hoped to get at least $3-5 million in state money. What this means, he said, is that if bids for phase one come in within budget and the FEMA money eventually arrives – the county has applied for $60 million in FEMA sand money – phase two can be funded entirely with FEMA and town money.

There’s not yet a firm estimate of the cost of that project.

“This should work out good for everybody,” Rudolph said of the timetable. “It (the whole project) was probably going to be split over two years even if we had bid it out as a base and an option, so separating it doesn’t really make any difference.”

What it does, he said, is enable the county to tackle the areas that need the sand the most as soon as possible. Pine Knoll Shores’ beaches haven’t been renourished in many years, nor have the beaches in western Atlantic Beach, although eastern Atlantic Beach has regularly receives free sand from the dredging projects at the North Carolina Port of Morehead City.

The portion of Salter Path left undone in the spring 2019 project, around the county’s beach access facility, also has not been renourished in a long time.

The spring project completed this year covered 5.2 miles of beach between the Indian Beach/Pine Knoll Shores town boundary and the access ramp on Ocean Drive in Emerald Isle and totaled 975,647 cubic yards of sand, deposited and usable in time for the summer and the next hurricane season. It also included reconstruction of damaged dunes and the planting of vegetation to help the keep the dunes in place to offer hurricane protection.

Rudolph called that a “nice accomplishment.”

The combined Phase 1 and Phase 2 projects should cover 15.6 miles of beach, adding up to as much as 2.9 million cubic yards of sand.

If all goes as envisioned, the estimates are: Pine Knoll Shores, 716,310 cubic yards; central Emerald Isle, 472,316 cubic yards; western Atlantic Beach, 428,970 cubic yards; western Emerald Isle, including the Bogue Inlet area, 927,280 cubic yards; and the Salter Path “hole,” 90,090 cubic yards.

Basically, Rudolph said Monday, when the new project is complete, everyone on the island should be able to say their beaches have been nourished within the past two calendar years.

This story is provided courtesy of the Carteret County News-Times, a tri-weekly newspaper published in Morehead City. Coastal Review Online partners with the News-Times to provide our readers with news of the North Carolina coast.

MOREHEAD CITY – Charles “Pete” Peterson, who retired June 30 as distinguished professor at the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences, credits his time as a graduate student at the University of California Santa Barbara for his combination of passionate environmental activism and rigorous, world-renowned marine research.

It wasn’t, Peterson said last week, his parents’ idea of a suitable academic path for someone who’d earned his undergraduate degree in biology at Princeton University in 1968.

Princeton, after all, was and still is an elite, private Ivy League school.

UCSB?

“I had trouble telling my parents,” Peterson recalled about a week after his retirement after 43 years at UNC-Chapel Hill and its marine science laboratory in Morehead City. “It wasn’t UCLA (University of California Los Angeles) or Southern Cal (University of Southern California),” which were the flagship schools of the California system. “It was known as a ‘surfing school.’”

But it turned out to be the right place at the right time. In 1969, the year before Peterson earned his master’s degree in biology with a minor in oceanography at UCSB, picturesque coastal Santa Barbara was the site of what was, until the Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of crude off the coast of Alaska in 1989, the largest oil spill in the nation’s history.

The Santa Barbara spill spewed an estimated 3 million gallons of crude oil into the Pacific, creating a 35-mile-long oil slick and killing thousands of fish, sea mammals and birds. It was a disaster of epic scale. But for a budding young marine scientist, the tragedy was also inspiration and a research opportunity. Fifty years later, Peterson clearly remembers volunteering in a Santa Barbara city park to help clean up and save oil-coated, poisoned seabirds.

“It was an assembly line,” he recalled. “It was sad. But we did the best we could.”

Twenty-four years later, in 1993, after earning his master’s and doctoral degrees in biology and a post-doctoral degree in zoology at UCSB and teaching, doing research and publishing papers at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County and UNC-IMS, Peterson began a 21-year stint on the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council, advising its director on the effectiveness of restoration efforts and reviewing research proposals.

One of his key roles, he said, was convincing the council that long-term research into oil spills’ effects was essential. It wasn’t, he said, “about just cleaning up and moving on,” because what happened in Alaska would surely be applicable to future spills. An article he wrote in the journal Science made waves in the understanding of ecosystem-wide damage after oil spills.

In 2010 when the Deepwater Horizon disaster broke the Exxon Valdez record, with 210 million gallons spilled, Peterson was the lead author in a report on a study produced by the Gulf Oil Spill Ecotox Working Group at UCSB’s National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis and published in the journal Bioscience.

In an article about the report, published in UCSB’s The Current, he was quoted as saying, “We now have a sense that the bulk of the impact was probably in the mid-water and deep ocean. “Who the heck knows what oil does to the mid-water pelagic and deep-dwelling critters? We need an integrated collaboration between deep water explorers, modelers, ecotoxicologists, microbial ecologists, and so on — all working together in unprecedented ways. We need a whole new type of marine ecology.”

Seashells on the Jersey Shore

Peterson came to all of this naturally. He grew up on a barrier island on the New Jersey shore, and at maybe 5 or 6, he said, became enamored with collecting seashells. With the inquisitive mind of a scientist-to-be, he asked his parents a lot of questions about them. They bought him some books.

The interest in marine organisms stayed with him — he’s still fascinated by shells and has gone to see numerous collections. The fascination set him on a career path, knowingly or not. In high school, he received an award from the National Science Foundation that enabled him to spend a summer studying coastal ecology at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California.

He studied and he surfed. And, Peterson says now, he knew then that California was where he needed to be.

When he arrived at UCSB, he was, he said, just plain lucky. His adviser was Joseph Connell, an ecologist and expert on biodiversity, coral reefs and rainforests. The grad student soaked it all up.

He researched the damage from oil spills to marshes and marine organisms, and when it came time to get a job, Connell and a famous professor at Princeton, Robert McArthur, had connections and influence. McArthur was an ecologist who had made significant contributions in many areas of community and population ecology.

“It’s funny,” Peterson said. “You sometimes make decisions that you don’t really understand, that don’t seem to make sense to some other people at the time, but you meet people who end up helping you. You just never know.”

Peterson interviewed for positions at a number of California schools, including Stanford, UC-Davis and Cal State-Fullerton. But by then, he said, he was a bit tired of the unbearable California traffic and ready for change. So, he went to the University of Maryland-Baltimore County and loved it.

He got to do research in the vast Chesapeake Bay system, traveling into Virginia as well as Maryland. And, crucially, UMD-BC had connections to UNC, where professors were doing research in North Carolina’s vast estuaries, including the Albemarle and Pamlico sounds.

When it came time to move on – “You have to provide for your family, and I’d gotten to that point,” he said – North Carolina and UNC beckoned.

Part of the reason, he said, was that even back then, UNC’s marine science program was interdisciplinary with professors teaching about and researching a wide variety of subjects. UNC also had a marine lab in Morehead City, and it had a focus not just on academics for its own sake but also on applying research to solve problems in the region.

Peterson certainly did that.

He was on the state Environmental Management Commission, a policy-making panel, from 1989 until 2013 and was deeply involved in formulating the state’s first stormwater rules to protect coastal water quality by limiting the amount of polluted runoff into creeks, rivers and sounds. He fought hard battles there and has never been convinced the rules were or are now strong enough but believes they’ve helped.

“We had to do something,” he said. At the time, in the early 1990s, there was almost no rules to stop runoff from entering coastal waters, carrying pollutants from streets, parking lots and rooftops. Shellfish harvest closures were increasing rapidly, and nitrogen and phosphorous were causing ever-increasing algal blooms, which rob waters of oxygen.

That effort, he said, was “facilitated” by the then-very-young North Carolina Coastal Federation and its founder-director, Todd Miller, whom Peterson said had “a great ability to communicate with people” and make compromises, rather than alienating potential allies.

Peterson also served for years on the state Marine Fisheries Commission, an often-controversial panel that makes policy and rules for the state Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries. He became known as a fighter for the region’s commercial fishermen, but one who based decisions on science instead of emotion.

Peterson developed long-lasting relationships with state government decision-makers and with environmentalists. He was outspoken but couched his comments in science.

Peterson’s research helped lead to stronger standards for the sand that is placed on the ocean strand during beach renourishment projects. He had noticed that some sand was either too shelly and not beach-goer friendly or smothered marine organisms, such as mole crabs, that live in and near the surf zone.

“I didn’t come out against beach nourishment,” he said, because he realized the value of a wide beach to the coastal town’s economies. “But I did try the best I could to make sure that nourishment would be the best we could do.”

In recent years, Peterson has pushed hard, publicly, for rejuvenation of the state’s oyster population, which a few decades ago was devastated by habitat losses and a parasitic disease known as dermo that kills oysters before they reach harvestable size. But it’s not just been a push for economic reasons, it’s also been a push for water quality, because oysters are filter feeders and remove pollutants.

Some of his recent research focused on oyster reef ecology, work that has been used by the state and the Coastal Federation in developing new reefs in the Pamlico Sound, funded by the North Carolina General Assembly. Research by Peterson and others at UNC has also shown that a combination of oyster reefs with the planting of sea grasses, a living shoreline, is a viable, cheaper and often more effective form of erosion control than seawalls that also creates habitat for other marine species.

Peterson is pleased about the restoration projects and that living shorelines are gaining favor.

“I’m happy to have played a part in these things,” he said.

Peterson has also supported wind energy development and believes it’s a viable alternative to offshore oil drilling in many places, including North Carolina. He’s disappointed that little has come to fruition, so far, and recalls that not so long ago, the state was a leader.

Science-Based Policy

For his work and his dedication to environmental education in other arenas, Peterson in 2007 received the federation’s Pelican Award for outstanding government service. He said he was proud to receive it, but also proud that he got it without compromising principles of applying science honestly to affect policy.

“I have never,” he said, “advocated for something I didn’t believe was not based on scientific evidence.”

Throughout his career, Peterson’s been known as an effective, even enjoyable, communicator of science to the masses. In interviews with reporters and public talks, he avoids scientific names for marine organisms, sometimes calling ’em “critters,” as he did in the interview about the Deepwater Horizon study. Or he’ll call them “cute,” or “cuddly.”

He believes scientists should not only emerge from the ivory towers, they should “talk to people in ways they can understand” how research and policies affect them.

Peterson said that he and others at UNC-IMS have worked with public school teachers to develop basic lesson plans so students can appreciate and understand the marine environment.

He’s also worked with his students to make sure that when they speak to the media, government officials or regular folk, the message can be easily understood and recognized as important.

Peterson’s students, he said, will be his most important legacy. He’s proud that many he trained have been successful and dedicated to science and the public application of research. He’s most proud, perhaps, that many were women because his goal for years has been to narrow the gender gap in his field.

“I love it when they move on” to UNC and other schools and make significant marks in the field, he said. And he’s particularly happy when they contribute to their communities by serving on committees and working with interest groups to preserve marine habitat.

“That’s what it is really about,” he said. “It’s about teaching. It’s really what has always driven me. You can do all the research, all the other things. But what really matters is passing it on to the students.”

Peterson loves, he says, seeing the spark of passion arise in a student, that indicator that there’s a desire not only to learn, but to make a difference.

So, what’s next for Peterson?

He said he still adjusting to “this retirement thing,” but he isn’t sitting back and doing nothing. He’s long had an interest in sea turtles, he’s been associated for years with the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, on Florida’s Gulf Coast. He plans to spend more time there now, with an eye toward helping turtles and other marine mammals by working to help shape policies.

He might move to Florida, after decades of living on Bogue Sound in Pine Knoll Shores, where he helped raise a family. The Sarasota area is famous for shell collecting, which, after all, is kind of where this whole journey began decades ago in New Jersey. But Peterson said he won’t abandon North Carolina, or stop being involved in what he believes is important to the state’s marine environment.

“It’s been home for all these years, and it’s important to me,” he said. “I might be a little less involved, but I’ll weigh in when and where I think I can help make a difference.”

Reprinted from the Carteret County News-Times

PELETIER — Three months after he first pitched the planning board a proposal to rezone Silver Creek Golf Course for a major residential development, owner Eddie McNeill got his wish Monday night.

Town commissioners, during their monthly meeting in town hall off Highway 58, voted 2-1 for the controversial proposal to rezone the 200 acres from B-1, business, to R-20, residential with minimum lot size of 20,000 square feet.

Commissioner Larry Rhue made the motion to approve the change and got support from Commissioner Dan Taylor. Alice Dunn voted in the minority and Commissioner David Bragg was absent.

Commissioner Bill Norris, who Mayor Dale Sowers revealed Monday night had submitted his resignation from the panel effective March 19, was not at the meeting. The mayor votes only to break ties.

McNeill can now build what he estimates could be up to 220 single-family homes on the property, down from the estimated 335 when he first applied in January for R-15, residential with a minimum lot size of 15,000 square feet.

The next step in the project is for McNeill to submit a subdivision site plan to the planning board. Commissioners and Sowers have stressed that residents will have opportunities to weigh in as that board and the commission considers the plan.

Silver Creek opened in 1986. McNeill, during the January meetings of the planning board and commission, said he closed the golf course in September after damage from Hurricane Florence and decided to revisit a long-delayed idea to develop the property.

McNeill said he envisions homes in the 1,800- to 2,100-square-foot range, but also noted the final number of lots is subject to many considerations, such as determination of wetlands and layout of roads.

The homes would connect to a private waste treatment plant in a corner of the golf course property, according to McNeill, and would get water from West Carteret Water Corp. The development would be screened from adjacent residents’ homes by a 20-foot vegetative buffer.

In February, an overflow crowd of about 80 people packed the 35-seat town hall meeting room for the public hearing and all but McNeill and his attorney opposed the change. Neither was there Monday night.

Speakers during that February public hearing said the project could harm creeks and the White Oak River, dramatically increase traffic and increase drainage problems.

The commissioners voted 3-2 in favor of the rezoning request at its March meeting, which was the first reading, but at least four of five votes was needed to pass on a first reading. On second reading, only a majority was needed. There was no debate Monday among board members.

Norris, who voted with Dunn against the rezoning in March, said in an interview Tuesday that he resigned mainly because he was in his 16th year on the panel, had been on the planning board for a few years before that and wanted to enjoy his retirement.

He was concerned about the rezoning and its potential impact on water quality in the White Oak River and its tributaries.

“We’re not doing enough to protect our resources the best we can,” he said. “I just felt like at this time I was unable to fulfill my duty to the citizens and the surrounding community. I’ve been honored to serve, but I felt like it was time for me to give up the seat.”

MOREHEAD CITY – The man who has led the state office responsible for making sure coastal waters are safe for swimmers and others is calling it a career after more than 30 years on the job.

J.D. Potts, head of the Recreational Water Quality Program in the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, will work his last day on Thursday, Feb. 28, leaving the office in the hands of a new chief for the first time since its inception in 1997.

He’ll also leave behind a legacy: Since the program started, he said in a recent interview, there has never been a documented case of anyone, anywhere, getting sick from swimming in North Carolina’s coastal waters.

“We’ve had some complaints,” he said, “but nothing documented by a doctor.”

Potts said he’s proud of his career and the work of the staff, and he feels he’s leaving the office in good shape.

The program tests 204 swimming sites, most on a weekly basis during the swimming season, which runs from April through September. All ocean beaches and high-use, soundside beaches are tested weekly from April through September; lower-use beaches are tested twice a month.

All sites are tested twice a month in October and monthly from November through March. Water quality sampling results for all locations are posted on the program’s website.

All of those samples are tested for enterococcus bacteria, an indicator organism found in the intestines of warm-blooded animals. While enterococcus doesn’t cause illness itself, its presence is correlated with that of organisms that can cause gastrointestinal and other illnesses and symptoms.

When enterococcus levels exceed state standards, Potts’ office puts up an advisory sign, warning the public to stay out of the water. There’s no statutory authority to actually forbid people from swimming when a sign goes up, but most heed the advisories. The staff returns as soon as reasonable to take new samples, and takes the sign down when it’s safe again. Archived information about swimming advisories are posted on the website.

The program has been a bit controversial in the past.

“When we first started, there were a good many complaints about what we did,” Potts said. “You’d hear things like, ‘This house rents for $1,000 or $1,200 a week, and you’re telling me we can’t go in the water?’ We don’t hear that as much now. We’ve really tried to work to educate the public, as well as the managers in the local governments, and I think it’s worked. I think most people understand now that it’s for everyone’s benefit.”

In essence, he said, people now generally realize that the impact of a warning sign put up at a site for a day or two, or even longer, pales in comparison to the possible health risks, and to the likely impact on the coastal tourism-based economy if North Carolina were to get a reputation for having unsafe swimming waters.

Potts’ career began in 1989, shortly after he graduated from North Carolina State University, where he studied soil science.

A friend in the program got a job with the Onslow County Health Department and told Potts, a Mocksville native, about another opening. He applied, and got the job. Not long after that, there was an opening in the state shellfish sanitation section, which was then under the Department of Health, and he applied and got that one, too.

He started as a “shoreline sampler,” going out every day to look at possible sources of pollution that would foul and result in the closure of shellfish harvesting.

In the 1980s and 1990s, though, North Carolina’s coast got some seriously bad publicity about some seriously bad water quality problems. Remember overflowing hog waste lagoons near rivers that lead to the coast? It’s a problem that still occurs from time-to-time. Remember Pfiesteria? That was the toxic dinoflagellate associated with harmful algal blooms and fish kills. Remember massive fish kills?

Eventually, the state got called a “beach bum,” by the Natural Resource Defense Council, for not having a recreational water sampling program. Officials decided to start one and fund it, and Potts was named its chief.

Growing up in the Piedmont, he was always interested in soil, trees and the environment.

Potts worked for a time on a tree farm owned by his high school Future Farmers of America teacher, and he always loved being outside. After high school, he went to Davidson Community College – there wasn’t enough money to start his education in a university – before joining the Army for a while and eventually heading to NCSU to study soil science and graduating in December 1988.

Over the span of his career, Potts said, he’s been pleased to see North Carolina’s ocean swimming waters remain largely clean, except during isolated instances like major flooding and stormwater discharges after hurricanes.

“I think we have a good reputation,” he said. “People know that if they come to our beaches, they’re going to be able to get in the water and swim.”

That’s a little less true, of course, on the sound side of the barrier islands, where increased development and the attendant increase in stormwater runoff is more problematic without the incredible dilution capacity of the ocean. Closures generally occur after heavy rain events, as the rain washes pollutants from roads and other hard surfaces into the waters.

Generally, Potts said, soundside water quality is good, but it’s not unusual for those “don’t swim” advisory signs to pop up.

But the state, he feels, does a much better job now than it did years ago to retest those waters quickly, and to get the signs down fast.

That’s made those local government managers and administrators, not to mention tourism interests and beachgoers, happier.

“We’ve worked hard to develop good relationships with them,” Potts said of local government officials, “and we try to give them a ‘heads-up’ about potential problems to try to reduce the anxiety.”

Potts doesn’t foresee serious water quality problems on the ocean side – “I think it’s ‘good’ to ‘excellent’ now,” he said, adding that it’s likely to stay that way. But he fears that continued development will result in some declines at some sites along the sounds and creeks.

“We may see more closures at some places as time goes by,” he said.

“I think we have a good reputation. People know that if they come to our beaches, they’re going to be able to get in the water and swim.”

J.D. Potts, Chief, Recreational Water Quality Program

Potts said he thinks the state and local governments do a fairly good job regulating development that leads to runoff, at least when compared to the past.

“When I started in 1997, there really weren’t any rules,” he said.

Things began to improve in the early 2000s, he said, culminating in the General Assembly in 2004 adopting a stormwater runoff bill. It was supported by local governments and some developers, but opposed by most environmental groups, who thought the law was too weak. Studies showed the groups were right.

New stormwater rules adopted by the Environmental Management Commission in January 2008 were then approved by the North Carolina Rules Review Commission, passed during the General Assembly’s short session in May 2008 and signed into law by Gov. Mike Easley in August 2008.

Now, at least some coastal towns and counties have developed their own stormwater runoff rules.

Potts isn’t one to publicly blast people, including politicians, but he’s not sure there isn’t more that should be done.

He said the state’s enterococcus standards are strict enough, though.

For Tier 1 waters – areas where swimming occurs daily during the April 1-Oct. 31 “season,” including any public access swimming areas and any other swimming areas where people use the water for primary contact, including all oceanfront beaches – the standard for closure is anything in excess of a geometric mean of 35 enterococci per 100 milliliter of water, that includes a minimum of at least five samples collected within 30 days, or a single sample of 104 enterococci per 100 milliliter of water.

For Tier 2 waters – a swimming area used an average of three days a week during the swimming season – the standard is anything in excess of 276 enterococci per 100 milliliter of water. And for Tier 3 waters – a swimming area used an average of four days a month during the swimming season – it’s anything over 500 enterococci per 100 milliliter of water in two consecutive samples.

Although waters are tested in the “winter season,” which runs Nov. 1 through March 31, in most cases swimming advisories are not issued during that period.

“If the standard wasn’t high enough, you’d see more advisory signs than you do,” Potts said.

Potts has long had a good relationship with environmentalists, including those in the Coastal Federation, as have others in his office and in the shellfish sanitation office. They’ve all generally been strong advocates for reasonable rules that protect not just public health, but also the coastal environment.

The soon-to-be-retiree is proud of those good relationships, too.

“It makes me feel good that we’ve been able to work together, all up and down the coast,” he said. “I’m glad that they respect the program.”

Potts said he’ll miss the job and the wide variety of people he’s worked with during his 30-year tenure.

One of those is Steve Murphey, who worked with Potts for years in shellfish sanitation, but is now director of the fisheries division. He and Potts are close friends.

“He’s been a mentor to me,” Murphey said. “He did a lot of training when I first started out over there. He taught me a lot. It’s, well, you, you put the book down at some point and go out and learn it in the real world. And that’s what we did.”

Murphey said the state is losing a man who’s a combination of a gifted scientist and a person with great people skills.

“He’s going to be really tough to replace,” he said.

Potts, Murphey said, developed, or “pioneered,” many of the sampling techniques and analyses that are still used. Even when he was a shoreline surveyor before he was head of the recreational waters program, Murphey said, Potts was an expert at identifying the polluted discharges that fouled some of North Carolina’s coastal waters.

“He was a great trainer, and he knew how to work with those (local government officials),” he said. “He taught me a whole lot.”

But Potts is excited about retirement. It will give him the chance to spend more time with his family and to enjoy his hobbies, including woodworking.

“It’s been a hobby of mine since high school, and I’m looking forward to doing more,” he said. “People give me timber and I make furniture. I’m going to start making natural tables.”

He’s also going to take welding classes.

“I’ll stay busy,” he said. “I wanted to retire young enough to be healthy and enjoy doing the things I love.”

BEAUFORT – Construction is nearing completion of the Bonehenge Whale Center, a workshop and museum in a gorgeous new building nestled in a grove of trees at 275 West Beaufort Road.

According to its director, Keith Rittmaster, natural science curator at the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort, the building passed an inspection by the town in mid-January and has a conditional occupancy permit, and that’s a good thing, for sure.

Rittmaster has to move all of the trappings of years’ worth of work, including partly reconstructed marine mammal skeletons, out of a trailer about a football field’s length away by April and into the new building. The conditional permit allows that.

After showing a reporter the new building, then walking over to the trailer, then heading back to the soon-to-be Bonehenge building, Rittmaster was carrying stuff.

“I’m not going to walk out of here (the trailer) without taking something to the new building,” he said. “There’s a lot to move and not a lot of time.”

But what a building it is, and what a whale of a tale of community spirit Bonehenge is, both in terms of the marine-mammal-loving Carteret County community at-large and its marine science community.

The center all has been paid for with donations, and even the general contractor, Vic Fasolino, donated his time, using volunteers to do much of the work. To date, volunteer monetary donations have reached $240,000 in a little more than a year.

Recently, a stainless steel refrigerator, an oven and other kitchen equipment just showed up and fit perfectly into the kitchen, donated by Cape Carteret resident Helen Aitken and her husband, Scott.

“That’s the kind of kindness and generosity that has propelled this project from the very beginning,” Rittmaster said. “I can’t even begin to say how thankful I am for all of it.”

The aptly named Bonehenge is to be a home base for research, exhibit preparation and display, marine conservation, educational programming, outreach, publications, and stranded specimen collection and maintenance that focuses on North Carolina cetaceans or aquatic mammals.

Rittmaster and others who will work there on projects specialize in “hinging” back together marine mammal skeletons, many from animals stranded on local beaches, for display in various locations, including the Maritime Museum, state-owned Jennette’s Pier in Nags Head and eventually Bonehenge itself.

The term “Bonehenge” was conceived in 2009 to represent a volunteer-built pole barn, a fundraiser and a website dedicated to the bone preparation and skeletal re-articulation of a 33.5-foot-long male sperm whale that stranded and died at Cape Lookout in January 2004. That skeletal display, named Echo, was completed in March 2012 after years of painstaking work by Rittmaster, and is on display at the Maritime Museum.

But the new Bonehenge building is a far cry from that volunteer-built pole barn. The two-story building, a full bottom floor and a sort of loft with a walkway that looks down through open space to the first floor, is full of intricate detail and fine craftsmanship. It has a nautical feel, with the interior paneling made of pine siding, and it has warm lighting from windows and a cupola. It will be a comfortable place for the researchers, visiting students and “bone-hingers” as well as a warm and inviting place for the public to see the displays of marine mammal skeletons and other related items.

“I’m just amazed at how well it has turned out,” Rittmaster said. “I can’t say enough about how impressed I am with the quality of the work.”

When the building is ready for the public – after water and sewer service arrives via the town of Beaufort – visitors will enter through an archway made of the mandibles of a 46-foot Atlantic right whale that stranded on March 27, 2011, in Nags Head. Like everything else that will be in the building, those mandibles represent a teaching moment.

Right whales have been hunted nearly to extinction over the past centuries, and a necropsy revealed that this one had been entangled in line and had been hit by a ship.

“We want to tell people about the need for conservation of marine mammals, and about the things that threaten their existence,” Rittmaster said.

Once through the mandible archway, those who visit will walk across a floor painting by Nan Bowles of Beaufort depicting four dolphins native to the nearby waters: Butterfly, Onion, Fringe and Fringe’s calf, Frankie. It’s another teachable moment, this one about how researchers identify and track dolphins through photos. And because one of those dolphins died and was found with plastic in its stomach, it’s also an opportunity to teach about the incredible amount of plastic in our waters and the threat plastic poses to marine life.

One display in Bonehenge will be the skeleton of Capt. Morgan, a dwarf sperm whale that stranded at Morgan’s Creek Landing in Beaufort. The dwarf sperm whale is an offshore species, Rittmaster said, and the skeleton he put together has been on display at the Trinity Center in Pine Knoll Shores.

Another will be the skeletal re-articulation of a 37-foot female humpback whale named Pitfall. In 2001, at the age of 3, she was hit by a large ship and washed ashore in Massachusetts. Rittmaster was offered her remains and said yes, despite not having anywhere to display them at the time. Once the skeleton is finally assembled, Pitfall will hang from the exposed beams inside Bonehenge.

The public will be able to touch things in Bonehenge, such as whale baleen. That’s something Rittmaster is excited about, because touching helps people make a real, indelible connection to marine life.

“I want people to handle whale baleen, a material usually called whalebone,” he said in an interview in January 2018, shortly after the fundraising effort for the building began. “I want them to touch a whale heart. I want them to ‘feel’ whales and other cetaceans.”

The opening to the public, however, isn’t likely anytime soon, and will be by appointment when it happens. That’s because Rittmaster is the only staff member and he has other responsibilities. Rachel Johnson, public information officer for the town, said water and sewer service can’t be extended to the Bonehenge building until the facility is in the town limits; it’s just outside. To do that, Bonehenge would have to request voluntary annexation. Rittmaster said that’s in the works.

Bonehenge is affiliated with the Maritime Museum, through an agreement between the museum and the nonprofit organization, Carolina Cay Maritime Foundation, formed to raise the $33,000 to purchase the building’s site and the additional amount build the facility.

Rittmaster is still employed by the museum as a curator, but he also is director of Bonehenge.

He said he was advised from the beginning that it would be a long and arduous process to make Bonehenge a reality if he and the others involved sought to make it a state project. State involvement necessitates countless bureaucratic hurdles not only for property acquisition, but also for construction.

Now 62, he grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, and certainly never expected to wind up putting together dolphin and whale bones.

“Growing up I hated museums and I had no interest in bones or anatomy,” he said in a previous interview. “In fact, I thought it was macabre whenever I saw animal bones on display in someone’s home.”

It all changed in 1975, when Rittmaster, then 18, moved to Buxton on the Outer Banks. He started surfing among dolphins and saw his first whale stranding. It was a life-changing event.

He eventually met his wife-to-be, Vicky Thayer, the central coast marine mammal stranding coordinator for the Marine Mammal Stranding Network, in graduate school at Duke University.

Since 1985, Rittmaster, Thayer and others have collected bottlenose dolphin fin photos. Rittmaster said around 4,000 photos, representing about 1,200 dolphins, have been added to an online database that allows people to help match the fin photos, and in turn, lead to discoveries in bottlenose dolphin migrations, associations, genetic stocks and birthrates. Federal fish biologists use it to learn about the genetic pools of bottlenose dolphin populations.

Bonehenge is a natural extension of that work. Already, researchers and staff from the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, the Maritime Museum, Cape Lookout National Seashore and North Carolina State University’s Center for Marine Science and Technology in Morehead City have said they want to work in the building.

In addition, thanks to a system that will allow entry to the building with one-day unlock codes, Rittmaster plans to make the facility available to volunteers and students who want to do research. There’s a room that will be equipped with a computer, stainless steel tables and seating for that purpose.

Fundraising continues for Bonehenge, with a goal of $300,000. Rittmaster said money is still needed for tools, cabinets and other necessities for great work and research.

“I’ve been overwhelmed by the generosity of our community,” he said. “I’m confident that it will continue until we reach our goal.”

To donate, visit the Bonehenge website.

CEDAR POINT — Town officials expect to close on the purchase of 56 acres along the White Oak River sometime between late February and early April of next year, according to an email sent Thursday by town clerk Jayne Calhoun.

Voters in the Nov. 6 election approved the sale of $2.5 million in general obligation bonds to pay for most of the $2.8 million land deal for the town’s first park. The town will kick in $300,000 from its general fund.

The bond sale could result in a property tax increase of up to 3 cents, from 6.25 cents to 9.25 cents per $100 of assessed value, but officials are working on grants to eliminate or at least reduce that increase.

The bond referendum passed by a margin of more than two-to-one, 523 to 240, but the town is still waiting for official certification of that result by the Carteret County Board of Elections.

Once that is done, sometime between Nov. 16 and Nov. 22, the process for completing the transaction can begin.

According to the email from Ms. Calhoun, the next step is up to the North Carolina Local Government Commission, “which is the organization to which all municipalities must answer when it comes to responsible usage of taxpayer dollars.

“The LGC will present to the town funding options, which could continue to be the bond (sale), or, if the interest rates are more favorable, general financing,” according to the email.

The email adds, “Town staff has been unable to assess the property damage as a result of Hurricane Florence. As such, no public will be allowed to enter the property until such a time as public safety is ensured.

“Hurricane recovery for our town and its citizens has taken precedence.

“There is some personal property remaining on the grounds that is to be removed by the owners prior to closing.”

The purchase from the North Carolina Masons is to include all of the remaining Masonic property off Masonic Avenue, except for the historic Octagon House, which will remain in private ownership but will still be available for town functions.

The town’s plan is to leave most of the scenic and wooded waterfront property in its natural state, but to provide passive recreation opportunities, such as trails and picnic facilities and maybe a kayak launch, plus expansion or improvement of improve an existing pier.

Part of the goal of the purchase is to preserve or improve water quality in the White Oak River by making the land unavailable for development.

Mayor Scott Hatsell has hailed the purchase as a way to secure the property against development, and to provide a place for future generations to enjoy all that the scenic river has to offer.

WILLISTON – It’s probably safe to say that relatively few women – or men – would start an oyster seed nursery at age 65. It’s probably even safer to say that few if any women who deign to take on that task and degree of risk would buy a big, decrepit cinder block building, renovate it and hope that the business will help revitalize an entire community, albeit a small one.

But Susan Fulcher Hill is doing it in Williston. A few years ago she and her husband, Robert, purchased the run-down, long-abandoned 8,000-square-foot Willis Brothers Seafood building on U.S. 70 at Jarrett Bay. After years of learning and planning, in late July they “planted” their first tiny larvae – 3 million of them – with the goal of selling seed oysters to the growing number of oyster farmers around the state.

Will the business make money?

“We certainly hope so,” Hill said recently. “But it’s like anything else that involves Mother Nature: You don’t know. We should know by the end of August.”

But the story of how Susan Hill got to this point is as interesting as the question of whether the couple’s business will succeed.

A native of Williston, she’s the daughter of Donald Fulcher, who made a career on the water. He was a commercial fisherman and for many years was the chief engineer for the Eastward, the first research vessel used by the Duke University Marine Laboratory on Pivers Island. So she grew up with salt water in her blood, and with an abiding love for all things marine.

By the time it was time to go to college, Susan headed to East Carolina University to major in marine biology. She ended up transferring to Vanderbilt University and graduated with a degree in biology, then headed off to Brigham Young University in Utah, where she earned a master’s in food science and nutrition.

Eventually, she met Robert, they got married and founded a company, Diabetes Care and Education Inc., in Greenville, South Carolina.

“I was diagnosed with diabetes when I was 19,” Susan said.

So starting and running a company that helped other diabetics obtain supplies, support and information seemed as natural as a Williston native getting involved in seafood. And the company was very successful. Eventually, they had offices in five states, and the headquarters ended up in Louisville., Kentucky, where the couple stayed for 20 years.

When they sold the business in 2007, they retired, and spent much of the next 10 years doing volunteer work and missions for their church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

But all along, Susan said, there was a nagging desire to return to her first love, marine biology, in some way, and a desire to come home to Down East Carteret County.

Eventually, opportunity presented itself in the form of that old Willis Brothers building, which locals just call “Elmer’s clam house,” she said.

“When I was growing up, it was the hub of eastern Carteret County,” Susan recalled. “Dozens and dozens of people worked there over the years. Williston used to have a post office and a store, and we’d walk to the store and get a soda, go to the post office and get the mail, then go to the clam house and watch the boats at the boatworks. There are a lot of memories for me and many other people in that place, a lot of history, and a lot of emotional connections.”

The ‘Clam King’

Elmer Willis was known far and wide as “The Clam King.”

According to a 2014 CRO article by Frank Tursi, “Willis quit school after the eighth grade to help his father fish commercially. He left for Norfolk where he worked for a time as an engineer on boats, but he came home to stay in 1939, bringing with him a wife – Pearl Smith of Atlantic – and a 2-year-old daughter, Nancy. Another daughter, Beverly, would be born later.”

Willis opened a general store just past the bridge crossing Williston Creek. It housed the post office Susan Hill mentioned, and in the early 1940s Willis started the seafood business with his brother, Wesley, who later sold his share to Elmer.

Heinz was the big customer – think clam chowder, although not necessarily the great stuff produced by skilled seafood artist in Carteret’s fishing villages – but Elmer Lewis sold the national company all the clams they used for many years.

Willis Brothers’ clams also went elsewhere in the U.S. besides Heinz in Pittsburgh. Cleveland was a huge market; for some reason clambakes were always big there.

Willis Brothers clams also raised money for local schools for years at clambakes. The business, and Elmer, were integral and important parts of the community and culture of a place that was isolated and self-sufficient. And proud of it.

But Elmer died in a car wreck in 1977 and the clam house closed. A fire destroyed the store and boatworks in the 1990s, and the clam house deteriorated into what Tursi, in his 2014 article called, “frankly, an eyesore.” There were efforts to obtain grants, and talk of a park.

But if it had become an eyesore, it was, as Susan said, one with rich, still vibrant history. And it still kindled emotional connections to times gone by, perhaps better times, for many people, including a Williston native who had been gone a long time and had salt in her blood.

So she put in a bid for the property and got it, and started talking to people. She knew that the state, with a push from the North Carolina Coastal Federation, was getting into oyster production in a big way, building reefs and encouraging oyster farming, both to revive a once-thriving industry and to help improve water quality. One oyster – just one – can filter clean up to 50 gallons of water per day. So Down East Mariculture Supply Co. began to become a reality, slowly.

Susan had found out more than two years ago, at a North Carolina Sea Grant meeting, that there was a shortage of oyster seed for those efforts, and that almost all seed used here comes from Virginia. Buying from Virginia can be time-consuming, as state Division of Marine Fisheries rules require that those larvae or seeds must be tested for disease. So even those are sometimes hard to get.

And that’s when her idea was hatched. A shortage is an opportunity for the adventurous. But there was a lot of work to be done.

“A lot of people said I should tear the building down, but I didn’t want to do that,” Susan said.

Part of the reason was that history, that culture, but part of it was also practical. While most oyster nurseries are outside, Susan said, “At our ages, we didn’t really want to be outside in all the heat and the humidity and the rain and wind.” So they decided to pipe the seawater into the building, where the larvae would be placed in upwellers and grow to the size needed by the state’s oyster farmers.

Hatchery Protocol

Generally, nursery systems pump seawater to provide a constant flow of water and food to the oysters. The designs and locations may differ, but the goal, no matter how it’s done, is to allow the oysters to grow to approximately an inch as quickly as possible. From the nursery, these seed oysters can either be sold to other commercial producers for grow-out or placed in a company’s own grow-out facility. The Hills opted to just sell the seed oysters.

With her knowledge of marine biology and her ties to the commercial fishing industry and its heritage, she knew a good bit of what she needed to know. But Susan studied intensely, taking classes at Carteret Community College, talking to others, reading extensively on the internet and taking a seminar from a renowned expert on the subject, Scott Rickard of Auburn University.

“We’re basically using his protocol,” she said. Most experts say 20 percent of the larvae die before they reach the size oyster farmers need, she said, and that would be 600,000 of that first batch of 3 million. Rickard has much better success, and Susan’s hoping she and Robert do, too. It’s a waiting game, for now.

And it’s taken quite a while just to get to the point in late July when the first larvae went into the water.

The building needed major renovations. Those aren’t finished yet. But after two years, it’s usable, and Susan thinks it looks nice. Inside, the nursery takes up only a small fraction of the space, and she wants to use at least some of the rest of the space to help rebuild those connections so many residents in the area had to the site.

“This isn’t all about us, or even just about us and oyster farmers. It’s also about the community.”

Susan Fulcher Hill

“We’re open to ideas,” she said. “We want people to give us suggestions.”

There’s room for art, and she’s been talking to a mosaic artist. Susan wants an educational, history component to the building, devoted to the area’s rich hunting and fishing culture. She envisions ecotours, students and others visiting to see how the process works, and they might eventually sell supplies.

“We want to help bring some jobs back for people in Williston,” she said. “This isn’t all about us, or even just about us and oyster farmers. It’s also about the community.”

The community, she said, has been positive.

“I think people are excited,” she said. “Everyone seems thankful that we didn’t tear down the building, that we’re making use of it.”

One who is pleased is Elmer Lewis’s daughter, Nancy, who is a Williston native but now lives in Davis.

“I’m very happy with what Susan is doing,” she said. “It certainly looks a lot better, and I’m glad that the building is getting used for something that can help the commercial fishing industry.

“The fishing industry is in such difficult times,” she added. “It’s hard for me to be believe there’s not a fish house in Atlantic. And we had an inspector at our business (Luther Lewis and Son Crab Co. in Davis) and I asked him how many crab-picking places there are in North Carolina now. He had to think really hard and finally said, ‘Less than five.’ At one time, there were 45.”

Ms. Lewis’s company – her husband, James Paul Lewis died in 2016 – used to be involved in all aspects of the crab fishery and operated 10 trawlers, but now just makes crab cakes, which are shipped up and down the East Coast.

So, saving “Elmer’s clam house,” she said, preserves a significant part of a heritage that is rapidly disappearing.

“At one time, just about everybody in Williston worked there,” she said. “There would be a 100 pickers in there.”

Her father, she said, was an innovator, a brilliant man despite having only an eighth-grade education. He built yachts and head boats, and that legacy lives on in Jarrett Bay Boatworks. He started the scallop business in the area, and even developed and patented a scallop-shucking machine.

She’s happy that his legacy lives on in the building.

“It was so sad to see that building in such disrepair,” she said. “I hope Susan has great success.”

MOREHEAD CITY – Rachel Noble didn’t originally intend to earn a bachelor’s degree in molecular biology from Carnegie Mellon University and a doctorate in marine biology from the University of Southern California.

Nah. She initially wanted to be an astronomer. It’s just that, well, upper-level calculus in three dimensions got in the way, and she quickly realized at Carnegie Mellon that she’d be better off “settling” for her second scientific fascination. So instead of gazing at stars, she ended up gazing at bacteria in shellfish and the waters they inhabit.

It’s a good thing for shellfish waters – and more recently, for food safety – that she did. Nobles, distinguished professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering and the Department of Marine Sciences at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and director of the Institute for the Environment’s Morehead City Field Site at the UNC Institute of Marine Sciences, has spent the last 17 years in Carteret County making a name for herself around the nation and world in her “second” academic choice.

She has developed a rapid, two-hour test for E. coli and enterococcus bacteria that public health officials in North Carolina and elsewhere use to determine the safety of shellfish harvest and swimming waters, and now is being adapted to test the safety of agricultural products, too.

In recent months, she’s been interviewed numerous times by CNN and other national media outlets about the E. coli breakout that contaminated lettuce, and she’s working to get the Food and Drug Administration to approve a rapid test for that use, as well.

She thinks it could be a game changer. Instead of being reactive – waiting until bacterially contaminated produce is on grocery store shelves and people are sickened – the speed of the test could help ensure that contaminated produce is never shipped. She knows her team is not the only one in the race but believes hers is the fastest and best choice.

But back to her academic and career choices.

Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Noble recalled recently, “I was always outside but I always loved science and math, too. I knew very early that I was going to be a marine biologist or an astronomer. So, after high school, I went to Carnegie Mellon to study aerospace engineering.”

“I was always outside but I always loved science and math, too. I knew very early that I was going to be a marine biologist or an astronomer.”

Then came that upper-level calculus, which she found more of a challenge than expected.

“I decided I was more interested in biology,” she said, dryly.

It was a natural choice.

“Growing up, we didn’t really have a lot of money, so all of our vacations were at the Jersey shore,” she said. “And I’d spend the entire trips outside, in the tidal pools and the ocean.”

When it came time for grad school, Noble headed to the sun-and-water capital of the United States, California, where she enrolled at USC in Los Angeles. She graduated in 2001 with a doctorate in marine biology. It was, she said, an eye-opening experience. Southern California, as it is in most things, was way ahead of the East Coast in terms of recognizing the problems and challenges posed by water quality issues, if only because of the incredible pressures put on the ecosystems by the huge numbers of residents and visitors.

“Back then, South California was getting probably 250 million tourists a year,” she said. “It’s probably 300 to 350 million by now.”

Because of those visitors, and the importance of tourism to the economy, officials there realized early on that they had to address sewer discharges into the ocean and protect water quality. They started taking steps long before anyone else.

Noble was in that problematic and problem-solving crucible as a student and it made an impression. She wrote her dissertation on “Fates of Viruses in the Marine Environment,” and soon, with her doctorate in hand, began looking for employment.

She interviewed for a range of university jobs – California, State University of New York – but she also visited UNC and its Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City, where a couple of professors and researchers, Pete Peterson and Hans Paerl, both of whom are still there, quickly impressed her.

Both had earned their doctoral degrees in California in the early ’70s, Paerl at University of California, Davis and Peterson at University of California, Santa Barbara.

“They were world-class researchers, and they made the point, when I interviewed, that UNC was a world-class facility, where you could do work with a global impact, but in a place where the quality of life was awesome,” Noble recalled.

So, Noble arrived at UNC IMS in 2001, and finding what Peterson and Paerl said to be true, she stayed. She, like so many other marine biologists in Carteret County, has enjoyed the synergy of the marine science community of professors and researchers at the North Carolina State University Center for Marine Sciences and Technology, or CMAST, the Duke University Marine Lab, National Marine Fisheries Service Laboratory, also known as the NOAA Beaufort Lab, the state Division of Marine Fisheries headquarters, North Carolina Sea Grant’s regional office and others.

Noble also has been pleased over the years with her close cooperation with the state’s Shellfish Sanitation Section, which tests swimming and shellfish waters regularly for bacteria and opens and closes them based on strict standards that have for decades protected public health. She praised Patti Fowler, longtime but now-retired head of shellfish sanitation, Fowler’s successor, Shannon Jenkins, and J.D. Potts, longtime head of the state’s recreational waters testing program.

“They’ve always been cooperative and helpful and interested in our research,” she said. “You don’t find that everywhere, with all government agencies. It’s been great.”

It’s also important. North Carolina’s commercial shellfish and finfish industries are crucial to the economy, as is the tourism industry, and all depend on clean water. One big outbreak of bacterial contamination in a North Carolina shellfish product would decimate the industry, and to the credit of state workers, environmental activists and researchers who have pushed for good programs, there’s never been one.

Noble has also been involved in anti-pollution efforts here. A Beaufort resident, she’s the lead in a three-year study, now in its second year, that could shine light on how to best manage stormwater to protect coastal water quality. Noble is also on the town’s stormwater advisory committee, which meets regularly.

One thing researchers in the three-year study have learned is that the old idea that most pollution in stormwater comes out in the “first flush,” or the runoff from the first half-inch or inch of rain runoff, isn’t true. Studies in California and along North Carolina’s Outer Banks have shown that pathogens – viruses, bacteria and other potentially harmful micro-organisms – are discharged throughout a storm, a finding that calls into question the design of some stormwater ponds used for years to allow runoff to settle and get “natural treatment” before flowing to rivers, streams and sounds.

It’s work like this that Noble hopes can help North Carolina and its coastal communities keep pollution problems from worsening amid what she called growing pressure from population growth and development, much of which involves impermeable buildings and parking lots that increase the flow of polluted stormwater runoff, the main cause of impaired waters along the coast.

But she’s not convinced the state is keeping pace with the threats to its waters.

“Development is more intense, and the storms are more intense,” at least arguably because of climate change, she said. “Shellfish sanitation and other agencies do a good job.” But, she added, “I’m not convinced that (the state) is committing the financial resources necessary” to keep pace with the increasing threats to water quality.

She said that if the state is going to commit to increased oyster beds and harvesting, then it needs to commit more money to hire oyster and shellfish experts to monitor the health of what is harvested and sold. The state needs more water quality staffers in general, she said.

“I think we’ve done a generally good job, but I don’t think we’re really keeping pace with the pressures,” she said.

But Noble is hopeful, if only because the state is placing increasing value on oysters both as an economic resource and as water cleaners. Shellfish clean water as they filter feed. She praised the North Carolina Coastal Federation for its work to promote oysters and build reefs. Still, she believes the state needs a 10-year action plan, with a firm commitment to make a difference.

“We need to keep up the momentum and increase it,” she said.

Noble is also hopeful that the tests she has developed will help. Already, the two-hour bacterial tests, down from 24 hours or more, are being used, if not yet widely.

As for testing produce and the water that irrigates it, on which she has worked with BioGX, an Alabama-based company, she’s also hopeful, but believes it will take time before her method, or those in development by others, will be widely adopted.

But the concept, Noble believes, makes sense, and it’s showing results in tests in the field in the nation’s winter-growing lettuce “basket.” The recent outbreak, according to the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control, centered on the Yuma, Arizona, romaine lettuce-growing region.

The last date of harvest was April 16, and romaine from the Yuma region is no longer available in stores or restaurants, due to its 21-day shelf life. But, according to the CDC, 197 people in 35 states became ill, more than 90 were hospitalized and at least five died.

Noble said part of the problem is that lettuce requires large quantities of water, and in the mostly arid regions where it is grown, that requires intensive irrigation of huge fields, most through mechanized methods. If the water supply is contaminated by E. coli, the bacteria is sprayed in the fields. However, Noble said she believes that although bacterial contamination can’t ever be totally eliminated in food, the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, which requires better testing, spurred her idea to adapt the shellfish water rapid-test to test farm produce, was a step forward.

The law, which then-President Barack Obama signed in 2011 and is being phased in, requires large farms to begin to test their agricultural water for E. coli throughout the year.

“I think the law is a good one,” Noble said. “I think public health will benefit.”

Her goal is to do everything she can to make sure that the water supplies for produce are safe, but also to make sure the products shipped to grocery stores aren’t contaminated. The faster the tests can be administered and analyzed, the better. She feels the same way about shellfish and waters in which they grow.

Noble said she started thinking of this produce situation – and the rapid-testing concept – years ago. She realized her rapid shellfish water testing system could be beneficial but not that it would take so long to get approval for agriculture and food safety.

“It is a time-consuming process to get full approval,” she said. “But I think we’re moving in the right direction and will be successful.”

She conceded that consumers might have to pay more for improved food safety, more than the going average of $2.99 per head of romaine lettuce. Other new tests may be less expensive, but they’re not as fast as her team’s.

“I think there’s room for everyone,” who can make a difference, she said.

Learn More

• The Noble Lab

One doesn’t hear many people say they wish they’d been on a ship stuck in ice for four days in the middle of Antarctica’s treacherous Weddell Sea.

It is, after all, a harrowing, cold place. The place where the three-masted ship, The Endurance, sailed by Sir Ernest Shackleton, was famously crushed by ice and sunk by flooding in 1915. It took months to rescue the folks that were on the ship.

But when Dr. Andy Read, a marine mammal expert and director of the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, said recently he wished he was stuck there, he was dead serious. He was truly jealous of his colleagues from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Duke, Stanford University and the University of California-Santa Cruz.

“I’d trade,” he said, even though Duke was playing its opening-round NCAA basketball tournament game against Iona in a few hours. “I wish I was there.”

His colleagues, he said, were having all the fun while he was stuck in Beaufort with his administrative duties – not that he minds them, mind you – and doing research that’s generally much more mundane than chasing and tagging minke whales in Antarctica.

Fun? Fun? Really? This is how Mary Lide Parker, a freelance journalist on the polar trip, put it in her online blog, “The Pago Files,” which has been appearing through a link to the researchers’ postings on Twitter. A pagophile is any living organism that thrives in ice. Pago is a word of Greek origin, meaning cold, frost, freezing; fixed or hardened.

 “KC is staring out the porthole window in the gym when I pose an annoying question.

“‘Wanna hear something depressing?’”

“He turns away from the window and removes his earbuds. ‘What’s that?’

“I point to the mileage number on the treadmill where I’m currently walking. ‘I’ve gone farther on this treadmill in the past 30 minutes than the ship has gone in the past 30 hours.’”

“He laughs, and I laugh with him. We have to laugh so we don’t go insane.”

Parker is along because the National Science Foundation, or NSF, which funded the research trip, now generally requires researchers to have someone well-qualified along to document their research, according to Read.

She’s had plenty to write about and photograph.

On the fifth day, Read said, the vessel, the 230-foot-long RV Laurence M. Gould, got out of the ice, and the scientists should be back in the United States by about the end of the month, ending a seven-week expedition that he said included 12 days of actual research time around the Antarctic Peninsula.

That’s a tale of how long it takes to get to Antarctica, prepare, do your stuff and get back. It’s a loooooong way. And it’s not smooth sailing. It’s among the roughest, toughest passages in the world.

Folks on board from North Carolina include Dr. David Johnston, associate professor of the Practice of Marine Conservation & Ecology at Duke University and director of the Duke Marine Robotics and Remote Sensing Lab, and Dr. Chris Taylor, a research ecologist with NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science lab in Beaufort.

Taylor is an expert in using underwater acoustics – fisheries sonar, fish-finding echo sunders and multi-beam sonar. On this trip he has also measured krill from a net towed through whale feeding hot spots and has quantified krill density and distribution using echo-sounders. Krill is what baleen whales eat, they’re tiny crustaceans, kind of like mini-shrimp.

You might not think it would be hard to find a whale. Minke whales are so-called “small,” by baleen whale standards, but that’s a relative term. Adults generally are 23 to 26 feet long and weigh 4 to 5 tons. That’s 8,000 to 10,000 pounds, at least twice the weight of an average motor vehicle in the U.S., since we drive such big stuff. It’s a BIG critter.

But minkes, Read said, are very fast, much faster than the larger humpbacks that frequent the Antarctic. They can, according to internet sources, swim at 21 mph when they feel threatened. The fastest human, officially, is Usain Bolt, who hit 27.8 mph during the 100-meter sprint in the 2009 world track championships. He obviously didn’t weight 4 or 5 tons and wasn’t pushing against water.

First, if you want to study a minke, you’ve got to catch up with one. And of course there’s the ice thing. They spend a lot of time under it, hiding from their main predator, the killer whale. You have to be at the right place at the right time in order to see what they do.

So why spend several weeks traveling to and returning from one of the most isolated places in the world to study whales that are fast, often under ice and, according to Read, “shy?”

“Relatively little has been known about minke whales,” Read said. “One thing we want to know is how they and the humpbacks co-exist.”

Both species, for example, eat mostly krill, those small crustaceans found in all the world’s oceans. Krill feed on phytoplankton and zooplankton, converting these into a form suitable for many larger animals.

In the Southern Ocean, one species, the Antarctic krill, makes up an estimated biomass of around 3.79 million tons. But how much do these whales eat? Do they compete for food? Do the two species, the humpbacks and the minkes, get along?

“Basically, what we want to know is, ‘How does the minke make its living down there?’” Read said.

The minkes, he said, have established a good niche in the Antarctic, in part because of their small relative size. They can maneuver well between ice patches, and they eat smaller portions, which lets them survive around less dense patches of krill.

There’s no doubt, he said, that they do quite well. They’re not threatened or endangered, in fact they are “very abundant.”

Another thing the researchers want to know is how the minke and other species of whales are being affected by climate change.

“The peninsula is warming very fast,” Read said. “We’re actually beginning to see grass take hold in some places. And we’re seeing more (warmer weather) species of penguins.”

As ice thins or breaks up, will the minke whales have less ability to hide from predators? Will their population continue to grow or will it shrink? And what impacts will either have on the humpback?

The technology the researchers are using to investigate these questions and others didn’t really even exist just a few years ago.

Drones, Johnston’s specialty on this trip, can not only photograph the minke whales, they also enable the researchers to measure them, both length, which can indicate age, and how fat they are: an indicator of health. You don’t want to see skinny whales.

But as important as the drones are to the research, the “stars of the show,” Read said, are two different kind of tags.

Some stay on for long periods of time and upload data to weather satellites. These allow researchers to follow minkes for extended periods to learn where they go and when, but there’s a lot of competition for data use on those satellites.

Other tags used more are short-term, for about 24 hours or less, and are attached with suction cups. Until recently, no one’s been very successful putting the tags on minke whales.

“These are like iPhones on steroids,” Read said of these tags. “You can hear all the sounds the whales make and the sounds they hear, and you can see what they see, see what their habitat looks like. It’s really amazing.”

The problem is, these tags are very expensive. Just one costs about $25,000. So, Read said, “You have get them back when they fall off. They’re supposed to float to the surface,” and you find them because they send out a radio beacon. Usually.

The big problem, Read said, is that sometimes they fall off under the ice. At $25,000 a tag, you don’t want that to happen. Luckily, Read said, the team on this trip hadn’t lost one as of March 15, the day of this interview.

In fact, he said, all of the work has gone exceptionally well. The team has seen and tagged lots of minkes. On one day, according to one of Parker’s Twitter posts, the team had completed six drone flights over 11 whales by lunch time.

All of this research has been based from the Gould, which according to the NSF website, can accommodate up to 26 scientists and associated staff, and consistently shuttles people and supplies between Punta Arenas, Chile and Palmer Station, Antarctica.

Read said it’s pretty comfortable for those accustomed to such missions, and generally has little problem getting through the ice. But on this trip, it did.

Early in the trip, the Gould had dropped a team of geologists on Joinville Island, which Parker in her blog called a “barren, windswept strip of land.” On the way back to pick the geologists up, things came to virtual halt.

“Right now we’re about nine miles away, the mountains of the island just barely visible through a layer of low-lying clouds,” Parker wrote in her blog. “Nine miles doesn’t seem that far, until Dave Johnston tells me we have covered just over mile in the past five hours.

“‘Pray for a change in winds,’” she said Johnston said, “‘Otherwise we’re going to be here for a while.’”

They were.

“Every so often we hear harsh grinding noises emanating from the metal hull of the ship, usually followed by a sudden, awkward lean,” Parker wrote.

“All afternoon the ship rams forward, then jerks into reverse. In the evening, just before the sun begins to set, a thick fog descends. The ship finally stops moving, and I head to the bow with my camera.

“There is no other word for it — we are in a void.”

By day four,” she added later in the dispatch, “it is apparent to everyone that we aren’t going to make it to Joinville Island. Fortunately, at the bottom of the world, the immense forces of nature are matched by human generosity, often in the form of a helping hand from complete strangers.

The Argentinian Navy, Read said, sent two helicopters to evacuate the geology team from the island, and then took them to an Argentinian vessel. Eventually, when the Gould got “unstuck,” the ships rendezvoused. Everyone was fine despite the ordeal. Folks might have been bored, he said, but there were plenty of provisions, and no real danger.

Still, Read echoed Parker’s comment about “human generosity, often in the form of a helping hand from complete strangers.” In such an unforgiving and remote place, he said, “It’s how you survive at times.”

Read is looking forward to using some of the technologies used in Antarctica in Carteret County this year.

Whales are increasingly common in the waters off the county, he said, perhaps partly because changing climate. Folks are seeing more juvenile humpbacks in the winter and spring, mostly juveniles, most likely feeding on menhaden and croaker.

“If we could do some of this here, it would be cool,” he said.

CARTERET COUNTY – If someone named an environmental all-star team in Carteret County, 66-year-old Michael Murdoch of Wildwood and Ocean would surely be a unanimous choice.

He cofounded the Croatan group of the Sierra Club a few years ago, and has watched its membership double. If there’s a public meeting or a rally, he’s there, pushing to stop oil and gas drilling off the North Carolina coast and to promote wind and solar.

He’s organizing a big campaign to address roadside and waterborne litter in the county. He’s trying to stop the state Department of Transportation from building a four-lane highway through Wildwood. And, in his “spare time,” he is building a solar-powered barn on his all-natural, all-organic small farm in Ocean.

If you get Murdoch talking about that, you might think he thinks it’s the most important thing he is doing. In truth, though, he sees the 5-acre farm as a natural extension of all the other work he does, a demonstration of an unwavering commitment to not just talk the environmental talk, but to walk it.

He and his wife, Deede Miller, sister of North Carolina Coastal Federation founder and director Todd Miller, bought the land from Todd’s father, Teddy, about 10 years ago.

He’s grows lots of things – tomatoes, asparagus, blueberries, okra, sweet potatoes and of course, the world-famous Bogue Sound watermelon. He gives away a lot of what he grows, and sells enough to more or less break even.

“I wouldn’t call myself a farmer,” he said on Sunday morning as the wind rose off nearby Bogue Sound. “I’m more of large-scale gardener. And it’s not really a business.”

It’s really a concept, and a labor of love. He mixes rotted sawdust with soil, buys manure for fertilizer and even has a solar-powered electric fence to keep the deer out.

And the barn/shed? He and a friend are building it by hand, slowly, with recycled lumber. It will be solar-powered, too. Inside are two tractors, dating back to 1940 and 1949. Both work.

“There’s no electricity here,” he said. The downstairs is mostly Murdoch’s work space, while the upstairs is Deede’s art studio. Besides, Mr. Murdoch wants to set an example for others to show that it can be done. He knows there are all-natural farms elsewhere, but knows of no others around here.

“Some of my friends laugh at me, but what else am I going to do with my time?” he said.

Murdoch grew up in Wildwood, then a largely rural community west of Morehead City. It was an idyllic time, in the 1950s and ’60s, before the boom along the coast, and Murdoch recalls fondly walking with his dad in the woods to go fishing or “just to be outside.” Life pretty much revolved around the Presbyterian church.

His mother was employed at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s  fisheries lab on Pivers Island in Beaufort, so science and education were important to the family.

After graduating from West Carteret High School, Murdoch went off to East Carolina University to major in parks management. The environmental movement was just kicking into gear; folks were reading Rachel Carson’s seminal “Silent Spring” and Aldo Leopold’s “Sand County Almanac.” Murdoch attended his first Earth Day event at ECU. It struck a chord that still reverberates today.

It was also a time of gasoline lines. People believed the world was running out of oil. It was really just the Arab oil embargo that caused the lines, but it got many people, including Murdoch, thinking of a world in which fossil fuels wouldn’t be the dominant form of energy. Since then, a majority of the American public has come to believe that fossil fuels are causing climate change.

“I would say it was a turning point for me, like it was for a lot of other people, when Earth Day started,” he said. “There was so much energy and enthusiasm, and you just wanted to be involved.”

Murdoch earned his master’s in recreation and parks administration from Clemson University, and his professional career took him to parks in North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and Maryland.

In South Carolina, he got his first experience with starting a Sierra Club Group in Georgetown.

He met Deede Miller, from Ocean, at his 20^th high school reunion at West Carteret.

“I’d never been to one before,” he said.  “My mother made me go. It was right time, right place.” They married in 1990. But Murdoch always knew that when he retired, he wanted to come home to Wildwood. Miller wanted to come back, too.

“There’s just something about this county,” he said. “There are plenty of great places to live, but Carteret and its people get a hold on you.”

So in 2012, back they came. Wildwood was still much the same at its core; a quiet rural place with lots of farms and woods. But the post office is gone, the volunteer fire department is gone, and around the edges, Morehead has been steadily approaching with shopping centers and developments, many of them paving farm fields, causing more runoff into the Newport River. But the changes in the past couple of decades, Murdoch believes, are nothing compared to what might come.

Near the end of 2017, DOT began planning for a road project long pushed for by Morehead City and county officials, that will cut through the Wildwood community, but residents have pushed back in opposition to the plan, urging the state to find another route.

The proposed $44.2 million project is included in the State Transportation Improvement Program (STIP) as project R-5727. It would extend the current Bridges Street Extension by about 3 miles and connect Morehead City and Newport.

The road project includes widening the roadway along Business Drive to Old Airport Road and will continue westward to connect to U.S. 70 near McCabe Road. It would be a four-lane, 120-foot thoroughfare divided by a raised median and will run essentially parallel to U.S. 70.

“It would destroy Wildwood,” Murdoch said. “DOT says it’s to get people off Highway 70, but for what purpose? To get people from one place another a couple of minutes faster? And at what cost? The destruction of a community?”

DOT, he said, has talked about improving things for motorists, “what about our quality of life? We matter.”

So Murdoch and others started a petition drive, and he believes they’ve gotten DOT’s attention. But the outcome is far from certain, and Murdoch believes the process was flawed to begin with.

The justification for the project appears to come from a survey distributed in 2011.

But, he said the survey “asked the respondents where they lived,” but Wildwood wasn’t even listed as an option.

“Was this intentional or just an oversight? Apparently Wildwood is not considered a community anymore. Wildwood was left off the survey despite having its own voting precinct.”

At any rate, Murdoch has been impressed by the volume of support he and others have received.

“It’s made me very optimistic,” he said. “I didn’t think we’d get this much support. At least they (DOT) now knows Wildwood exists. I get the feeling that some planner just looked at a map and say, ‘Hey, there’s nothing here’ and drew a line through Wildwood. Well, we are here, and care.”

Murdoch started the Croatan chapter with help from others and in just a handful of years, with him as chairman, it’s grown from about 300 members to more than 600, and the club has become prominent in the fight to keep oil and gas drilling away from the North Carolina offshore waters. The club serves Carteret, Craven, Jones, Onslow and Pamlico counties, and has organized and conducted numerous waterway and shoreline cleanups.

Which brings us to … litter, the most recent of Murdoch’s passionate causes.

He maintains that it increased in recent years, while cleanup efforts and police citations for littering have declined, as have convictions.

“I know there are obviously more important things, like murder and opioids, but this litter – much of it plastic – is choking us.”

In the old days, Murdoch said, most people thought of litter as just an eyesore. But new research increasingly shows that in the water, plastics break down into micro-plastics, which are consumed by marine organisms and then consumed by us.

“I think we need a unified approach,” he said. “We’ve got to make sure people understand that it’s more than just an ‘eyesore’ problem.”

Murdoch has been meeting with community leaders and politicians and candidates, as well as the Carteret County Chamber of Commerce and law enforcement agencies in order to get an initiative started in April.

He’s not sure yet what form that initiative will take, but knows it should include strong cleanup components as well as public education.

“I think it’s just a forgotten issue. When was the last time you saw one those ‘$50 fine’ signs to warn people about littering?” Murdoch said.

“It used to be people thought most of the litter came from tourists,” he said. “It’s now pretty obvious that many people are part of the problem, and many people need to be part of the solution.”

MOREHEAD CITY — Steve Murphey, named earlier this month as the new director of the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, has always been around water, and interested in the things that live in it.

He was born in 1960, and grew up in Kathleen, in central Florida north of Lakeland, on a steady diet of Jacques Cousteau, fishing and camping.

“We lived on a small farm, and we had some cattle and chickens and things,” he said in a recent interview. “But Florida isn’t very wide, and there’s water everywhere. We’d go (east or west) and go fishing in the sounds and sometimes deep-sea fishing on head boats. And I was just entranced by Jacque Cousteau’s television show,” he said, referring to “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau,” a documentary series that ran from 1966 to 1976.

The 1960s and ’70s, of course, were times when parents rarely prearranged their kids’ activities. “You’d go outside in the morning and not come in until you were called in for dinner,” he said. “You were just outside all the time, every day.”

But if the young Murphey was an outdoor boy, he was also always at least somewhat interested in science. He came by it naturally; his father, a fifth-generation Floridian, was a chemical engineer and his mother was a public health nurse, so it was only natural that he was interested in geekish things, too. But when he graduated from high school, Murphey, like many at the time, didn’t have much of an idea what he wanted to do.

So he took a year off school, indulging his interest in photography by apprenticing with a photographer. He also dug ditches and took some other manual labor jobs. “I pretty much checked off everything I didn’t want to do for a living,” he said.

He eventually settled on science and went off to college and earned a bachelor’s degree in marine biology from the University of North Carolina Wilmington in 1984. His first job out of school was as a marine biology technician with the South Carolina Division of Marine Sciences in Charleston.

He met there his wife-to-be, Trish, where she held the same position. But they eventually realized they needed to make more money, and a few years later, when he saw an opening with the Division of Marine Fisheries, he applied, won the position and the family moved to North Carolina in 1987. Trish eventually became a lead species biologist for the division, and they’ve both been there, mostly in that state fisheries division building on Arendell Street in Morehead City, ever since, making Murphey the first person in many years, if not ever, to rise through the ranks of the division all the way to the top.

It’s not something he ever expected. He has held a variety of positions that include development of artificial reefs, reef fish assessment, oyster sanctuary development, policy development and section management for habitat enhancement and coastal habitat protection.

For about 11 years, he was not with the fisheries division, but with the division of environmental health in the shellfish sanitation section, which does water quality surveys and seafood inspections, things designed to protect public health. But it was still, essentially, fisheries biology work.

“I remember Darlene Rappa,” who coached Murphey’s daughter, Casey, in soccer at Morehead City Middle School, “had this bumper sticker that said something like ‘Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity,’” Murphey said. “I’ve always tried to be prepared to take advantage of opportunities when they come along.

“Whatever job I had at any time, I was always interested in other things in the division outside my specific job. It kept things more interesting.”

It also gave him as wide an array of knowledge of the division and its missions as anyone. So when the state decided last year that Braxton Davis should no longer be director of both the coastal management and marine fisheries divisions of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, who was better positioned for the fisheries post than a man who knew so many of its people and its functions? Preparation met opportunity. Some might call it luck. But it really wasn’t.

Murphey is, by all accounts, a people person. He can seem quiet at times, but he’s funny, personable and engaging. Several employees at the division last week said that if they’d had a choice for their boss, he’d have been at the top of the list.

But he’s also very competitive, and can be intense, when he feels it’s necessary. He was an assistant girls’ soccer coach with Rappa at Morehead City Middle School, helped coach Casey’s club soccer team for more than a decade and was also an assistant girls’ soccer coach at West Carteret High School.

He did not like to lose, and those teams were successful for many reasons, not the least of which was Murphey’s balanced combination of fieriness and fun. The club team, the Morehead City-based Riptides, won a state championship in 2007. The core of that team remained together for years, played together at West and eventually became the first club team in Carteret County to make it to the top division in youth soccer in North Carolina.

That experience taught Murphey a lot, he said during the interview, and he still has a photo on his desk of a group of the girls – the Magnificent Seven, he calls them – on senior night at West Carteret High School in 2012.

One thing that experience taught him was never, ever to underestimate the abilities, drive and dedication of the younger generations. It’s common now to hear folks bemoan the lack of ambition of younger folks who were raised, some think, lazy and spoiled by “participation” trophies and parental coddling.

Murphey knows better. He saw the time and effort it took for those girls – all excellent students who went to college – to excel, and to move onto good jobs and grad schools. It’s something that will serve him well as fisheries director, because most of the men and women Murphey worked with at the start of his career have retired, succeeded by a younger generation, many just a few years older than those soccer girls are now.

“They are different,” he said of the younger employees. They might care a little more about free time and family than some in previous generations, but “they are passionate and smart, really an exceptional group. They have handled workloads that many of us couldn’t have dreamed of handling all the way through high school and college.”

It’s those employees Murphey will now direct at a division that is responsible for the stewardship of the state’s incredible and varied marine and estuarine resources, managing all of them for the benefit and health of myriad groups of stakeholders, many of whom believe they are in competition with each other.

Conflicts – social and political – between commercial fishermen and recreational fishermen and competitive subsets within them, for years have caused controversy, and Murphey knows those won’t ever go away. One of his goals is to better educate the public – those who just eat seafood, those that catch fish and shellfish for fun or for profit – so there’s a wider and more nuanced understanding of the science behind fisheries management decisions.

He’s soliciting ideas from the staff, and he’s meeting with stakeholders. One thing he knows for sure is that the division must not only maintain and enhance its data collection efforts, but also its efforts to get that data in the hands of the public in understandable and meaningful ways. It’s crucial, he said, for the public to trust the data as much as possible. And that, he said, is a challenge, because counting fish and shellfish is “like counting deer in the forest … except you’re underwater and it’s dark and you can’t see them.”

He wants to beef up the budget for data collection and analysis, if possible, “because the better the data, the better decisions you make.”

Murphey has worked closely with state legislators on some issues, and thinks most, if not all, share the goals of the fishing and fish-consuming public: Equitable access to the stocks and sustainability; no one wants to see species disappear. And, he said, legislators seem to genuinely want good information from the division.

He understands the politics. The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission, which makes broad policy decisions for the division, is composed of members who are specifically appointed to represent various interest groups and segments of the population. The fisheries division staff’s mission is to present that commission with scientifically derived data to guide those decisions. And legislators in Raleigh hear from those competing user groups and are occasionally pressed to intervene on behalf of one or the other.

Managing marine resources is a huge and complicated job, with a lot at stake. Commercial fishermen in the state landed 60 million pounds of finfish and shellfish worth $94 million in 2016, according to the division’s statistics. Recreational marine fishermen that year were estimated to have landed 11.9 million pounds of fish. Roughly twice that poundage is estimated to have been caught and released. Both fisheries have tremendous impacts on the state’s economy, and not just along the coast.

And, Murphey said, a warming world — and warming waters — are changing things in ways we don’t yet fully understand. Some fish species are inhabiting waters in which they previously weren’t seen, at least at certain times. Some appear to be moving into deeper waters.

“Why this is, is not entirely clear yet,” Murphey said. “But it will have an impact on management,” and potentially on public health and seafood consumption.

For example, oysters are safely harvested and consumed only in cool and cold weather months. What if those months decrease in number? What new species might show up?

Overall, Murphey thinks the state’s marine resources are in pretty good shape.

“There are some challenges, and some success stories,” he said. “But the elephant in the room is protection of the habitats that are essential to the fisheries. We need to look more closely at habitat, and what more we can do to protect it, and need to let ourselves think outside the box.”

He said he’s optimistic, in part because the state’s residents care deeply about marine resources, and because the division staff is so knowledgeable, dedicated and enthusiastic.

Murphey’s life is undergoing some adjustments. Because of his promotion, his wife, also a fisheries biologist, had to leave the fisheries division and is now working for the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership, or APNEP, an organization that tries to identify, protect and restore the resources of the Albemarle-Pamlico estuarine system, working under the state Department of Environmental Quality.

It’s a good fit for Trish, he said, and he hopes his new job will be a good fit for him and the division staff.

He’s looking forward to working with everyone who has a stake in those resources, and believes he can retain his vaunted sense of humor through the inevitable policy debates and disagreements.

“This is a fun place to work, and I’m very grateful for this opportunity,” he said. “I get to go out on the water some and work with some of the finest people I’ve ever met.”

Learn More

• North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries

BEAUFORT – One of the more unique museum concepts in recent coastal North Carolina history appears to be rapidly coming to fruition.

Keith Rittmaster, natural science curator at the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort, said late last month that he is confident that the building to house the Bonehenge Whale Center will be completed, although not necessarily open, sometime before the end of 2018. The facility, now occupying a trailer in Beaufort, will be a home base for research, exhibit preparation and display, marine conservation, educational programming, outreach, publications and stranded specimen collection and maintenance that focuses on North Carolina cetaceans, or aquatic mammals.

The term “Bonehenge” was conceived in 2009 to represent a volunteer-built pole barn, a fundraiser and a website dedicated to the bone preparation and skeletal rearticulation of a 33.5-foot-long male sperm whale that stranded and died at Cape Lookout in January 2004. That skeletal display, named Echo, was completed in March 2012 after years of painstaking work by Rittmaster, and is on display at the Maritime Museum.

But that one whale skeleton, challenging as it was to piece together and prepare for display, is nothing compared to what Rittmaster is planning. He wants to display skeletons and other artifacts to represent and teach others about all of the 34 cetaceans – whales, dolphins and porpoises – that inhabit North Carolina waters, either year-round or intermittently.

The planned building on West Beaufort Road is being entirely financed by donations. And what gives Rittmaster such confidence about a 2018 completion date is that in just a few months, the Bonehenge website has generated more than $80,000 in contributions toward construction of what is expected to be a $300,000 building.

“I’m to the point now where I’m starting to say ‘when’ we finish it instead of ‘if we can’ finish it, Rittmaster said. I don’t know if we can sustain this level of donations, but it’s been amazing so far. People are very interested, and they’re being very generous. They want to see this happen.”

There’s been at least one $25,000 donation, and one for $15,000, plus many smaller ones. What makes folks want to donate large sums of hard-earned money to a museum for whale and dolphin bones, among other things?

It varies from person to person and group to group, of course, but Rittmaster said that for many, there’s a common thread: personal experience.

One donor became excited because she took part in the effort to put together the skeleton of the sperm whale.

“She told me she loved being part of the team that made that happen,” Rittmaster said. “She said it was great to be a part of something that was bigger than anything anyone could have done individually” to display the skeleton of such a majestic creature for all to see.

Others have been moved by experiences of seeing whales on cruises, or just seeing dolphins frolicking in waters, or by participating in local efforts to save stranded cetaceans.

Rittmaster recalled the incredible community effort years ago to try to save “Benny,” a dolphin that was stranded on a Carteret County beach and ended up in a tank at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries lab on Pivers Island in Beaufort. Countless people helped, whether by bringing food or providing comfort to Benny in the tank.

It’s not unlike how Rittmaster came to enter his unusual career.

As reported here in September 2016, Rittmaster, now 61, while growing up in Princeton, New Jersey, never expected to wind up putting together dolphin and whale bones.

“Growing up I hated museums and I had no interest in bones or anatomy,” he said then. “In fact, I thought it was macabre whenever I saw animal bones on display in someone’s home.”

It all changed in 1975, according to that article, when Rittmaster, then 17, moved to Buxton on the Outer Banks. He started surfing among dolphins and saw his first whale stranding. It was a life-changing event.

He eventually met his wife-to-be-and-still, Vicky Thayer, the central coast marine mammal stranding coordinator for the Marine Mammal Stranding Network, in grad school at Duke University.

Since 1985, according to that 2016 article, Rittmaster, Thayer, and others have collected bottlenose dolphin fin photos. Rittmaster said around 4,000 photos, representing about 1,200 dolphins, have been added to an online database that allows people to help match the fin photos, and in turn, lead to discoveries in bottlenose dolphin migrations, associations, genetic stocks and birthrates.

Federal fish biologists use it to learn about the genetic pools of bottlenose dolphin populations.

Humans, Rittmaster said last month, have a deep connection to these creatures – whales and dolphins – after encountering them, whether in the wild, from a distance, or up close and personal in captivity. And he thinks Bonehenge will only strengthen that connection, and make people want even more to save the marine mammals that are threatened by pollution, fishing nets, ship strikes and other dangers.

He wants people to feel that connection, not just figuratively, from a distance, but physically, by touch, at Bonehenge.

“I want people to handle whale baleen,” a material usually called whalebone. It is not to be confused with whale bone or whale’s bone, meaning the actual bones of whales, used in carving, for cutlery handles and other uses for the bones of various large species. “I want them to touch a whale heart. I want them to ‘feel’ whales and other cetaceans.”

That, Rittmaster said, is how to make the emotional connection to these majestic creatures, usually seen on television or at a distance from a cruise, even more personal, to make people want even more to save them.

“I don’t want to keep these things in glass,” he said. “I want them accessible to you and your kids.”

Bonehenge is to be open to the public of course, and free. It’s going to be for visits by those who are interested, from students to adults. Rittmaster envisions a slow start, with some set hours, but he lives nearby, and said he can and will open it up on demand. In fact, he looks forward to that.

“I want it to be accessible to all people when they want to see it,” he said. “There’s going to be lot there. It might start off slow, but I think a lot of people will come.”

The idea is not that it’s separate from the museum, but more of an adjunct to it. Rittmaster said he was advised from the beginning that it would be a long and arduous process to make Bonehenge a reality if he and the others involved sought to make it a state project. State involvement necessitates countless bureaucratic hurdles not only for property acquisition, but for curating. So it will stay, at least in the beginning, a nonprofit, private organization.

He’ll remain a maritime museum employee and continue his other important work, among it that rearticulation, putting bones back together. He buries locally stranded or donated marine in a “graveyard” near his trailer office on West Beaufort Road, close to the Maritime Museum’s Gallants Channel Annex. After a few years, time enough for the flesh to decompose, he digs them up and gives them to interested researchers. Or sometimes, if the specimen is especially unique, he makes displays.

He works with a variety of people on these projects, including “volunteers, students, colleagues, co-workers, family, experts, and sometimes even people off the street,” he said in 2016. He wants to keep doing it.

The Bonehenge building effort really began in early 2017, when volunteers and donors collaborated with Rittmaster to purchase land on West Beaufort Road. The land is now owned by the charitable nonprofit Carolina Cay Maritime Foundation.

Rittmaster said he’s had numerous offers to help with the project gratis, things like landscaping and interior lighting and architectural designs. But he wants to pay for the actual construction of the building through the fundraising effort, in part because he wants a local contractor to do the job and get paid for it. It’s important to him.

Needless to say, Rittmaster is excited. He currently has his office in a trailer, with no running water, on an otherwise empty lot near the eventual building site. It’s crammed with books, dolphin photos, marine mammal bones, tooth molds and monofilament fishing line – a huge problem for marine mammals – not to mention the bones of Pitfall, a 37-year-old female humpback whale who died years ago from a ship strike.

“I’m glad to have this space,” he said. “But we just can’t embrace all the opportunities we have.”

For example, there’s a skeleton of the very rare Gervais’ beaked whale hanging in the state-owned Jennette’s Pier in Nags Head; Rittmaster would love for it to have a home in Beaufort.

“The new building will be so much better. We have (school) classes come through here now, but there’s really only room for about six people at a time. In the new building, we’ll have room for whole classes, and room for scientists to do research and collaborate.”

He believes it is all very important; with some whale species and other cetaceans threatened with extinction, it’s crucial for the public to learn about them and make that emotional connection necessary to make a real commitment to saving them.

He admits he’s been surprised by the outpouring of support for Bonehenge. But again, it’s similar to that effort to help Benny years ago; it’s a grassroots effort, Rittmaster said, born of an emotional attachments by people who recognize the importance of saving species that we might not see every day, but to which we relate.

It’s akin, one might say, to the formation of teams of volunteers who prowl beaches all over the world, including Carteret County, to make sure that sea turtles nests are not disturbed and that turtle hatchlings can make their way to the sea.

“People care, and they are concerned,” Rittmaster said. And he thinks Bonehenge will serve to heighten awareness and concern.

“I can’t wait for this to happen,” he said.

Learn More

• To donate, or to help make Bonehenge a reality in other ways, visit bonehenge.org or call 252-528-8607.

BEAUFORT — “It’s time to fish or cut bait,” if the world truly wants to save the North Atlantic right whale from extinction, Doug Nowacek said recently.

Nowacek, a whale and marine acoustics expert at the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, was reacting to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s recently completed North Atlantic Right Whale Review.

The review released in October paints a grim picture for the survival of one of the world’s most majestic and endangered species – there are by all reputable accounts fewer than 500 of them left on the planet.

Nowacek paints it even a bit more grimly.

While NOAA’s review states that the most recent population is about 458 whales, up from around 270 in 1990, it also notes a steady decline from an estimate of 483 in 2010.

But the numbers look worse if you dig deeper, Nowacek said. For example, 18 right whales are known to have died this year alone, 12 in Canada’s Gulf of St. Lawrence. There have been only five known births.

That, Nowacek said, is more than three times more deaths than births, an unsustainable rate for any species.

“The females used to have a calf roughly every three years, maybe two if there if they are healthy, maybe four if there are more stressors,” he said. “Now that’s up to six or seven.”

The, whales, which can reach 158,000 pounds and 50-55 feet long, are generally thought to live up to 50 years, “but more and more of them are dying in their 20s and 30s,” mostly from ship strikes and entanglement in nets, Nowacek said.

Since the whales generally take 10 to 20 years to reproduce for the first time, that means many of them are only having 10 to 20 or so years in which to reproduce. If you assume that roughly half of the right whales are generally male, there’s already a very limited pool. And Nowacek pointed to a paper published this past summer by Richard M. Pace, Peter J. Corkeron and Scott D. Kraus, which states that their study found “reduced survival rates of adult females relative to adult males.”

In both 2010 and 2011, there were estimated to be 200 females in the species, declining to 186 in 2015, according to the paper. Males declined from a peak of 283 in 2010, to 272 in 2015.

The researchers’ conclusion is that, the “population has not been rebounding well in recent decades, and our analysis raises concern that the slow recovery has stopped or even reversed.”

Kraus is vice president, senior adviser and chief scientist for marine mammals at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium in Boston. Corkeron and Pace are NOAA employees, and the study was done for NOAA.

Nowacek also noted that right whale deaths have exceeded PBR, or potential biological removal, for at least 20 years. PBR is a fishery management term defined by the Marine Mammal Protection Act as the maximum number of animals, not including natural mortalities, that may be removed from a marine mammal stock while allowing that stock to reach or maintain its optimum sustainable population.

So, less time to reproduce, longer times between calving, fewer females, a long time to reach reproductive age and accidental deaths that exceed PBR. It’s not a good situation.

Nowacek says he appreciates NOAA’s review and its recommendations, including the following:

• Designating a right whale recovery coordinator in the Greater Atlantic Region to focus efforts on recovery. Diane Borggaard, a biologist with 20 years of experience in species recovery, is taking on this role.
• Convening a new Greater Atlantic Region North Atlantic Right Whale Recovery Team, a group of experts in whale research and management that will coordinate closely with the Southeast Region’s Implementation Team.
• Collaborating with U.S./Canadian working group to reduce ship strikes and fishing gear entanglements, two of the largest human-caused threats to right whales. NOAA has already held several meetings with counterparts in Canada to discuss gear modifications, gear markings and ship-speed regulations.
• Convening a work group with Canada to focus on addressing the science and management gaps that are impeding the recovery of North Atlantic right whales in U.S. and Canadian waters. The group’s first meeting was held in September.
• Reinitiate the fisheries biological opinions under the Endangered Species Act in light of new information on right whale biology that may reveal effects of the fisheries that may not have been previously considered in the original biological opinions.

Nowacek doesn’t think right whales have a lot of time for “convening” and “re-initiating.” They need action now.

NOAA’s report includes the following recommended actions:

• Developing a strategy for understanding stressors on right whales, including the effect of chronic, sub-lethal entanglement on overall and reproductive health and the effects of changes in environmental conditions and prey availability.
• Developing a long-term, cross-regional plan for monitoring right whale population trends and habitat use.
• Prioritizing funding for a combination of acoustic, aerial and shipboard surveys of right whales that can be used to understand right whale presence in near real time.
• Evaluating the effectiveness of the Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan and the Ship Speed Rule to determine whether it may be necessary to modify or extend these protections.
• Reviewing the effects of commercial fishing operations on right whales.

But, Nowacek noted, those “ing” words are there again: “Developing.” “Reviewing.” “Evaluating.”

“I know NOAA is trying, and everyone appreciates that,” he said. “But I think it’s important to keep holding NOAA’s feet to the fire.”

Ship-strike deaths of right whales have declined in recent years, he said. That’s largely a result of a 2008 federal rule that requires large ships to travel at speeds of 10 knots or slower, seasonally, in areas where right whales feed and reproduce, as well as along migratory routes in between.

But net entanglement is an issue that doesn’t require more study.

“We need to get the gear out” of waters, particularly at times when we know right whales are likely to be there,” Nowacek said.

According to an article by Ann Hui in The Globe and Mail, a Canadian newspaper, it was about four years ago when fishermen started seeing right whales off the coast of Cape Breton Island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It was about the same time that fishermen and others in the Bay of Fundy had stopped seeing right whales there.

“With each summer came more sightings,” according to the article. “The sightings were initially treated as a passing curiosity. But then came the deaths. That’s when everyone started paying attention.”

Reports indicate there were close to 120 right whales in the gulf this summer. That means 10 percent of those there died. And that represented 2.6 percent of the entire estimated population. If you take 18 as the number – U.S. and Canada – that’s almost 4 percent of the population.

The first dead whale was discovered in the first week of June. Five more were found that same month, and more as the summer went on.

In the second week of July, the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans, or DFO, announced a temporary closing of fisheries in one small area of the gulf. Eventually, it just shut down a huge swath of the gulf for the rest of the deep-water snow crab season.

According to the article, a report eventually detailed the cause of death for six of the whales: Four died from vessel strikes and one from a long-term entanglement in fishing gear. A sixth was also believed to have died from a ship strike, but it was too decomposed for complete confidence. But there were other entanglements, too, at least four, although two were disentangled.

The necropsies showed no evidence of bio-toxins, infectious diseases or starvation in the whales.

In August, Transport Canada set temporary speed limits of 10 knots for large vessels of 20 meters or more in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and it was to remain in place until the whales moved on, most likely this month, when they normally start heading south into U.S. waters. Some reportedly have been seen off North Carolina, though Nowacek isn’t sure they’ve been accurately identified.

Canadian fishermen are obviously concerned, particularly those in fixed-gear fisheries, involving traps and lines left in the water unattended for a long period of time.

According to the article in The Globe and Mail, fishermen in the Gulf of St. Lawrence might be able to learn from the experience of the watermen in the Bay of Fundy.

“In most years, the whales migrate south by October,” according to the article. But in 2006, the whales remained in the Bay of Fundy well into November, and DFO threatened to implement full closings just as the lobster season was about to get under way. Working together with the federal department, the local fishing industry was able to put in place a series of policies to avoid whale interactions and also avert closings.

An important part of this was setting up a hotline for fishermen to call each day before heading out for information on whale sightings and locations. Education campaigns for local fishermen focus on what to do when they see a whale.

Canadian fishermen have also been researching the effectiveness of new equipment designed to avoid such entanglements.

Nowacek said that’s a good thing, and it’s happening in the U.S., too. But, he noted, bureaucracies like NOAA don’t move quickly to allow new gear or significant gear modification. And time is of the essence for the right whales.

Shippers have been helpful, and fishermen, including lobstermen in the Boston area, have proposed changes, he said. Many want to help. But, again, “Right whales don’t have a lot of time.”

Nowacek also emphasized that the problem is only getting more complex. Even during the brief population rebound earlier in 2002, no one he knows in the scientific community thought it was “solved.”

One of the complexities is that it’s hard to know for sure where the right whales are going to go, and the routes they will use to get there, as the disappearance from the Bay of Fundy and appearance in the Gulf of St. Lawrence shows.

And, Nowacek said, during the long debate in the Obama administration over seismic testing for oil and gas reserves and drilling for oil and gas off the East Coast, he and many other leading marine mammal scientists pointed out that the testing and drilling could be horrible for the remaining right whales, disrupting their migration routes, feeding and reproduction.

The Obama administration put the East Coast offshore waters off-limits to drilling, and didn’t give permits to companies that wanted to do the seismic testing. But the Trump administration has revived those goals for the waters off the South Atlantic, including North Carolina.

Meanwhile, new acoustic research shows that right whales are offshore from North Carolina to Georgia, not just in the depths of winter, but nine months a year. That magnifies the risk right whales face from oil and gas development.

Climate change is another risk factor. Some have said that’s why there were so many right whales in the Gulf of St. Lawrence this summer. Historically, they have generally started the spring in Cape Cod Bay of Massachusetts, then summer in the Gulf of Maine and the Bay of Fundy before heading south. The Gulf of St. Lawrence is pretty far north of that range.

NOAA, in its announcement of its five-year review of the right whale population, recommends that the species continues to be listed as endangered and confirms the risks.

“We identify the most significant need as reducing or eliminating deaths and injuries from human activities, namely shipping and commercial fishing operations,” according to NOAA. “The second priority is to get better data on their population trends, distribution and health, as well as on their habitat needs and uses. The third priority is to study the other potential threats, such as habitat degradation, noise, contaminants, and climate and ecosystem change, and determine ways to address them.”

Again, Nowacek praised NOAA for its assessment and for concluding that the right whale should remain on the endangered species list.

It all, he said, “Looks good on paper.” But looking good on paper might not be enough.

Learn More

• Read NOAA’s North Atlantic Right Whale Review
• Read the Pace, Corkeron and Kraus study (Word document)
• View an interactive North Atlantic right whale sightings map

Editor’s Note: The story was updated 4 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 30.

For some people who become deeply enmeshed in climate change and its impacts, there’s one event, maybe one scientific finding that figuratively smacked them in the face and set them on that path. It could have been Al Gore’s 2006 movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” or a summer of soaring temperatures, or a government report.

Rachel Willis, a University of North Carolina Chapel Hill professor who’s becoming well known for advocating that the world’s transportation infrastructure must increasingly work with – not against – climate change and sea level rise, didn’t get figuratively smacked. She literally got socked.

Willis, who teaches in the Department of American Studies at UNC, is by training a labor economist, and back in the 1990s, she’d been working on research about child care facilities and the benefits to the economy, work that helped lead to the legislation that created North Carolina’s Smart Start program for preschoolers.

In 1994 at a conference, she met a sock manufacturer. He introduced her to an industry specialist who created training programs to help factory owners and managers communicate more effectively with employees and help workers. In a labor economist professor’s mind, something clicked. But it wasn’t climate change. It was simply that socks were manufactured and transported all over the world: a great case study.

So for a decade, Willis went all over the world – Italy, China, the Czech Republic, and of course, all around North Carolina – to learn about socks: how they’re made, who makes the equipment that makes them, how they’re sold, how they’re marketed. She interviewed thousands of people, she said in a recent interview with Coastal Review Online.

And in the process, something clicked again: It wasn’t really about the socks. It was about the future of manufacturing. It was about competitiveness, it was about transportation. And ultimately, it became about climate change, because Willis realized that as the world’s atmosphere and oceans warm and expand and sea level rises, transportation infrastructure – roads and bridges and ports – are increasingly threatened. Coastal infrastructure is also threatened by increasingly frequent and more powerful storms.

“It all just sort of came together,” she said. “I’d always believed in climate change, but I really didn’t know much about it.” For someone who spent 10 years learning about the global sock trade, she dove in with enthusiasm, and came to believe that climate change and all of its ramifications – sea level rise, droughts, increasingly frequent and more powerful hurricanes and other storms – threatens the world’s economy, and by extension, its people. Not later. Now.

So she started traveling again, but this time with a new purpose, to learn about how other countries are dealing with infrastructure, ports and bridges and roads, especially, at edge of the waters, where sea level rise is naturally going to have the most impact.

She went to the Netherlands because that country has come to learn to work with nature after years of trying to conquer it. She went to the Welsh city of Cardiff on Cardiff Bay, which she said had, until about two decades ago, among the biggest daily tidal shifts of any water body in the world, so dramatic that access to the sea was limited to a couple of hours each side of high water.

She went to London, which is bisected by the Thames River, that throughout history has been responsible for devastating floods in parts of one of the world’s great cities.

What she saw in all of those places were changes, innovations, the results of the kind of thinking she believes has come to be in short supply in the United States, at least on these kinds of issues.

In the Netherlands, where about 20 percent of the land is below sea level, she saw the biggest flood barrier in the world. Called Maeslantkering, a part of the Delta Works project that began in the 1980s, it’s controlled by a supercomputer and closes if the city of Rotterdam is threatened by storm surge.

To get there, Willis first rode on an electric train that ran on power generated from wind energy, then rented a bike, something she said is a ubiquitous practice in the country.

Things clicked again.

Millions of Dutch workers commute daily by bicycle. All of the country’s electric trains run on wind energy. That’s a considerable difference from the U.S., where the interstate highway system is the hub of transportation, and almost no one bikes to work, comparatively speaking.

“It was pretty amazing to see,” Willis said. “They learned a long time ago to use what they have, and to take problems – like high wind – and turn them into solutions.”

They’ve built ports and shipping facilities that are generally safer from the impacts of sea level rise because of the Maeslantkering and Delta Works. The Dutch, she said, take water management as seriously as the U.S. takes national defense, because, in a real sense, it is national defense for such a low-lying country.

The Dutch, she said, also have turned the whole Maeslantkering, in what is known as the Hook of Holland, into an attraction, an economic engine.

There’s a museum there, for example, that educates people about the impacts of storm surge, the water that floods areas as storms roar ashore.

In the United States, Willis said, we warn people about storm surge during hurricanes, but after the storm surges occur and areas flood, the news media report the devastation and then “everybody moves on and it’s forgotten in a couple of weeks.” And nothing much changes.

In London, Willis saw the Thames Barrier, a series of 10 steel gates that are level with the river bottom until flooding threatens London. They are raised when the threat occurs – to what she said is the height of a five-story building – and block the rising waters. It holds the waters, then lets them out, slowly, after the event, a process that’s coordinated so canals along the river don’t flood.

In Cardiff, Willis said, she saw the system called Barrage, which was built and completed with European Union money about 20 years ago. What it does, she said, is retain water in the bay, essentially creating a more permanent bay and keeping the dramatic tidal shift from exposing a vast muddy bottom that was unattractive. And again, the area has become an economic engine, she said, as there are numerous shops and attractions, as well as pedestrian and bike paths.

It’s this kind of innovative thinking, Willis said, that gives her hope for efforts in the U.S. in general, and North Carolina in particular, to protect flood-prone areas.

“I’m not pessimistic, I’m optimistic,” she said. “But people in North Carolina and elsewhere need to vote for people who understand the science of climate change and what is at stake. Then we all have to plan and act cooperatively to work for future generations to be able to enjoy the North Carolina coast. We can do this, but we have to be realistic.”

She said that in Denmark, which she’s also visited, ferries are major carriers of not only people, but also cargo, serving as links between railroads. The same, she said, is true in Ireland. In some places, multi-level “super” ferries, some six or seven stories tall, carry buses, cars, bicyclists, pedestrians and cargo.

Willis can envision that type of thing in North Carolina, in conjunction with other changes in the transportation system.

Ferries, she said, could move people to the Outer Banks, and light rail systems along the banks and golf carts could carry them to where they need to go once they are there. The whole idea, she said, is that roads are so expensive to maintain, especially in the wake of sea level rise, and these other transportation methods are less expensive to maintain and less expensive to replace than flooded and destroyed roads.

These alternative transportation methods would also be far less damaging to the environment, she said, and would reduce the carbon output that contributes to climate change. So would more bike paths and pedestrian walkways.

In keeping with her training as a labor economist, Willis would like to see the state, the nation and world embrace different methods of getting things from “here to there.”

The U.S., she said, has for too long relied too heavily upon air planes and overland transportation of goods, largely by trucks, when rail and water transportation are far less costly these days for companies.

It costs about 80 cents per mile to move one metric ton of freight on an airplane, she said in the interview. It costs 27 cents to move it by truck. It costs two cents by rail and only one cent by water.

“That – the water transportation cost – is amazing,” she said. “It’s 1/27^th of the cost by truck.” And it dramatically reduces the carbon input into the atmosphere, especially if cargo vessels and trains can over time be switched to alternative sources.

Morehead City, she said, is in good position to benefit from these concepts, since the state port is served by a railroad, thanks to the vision of the city’s namesake Gov. John Motley Morehead, who got the track built way back in the 1800s.

It was, Davis said, an idea that made sense then, fell out of favor as interstate highways took over as routes for commerce, but makes even more sense now.

Willis is in line with Orrin Pilkey, a Duke University professor and researcher who for decades has preached the need for a strategic retreat of structures from the oceanfront.

“The major storms and flooding events are happening more frequently,” she said. “Does that mean we have to abandon the Outer Banks? No, of course not. But we have to have a better plan. We have to have policies and incentives to that discourage building at the water’s edge.

“What we do now is encourage it by subsidizing risk,” Willis continued, through government-subsidized flood and wind insurance, for example, and by allowing destroyed buildings to be rebuilt exactly where they were, in most cases.

Like Pilkey, she said a good first step would be to simply not allow that to happen. There should also be government-sponsored buyouts for the people who own those structures.

“What we do now is just irrational,” she said. “There have been plenty of cues in recent years that we need to change our thinking. We’ve had some very big cues just the last couple of months: Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Irma in Florida and Maria in Puerto Rico. And it’s not just in the United States.”

It’s clear, Willis said, that in some instances, wealthy countries and communities can reduce the risks of sea level rise and storm surge damage with engineering marvels that cost billions. But it’s also clear that not all countries, or even all communities in rich countries, have the resources to do that.

“We’re going to have to make hard choices, determine what is most important for us to protect, what is the most important in terms of the number of people and the economy.”

Ports are, and should be, high on the list of top choices for protection, she added, and not just American ports.

“Who are we shipping to?” she asked. “And who is shipping to us, and what are we shipping? Do we want bananas, for example? Do we want concrete and steel and the raw materials we need for products we make?

“It’s a global problem, and we can’t afford to just think about our infrastructure, our ports. We need to care about other places. We’re all in this together. We need be holistic in our approach.”

Willis said that means policymakers and others who are concerned should go to other countries, as she has done, to learn more about how they are adapting to rising sea levels.

“You can’t legislate sea level to stop rising,” she said. “This is not a problem that’s going away. It’s water over the bridge, and it’s going to happen more often and with greater severity in coming years.”

Planners must also think holistically about individual projects: How will it affect its entire region?

“If you build something to protect Manhattan, that water will go somewhere else,” she said. “The Thames Barrier is an integrated system that works with 18 or so other canals. These are complex problems with complex solutions.”

And, Willis said, stakeholders – fishermen, residents, business owners – must have input into the processes that lead to innovative solutions.

“You want protection when it’s needed, but you also want to maintain fishing and aquaculture and the other things that contribute to the economies,” she said.

Learn More

• Read Willis’ bio
• “Water Over the Bridge”

“Water is our liquid bond,” Britt Sheinbaum said, halfway through an interview last week.

Sheinbaum, who is working on a Lower Cape Fear Basin water quality protection blueprint out of the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s southeastern office in Wrightsville Beach, where she lives, feels that liquid bond a little deeper than most, and made the connection in an unusual manner: She answered a help-wanted ad in the Washington Post.

She had a bachelor’s degree in international relations, and had moved to Washington, D.C.

“I had thought I’d end up in the State Department, the U.S. Foreign Service, like my father (Gilbert H. Sheinbaum), but I needed a job,” recalled Sheinbaum, who was the keynote speaker this week in Raleigh at the 97th annual conference of the The North Carolina Section of the American Water Works Association and The North Carolina Member Association of the Water Environment Federation.

“I’d been out of school for a while, and I saw the ad and answered it. I ended up staying for nine years,” as a staff liaison at the Water Environment Federation, an Alexandria, Virginia-based nonprofit association that provides technical education and training for water quality professionals.

A few years later, her watery connection took another serendipitous turn. She took a trip to Israel and Palestine. A tour guide asked her what she did, and she answered. “Oh, good,’” she remembers the guide answering. “We don’t have a lot of water. You can help us.”

It sparked something in her. She remembers traveling the arid lands, back in 2013, and noticing how Israel, in particular, conserved water and viewed that as a “cornerstone” of its national security.

“I was very interested in better understanding the relationships between conflicts and water, and I decided I wanted to learn more about it, so I looked for a school that had a graduate program in that area of study,” she said. “It just turned out that there was one at Tel Aviv University. And I was very lucky. The program was so new that they pretty much let me do whatever I wanted to do.”

In what was essentially an independent study program, she earned her master’s degree in International Conflict Resolution and Mediation, concentrating on water issues. Now she’s a certified North Carolina Superior Court mediator and is pursuing a second graduate degree from Oregon State University in Water Conflict Management and Transformation. Her undergraduate degree is from Sweet Briar College in Virginia.

So how did this globetrotter – who lived in Madagascar, Malawi, Sri Lanka and the Philippines, among other places, as she grew up the daughter of Foreign Service officer – end up in Wrightsville Beach?

“It’s a classic case of falling in love with a very handsome man who became my husband,” she said. She met Hank Carter, an artist and a first mate on an oceangoing tugboat for Vane Brothers Inc., based in Baltimore, during her time in Washington.

“He’s lived in Wrightsville Beach his whole life, except for about six months,” Sheinbaum said. “If we got married, there was never really any question we were going to live here. He pretty much made that clear on the first date. And I don’t mind. It’s such a beautiful place. I love it here.”

It was not really a stretch, though. Sheinbaum grew up on all those aforementioned islands – she was born in Madagascar – and loves the island lifestyle. Being on an island also drives home, every single day, the importance of water to human life.

Looking back, Sheinbaum said, she didn’t know it at the time, but her international island-hopping childhood gave her a unique perspective for what turned out to be her life’s calling, so far.

“I grew up living with and talking to a very diverse group of people in those societies,” she said. “And looking back, it gave me a different view of conflicts, and about the need to be able to resolve them. It turned out that water is a major source of conflict in many different parts of the world.”

Syria, for example. The war-torn country suffers from a lack of water, partly because of geography and climate, but most recently because the distribution system had been destroyed, in part because of fighting among rebel groups and the government over who gets what’s left, how and when.

Water, Sheinbaum said, isn’t the cause of the Syrian wars, but when you add a lack of water to the volatile mix of politics and religion, it adds fuel to a raging fire. And the same is true in many places.

Oxfam, an international confederation of charitable organizations focused on the alleviation of global poverty, concluded in a study, she said, that diseases from unsafe water and lack of basic sanitation kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war. When you combine that with war, the costs to humanity are incalculable, from Gaza to South Sudan to Nigeria and Kenya and Yemen.

“But I’m generally optimistic,” she said, of efforts by the U.S. to promote access to clean water internationally. “I think we cooperate more than we fight,” over water resources, she said.

The United States, Sheinbaum conceded, is a wealthy country with generally healthy, if aging, infrastructure, so access to water isn’t usually high in the minds of average citizens. But problems come up, such as the high levels of lead in the water in Flint, Michigan, and the discovery close to home this year of GenX, a chemical manufactured by Chemours, an offshoot of DuPont, in the water supply in Wilmington, the largest city in New Hanover County, just across the bridge from Wrightsville Beach.

Chemours has been commercially manufacturing GenX since 2009, under an agreement with the federal Environmental Protection Agency that it would prevent discharge of the chemical compound into the Cape Fear River. But the company, according to reports, has been dumping GenX into the river for more than 30 years, when it was being created as a byproduct of a vinyl-making process. Sheinbaum started on her federation project for the Lower Cape Fear Basin in July. The GenX issue has changed things somewhat.

But, she said, she’s pretty confident the local governments in the area will embrace the federation’s effort; it’s in everyone’s best interest, because water is our “lifeblood.”

While “water wars” aren’t a real threat at present in the United States, Sheinbaum said, it hasn’t been that long since there were political wars, sometimes with violence, over water. One need only watch the 1974 movie “Chinatown” that was inspired by the California Water Wars, a series of disputes over southern California water at the beginning of the 20th century, which Los Angeles interests secured water rights in the Owens Valley.

It’s also a subject of a lot of writing, including a highly praised and award-winning novel called “The Water Knife,” by Paolo Bacigalupi, which describes a not-so-distant U.S. future in which the Colorado River has dwindled to a trickle, and intrigue and criminal activity emerge as Nevada – Las Vegas – and Los Angeles fight for water in the western U.S.

All of this might seem farfetched, but with many scientists blaming climate change for droughts in the recent past and predicting more in the future, particularly in the often-arid American west, water wars of some sort are by no means hard to imagine.

California, she said, is a good modern U.S. example. The state was at a crisis point just a couple of years ago as a years-long drought gripped the region. Things have improved, the crisis averted for now, but there’s no guarantee it won’t happen again, and worse.

The point, Sheinbaum said, is that we need to be prepared, no matter how comfortable we might feel as citizens of a rich nation, because water is life. That was the subject, to a degree, of her talk at the conference in Raleigh this week.

Her travels and research, she said, in the interview, have shown her that many countries, some also blessed by copious water sources, good geography and solid infrastructure, have done and are doing more to protect and enhance their supplies of the most precious resource on the planet. It’s just smart. And it doesn’t have to be at the expense of the economy.

In Denmark, she said in her promo for her talk at the conference this week, water consumption has decreased by nearly 30 percent since 1980, while the country’s gross domestic product has increased by 75 percent during that same period; hardly a drain on the economy. In arid Israel, 85 percent of wastewater is recycled. Americans haven’t really come to grips with that concept, at least in terms of using for drinking, cooking and bathing, but they might have to do so at some point.

“Water in the water canals and ponds around Dutch cities like The Hague and Amsterdam is so clean that citizens are encouraged to find their local swimming hole through a swimming water app,” she said in the promo. “These nations have made a strong domestic water management policy a cornerstone of their national security model, a byproduct of which has been a strong national economy.

“Water supply may not be the biggest threat to national security, (but) how a country handles water will dictate its chances for surviving and thriving.  When undervaluing water conservation and treatment, a community ignores a latent security risk by creating a vulnerable supply, as well as the untapped potential for economic growth and development.”

In the U.S., she added in the interview for Coastal Review, many local governments don’t have adequate staff or funds to study and address water issues, and they need support in order to develop strategies for public acceptance of water projects.

“I think most take it seriously, but also kind of take it (water) for granted,” she said of U.S. and local governments’ attention to water resource and water quality issues. “There are many earnest and concerned people working hard on these issues, but we need, all of us, to do a better job of communicating the concerns.

“Part of that is normal,” she added, since water professionals aren’t trained in the nuances of communication with the public; they’re generally very dedicated and highly-trained people, but technical by nature and by education.

People like her, she said – with a somewhat varied skill set – need to help the water professionals communicate to the public the need to take water resource issues seriously, even if on the surface there appears to be no U.S. crisis. It’s important.

One obvious issue, she stressed, is that aging infrastructure. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates a need for $600 billion to be spent over the next 20 years to meet essential drinking and wastewater needs; in some places, some water pipes date back to the Civil War.

“We need to plan for things that can happen,” she said. “Things can change in a hurry. We need to be prepared.”

Rick Luettich, director of the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City, grew up in Maine, fascinated by water. But it was very cold water.

“I’m not sure why it fascinated me,” he said. “We had ponds and creeks and snow melts, and I just loved to be out in it, building dams and playing and figuring things out. I remember always coming into the house soaking wet as a kid, and getting told by my parents that maybe I ought to spend a little less time in it. And it really was cold.”

It’s no surprise, then, that when the self-professed lifelong science and math geek went off to college, he chose a warmer clime, Georgia Institute of Technology, otherwise known as Georgia Tech, in Atlanta, where he earned his civil engineering undergraduate and master’s degrees, before returning to New England to earn his doctorate in civil engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT. Cold water again.

So what to do after graduation? Having had a taste of the South, New Englander and Boston Red Sox fan Luettich eventually went back to it, and started work in 1987 as an assistant professor in marine sciences at UNC-IMS. Warmer water, for sure, but it still fascinated him, though mostly, now, it contained fish and shellfish. That, after all, was the primary focus of the institute, and still is.

His research for a time focused mostly on how the movement and the quality of water affected marine life. But he’s also always been interested in the practical application of his scientific research. Eventually, that led him to be the co-developer of ADCRIC, a computer modeling program that over the past 20 years has become the most-used method of predicting how much storm surge will affect particular locations as hurricanes approach land.

He hasn’t given up his other research and work, such as observational studies that have included moored and shipboard sampling to characterize physical processes in coastal systems, often oriented toward understanding the role of physical processes – algal blooms, dissolved oxygen depletion – in areas of water quality and fisheries recruitment.

But he’s been a busy man this fall, as hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria approached Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico, respectively, pushing storm surges measuring in feet into some heavily populated and vulnerable areas.

Luettich might not be The Weather Channel’s Jim Cantore, ubiquitous in rain gear, showing up wherever a hurricane is poised to strike. But he’s become somewhat of a media star nevertheless, turning up to discuss potentially deadly storm surges. He’s done a couple of dozen interviews this hurricane season, and he’s glad to do it, because he knows that storm surge is the deadliest and most destructive part of most hurricanes, whether people realize it or not.

Information about surge is critical to local decision-makers.

ADCIRC’s website for a time this fall was getting up to 100,000 hits per day.

But public information about storm surge can be confusing; many outlets put it out there, and from various sources. This year, for example, as Irma approached Florida, predictions of storm surge in the highly developed Tampa Bay area, where the hurricane seemed headed for a direct hit, and in Fort Meyers and Naples, ranged as high as a 6 to 9 feet.

ADCIRC wasn’t showing that. Rather, as the hurricane’s track solidified, it was showing that Irma was first going to suck the water out of Tampa Bay, leading to a phenomenon in which a portion of the bay would be, temporarily, high and dry.

And, by the time Irma’s back side arrived, it would have been over land for some time, and it would be weaker. Not only would some of that surge simply refill the bay, there’d be less wind to push it ashore.

It didn’t mean Tampa Bay’s shoreline would be out of the woods, by any means. But, Luettich said, it did mean a 6- to 9-foot surge wouldn’t likely materialize. So he wasn’t surprised when the actual surge was more along the lines of 2 to 3 feet.

“That’s pretty much precisely what we predicted,” he said.

It was partly a function of the path the hurricane took. At the last minute, Irma moved inland before it got to Naples, taking its eastern wall away from the ocean. The winds were moving west and sucked the water out first. In the end – incredible damage notwithstanding – Irma turned out to be about the best-case scenario, from a track and surge perspective, for Florida’s west coast.

Luettich doesn’t blame folks for expecting and putting out reports about the widely mentioned 6- to 9-foot surge. It’s a function of the incredible amount of attention media pay to hurricanes, and a function of the overall goal of those who put out the most, and most noticed, information.

For example, most folks rely on the National Hurricane Center. And the center’s mission is more broad-brush than that of ADCIRC and its users. ADCIRC, Luettich said, uses the advisories the National Hurricane Center generates for storms every six hours, such as wind speed, wind fields, predicted paths and wave heights to help generate its predictions.

ADCIRC, which has been refined for years, performed as one of its two lead designers expected.

Back in 2012, in another Coastal Review Online story, Luettich said ADCIRC wasn’t the first program of its kind, but was a “major leap forward,” largely because of the underlying database. Luettich’s prime collaborators at the University of Notre Dame used topographic and other crucial data from an array of sources, from federal agencies down to the county level.

ADCIRC by then had already proved its usefulness, cited in the 2012 story.

As Hurricane Irene had moved up the East Coast in 2011, Luettich said then, Joseph DiRenzo, chief of operations analysis for the Coast Guard’s Atlantic area, had placed a phone call from his office in Portsmouth, Virginia, to Luettich.

DiRenzo was worried about the Portsmouth base, which is the Coast Guard’s command center for the Atlantic, as it was on low ground prone to flooding. Though Irene wasn’t forecast to become a major hurricane, DiRenzo wanted to know what kind of storm surge to expect in Portsmouth.

At DiRenzo’s request, Luettich ran ADCIRC. It was quickly evident there would be problems in Portsmouth: Models indicated the base would be inundated. Forewarned, base commanders in Portsmouth loaded two C-130 aircraft, one carrying command staff, and flew them to St. Louis to ride out the storm and control Coast Guard operations from Missouri, 900 miles away. Not too long after that, the base was indeed flooded by storm surge and lost power.

But in that 2012 story, Luettich said the program would get better, and he now says it has. The database has of course been further refined, and the computers are faster and more powerful. He’s more confident in the predictions than he was five years ago. It’s also been improved by a continual process of looking at what it gets wrong.

“That’s often more important than looking at what you’ve gotten right,” he said, echoing a basic scientific principle. “You look at what went wrong and ask, ‘Why?’” And when you divine those answers, you refine.

ADCIRC, Luettich said, is widely used by the Army Corps of Engineers and others, including the National Weather Service, which is the parent agency of the National Hurricane Center, both part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It’s also the chief tool used by the National Flood Insurance Program, and is used by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to evaluate the flooding vulnerability of coastal nuclear power plants.

Not surprisingly, Luettich is in demand. He’s been on a long consulting assignment to help redesign the flood-control infrastructure in New Orleans, which suffered such a devastating blow from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He still goes to Louisiana once a month to help the Army Corps of Engineers design improvements, to the tune of $14.5 billion in what’s called a “Hurricane and Storm Damage Risk Reduction System.”

He leads the Department of Homeland Security Coastal Resilience Center of Excellence, and initiated the Center for the Study of Natural Hazards and Disasters to promote multidisciplinary hazards research.

He believes local and state governments are paying more attention to, and addressing storm surges issues gradually, although wind and rain still receive more media coverage, especially after the huge rainfall and record flooding in Houston from Hurricane Harvey.

Folks in the Northeast began paying more attention after Superstorm Sandy in 2012, and already, officials in Houston are paying more attention after the devastation caused by Harvey in August and September.

Luettich said that although hurricane season this year has kept him busy with ADCIRC, much of it is now automated, and there others who are capable of running the program. His role with the program is now more “forensic,” looking at the program critically after major events and helping to decide what, if anything, went wrong, and how that can be fixed.

He’s been at UNC-IMS for more than two decades now, the last 13 years as director, and doesn’t plan to leave, although he concedes he’s had opportunities.

But where would he go? North Carolina’s coast, the Morehead City-Beaufort area in particular, is Nirvana for marine science research and collaboration. Within a couple football fields’ length on Arendell Street in Morehead City alone are UNC-IMS, the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries and N.C. State University’s Center for Marine Sciences and Technology. Just a few miles away in Beaufort, there are the Duke University Marine Lab and the NOAA Southeast Fisheries Science Center. North Carolina Sea Grant has a heavy presence, and there’s a national estuarine reserve named after Rachel Carson, who studied some at the Duke Lab. It’s hard to top that confluence.

Those opportunities for collaboration with other world-class teachers and researchers in various marine science fields are a large part of what has kept Luettich, and many others around for decades at UNC-IMS and those other seemingly remote outposts, miles away from their parent institutions in the North Carolina interior cities of Raleigh, Chapel Hill and Durham.

“There are very few places like this, where you can collaborate with so many others and do work that affects people right in your own backyard, in this field,” Luettich said.  “I’ve always been most interested in applied research, and the coast of North Carolina has so many opportunities for that.”

Plus, he said, UNC’s main campus in Chapel Hill has long supported marine research, and has a strong program that involves not just the institute, but a thriving department in Chapel Hill. The school, he noted, is a public one, and it believes in and stresses public service. In addition to science-based involvement, Luettich served two terms as an elected member of the Carteret County Board of Education.

“I can’t say enough about the support we get here from Chapel Hill,” he said.

He also noted that the university and its marine lab have always emphasized the need for its professors and researchers to try to relate their work to local residents.

“I’ve always felt, too, that one of our most critical missions is to be involved, and to relate to, our local communities,” he said. UNC-IMS scientists try to put things in practical terms, understandable by laymen, not just scientists, Luettich said, and they also try to listen.

“There are so many times when, if you stop talking and just listen, the folks with practical experiences and knowledge can teach you, or at least provide insights that can further your interests and lead you to think about things in different ways and affect your research,” he said.

He also relishes the family atmosphere at UNC-IMS, and in the collaborations with the other facilities, and believes that’s also partly for the responsible for so many of the scientists staying in Carteret County’s facilities for long periods of time when they obviously are in demand elsewhere.

“There are many smart and gifted and driven individuals in academia, and here at UNC, too,” he said. “In many places, that can be chilling. A lot of big egos,” he said, can lead to a lot of infighting and discomfort.

But, he said, “Here, we have for many years cultivated a real ‘family’ culture that has tempered that.  People do want to stay here.”

Many who work and study as graduate students under the longtime professors at IMS come back to work there if they can, Luettich said, and they also collaborate on research with IMS professors if they get jobs elsewhere.

There’s also the undeniable fact that the pressures of daily living are less than they are in more heavily populated and develop bastions of marine science.

“It’s a great ‘sandbox,’” Luettich concluded.

Learn More

• ADCIRC
• Coastal Resilience Center
• Taking Measure of a Storm’s Potent Punch

Not that long ago, chances are pretty good Interfaith Power & Light (IPL) was not a household name in many homes in North Carolina.

The organization began in 1998 with Episcopal Power & Light and the support of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. It was, according to the website, “a unique coalition of Episcopal churches aggregated to purchase renewable energy.”

By 2000, though, the idea had caught on and expanded its mission, at least in California, and the Episcopalians had brought in other faith partners. It was re-christened as California Interfaith Power & Light, and the concept grew to include efforts to “educate … people of faith about the moral and ethical mandate to address global warming.” California IP&L helped pass California’s climate and clean energy laws.

And like many things that start in California, it didn’t just stay in the Golden State. There are now IP&L chapters in 40 states and Washington, D.C., and the 501(c)(3) organization has become a leading nationwide faith-based player in the climate change debate.

IP&L is now a part of more than 1,500 churches of various faiths,  and many thousands of people in them are involved in what they consider a moral imperative, perhaps the moral imperative, of our time: saving the planet.

One of those congregations is the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship in Morehead City, where member and leader Penny Hooper of Smyrna received a request in 2006 from a friend, Robert Meadows, an Episcopalian in Beaufort, for a venue in which to show Al Gore’s movie, “An Inconvenient Truth.” Ms. Hooper, who was a member of the Green Sanctuary Committee at UCF, helped set it up for viewing there, became increasingly involved, and came to believe, she says now, that people of faith not only can be involved in fighting for the country’s efforts to address climate change, they must be, and can be among the most important players.

She’s now chairperson of the North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (NCIPL) Leadership Council.

“Every faith has as part of its basic tenants the responsibility to take care of creation,” she said. She added there is that other basic tenant about taking care of the poor, who for a variety of reasons, tend to suffer the worst effects of a warming and a more unstable planet. As stated in the King James Version of the Bible: “Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

Hooper’s own faith, Unitarian-Universalism, expresses those things in a number of ways, including in its seven principles, two of which are:

• The inherent worth and dignity of every person; and
• Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

But, Hooper said, UCF is far from alone in its support of IP&L and its goals in North Carolina.

The North Carolina Council of Churches, founded in 1935 and now representing about 1.5 million congregants in churches of 18 faiths, has a link to NCIPL under the programs tab on its website. With urging from IPL, the North Carolina Council of Churches on Sept. 17 adopted an anti-fracking resolution that states, in part, that “… any new investment in energy infrastructure based on the extraction of fossil fuels is morally reprehensible and, as people of faith, we believe it is an abuse of the God-given gift of creation for which we are charged to care.”

Why is this important to IPL, the council of churches and others?

“This goes to the fact that if we build all these pipelines, then we will be beholden to burn fracked gas for 30-50 more years, rather than moving towards renewable energy throughout our state and nation,” Hooper said.

In that resolution, the council also states, “The Union of Concerned Scientists report(s) that burning fossil fuels shows us the visible cost to our ecosystem, but the hidden costs are much higher. Fracked gas is extremely dangerous. Besides being flammable, gas pipelines emit a significant source of methane emissions through leaks large and small, a material 84 times more detrimental to our atmosphere than carbon dioxide. No pipeline is … leak-proof, no matter the guarantees …

“Furthermore, we wholeheartedly disagree with the process of fracking because of the extreme detrimental effects to the environment where this process occurs. It has been well documented that irreparable damage is caused to drinking water and to the seismic stability of the earth when this technique is put to use.”

What’s needed for the future of the planet and future generations of its inhabitants, Hooper believes, is a true paradigm shift, and IPL is working toward that through education and programs. For example, there’s, “Cool Congregations,” in which IPL provides education and tools for churches, and individuals in them, to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions – and save money on energy bills.

Through a program known as “Cool Harvest” IPL will help churches learn more about climate-friendly foods that are also healthier than the diets of many people, and will teach people how to plan and create sustainable vegetable gardens.

IP&L and its member churches will also do energy audits for homes and businesses. They work with power companies, such as Duke Energy and Carteret-Craven Electric Cooperative, to bring in people trained to identify and help people implement energy-saving measures.

In addition, Hooper said, IPL is involved in lobbying, urging congregations to send letters, individually and as groups, to legislators who can make a difference in the effort to limit or stop carbon emissions that lead to climate changes.

Recently, Hooper penned a letter to U.S. Rep. Walter B. Jones Jr., R-N.C., thanking him for opposing oil and gas drilling and seismic testing off the North Carolina coast, but also urging him to join the House of Representatives Climate Solutions Caucus and sign on to House Resolution 195, which was started in September 2015 and has been supported by religious leaders who called for an interfaith moral “Call to Conscience on Climate Disruption.”

Hooper said in the letter that the resolution was “a timely response to Pope Francis’ address to the United States Congress following his release of his Papal Encyclical, “Laudato Si,” written earlier that year. I also know that you understand the risk climate change poses to our military in the form of increased destabilization across our nation and world,” she wrote. “Resolution 195 expresses the commitment of the House of Representatives to work constructively on creating and supporting economically viable and broadly supported solutions to measured changes in global and regional climates.”

Another issue Hooper and NCIPL have been working on involves state House Bill 589, which was signed into law by Gov. Roy Cooper after being passed by a big bipartisan majority in the state General Assembly. While it imposed an 18-month moratorium on wind energy development, which jeopardized as much as $1 billion in new investments by two wind projects in largely rural and economically distressed counties in the eastern part of the state, it also updated the state’s solar energy policy, and according to some, should make it easier for home and business owners to use solar.

Hooper and others deplore the wind energy moratorium. But she said she and NCIPL are working with Duke Energy to ensure that H 589 gets interpreted by Duke Energy and the Utilities Commission “with houses of worship in mind, as well as the environmental justice issues of installing new solar. We want to encourage putting solar in poor communities and in communities of color,” she said.

NCIPL is also involved in what the organization calls the Paris Pledge, which encourages signers to strive for a 50 percent carbon emission reduction by 2030 and sets a goal of being carbon neutral by 2050. Interfaith Power & Light would like to see global nations commit to these levels.

IPL’s founder and president, the Rev. Sally Bingham, hand delivered to UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon in Paris a long list of congregations and individuals who indicated they were willing to commit to the same carbon reduction level the group is asking nations to make.

In addition, UCF and other IPL-affiliated congregations have adopted resolutions, or statements of conscience, urging the U.S. to get back into the Paris climate change accord.

President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the country from that accord placed a new urgency on actions, Hooper said. The country, she added, needs to be involved, so at least it has a “seat at the table” in discussions that will continue among the other industrialized nations in the world whether the U.S. is involved or not.

All of these things that IPL support, Hooper said, are meaningful individually, but are more important, larger than the sum of their parts, collectively.

And the wide variety of grassroots efforts initiated by people like Hooper in NCIPL draw praise from Bill Bradlee, the California-based affiliate services director for IPL’s national office.

“My sense is that NCIPL is extremely effective,” he said. “They work a lot on the federal and state policy efforts, but they also undertake many efforts on the local level, both to affect policy and to engage people at that level and get them involved in the issues.”

NCIPL, Bradlee said, builds coalitions and tries to work with some that might not seem to be natural allies. “It’s not just quality of the outreach, but also the quantity of the outreach,” he said.

He conceded it’s hard to quantify the influence of IPL on decision-makers, but numbers matter, and the growth of the group in recent years has been significant. He does sense that when IP&L speaks or writes, the fact that it’s a faith-based organization resonates with many, and that makes a difference.

Bradlee thinks that despite some setbacks under the Trump Administration, the American people increasingly embrace the need to address the issues raised by climate change.

“It’s hard to see day-to-day or even month-to-month, but you can sense that it’s building, especially if you look at it year-to-year,” he said. “Our growth – we have affiliates in 40 states now – gives us more cachet when we talk to members of Congress or state legislatures, as well as to other faith leaders.

“We’re building a faith-based movement, and that’s hard and takes time,” he said. “But at the same time, it’s clear that once people get involved in such work, which they consider morally and spiritually important, they find it very fulfilling. They realize how important it is, and they don’t give up. They keep moving, step-by-step, and they’re not going to stop.”

For more information about what NCIPL offers locally, contact Hooper at pjhooper@ec.rr.com or 252-729-2521.

Learn More

Interfaith Power and Light

Editor’s Note: Reporter Brad Rich is a member and past president of the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship in Morehead City.

When Dr. Craig Harms returned a call to talk about his book, he was leaving the North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher where he’d been examining sea turtles, and heading to a sea turtle hospital in Surf City, where he not only has been treating turtles but also teaching sea turtle medical treatment to fourth-year veterinary school students from North Carolina State University in Raleigh.

Nothing could have been more appropriate, because Harms, a professor in the Department of Clinical Sciences at N.C. State’s Center for Marine Sciences and Technology, or CMAST, in Morehead City, has helped write, edit and get published in July, “Sea Turtle Health and Rehabilitation,” an academic yet practical tome many feel is destined to become the bible of how to diagnose and treat the reptiles that are beloved by many folks around the world.

“(It) is the first-ever comprehensive book on sea turtle husbandry, health, medicine and surgery,” according to the publisher, J. Ross Publishing of Plantation, Florida. “This full-color guide presents extensive information for the rescue, evaluation, care and rehabilitation of sick and injured sea turtles at every stage of life.” The publisher calls the work “an essential volume for veterinarians, veterinary students, veterinary technicians, rehabilitators, aquarists, biologists and conservationists who work with sea turtles.”

Harms, who also directs the Marine Health Program at CMAST, isn’t expecting to get rich. The 1,100-page book with 600 full-color photos and illustrations lists for sale at $295, so it’s not likely to be purchased by many of the thousands who in recent years have joined teams that prowl beaches in North Carolina and elsewhere to watch sea turtle nests and help the hatchlings make it to the ocean when those nests “boil,” as it’s called.

But money was never the point.

“It was just something that I and some others thought needed to be done,” Harms said in the phone interview. “And we feel like it turned out very well.”

At one point, the notion had occurred to Harms that he could do it all himself. It didn’t turn out that way, but that’s OK. Others had started first, and asked him to participate.

It was, he said, “something a lot of us in sea turtle medicine had in the backs of our minds, something that would provide as much as possible of all the good information that we have accumulated. It took three years, and a lot of people were involved.

“It turned out to be well beyond a one-person job. Once we all got started, it just kept growing and growing. It went well beyond what any of us thought it would be. But to the credit of the publisher, they didn’t mind.”

The goal, he said, was simply to “bring together all of that expertise and all of those experiences of people in the field in one place, as a go-to resource for sea turtle medicine.”

The contents include the life history of sea turtles, of course, but also page after page about the complex issues related to the diagnosis and treatment of conditions that are frequently encountered in sea turtles.

There are entire chapters on what the publisher calls “subjects related to sea turtle health and conservation,” such as mortality investigation, fisheries interactions, oil spills and other environmental contamination, pathogens, cold stunning, and harmful algal blooms.

In the past, the sea turtle community relied on scattered chapters and papers to obtain information on care and rehabilitation. It would have been hard to imagine this a decade ago, but the public seems to have fallen in love with these giant reptiles, who, each year, defy the odds and survive in the face of innumerable obstacles.

In Emerald Isle alone – a Carteret County barrier island town with a permanent population of only about 3,000 – there are close to 100 volunteers, some visitors but mostly residents, who spend many summer and fall nights watching nests, digging trenches for hatchlings, moving nests out of tidal zones and into safe places.

Many describe the boiling of a nest and rush of the tiny hatchlings to the sea as close to a religious experience, one perhaps equaled by the sight of the formerly pregnant mother turtle lumbering back into the water after digging the nest on the beach.

Harms gets it, and knows that part of it is the fact that turtles live for decades, are generally all endangered or threatened and remind us of the natural world upon which we have inexorably impinged, to deleterious effects. Maybe we feel that saving sea turtles is saving a part of us?

“They’ve certainly captured the imagination of the public,” Harms said. “They’re reptiles, like snakes, but they don’t seem like reptiles. They have ‘cute’ faces. They make an impression you don’t forget. They seem gentle and friendly. They have big eyes. Their life spans are similar to ours. And their physical presence is, to some degree, symbolic of the health of the marine environment.”

In other words, if these ancient species, these ultimate survivors – loggerheads, Kemp’s ridleys, greenbacks, leatherbacks and the rest, which trace their ancestors back 150 million years – disappear, what does that say about or roles as stewards, and about us in general?

Harms seems somewhat of an unlikely sea turtle guru, given that he grew up in land-locked Iowa. But Iowa also has a great history of spawning conservationists. Think Aldo Leopold, author of “A Sand County Almanac,” and Ding Darling, the legendary editorial cartoonist who inspired millions; he also initiated the Federal Duck Stamp program and designed the first stamp and was appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to be the first head of the U.S. Biological Survey, the forerunner of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Harms grew up in Iowa with parents, Ron and Pat, who now live in Morehead City, but were well aware of that culture in Iowa and were always “into” nature.

Sea turtles, of course, were a “foreign concept,” he recalls of his youth, but conservation certainly wasn’t, nor was love of animals. He earned his doctorate in veterinary medicine from Iowa State University in 1989, and his Ph.D. in immunology from N.C. State in 1999. He was a natural for CMAST, which opened its doors on the shore of Bogue Sound in 1997.

In a CMAST article on his work with whales in 2014, he said this about his work with marine mammals and reptiles: “It’s not what I thought I’d be doing back when I went to veterinary school at Iowa State … but relief of animal suffering, collaborating with colleagues who have varied expertise and applying diverse training to novel challenges, is all consistent with that preparation.”

Also consistent is Harms’ participation in writing a book that will help others do the same.

“It was a great team,” he said. “The only downside is the book is so expensive, but there’s really a lot there. It’s comprehensive, and hopefully it will help those in the field now, and those who come later, to save more turtles.”

It’s not always “fun” being a marine veterinarian. He’s had to euthanize turtles, as well as large whales, but has pioneered ways to do that as humanely as possible. But even those duties are meaningful, because the post-mortem necropsies contribute to the knowledge base.

Sea turtle work, though, is especially gratifying, because they are resilient, and the survival rate of injured and sick sea turtles is close to 90 percent.

“Generally, if we can get them past the first week, they will make it,” he said. “And it feels great to succeed. It’s always a challenge, and we take it hard when we have to euthanize one, but the success rate is way higher than it is for many other injured or sick rescued species, such as birds, which are so fragile.”

Part of it, he said, might simply be evolution. Turtles are tough, and not just their shells. “They live a long time,” he said. “They take a long time to die, but they do also take a long time to fully recover.”

He’s optimistic about the survival of the various species, but concedes there is no guarantee. There are so many threats.

Commercial fishermen, aren’t the biggest one, though, at least to Harms’ way of thinking.

“They’re one of many threats,” he said of the turtles getting caught in nets. “But it’s also the most easily identifiable threat. It’s an easy place to point a finger. But there are many other threats.”

They are prone to tumors and soft tissue diseases, as well as viruses, he said. Nutrient-laden stormwater runoff pollutes the waters, and climate change, which is warming the waters, he believes, “is a big threat, although we don’t yet know how big and over what time scale.”

Then, of course, there are plastics in the waters, which the turtles can and often do ingest, blocking their digestive systems. Plastic is a huge problem in the Sargasso Sea, a patch of the Atlantic Ocean where turtles use sargassum mats as nurseries and where hatchlings have food and shelter.

There’s also the persistent problem of lights on the beach during hatching season; hatchlings will head toward the light instead of toward the water, and they are then easy prey for birds and crabs.

But those sea turtle teams, like the close to 100 volunteers in Emerald Isle, are big helpers. Although hatchlings face innumerable threats even once they get to the water, the more hatchlings that make it that far, the more survive.

“I’d never have believed just a few years ago that so many people would be involved in these efforts, and it’s worldwide, not just in the United States,” Harms said. “Wherever there are sea turtles, there are people trying to help save them. And wherever there are sea turtles, there are sea turtle researchers.”

The sea turtle population in North Carolina, Harms said, seems relatively stable, but it’s a mixed bag elsewhere.

“They are survivors, though,” he said. “If we don’t screw up things too bad, they’ll survive.”

Harms is also on the adjunct faculty at the Duke University Marine Laboratory on Pivers Island in Beaufort. He is a past president of the American College of Zoological Medicine and of the International Association for Aquatic Animal Medicine. He has authored or co-authored more than 125 peer-reviewed publications and several book chapters on zoological medicine. In 2011, he received the Stange Award for Meritorious Service by the Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine.

Among the others involved in the writing and editing of “Sea Turtle Health and Rehabilitation” are the following:

• Overall editor Dr. Charles Manire, director of research and rehabilitation at the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach, Florida.
• Terry Norton, founder of the Georgia Sea Turtle Center on Jekyll Island, Georgia.
• Brian Stacy, veterinarian for the National Sea Turtle Program under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Marine Fisheries Service, Office of Protected Resources, in Gainesville, Florida.
• Charles Innis, director of animal health at the New England Aquarium in Boston.

Learn More

• Purchase the book

MOREHEAD CITY – There probably are relatively few people who understand the importance that the U.S. military, particularly the Marine Corps, places on understanding and protecting the environment of the land and water it uses.

Hans Paerl, professor of marine and environmental sciences at the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City, is one of them. He and colleagues from UNC and other universities are preparing to publish a paper that will outline the results of a multi-year study they conducted in and around the New River, which flows as an estuary through Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, then enters Onslow Bay in the Atlantic Ocean through New River Inlet.

The overall study, funded by the government, looked at the terrestrial portion of the area as well as the aquatic, and Paerl’s portion mostly involved quantifying the carbon and nutrient flows through what’s technically called “the freshwater-marine continuum of a temperate, micro-tidal estuary.”

Carbon, of course, is the building block of life as we know it. But carbon dioxide, or CO₂, the main greenhouse gas that most climate experts believe traps the Earth’s heat and is leading to significant changes in the climate, including sea level rise. And because Camp Lejeune and many other Marine Corps bases are near coastal waters – Marines are the nation’s amphibious fighters, and need to train in and around those waters – sea level rise and coastal habitat changes are important to them.

“They want to know what’s going on, on their properties and around them,” Paerl said. “And they want to know what their role is in what’s going on.”

Part of that is economic, part of it is planning.

“Many of the generals and others at the top are very forward-thinking,” Paerl said. “They can look down the road and see that at some point in the future, there might very well be carbon regulations and taxes. They want to know where they stand.”

In Lejeune’s case, Paerl said, the base is in pretty good standing. The study shows that 85 percent of the “nutrient budget” in the estuary – carbon is a nutrient, as are such things as nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and calcium – comes from upstream, not from the base.

The river, which is only about 50 miles long and entirely contained in Onslow County, rises in the northwestern region and flows east-southeast past Jacksonville, where it widens into a tidal estuary about 2 miles wide. But before it gets to Jacksonville, it flows through mostly rural and agricultural land. That agriculture includes not only row crops, but also many hog farms with millions of hogs and their necessary waste lagoons. Nutrients abound.

So, Paerl said, it’s not surprising that the estuary’s nutrient load mostly comes from upstream, and the military officials are surely “delighted” to know that.

“What it means is that if we start getting more nutrient regulations, they’re in a pretty good position to show that they are not primarily responsible” for the problems that cause the need for regulations, Paerl said.

And there are plenty of examples of regulations arising from water quality problems. The state declared the Neuse River “nutrient sensitive” in the 1980s, after numerous algae blooms and fish kills, and developed and implemented rules designed to regulate sources of nutrient pollution in the basin, including wastewater, stormwater and agricultural runoff. The rules also require vegetative buffers along the water.

But beyond that, Paerl said, the Marine Corps and other branches of the military are concerned about climate change. At Camp Lejeune, they want to protect and maintain their ecosystem, because it’s similar to conditions in many areas of the world that Marines might have to fight. So they need to train in that ecosystem. Sea level rise and other ramifications of climate change could threaten those training grounds.

And, Paerl noted, military officials have long been concerned that an increasingly less stable climate with more droughts that disrupt food supplies, more major storms and continually rising sea levels, will create less stability in other countries, possibly leading to more need for U.S. intervention. They’re interested, perhaps more than most politicians these days, in limiting climate change.

What did the study find out specifically about organic, or vegetative, carbon and carbon dioxide, that predominant greenhouse gas, in the New River estuary?

Interestingly, Paerl said, it turns out that the estuary is, in general, pretty balanced between being a carbon sink, or holding carbon so it’s not released as carbon dioxide, and a contributor of CO₂ to the atmosphere.

“But that can change year-to-year,” he said. It turns out that much of that variation is related to weather, which is affected by climate.

“What we’ve found is that when we have major perturbations, chiefly storms, much more CO₂ is released,” Paerl said. “There were five or six major perturbations (during the study period), and we had the opportunity to look at (the effects) of those.”

What they’ve found is that “you can lose almost as much carbon to the atmosphere” from one major storm as had been stored away, or “fixed” by plants, in the estuary during the entire year in which the storm occurred.

“It’s kind like a gigantic ‘burp,’” the scientist said, that can, instantly negate a year of carbon storage by the algae and other plants.

Algae, another area of expertise for Paerl, can be terribly bad for estuaries, as it robs the water of oxygen when it decomposes, sometimes leading to fish kills. But, Paerl quipped, “I don’t think storms are really a good way to clean up our estuaries.”

At any rate, it sets up what Paerl said is a classic feedback loop.

“The more storms we have, then (based on the research) the more emissions we get,” he said. “And the more emissions we get, the more unstable the climate is likely to become, which means more storms. You have to wonder where it ends. Are we eventually to going to end up with 10 times more storms?”

It’s not, of course, “a perfectly linear world,” Paerl acknowledged, as there are other factors, such as El Nino, that influence the number of hurricanes and other storms. But you have to look at it not just from one year to the next, but decade by decade.

The New River work pretty much confirmed what previous work by Joseph Crosswell, also of UNC-IMS, found previously through work in the Neuse River, the largest tributary of the huge Pamlico Sound estuary, Paerl said.

The bottom line, he added, is that estuarine systems are very effective at holding carbon, unless disturbed. Some carbon even comes out and is “stored” by humans, through harvest and consumption of seafood.

But when those storms do hit, the negative atmospheric carbon effects can be quick, as in the windy Hurricane Irene in 2011, or slower and more sustained in the case of other, less windy storms that are mainly rainfall and flooding events.

Paerl said the overall study was funded by the Department of Defense’s Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program, and has been headed by RTI International, an independent, nonprofit research institute based in the Research Triangle Park. Other researchers have come from private companies, as well as from Duke University, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the College of William and Mary and the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

“It’s been a big effort, with a lot of parts,” Paerl said, and he credits the Department of Defense for being interested.

“They are really pretty good stewards of their environment, and it makes sense for them to be,” he said.

Paerl noted that the military also help preserve habitat outside the base gates by sometimes giving money to local governments to protect properties in the flight paths of Marine Corps aircraft that would otherwise be developed.

That’s happening now in Carteret County, where Emerald Isle is working with Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point officials to get money to help pay for the purchase of 30 acres of undeveloped land behind the town hall. That property, mostly maritime forest, has been zoned for years for more than 200 condominiums, and is in the flight path of planes going to and from nearby Bogue Field, an auxiliary landing strip for Cherry Point.

If the town gets the land, it will preserve up to 20 acres of it.

“A lot of people don’t realize how much they do,” Paerl said of the Marines. “It was good to work on this project to try to help them identify what’s going on in the estuary that runs through (Lejeune).”

And, he said, the study aids the cause of science and scientific research, which has recently been under attack in some circles, because the modeling involved should be applicable to not just other coastal military installations, but to similar estuarine systems that aren’t in government hands.

“We’ve learned a lot,” he said.

MOREHEAD CITY – Back before 2012, when Joel Fodrie and others at the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences embarked on a study to see if oyster reefs effectively sequester carbon dioxide, the predominant greenhouse gas that traps the earth’s heat and leads to climate change, they were hoping for what he called recently a “1+1=2” result.

In other words, the hope was that all oyster reefs served as carbon sinks, so not only were old ones providing that environmental “service,” so would new ones, no matter where you built them.

But, Fodrie said in an interview last week, science is rarely so simple, and it wasn’t in this case.

In an article published July 26 in the prestigious London-based “Proceedings of the Royal Society B,” Fodrie and his associates noted that, “decade-old experimental reefs on intertidal sandflats were net sources of CO₂ … resulting from predominantly carbonate deposition, whereas shallow subtidal reefs … and saltmarsh-fringing reefs … were dominated by organic carbon-rich sediments and functioned as net carbon sinks (on par with vegetated coastal habitats).”

So it turned out that whether or not an oyster reef functions as a carbon sink – keeping carbon out of the atmosphere, where it helps trap heat from the earth – depends in large part upon where the reef is located.

Those that are close to marshes and other vegetation do serve as significant carbon sinks, and thus are good fighters, in a sense, in the battle against climate change, Fodrie said. But at least some reefs, either existing ones, or new ones that are being built on flats away from significant vegetation, appear to be net releasers of carbon dioxide: They hold some in, they let more go into the atmosphere. Those increase in volume quickly; they are mostly shell, and the biosynthesis of shell is a carbon dioxide source.

That doesn’t mean that creation of those reefs is an altogether bad thing – they provide crucial habitat for marine species and, of course, provide oysters to harvest, sell and eat – they just don’t provide the same atmospheric environmental service as reefs that are subtidal or more closely associated with marshes.

In a practical sense, Fodrie said in the interview, what that means is that if you set out to build an oyster reef, “where you build it matters,” regarding what you want it to do.

To put it very simply: If you want to create jobs and income, grow oysters to feed people and provide habitat for other species, too, that can be done anywhere that’s suitable to oyster reef development. But if you want to sequester carbon, near shore is the best bet.

The reasoning behind that is that there are two types of carbon, organic and inorganic. Organic carbon, plant and microbial matter, is the stuff that oysters filter out of the water when they feed. Carbon dioxide is one of the ingredients that shellfish extract from the water to manufacture their shells. Inorganic carbon is extracted from ores and minerals; oyster shells are made up mostly of calcium carbonate, but also trace amounts of manganese, iron, aluminum, sulfate and magnesium, plus organic material.

Reefs, then, contain both organic carbon and inorganic carbon, which lives in the shells. The organic carbon takes carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, while shell carbon releases carbon dioxide back into it.

The researchers – Fodrie and Antonio Rodriguez, Niels Lindquist, Pete Peterson and Michael Piehler of UNC-IMS, plus, Rachel Gittman and Grabowski, now of Northeastern University, and Justin Ridge, then a UNC-IMS grad student – first worked on experimental reefs constructed 10 years earlier in the Rachel Carson Estuarine Research Reserve near Beaufort by Grabowski, who at the time was a graduate student at UNC-IMS.

They’ve discussed their findings publicly before, but Fodrie said it was important to get it published by the Royal Society, because it’s a stringently peer-reviewed scientific journal. The society published biological works in its “B” proceedings, and publishes mathematical, physical and engineering sciences work in its “A” proceedings.

It was important to use those experimental reefs, he said, because the researchers knew how old they were, and could measure the cores of the shells and the sediments to determine annual carbon burial rates.

Using a gas-powered jackhammer, they pounded pipe through each reef and used a car jack to extract the sediment-filled pipe. They found that the subtidal or marsh-fringe reefs held much more carbon in the sediments between the shells than those farther from shore.

It wasn’t, Fodrie said, what they’d really hoped for; it didn’t turn out that simply building oyster reefs, as the state Division of Marine Fisheries and the North Carolina Coastal Federation are doing, will automatically result in sequestration of carbon. But it was, and is, good science, he said, in part simply because it didn’t turn out exactly as they had hoped it might. There wasn’t a perfect correlation between the researchers’ initial hopes and their findings, and often that’s what science is all about. “You don’t,” he said, want to do a study and publish results that “overpromise.” You want to be honest.

“It’s nuanced,” Fodrie said of the basic results. “We have reefs in our area that are carbon sinks, and we have reefs that are net (atmospheric) carbon sources. The ones that have tons of shells are the ones likely to be CO₂ sources.”

So should the state fisheries division use this information when it builds reefs?

“They are interested in what we’ve learned, but I don’t think they can ‘serve that master,’” Fodrie said, because that’s not the goal of the state’s reef-building efforts. The division does it for the economics, for the water-cleansing function oysters provide, and for the habitat. But what about (the federation), which not only pushes oysters as habitat, water-cleaners and job-creators, but also is very much interested in ways to slow climate change?

The federation annually plants thousands upon thousands of oyster shells near shore as it creates “living shorelines,” which generally included marsh plants and are natural alternatives to the bulkheads waterfront property owners have built for years to slow or stop shoreline erosion.

The UNC researchers haven’t worked at living shorelines, but Fodrie said it would be a fun theory to test, and it makes sense that they too might be carbon sinks. And those shorelines also provide habitat, and encourage the expansion of marsh, which has long been known to be a valuable and important carbon sink in and of itself.

Eventually, the team’s research moved on to study natural reefs, some hundreds of years old, one about 4,000 years old, all in the in the Core-Albemarle-Pamlico sound estuarine system, and the findings generally matched the findings at the decade-old reefs in the reserve.

And the researchers discovered something else from their studies: If you’re interested in carbon sequestration, leave reefs alone, even the ones that don’t serve as carbon sinks. It sound’s counter-intuitive, Fodrie said, but, “When you destroy them, it’s a ‘lose-lose.’

“It’s a pretty profound nuance. Whether a reef is a potential carbon sink or a potential source of atmospheric carbon, if you disturb it, the result is, you put more CO₂ into the atmosphere.”

“Notably, down-core carbon concentrations in 100- to 4,000-year-old reefs mirrored experimental-reef data, suggesting our results are relevant over centennial to millennial scales …” the team’s Royal Society paper states. “Globally, the historical mining of the top meter of shellfish reefs may have reintroduced more than 400,000,000 milligrams of organic carbon into estuaries.

“Importantly, reef formation and destruction do not have reciprocal, counterbalancing impacts on atmospheric CO_2, since excavated organic material may be re-mineralized while shell may experience continued preservation through reburial.

“Thus, protection of existing reefs could be considered as one component of climate mitigation programs focused on the coastal zone.”

The IMS oyster reef research has been funded by grants from the Albemarle-Pamlico Estuarine Program, North Carolina Sea Grant, the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries and the National Science Foundation.

Learn More

• Oyster reefs as carbon sources and sinks

HARKERS ISLAND – Thanks to a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Marine Debris Program, a contractor working for the North Carolina Coastal Federation will soon clean up debris left over from an abandoned aquaculture facility in the waters near Harkers Island in Carteret County.

The $129,041 project is to be paid for with $64,474 from NOAA and a $64,567 match from the federation and the contractor in the form of staff and volunteer work hours and services, respectively. NOAA and the federation announced the grant Tuesday.

Bree Tillett, a coastal specialist for the federation, said the grant also will help fund development of best management practices, or BMPs, to help make sure that existing and future aquaculture operations don’t leave behind gear that can harm marine life or litter waters, posing threats to boats or swimmers.

The concept is to develop a consensus on BMPs for shellfish aquaculture marine debris disposal and prevention, and to incorporate these practices into North Carolina Sea Grant’s shellfish growers’ required class for leaseholders, Tillett said.

Partners in the grant include Sea Grant, NOAA and the Duke University Marine Laboratory.

Tillett said the debris has been there for years in West Mouth Bay, off Guthrie Drive on the “back” side of the island, and at one point encompassed about 30 acres of water.

What remains of the abandoned operation, she said, is mostly PVC pipes and plastic mesh netting, some of which has washed ashore and into the marsh along adjacent property. Some of it is in sea grass beds, which makes removal difficult because the beds are prime habitat for naturally occurring clams and oysters.

All told, the effort is supposed to remove 250 cubic meters, or 8,829 cubic feet, of debris from public trust bottom, and remove 600 pounds of shoreline debris, which has been there since the mid-1990s.

“We are looking forward to getting it cleaned up,” Tillett said, because the gear poses at least a slight threat not only to fish and wildlife, but also to those who might use the area recreationally. Tillett stressed that the goal of the project is not to cast aspersions on the aquaculture industry, which some people increasingly see as a big part of the future of the commercial fishing industry in the state.

In fact, she said, the whole project is forward-looking; a big component includes an effort to develop those BMPs, working with the aquaculture industry and North Carolina Sea Grant.

The federation is also involving “new science,” by working with the Marine Conservation Ecology Unmanned Systems Facility, the drone program headed by David Johnston at the Duke Lab on Pivers Island in Beaufort, which will photograph the conditions before the cleanup and after.

Chuck Weirich, a marine aquaculture specialist in Sea Grant’s office in Morehead City, welcomes the whole effort.

“Sea Grant is very supportive of this project,” he said. “It’s good work, a very proactive strategy.”

Weirich said he’s convinced that almost all who are involved in the relatively young but growing aquaculture industry in North Carolina are, and want to be, good environmental stewards, but conceded that as some projects develop and then some inevitably don’t make it, marine debris could become a problem in some cases.

“Right now, the industry is really very small and developing,” he said. “We here at Sea Grant believe in aquaculture, but we also see the need to ensure that those who are involved are good stewards. It’s something to keep an eye on in the future, and it will be good to see some guidelines developed. It’s important to avoid user conflicts and any other potential negative factors that could be associated with aquaculture.”

James Morris, an ecologist at the National Center for Coastal Ocean Science’s Center for Coastal Fisheries and Habitat Research at the NOAA lab in Beaufort, also supports the project.

Although he’s best known for his research on lionfish, tiger shrimp and other invasive species in and near North Carolina waters, Morris’ work increasingly involves aquaculture, which NOAA has been pushing in recent years. Morris has publicly supported “good aquaculture” for some time, and has had a lease. In a paper way back in 2013, he reported on a study that evaluated the environmental effects of finfish aquaculture, including interactions with water quality, benthic habitats, or bottom of a body of water, and marine life across various farming practices and habitat types.

“We did this study because of concerns that putting marine finfish farms in the coastal ocean could have adverse effects on the environment,” Morris said then. “We found that, in cases where farms are appropriately sited and responsibly managed, impacts to the environment are minimal to non-existent.”

In the report, scientists, including Morris, said that “continued development of regional best-management practices and standardized protocols for environmental monitoring are key needs for aquaculture managers. As aquaculture development increases in the coastal ocean, the ability to forecast immediate or long-term environmental concerns will provide confidence to coastal managers and the public.”

Just a year or so ago, NOAA released an aquaculture plan, which its website says will guide efforts within NOAA Fisheries to support development of sustainable marine aquaculture from 2016-2020.

The plan, according to the website, “features four main goals: regulatory efficiency, science tools for sustainable management, technology development and transfer, and an informed public.” Other parts of the plan include strengthening partnerships, improving external communications, building infrastructure to support marine aquaculture and sound program management. The plan also sets a target of expanding sustainable U.S. marine aquaculture production by at least 50 percent by 2020.

NOAA contends aquaculture is needed. “The U.S. imports over 90 percent of its seafood, about half of which is farmed,” the website states. “While aquaculture globally has grown dramatically over the past 30 years, in the U.S. production has remained low.”

Kathryn Sullivan, NOAA administrator at the time the plans were developed, is quoted on the website as saying that “aquaculture presents a tremendous opportunity not only to meet this demand, but also to increase opportunities for the seafood industry and job creation. Expanding U.S. aquaculture … complements wild harvest fisheries and supports our efforts to maintain sustainable fisheries and resilient oceans.”

As such, Morris said, it’s important that seafood farmers are good stewards, but also that others around realize that they are good stewards. And most, he said, are just that, because their very survival in the business depends upon clean waters.

He and Weirich agree that there are relatively few bad actors in the growing aquaculture industry, but it’s important the industry remains that way. There is still significant opposition to some projects, and any problems can exacerbate negative views.

The BMPs, he said, can help develop a spirit of cooperation and respect among the “grower community” and those around them, and ensure that the mess left behind on Harkers Island is an isolated incident. The idea is for aquaculture in the state to grow in a sustainable way.

The cleanup itself, he said, provides a good opportunity for research, as those involved will be able to monitor the changes in habitat over time afterward.

Tillett, the federation coastal specialist, said there is also money in the grant to do some other marine debris habitat cleanup work not related to aquaculture, such as at Hoop Pole Creek in Atlantic Beach, where federation volunteers and staffers have worked many times.

Although it’s not a huge grant in terms of money, she said, a lot of good should come from it.

Steve Murphey, Habitat and Enhancement Section chief at the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, agreed it will be a good thing to see the area cleaned up. The division, he said, has now included a clause in its lease agreement to make sure that happens, should a leaseholder abandon a project or have his or her permit revoked, but that doesn’t address any existing problems.

Murphey also welcomed the idea of working BMPs into Sea Grant’s educational material, because the more gear that is used in such operations, the more opportunities there are for problems, regardless of best intentions.

Learn More

• Updates on marine debris removal

BEAUFORT – Bland Simpson’s introduction to the North Carolina Coastal Federation came in an out-of-the-blue request in the mid-1980s from founder and executive director Todd Miller.

Simpson, Don Dixon and Jim Wann had finished the first couple of performances of their musical, “King Mackerel and the Blues are Running,” and “Somebody told Todd it might be a good connection with NCCF to raise public awareness,” Simpson recalled back to 1986, when the federation was just 4 years old. “So, Todd called and asked if we’d do a show in Carteret County as part of the organization’s annual meeting.”

Simpson, who has a second home in Beaufort but lives most of his time about 10 miles west of Chapel Hill where he’s Kenan Distinguished Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of North Carolina, said that he asked Miller if he knew anything about presenting a show like “King Mack.” He didn’t.

“So, I told him what we’d need in terms of the sound and lights and other things,” Simpson said. “It’s not like putting on a concert with just a band. It’s more complicated. There’s a video component. It’s really pretty complex, so I gave him a ‘shopping list’ and he took notes and got it done.”

That was the beginning of a mutually beneficial relationship that lasts to this day, in the midst of the federation’s 35^th year, and it told Simpson something about Miller: He was quiet, but purposeful, efficient and effective. He did things thoroughly, and he did them well.

That first Carteret County performance of the soon-to-be-beloved musical at Carteret Community College’s Joslyn Hall in Morehead City was almost foiled, but not by Miller or anyone else involved with the federation. Dixon was in Baltimore the day of the show, and was supposed to fly to New Bern. But the flight was held up because of storms. Dixon didn’t get to New Bern until 6:15 p.m., and the show was supposed to start at 7.

“I took off for New Bern to pick up Dixon and asked Todd to keep the crowd out of the hall until I got back,” Simpson said. “He did. We got back in time for Don to do a five-minute sound check, they opened the doors, and in just like three minutes, the room was filled. It was like, one minute nobody was in there, and then it was full. That was my introduction to Todd and the federation.”

The Coastal Cohorts, as Dixon, Simpson and Wann are collectively known, put on “King Mack” a couple more times for the federation in those early years. The show was then put on hiatus because Dixon, a world-renowned producer and performer, including REM and others, had moved to Ohio and Wann, a highly successful musical playwright was spending a lot of time in New York. Wann was the principal author, composer and leading man of Broadway’s Tony®-nominated “Pump Boys and Dinettes.” All three were very busy, and it was logistically difficult to get them together in one place, even for something they all very much wanted to do.

“But every year, for like six years, Todd would call and asked if we could do it again,” Simpson said. “Finally, in 1994, it was possible, and we did it in Wilmington in connection with the governor’s (Jim Hunt) ‘Year of the Coast.’  So, Todd really kicked the show back into existence and it took off.”

The cohorts did the show in New York City for three weeks, then at the Kennedy Center, and filmed it for Public Television. Over the years, they’ve also done the show as a fundraiser for the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center and the federation, jointly. Simpson said that although he loves the museum, he owes it to the federation to always include the organization in any fundraising effort in the area.

“All of this created a nice life for the show,” Simpson said. “And it really was all because of Todd’s yearly calls. I can’t over-stress the importance of the relationship, in terms of conservation in North Carolina and our role in it. It wouldn’t have happened if not for Todd’s purposeful nature.”

The relationship also led Miller to ask Simpson in 2001 if he’d serve on the federation’s board of directors. He said “yes,” and remains on it. It’s a two-year term, but there’s no “kick-off” rule. Many, like Simpson, stay on for long, long periods of time. It’s another of the organization’s secrets to success, he said: Continuity matters.

And Miller, he added, is that steady hand. While others remain in the fold, he’s the constant.

“Todd is an extremely thoughtful and very forthright man about matters,” Simpson said. “The success of the organization has been amazing, and Todd’s nature is the biggest reason for that. He chooses the organization’s battles, the things it gets involved in, very carefully. He has always wanted to get involved in things where, win or lose, NCCF can make a difference.”

Many of them have been precedent setting, and are cited by conservation organizations across the nation as the way to do things.

Simpson added that Miller, and by extension the federation, has always made it clear the way to get things done is through negotiation and compromise, at least at first. Confrontations – lawsuits and the like – can be necessary in order to preserve the coast and its water quality, but you win allies and avoid making enemies when you present facts and work with people whenever possible. You might disagree one day, but the next day you might find common ground. There’s little if any point in burning bridges, either with state government or private developers.

“That’s a big deal,” Simpson said. “And he has always stayed true to the vision. He saw early on, a need for an organization that would stitch together a lot of groups that had come together for single issues, and to keep that organization together. That organization and its credibility is what has made NCCF so effective for so long.”

A Sense of Stewardship

Simpson came to all of this naturally. He was born and lived the early part of his childhood in Elizabeth City, where his father, Bland Simpson Jr., was an attorney.

“He had a very highly developed sense of stewardship,” Simpson said. “He was not at all dogmatic, and he was soft-spoken and thoughtful. But he passed on to me his thoughts and taking care of the natural world.”

Simpson grew up in and around the Albemarle Sound and the Pasquotank River, which in Elizabeth City was at the time very polluted.

“You had all these beautiful homes on the river, but to go swimming, you had to way down the river,” he said. His father, according to an old newspaper clipping Simpson recently found, was one of a handful of people who strongly urged the local government to clean up the river. It wasn’t exactly a popular idea; it was going to cost money.

The family moved to Chapel Hill in 1959, and Simpson went to the public schools there from the sixth grade through high school, before starting as a political science major at UNC. He also took lot of English courses, and got seriously into music, thanks in part to a course he took from a professor, Dan Patterson, who had an extensive knowledge of English and southern folk songs and ballads. “Two hundred songs about Robin Hood,” Simpson quipped. But he concedes they made an impression.

Simpson also recalls folk song “singalongs” by James Taylor and his siblings, in the auditorium at Chapel Hill High School. “There’d be maybe 50 or 60 people sitting on folding chairs singing all these songs by Bob Dylan and Peter, Paul and Mary,” he said.

The college had a good collection of old folk and blues recordings, and while Simpson was at the time more of a “pop” musician, that influenced his style and growth. He got signed by Columbia Records and moved to New York City, where he recorded and released an album that came out in May 1971. But that wasn’t the life Simpson really wanted, and he came back to Chapel Hill. He finished school, wrote his first novel, “Heart of the Country, A Novel of Southern Music,” and got asked to teach creative writing.

Since then, he and his photographer wife, Ann, a graduate of East Carteret High School in Beaufort, have collaborated on a number of books that have taken them into and through the rivers and sounds of the state’s coast. The latest, “Little Rivers & Waterway Tales: A Carolinian’s Eastern Streams,” a lyrical part history, part travelogue, was written after exploring the state’s lesser-known small rivers, including the White Oak, Trent, New and South rivers, which are right in the Carteret County-based federation’s wheelhouse. It even has a chapter on the federation’s successful, but harrowing, movement of a house, mostly by boat, from Harbor Island to Wrightsville Beach to serve as the organization’s southern coast regional office.

Much of the research for the book was done on trips in various boats – canoe, kayak, john boat – that originated in Beaufort. Simpson said it was one of the most enjoyable projects he’s undertaken.

He loves Beaufort, and spends as much time here as possible. It’s Ann’s old stomping grounds, of course, and it’s full of like-minded folks who love the waterways and support conservation.

He’s also continued his longtime membership as pianist and singer in the legendary, Tony Award-nominated “old-time” string music band, the Red Clay Ramblers. The banjo player in that band for many years was Tommy Thompson, a good friend of that college professor whose course Simpson took. Thompson died in 2003.

In November 2005, Simpson was given the North Carolina Award for Fine Arts, the state’s highest civilian honor. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill gave him a Tanner Faculty Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 2004. In 1999, he won the Governor’s Award “Conservation Communicator of the Year,” presented by the North Carolina Wildlife Federation, as well as the North Carolina Folklore Society’s Brown-Hudson Award for writing and music concerning state and regional heritage.

He was in Beaufort last week with Ann, who he met at the Nature Conservancy in Chapel Hill and married on Christmas Eve in 1988. He just finished a one-year stint as head of the UNC-CH English department. But he’s still a busy man, and plans to remain so. The federation will continue to be a part of that.

“I think we have done a good job, but there’s always more that needs to be done,” he said. For example, Simpson thinks the federation, while effective and well known along the entire coast, needs to begin to focus more on the inland regions where the rivers pick up pollutants and pathogens that affect coastal water quality.

“We are not the ‘Coastal’ Coastal Federation,” he said. “We’re the ‘North Carolina’ Coastal Federation. We can protect water quality all day here, and after 35 years, the public here – those who live here and many of those who visit – are much more aware of the issues, such as stormwater and impervious surface coverage. But that’s less true inland.”

Tougher stormwater rules are needed inland, and so is increased awareness of the effects dirty waters in places like Raleigh and coastal plains towns have on the waters at the coast.

“Those waters there are our waters down here,” Simpson said. And protecting North Carolina’s coast, he said, isn’t just important for those who live here and visit it here. It’s a unique place.

“It’s like (longtime East Carolina University coastal geologist) Stan Riggs says, ‘There’s nowhere else in the world where all of this exists,’” Simpson said, speaking of the “inland seas” that stretch all the way from Albemarle South near the Virginia border, through Pamlico Sound, Bogue Sound and the smaller sounds to the south.

It is, Simpson said, an intricate network of nature, a vast, interconnected system that not only supports jobs and provides recreational opportunities to millions, but also supports cultures and ways of life.

“It’s been enjoyable and very rewarding to be part of it,” Simpson said of the federation’s growth and increasing prominence in the state and beyond. “I look forward to continuing it. It’s a great bunch of people, and we’ve accomplished a lot together,” he said, but resting on laurels is not an option.

BEAUFORT – The University of North Carolina-Institute of Marine Sciences and the town are collaborating on a three-year study that should shine light on how to best manage stormwater to protect the quality of coastal waters, particularly coastal estuarine reserves.

According to Michael Piehler, one of the scientists on the project, the goal is to examine how stormwater flowing from Beaufort affects the Rachel Carson Estuarine Reserve, which includes Carrot Island, Town Marsh, Bird Shoal and Horse Island. The study is funded in part by the National Estuarine Reserve, and the results are expected to be at least partly transferable to other reserves in the national system, particularly those that are near urban areas, as the Rachel Carson is to Beaufort.

But, Piehler added, the researchers also expect to learn a lot of hard science that could help lead to changes in the way state agencies and others handle stormwater runoff, which is the biggest polluter of coastal waters used by shellfish harvesters, swimmers and boaters.

For example, he said, “We’re looking at the magnitude and pathways of stormwater, including outfalls, in Beaufort,” as well as what is contained in that stormwater.

The leader of the project is Rachel Noble, a UNC-IMS professor and researcher considered an expert on pathogens in stormwater. She’s also a Beaufort resident.

According to her lab’s website, “A main thread of Dr. Noble’s work is the application of novel molecular techniques for applied and basic science.” She has developed rapid water quality test methods, including those for E. coli, Enterococcus, and Vibrio species, and studies the dynamics of microbial contaminants contributed through stormwater runoff to high-priority recreational and shellfish harvesting waters. Specifically, the research seeks to separate the pollution from human activity from that already in coastal ecosystems to permit development of accurate models.

Piehler said that although the project is focused on Beaufort and the estuarine reserve, those rapid water quality tests Noble has developed could have practical uses not only there, but elsewhere.

Currently, Piehler said, methods used by North Carolina and others are slow. In essence, “you often find out that a water body was contaminated two days ago, because of the length of the analysis. If you can speed that up, you have real-time information and you can warn the public faster.”

Even better, he said, the rapidity could enable managers – such as the state Shellfish Sanitation Section of the Division of Marine Fisheries – to open waters more quickly after they’ve been closed because of contamination. And that could apply to shellfish-harvest waters and to recreational swimming waters, both of which are monitored by shellfish sanitation and are economically important to coastal communities and their citizens, as well as the state.

At the very least, he said, he and Noble hope the project can help create better “predictive models” of the effects of stormwater on the waters of the reserve, and elsewhere.

The overall study, Piehler said, involves the setup of six sampling locations, which use automated instrumentation, at known major sources of major stormwater discharge, along Front Street in Beaufort.  Two of them are at that street’s the intersections with Orange Street and Gordon Street, and both of those face the reserve, which is just offshore. So, knowing what comes out of those pipes, how much comes out and when the pathogens and sediments come out are keys to protecting the reserve and its fragile water quality. A “control” sampling site is farther away from the town, so the researchers can compare what comes out and into the waters.

One thing researchers have learned in recent years is that the old idea that most pollution in stormwater comes out in the “first flush” – the runoff from the first half-inch or inch of rain runoff – isn’t true, Piehler said. Studies in California, and along North Carolina’s Outer Banks, have shown that pathogens – viruses, bacteria and other potentially harmful micro-organisms – “actually are discharged throughout a storm,” he said, a finding that throws a bit of a monkey wrench into the design of some stormwater ponds that have been used for years to hold runoff so it settles and gets “natural treatment” before flowing to rivers and streams and sounds.

The recently acquired knowledge, Piehler added, also gives increased credence to efforts by the North Carolina Coastal Federation and others to intercept and hold polluted stormwater closer to its source, through use of things like rain barrels and rain gardens.

“The Coastal Federation is touting some successes with those efforts,” he said, “and we’re interested in working more on determining how you ‘gauge’ success.”

The concept of “flow reduction farther up in the watershed” does make sense, he added, as it’s better to catch pollutants before they get anywhere near the streams. And one of the most important pollutants to catch early is nitrogen, which probably does the most harm to coastal waters because it stimulates growth of algae that robs the water of oxygen when it breaks down. Even most treatment plants struggle to adequately remove nitrogen.

Piehler said the study has a large educational component, too, working with students at Beaufort Middle School, among others, to teach them about stormwater and its effects on the waters around them, It’s similar to what the federation does – helping students build rain gardens while also generating the next generation of dedicated stewards of the coastal environment.

Noble said Beaufort and other mid-sized coastal towns are at an ever-increasing risk for polluted stormwater problems, as well as flooding, because of a variety of factors, including old infrastructure and development and sea-level rise, which creates higher tides that can flood roads, such as Front Street. That means the tides essentially “push back” against the stormwater, leaving it no place to go. The result can be more polluted stormwater in the streets. Folks who have lived in Beaufort for a long, long time, Noble said, are occasionally seeing floods at times, and in places, they’ve never seen before.

High groundwater levels exacerbate the problem, as the stormwater on the land can’t soak in as quickly, so the land is less able to provide cleansing of the stormwater’s pollutants.

All of this means that stormwater control is increasingly difficult along the coast, especially in the urbanized areas like Beaufort, and these places are going to have tough choices to make, choices that are going to cost money. Technological solutions are expensive, especially when you’re talking about stormwater flows that can reach thousands of gallons per minute, Noble said.

That’s where landscaping solutions – like those preferred by the federation – can be among the most cost-effective.

Another aim of the study, according to Piehler and Noble, is to come up with specific recommendations on how Beaufort can address the problems. Is flooding the major issue, or is it runoff? And where are the major problem areas? And how do those problems, and solutions to those problems, affect the reserve.

Beaufort Planning Director Kyle Garner said he thinks the study will be beneficial to the town, especially any suggestions on what can be done and how to prioritize them.

“If that happens, it’s a win-win,” he said. “We know that when you talk about stormwater problems, it’s not just the quantity, it’s also the quality.”

Garner said the town does have a lot of old infrastructure, and has been working diligently on stormwater issues. The town has staff dedicated to the task of maintain and improving ditches and creating rain gardens and bio-retention areas.

“I think the things we have done have already made some difference,” he said. “The past few heavy rain events that we’ve had, we haven’t had as many problems as we sometimes did in the past.”

The town is working with the federation to develop a watershed management plan, a move other towns have already undertaken. For example, Swansboro did one with the federation, which was approved in February. The town had previously implemented a stormwater fee that applies, to varying degrees, to all developed residential and commercial properties.

For residential property owners, the fee is based on a structure’s square footage, and range $2 per month, or $24 a year, to $3 a month, or $36 a year.

The commercial fee ranges from $10 a month, or $120 annually, to $50 a month, or $600 annually, depending on the area of impervious surface on a property.

Revenue goes to an enterprise fund dedicated to stormwater management needs, including paying for construction, replacement, repair, improvement, maintenance, operation and use of ditches, pipes, drains and other methods to control runoff.

Garner said Beaufort officials believe a watershed management plan will be very helpful, and could even lead to increased chances of getting grants from state agencies, such as the Clean Water Management Trust Fund. The town has a stormwater fee for all residential properties of $4 per month, paid on the tax bill at the end of the year, but doesn’t have one for commercial developments. A plan, he said, could help Beaufort get a handle on how a commercial stormwater management fee might look.

The town also has a stormwater advisory committee, which meets regularly, and includes members with a lot of expertise.

Noble is on it, as are, among others, Carolyn Currin, a coastal and estuarine ecologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Beaufort Laboratory; P. Lee Ferguson, an associate professor of civil engineering at Duke University, which has its marine laboratory in town; Whitney Jenkins, coastal training program coordinator for the North Carolina Coastal Reserve and the National Estuarine Research Reserve; Robert Safrit, a landscape designer; and Tommy Simpson, a building contractor.

The town, Garner said, takes stormwater issues seriously, and wants to continue to make improvements.

The problems surface most noticeably when tides are high, he said, as Noble mentioned. But there are some areas that aren’t affected by tides where problems still occur.

Again, though, he said, “We are always working on those areas, trying to provide areas for more (stormwater) storage capacity.”

Jenkins, the Beaufort Stormwater Advisory Committee chair and the coastal training program coordinator for the North Carolina Estuarine Reserve and National Estuarine Reserve, hailed the collaborative nature of the study. In fact, she said, it’s required by the grant provider, the National Estuarine Research Reserve System, or NERRS, Science Collaborative, which collaborates with others who have stakes in the efforts. It’s not, she said, supposed to be science “in a bubble.”

“It’s all come together very well,” she said of the study. And while she said she doesn’t see “plumes” of polluted stormwater headed to the reserve on a regular basis, she knows there are plenty of sources.

“There are the town docks, where we are not sure everyone uses pump-out facilities,” she said. “There is the town’s wastewater treatment plant outfall, which we know works well but can have breakdowns. There are kayakers, and field trips to the reserve by students and other visitors.  There’s a lot of potential exposure to pollution.”

What’s good about the study, she said, is that it’s comprehensive, and pro-active: It doesn’t look just at where the storm water comes from, but will offer ideas on how to reduce it, and its impacts, with involvement from many players, including the town, the university and the state shellfish sanitation agency.

Jenkins agreed with the need for faster testing, analysis and actions to close and open waters when pollution is detected.

Shellfish sanitation doesn’t regularly sample Taylor’s Creek, she said, as it’s closed to shellfishing because it’s polluted. And though the agency does sample it for recreational purposes, that’s on a set schedule. Faster sampling and analysis, she said, would benefit all.

Piehler said he can’t yet quantify the problems at the monitoring sites, but expects to have some answers by the end of the summer.

“We really just got started,” he said. “We’ve been ‘tuning’ the instruments,” he added, and really just started getting samples from them last week.

But by the end of the year, he added, all involved should have a better understanding of how stormwater affects the reserve, and Beaufort should be on the way to getting some answers of its own.

Noble agreed.

“I think the study is going very well,” she said. “We’re doing some important work, we have great team members onboard and people are excited.”

Learn More

• UNC-Institute of Marine Sciences
• NERRS Science Collaborative

EMERALD ISLE – This Bogue Banks town won’t hear until late summer whether it will get grants to purchase a nearly 30-acre tract behind the town recreation center for a nature preserve and athletic fields, but scattered opposition and a recent report by the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program have some officials wondering about the future of the effort.

But when Mike Schafale of the Natural Heritage Program inspected the property in April in response to the clean water grant application from the town, he wrote that, “The town’s proposal to retain nine acres of the tract for recreational development would … be a serious threat to the natural integrity of the site, given the small size of the site.

“Though development in the wetlands would be unacceptable, and protection of them is needed to protect the creek, the most significant feature of the site is the maritime forest,” Schafale added. “At 23 acres, it is a small example, but it is one of the few last remnants of the extensive forest that once covered the interior of Emerald Isle, and is one of the better remnants in this region of the coast.”

Development of nine acres for recreation would be a “serious loss,” according to Schafale’s report, and if development were to occur in the middle of the site, “it would destroy virtually all of its ecological value.”

The report encourages the town to use the land as a natural recreation area, with trails and small parking lots, but without clearing large areas of the maritime forest or wetlands.

Town Manager Frank Rush said that if the town isn’t able to use the land for anything except passive recreation, he’s not sure it’s worth it.

“In a nutshell, it is ultimately up to our board of commissioners, but I am not sure if the town is willing to spend $400,000 to $500,000 on the land purchase if there’s no ability to use it for any purpose other than preservation and trails in the future,” the manager said in an email. “That’s a lot of money for Emerald Isle. We have many other demands for those funds, and the town already has a much nicer and larger natural area (nearly 40 acres) at Emerald Isle Woods Park, directly on Bogue Sound.”

Rush said the town views the potential purchase of the Surfside Realty Tract as an opportunity to provide athletic fields and other active recreation amenities, after a public planning process, while preserving two-thirds of the undeveloped parcel.

“Again, the ultimate decision is up to the town’s elected officials, but to me it’s not a question of preserving 30 acres versus preserving 20 acres. It’s really more a question of preserving 20 acres versus preserving zero acres. I suspect that those who have expressed concerns would prefer 20 acres rather than zero acres.”

Rush said the parcel is the only one in Emerald Isle that can accommodate any sort of athletic fields.

“There are currently nearly 500 school-age kids in Emerald Isle, in addition to many more young and active people in their 20s, 30s, 40s, and beyond, who would benefit from these kinds of facilities, and we expect more in the future as technology changes and more people are able to work remotely and live in a place like Emerald Isle.”

County-maintained athletic fields are available just across the bridge at Western Park in Cape Carteret. But the town, Rush said, wants to be “a complete community that offers these kinds of traditional recreation amenities and opportunities.  It’s all part of the overall package that will help to make Emerald Isle an even better place than it already is.”

While Rush remains optimistic about the grants, two commissioners interviewed this week agreed with him about the ball field issue and the idea that conserving most of the forest is better than nothing, especially given the eventual likelihood of multifamily development.

“I don’t think there’s that much interest in doing this if there is not a good possibility of athletic fields,” said Commissioner Jim Normile. Even with grants, he said, “there’s still a very large commitment of taxpayer funds.”

If taxpayers are to make that kind of financial contribution to the purchase, he said, it’s reasonable for them to expect something other than the trails and other passive recreation opportunities that already exist in Emerald Isle Woods.

Commissioner Candace Dooley said that “People might think there aren’t many kids in Emerald Isle, but there are, and many of them are involved in sports and athletics.”

Emerald Isle, she said, “wants to maintain a family atmosphere,” and in most places, athletic fields are part of that.

“I agree that without that (reservation for ball fields), it doesn’t make much sense for the town to ask taxpayers to commit that kind of money,” she said.

Town commissioners, during their monthly meeting on April 11, voted unanimously to seek the two grants and money from the Marine Corps, augmented by the tax money, to buy the property.

The land is was platted for a subdivision way back in 1989, but it was never built.

The property is bounded by Archers Creek to the south, which separates it from the town government complex; by residential units along Live Oak Street to the west; residential units along Sound Drive to the north; and residential units along Archers Creek Court and Coral Court to the east.

Some area environmentalists have expressed concern about the plan. It’s the largest maritime forest tract in town, other than Emerald Isle Woods, and serves as habitat for painted buntings.

In addition to state grants, officials also are seeking $1.5 million from the federal government through Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point. That request, Rush said, is feasible because the property is in the flight path for aircraft that use Bogue Field, an auxiliary landing strip across Bogue Sound in the town of Bogue. The military discourages development within the flight paths of its facilities, and often partners with local governments to minimize it.

Nate Halubka, manager of grants and outreach for the state parks and recreation fund, said this week that, at least for “acquisition grants,” his office isn’t concerned about how the land is used.

“We expect that the applicant will tell us what they expect it to be used for in the next five years, but that can change, and we know that,” Halubka said. “If the town says, for example, that they are going to put in ball fields, and that changes,” that doesn’t affect whether the town should get an acquisition grant.

“Public recreational use is our concern, whether it’s passive or active,” Halubka said. “It’s up to the town’s discretion to decide how it should serve the needs of the public.”

In other words, he said, if it’s ball fields, that’s fine. If it’s trails, that’s fine, too. And if it’s a combination, that’s also fine. The office funds all kinds of land-acquisition projects.

LuAnn Bryan, the Parks and Recreation Trust Fund recreational resources service coordinator for the state’s eastern region, said she believes her office will have about $5 million available for grants this year, and Halubka agreed.

“Of course, that all depends on what the legislature does, but they’ve been good to us in the past,” he said.

Walter Clark, executive director of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund, said he hasn’t seen the property, having only moved into his new position a couple of months ago, after heading the nonprofit Blue Ridge Conservancy in Boone. But he also spent more than two decades as North Carolina Sea Grant’s coastal law, planning and policy specialist, so he knows coastal issues and concerns.

He saw Schafale’s report and called it “interesting,” and said it will play some role in the grant decision, but he’s not sure how much.

The clean water fund has 90 land-acquisition applications on its table, Clark said, and uses a “scoring” system to rank them. The final decisions are up to the fund’s nine-member board of trustees, and he said hasn’t been around long enough yet to have a “crystal ball” that would give him any indication of their leanings.

He added that the trustees will also factor public input – letters and other communications – into the decision.

In action at the April 11 meeting, the Emerald Isle board authorized Rush to execute a contract for purchase and set up a “due diligence period” that could result in a closing of the deal at the end of October.

Cherry Point officials have initiated the internal federal process to secure the money, Rush said, but it’s a process that likely will take several months.

Based on discussions with officials at Cherry Point, Rush said he expects a definitive commitment by September, but the money might not be available for a few months after that. The state grant decisions could also come by early September.

If the state grants come through, but actual cash from the military is not available by the planned Oct. 31 closing date, Rush added, the town could enter into a short-term financing arrangement with The Conservation Fund of North Carolina.

The Conservation Fund of North Carolina is part of a national organization whose mission is to assist communities in the acquisition and conservation of public land, and they are serving as the town’s partner on the acquisition. Under the military’s program, Rush said, MCAS Cherry Point can provide federal funding only to previously authorized partners, and The Conservation Fund has been involved in similar previous deals with Cherry Point.

The Conservation Fund would be the actual entity that would purchase the property from the owners. The Conservation Fund would then convey the property to the town.

In his memo to the board, Rush noted that if the town does not receive enough money for the purchase, “it will likely be possible to have The Conservation Fund proceed with the acquisition on the town’s behalf. The Conservation Fund would provide the balance of funding necessary to acquire the property, and would then hold the property for some mutually agreeable time period.”

If that were to occur, he wrote, “The town would remain eligible for grant funding, and could apply for funding from the same grant programs in 2018 or could apply for funding through other eligible grant programs.”

The other option is to simply abandon the effort, he added.

Rush said that if the town can get the land, nothing would happen fast.

“Ultimately, I would envision the board soliciting additional public input on desired park amenities in the future, and using that public input to develop a specific park plan,” he said.

Learn More

• Clean Water Management Trust Fund
• Parks and Recreation Trust Fund

SWANSBORO — Now that a long-awaited plan for use of 290 acres of new mainland property at Hammocks Beach State Park is basically complete, Superintendent Sarah Kendrick is excited.

“I’m ready to get started,” Kendrick said. “I don’t think it will happen in the summer – we’re a little busy – but I think that this fall, we’ll be starting on some new trails. We don’t have the money yet, but trails are fairly inexpensive. There are already some trails on the property, and we can expand and improve those, as well as put in some new ones.”

The trails and other amenities in the plan, she said, will make the park more of a year-round destination. Its primary attraction has long been Bear Island, which is a four-mile-long barrier island served by the park’s ferries in the spring, summer and fall. It’s a popular site, with its unspoiled beach and lifeguards in the summer months, but park visitation dips dramatically when the ferries stop running.

Trails were among the most popular features residents of the area and other park visitors said they wanted to see in the new mainland plan, which was unveiled by Sage Design of Wilmington during a public meeting in the park’s visitors’ center on April 27. A long-discussed large boat-launching facility – maybe as large as the regional facility with two ramps in Emerald Isle – was among the least popular ideas and a source of controversy for more than a year, is not in the plan, although it was in one of two plan “options” unveiled at a similar public meeting in February. And even that plan showed the facility not on the new property, but on the southeast corner of the original park property, not far from the visitors’ center.

Sara Burroughs, owner and lead planner for Sage, said public input was an important factor in the decision to leave the ramp or ramps out of the final version of the plan, but not the only factor. Environmental issues also came into play.

“I came into this after the discussion had begun, and we basically wanted to get the public input, but also go by the facts,” she said. And those facts indicated that a ramp on Queens Creek, or elsewhere in the park, would almost surely impact such key environmental features as primary fisheries nursery areas, oyster beds and wetlands. Dredging would have been necessary. And the parking area for a ramp, and the ramp itself, would increase storm water runoff, which is the primarily cause of pollution and water quality problems in coastal waters.

“In the end, when you looked at everything, it really wasn’t that hard,” Burroughs said of the decision not to include a boat launching facility in the final version.

The boat ramp idea had been around in one form or another, at least unofficially for years. No one, however, was talking about it much until recently, before and after a successful $2 billion state bond referendum last March. That included $75 million for the state parks, of which $1.125 million went to Hammocks Beach State Park.

Many in the area didn’t know that money was earmarked for a boat ramp – it wasn’t listed as such in the legislation that authorized the referendum – and when word got around, opposition surfaced fast.

Proponents said the ramp was much needed in the area and would fit well in the park, which now has four islands, including Bear Island.

Opponents of the ramp idea said it would impact the tranquility of the park, increase traffic on Hammocks Beach Road and, if built on the 290 acres the park acquired last year on the Intracoastal Waterway, damage the fragile ecology.

They said they’d rather see the money used for trails and maintenance of existing facilities within the park.

One of those who vehemently opposed the ramp idea was Mary Ellen Yanich, a frequent park visitor who lives in Swansboro. She applauded the decision to leave it out.

“I think it’s a very good plan, and I’m actually surprised it (the ramp) wasn’t included,” she said. “All along, everyone (state officials) said the ramp would depend a lot on public input, but a lot of us didn’t believe that. I’m glad that public input from the survey was considered.”

State officials had indeed insisted public input was crucial.

“If the master planning process shows that a boat ramp is not needed or desired or is not feasible on the property, we can request that the bond funding be reallocated to a different project on the new property at Hammocks Beach,” Brian Strong, chief of the planning section for the parks division said last year.

According to a summary of the public survey responses, provided in February, the most requested features were trails, camping facilities, non-motorized boating access, a fishing pier and educational programs. Among proposed fishing amenities a pier and kayak fishing access were the most popular ideas.

Of the 672 respondents to the survey – available online and at the public meeting – 145 people said they’d prefer the park be left “in its natural state.” Fifty-two requested a boat ramp.

Members of the Friends of the Hammocks and Bear Island, the park’s volunteer support group, voted 23-7 in October 2016 to oppose a ramp. David Pearson, longtime president of that group and a proponent of the ramp – he said it was needed because some of the islands in the park, Dudley, Huggins and Jones, are not accessible by the park’s ferries – called that meeting at the request of members. He did not return phone calls seeking comments on the plan unveiled on April 27. Several other area residents who had supported the boat ramp idea also declined to comment.

The final version of the plan shows about five miles of trails, including about one mile suitable for bicycles. It also shows a variety of camping opportunities, ranging from “primitive” to a relatively small area for recreational vehicles.

The plan shows improvement of the existing FFA Camp Road, which leads to a planned camping area, and improvement of the 4-H Camp Road to the old Camp Mitchell.

Overall, though, Burroughs said last week, the plan minimizes new paving within the park, both to limit additional stormwater runoff and to avoid disturbing vegetation.

“Basically, we’re trying to use the hard surfaces that already are there,” Burroughs said.

That also pleased Yanich.

“It’s still a state park,” she said of the plan. “It’s not going to be all developed to be used by a select few. It’s still going to be a park for everybody, and it’s going to mostly stay natural. But I’m not convinced this is over.”

Nicole Triplett, who until recently was the waterkeeper for the White Oak-New Riverkeeper Alliance, had been worried about that when she attended previous meetings, and said she’s happy with the final plan.

The changes, like more trails and more camping, are generally “low-impact,” she said. Triplett also praised the public for getting involved.

“If it hadn’t been for the big outcry from people who live in the area, I think that ramp would be in there,” she said. “I’m glad that the planners took that into consideration.”

Kendrick and Burroughs both said they thought the planning process, with ample opportunities for public involvement, had worked well.

“I think Sage Design did a great job,” Kendrick said. “Sara (Burroughs) listened and paid attention and worked hard to make sure people had the opportunity to participate.”

Burroughs said the process had been positive.

“I know there was a lot of discussion in the community about the boat ramp before we got started (about a year ago), but people were polite and respectful as we moved forward with the plan, and I think we got great input from a variety of sources and ended up with a plan that most people will like.”

Don Reuter, assistant director and spokesperson for the state division of parks and recreation, said the process had been a good one, and should be completed by the end of June, with a final document approved by Mike Murphy, who is the division director.

“This process allows the division staff to garner input from all stakeholders, including the public, in order to identify the appropriate facilities for the park,” he said. “This long-term master plan will continue to evolve over time as more information is collected about the available natural and man-made resources in the park and study area.

Once the plan is finalized and approved, staff will be able to seek funding for capital projects, Reuter added. “However, it should be noted that each master plan’s capital program is scaled along the other parks in the system to make sure that we are following our mission to ‘Preserve the unique archeological, geologic, biologic, scenic and recreational resources’ in the state.’

These plans will be streamlined into a general management plan, which guides short-term improvements and day-to-day operations of the park. Once finalized, the plan will be posted online.

Burroughs said she didn’t expect any major changes before Murphy approves the plan.

“There might be some changes in language, some adjustments in some of the trails, but I don’t think there will be anything too significant,” she said. “The state division people in Raleigh and the park staff will look it over and comment. I don’t think it will take too long.”

The entire 290-acre purchase was completed in 2015, wrapping up years of legal battles.

The whole story began in the 1930s, when New York neurosurgeon Dr. William Sharpe amassed the acreage as a personal hunting and fishing retreat. He hired John Hurst, grandfather of Harriett Turner and John Hurst, as a hunting guide. The elder Hurst’s wife, Gertrude, quit her job as a schoolteacher to help manage and care for the land.

Later, Sharpe and his wife offered to give the land to the Hursts, but Gertrude asked that they instead deed it to a nonprofit that would run it as an education and recreational retreat for teachers of black students in North Carolina’s then-segregated schools. The Hursts kept enough of the land to live on.

The Hammocks Beach Corp. was set up to act as a trustee for the rest, and raised money to build some amenities for guests. Across the state, the children of black teachers still remember going to the camp, which opened around 1950.

The Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, and gradually, black families were welcomed at other vacation spots, and there was less demand for the camp at Hammocks Beach. The corporation leased the land to others to operate camps; 4-H and the New Farmers of America (black students and teachers) and, later, Future Farmers of America (all races) used the land. Eventually, they too stopped coming, and both camps were abandoned.

Thousands of black teachers and students visited the long-gone New Farmers of America. Hammocks Beach, before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, was known as the “black beach” in the state, and the plan calls for efforts to restore or renovate in some fashion the North Carolina Teachers Association Assembly Hall that is on the property.

Sage was hired months after the purchase was finalized, and began gathering information in July. In addition to the most recent public meetings in February and April, the firm held another at the beginning, last September.

Several people associated with New Farmers of America and the teachers’ association participated in the planning, with many calling for recognition of the area’s African-American history.

One who showed up in September was Virgil Nichols of Hillsborough, who was representing the Agricultural Teachers Association from North Carolina A&T University.

“There’s lots of history here, and in Swansboro in general, for us,” he said. “It was a very important place from 1935 to 1965.”

In the end, Kendrick said, “I know the plan won’t please everybody, but I think the majority will be happy.”

Learn More

• Hammocks Beach State Park Mainland Area Plan

CARTERET COUNTY – When the Army Corps of Engineers vessel Merritt completed some much-needed maintenance dredging in Bogue Inlet on April 20, the work was guided in part by data collected by a high-tech Carteret County firm.

Geodynamics LLC, based in Newport, has been working with the Carteret County Shore Protection Office on beach and inlet mapping projects since 2006, and has helped the county become a leader in the state in efforts to manage the beaches that draw the tourists that make the county’s economic engine hum, to the tune of about $337 million in 2015.

Greg “Rudi” Rudolph, head of the county agency, traces his relationship to Geodynamics founder Chris Freeman back to their grad school days at East Carolina University and UNC-Wilmington, respectively. Freeman was in the geology master’s program at UNCW, and was a research intern for a time with John Wells, a renowned geologist who was at the time director of the UNC Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City. Rudolph, at ECU, worked with another of the state’s most well-known and respected coastal geologists, Stan Riggs.

Coastal geology is a fairly small world, and their paths crossed. Eventually, Carteret County wanted to take control of its beach re-nourishment efforts – get ahead of the curve in terms of the hard science about what was happening to beaches and why – Rudolph discovered that Freeman and others had started Geodynamics. Thus was formed what Rudolph calls a mutually beneficial relationship.

In 2006, Geodynamics was contracted to develop, deploy and maintain a web-based, three-dimensional virtual beach-mapping program for Rudolph’s office. It includes a plethora of coastal science data, including shorelines, topography and bathymetry, sea turtle nesting sites, sediment sample information and other natural resource information. It was the first initiative of its type in the state, according to Rudolph.

Twice each year, generally in April and October, Geodynamics takes to the water in specially built and equipped vessels to map the sea floor and does the same by walking and riding on all-terrain vehicles on the beach. Sand measurements range from the dunes to a depth of about 30 feet in the ocean, which Rudolph said equates to about a mile offshore. You can see where the sand goes, and where it stays.

The result is stunning in detail. Using dozens of beach transects, from the dunes to a specific points out in the water, Geodynamics can now tell Rudolph and the Carteret County Beach Commission how much sand has moved and where, all along 25-mile-long Bogue Banks.

Beach and shoreline surveys are conducted twice a year, every year, to give a complete picture of what the state of the beaches are all throughout Carteret County. Since federal money is generally not available for beach re-nourishment projects anymore, the county and the Bogue Banks towns must pay for the work when it’s needed, and Geodynamics’ information helps the county plan for when and where it will be needed. When you combine that information with cost estimates, the result is a level of readiness no one else in the state can claim.

That baseline information is also crucial in the event a hurricane does strike; without knowing how much sand is in a place, it’s difficult to know how much is lost, and that is the key to getting emergency re-nourishment money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

But it’s not just for beach re-nourishment projects, as the dredging work in Bogue Inlet, near The Point, the western tip of Emerald Isle, shows.

In 2005, the town, with the help of grant funds, spent more than $11 million to “relocate” the channel farther west, away from the high-value and then-rapidly eroding real estate at the Point. It worked, and Geodynamics’ data shows it.

For example, Geodynamics info shows that between 2009 and 2013, the Point gained 6.77 million cubic yards of sand above the mean high water contour. However, Rudolph said, the company’s measurements also show that since 2005, the channel has migrated back toward The Point.

“Back in 2011, there was a big jump, something like 200 feet,” Rudolph said. At that time, some briefly questioned the success of the project, which at the time of construction had an estimated effective life span of 15 years. But, Rudolph said, the movement has since slowed, generally to 30 or 40 feet a year, and less in 2016.

Measuring movement, however, isn’t all Geodynamics has done. The company also designed a “safe box,” an area in which the channel needs to remain. Once it gets too close the safe box edge, it’s time to start thinking about another major realignment effort.

“Once the channel is near the safe box, our master plan dictates we move the channel back to a more equidistant position between the Point and Hammocks Beach State Park, with concurrent beach nourishment along western Emerald Isle,” Rudolph said. “To this end we have developed four ‘virtual’ transects in the inlet trending west-east, (by which) we consistently measure the channel position. This helps us quantify the sinusoidal (a mathematical curve that describes a smooth repetitive oscillation) configuration of the channel, too.

“For example,” he said, “the channel may be farther away from the safe box towards the ocean bar (ebb delta) but closer towards The Point proper. We perform a similar analysis for the shoreline at The Point by establishing a series of virtual transects using Coast Guard Road as our baseline.”

What the most recent info from Geodynamics showed, Rudolph said, is that if things continue as they have, Emerald Isle and the county should be able to put off a major inlet channel realignment until 2022, 2023 or even beyond.

That, of course, is big deal. Because recent estimates indicate a project might now cost well more than $15 million. The town has been socking away money, and the county would likely use some of the revenue accumulated over the years from the county’s tourist occupancy tax, and the local governments would likely seek help from the state, too.

But no matter how you look at it, Rudolph said, putting off that major expenditure for as long as possible is a good thing; after all half of the occupancy tax money is earmarked for beach re-nourishment projects, and while there is more than $15 million in that fund, a major hurricane anywhere along Bogue Banks could trigger a need for a project that would nearly deplete the fund.

Beach surveys have shown that there has been only minor erosion along the island in recent years, even after significant storms, but there are “hot spots” – one is in eastern Emerald Isle – that might need re-nourishment. And Rudolph said, “you knew know when that big one (hurricane) is going to hit.”

Meanwhile, guided in part by the Geodynamics data, the most recent dredging project in Bogue Inlet was a little different.

A recent survey of the southeast quadrant of Bogue Inlet showed continued eastward migration of the channel, Rudolph said, showed that a secondary ebb channel, deeper than the marked navigation channel, had formed, closer to where the old channel had been.

The thinking, according to Rudolph, was that by dredging and improving that new and deeper channel – taking advantage of the fact that it seems to be natural, i.e., where the water wants to go – the project might further lengthen the time before a major realignment is needed.

Town Manager Frank Rush said the Army Corps of Engineers had been in the area in late winter, doing some dredging for Coast Guard Station Emerald Isle, and had suggested doing the Bogue Inlet work then. But, Rush suggested that the work be delayed until April, closer to the start of the peak summer boating season. So they returned in April.

What they’ve done, Rush said, is essentially “establish a new, more central location for the connecting channel, and the Coast Guard will relocate the aids to navigation to follow the new route.

Onslow and Carteret counties, Swansboro, Cape Carteret, Cedar Point and Emerald Isle, contributed funds, with the counties and the towns picking up the lion’s share of the cost for the side-cast dredge boat to travel here and to do its work. The state also kicked in some money, left over from a previous project, from its shallow inlet dredging fund, which gets revenue from boat registration fees and from the taxes boaters pay on the fuel for their vessels. The Corps had not yet sent a bill.

Rudolph praised Geodynamics for being a “civic-minded” and doing its work a cost-effective rate the county can afford.

“They do a great job for us,” he said.

Chris Freeman, president of Geodynamics, said he agrees that the Bogue Inlet and beach-mapping projects have been a win-win for his company and the county.

“We’ve been doing this for six or seven years now … and Bogue Inlet is now one of the most studied inlets in North Carolina, if not along the whole East Coast,” he said. “In this project, we’ve learned a lot and gained a lot of insight into how inlets move and behave.”

Focusing on the Emerald Isle side, Freeman said, Geodynamics has watched “embryo” sand dunes turn into real, functioning dunes, and has seen the processes that come into play in the movement of inlets. It’s gratifying, he said, to be able to understand those processes better and to be able to look at how inlet migration can affect things like bird habitat.

Geodynamics is an eight-person operation, Freeman said, and focuses intensively on customer satisfaction; although growth is desirable, he and the others, including his wife and Geodynamics CEO, Sloan – who cut her teeth at the Duke University Marine Lab in Beaufort – prefer to grow slowly in order to always provide quality data that makes those customers happy, and which are useful to those who need that data.

Still, the company’s work is not all in North Carolina. Geodynamics has taken on projects for clients all along the South and Mid-Atlantic, basically from Delaware to Florida, and has also done some work along the Gulf Coast, including in Texas. The client list includes, among others, the Navy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Center for Coastal Fisheries and Habitat Research, the Army Corps of Engineers’ offices in Wilmington, Norfolk, Virginia, and Baltimore, Maryland, and the U.S. Geological Survey.

They’ve done some exciting work for the Navy, he said, including a project to help the military branch install a fiber-optic cable that runs from the beach to the edge of the continental shelf.

Freeman is especially proud that the company, while small, is committed to obtaining and using the best technology available for the work it does, even if it has to spend half a million dollars for one piece of equipment.

“We want to grow,” he said, “but we always want to keep that focus on doing what we do the best we can do it. We’re pretty specialized. It’s about quality,” he said, not quantity.

And it’s a business model that’s worked. Of the eight employees at Geodynamics, all but one, a recent hire, have been there for at least seven years.

“We’ll likely expand our office footprint fairly soon,” he said. “But we’re not about just going out and hiring more people to do something else. We are careful. We cherry-pick.”

Rudolph said he’s looking forward to the future work with Geodynamics.

“As we move forward with this program, we’re going to get even more specific with the data,” he said. “We want to look at these erosion ‘hot spots’ and try to get a better understanding of what’s going on there.”

Learn More

• Geodynamics
• Geodynamics’ work on Bogue Inlet
• Carteret County Shore Protection Office

EMERALD ISLE – Despite concerns expressed by some environmentalists, residents and an inspector for the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program, Emerald Isle Town Manager Frank Rush says the town can successfully protect water quality, preserve a significant chunk of maritime forest and eventually build athletic fields on a portion of a nearly 30-acre tract officials hope to buy.

The move would preserve the area, which is largely maritime forest, behind the town’s recreation center on Emerald Drive from residential development, but a state report based on a site inspection on April 12 calls the town’s plan for carving out the forest’s interior for ball fields, “a significant concern.”

Town commissioners, during their monthly meeting on April 11, voted unanimously to seek two grants and money from the Marine Corps, augmented by some tax money, to buy the $3 million property, the largest undeveloped tract in town. Commissioners also gave Town Manager Frank Rush the OK to apply for $545,000 from the state Clean Water Management Trust Fund, which awards grants for projects that protect or enhance water quality.

The plan is to preserve about 20 acres in its natural state, but with hiking trails and other opportunities for passive recreation, and to use nine to 10 acres for athletic fields, which have long been desired by town residents.

The land is owned by Surfside Realty Inc. and was platted for a subdivision back in 1989, but it was never built.

The property is bounded by Archers Creek to the south, which separates it from the town government complex; by residential units along Live Oak Street to the west; residential units along Sound Drive to the north; and residential units along Archers Creek Court and Coral Court to the east.

‘A Serious Loss’

Mike Schafale of the Natural Heritage Program did the inspection on April 12, in response to the town’s application for the Clean Water  grant, and noted in his report the town’s contention that, “If unprotected, it appears likely to be bought for residential development soon.” However, he also noted that, “The town’s proposal to retain nine acres of the tract for recreational development would also be a serious threat to the natural integrity of the site, given the small size of the site.

“Though development in the wetlands would be unacceptable, and protection of them is needed to protect the creek, the most significant feature of the site is the maritime forest,” Schafale added. “At 23 acres, it is a small example, but it is one of the few last remnants of the extensive forest that once covered the interior of Emerald Isle, and is one of the better remnants in this region of the coast.”

Schafale said the clearing of nine acres would be “a serious loss,” and if recreational development were to occur in the middle of the site, “it would destroy virtually all of its ecological value.” Development along the edge of the property, adjacent to neighboring houses, would be less destructive, but would still diminish the natural area’s significance.

“The town is encouraged to use the land as a natural recreation area, with trails and small parking lots, but without facilities that would require large clearings or remove any of the intact maritime forest or wetlands,” Schafale noted.

‘Balancing Act’

Rush, the town manager, said the very nature of the Clean Water grant the town seeks demonstrates intent to preserve the land and protect water quality. It’s the same funding source used for the town’s purchase of the Emerald Isle Woods land off Coast Guard Road.

In addition, the town board authorized Rush to apply for $500,000 from the state Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, and officials also are seeking $1.5 million from the federal government through Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point.

The air station request, Rush said, is feasible because the property is in the flight path for aircraft that use Bogue Field, an auxiliary landing strip across Bogue Sound in the town of Bogue. The military discourages development within the flight paths of its facilities, and often partners with local governments to minimize it.

The final piece of the funding puzzle would be $455,000 from town taxpayers, most likely through a short-term loan, either internal or external. That wouldn’t happen until fiscal 2018-19, which will begin on July 1, 2018.

That taxpayer funding, Rush said, is an important consideration in how the property eventually is used, as residents and property owners will “have an investment,” and have long indicated in land-use plans and surveys that they’d like to see some kind of athletic fields in town. The site is about the only place that can happen, and it’s also within a stone’s throw of the recreation center.

“It’s a bit of a balancing act,” the manager said, but it’s important for all involved to remember that it’s also about saving about 30 acres, minus wetlands, from potentially intense development.”

Schafale reported that mid-Atlantic maritime evergreen forest occupies all of the upland parts of the site, with a canopy dominated by loblolly pine and laurel oak, with smaller numbers of live oaks and a few large pignut hickory trees. The understory includes swamp red bay, American olive and Carolina laurel cherry. Yaupon holly and witch hazel are also present, with plenty of poison ivy, greenbriers and Virginia creeper.

“The forest is mature, though it shows the effects of intense hurricanes about 20 years ago,” he wrote. “The old canopy trees are interspersed with gaps of up to an acre or two where understory-size trees predominate.”

Much of the marsh on the site is freshwater, but salt marsh is present along the Archer Creek channel where viewed from Lee Avenue, and a small amount may be present in the tract.

“Archers Creek presumably is tidally influenced, though the vegetation along it in most of the site suggests fresh water,” Schafale added in his report. “Saltier water appears to extend beyond Lee (Avenue), but not to the middle of this tract.”

Water Quality, Habitat Loss

Larry Baldwin, the Crystal Coast Waterkeeper based in Morehead City, said he supports the purchase because the land is zoned for multifamily development and could be used for up to 237 condominium units. That’s eight units per acre allowed under town zoning rules.

Baldwin, whose group is licensed by the international Waterkeeper Alliance, said he supports what the town is doing, “for now,” because it’s important that the tract not be used for dense condominium development, which would result in streets, roofs, sidewalks and other impervious surfaces that would increase stormwater runoff, the primary cause of water pollution along the coast.

“I’m not familiar enough with what they (the town) are doing to oppose anything yet,” Baldwin added. “But I do hope that they will do the right thing, which would be to preserve the whole 30 acres. I’m going to be interested in seeing what they eventually propose to do.”

One important factor, Baldwin  noted, would be the location of the ball fields within the tract; the distance from the wetlands and the creek is crucial.

Rush said the town has always tried to be a good environmental steward. He said the roughly four acres of wetlands on the site would be protected.

“I absolutely think that we could,” Rush said, when asked if he believes the town could design a project for athletic fields that would not hurt water quality. The bulk of the property is high and sandy, he said, whatever the town eventually designs would include buffers. In fact, Rush said he expects the Clean Water Management Trust Fund will require a conservation easement on a portion of the property, primarily along the roughly 1,100-foot shoreline of Archers Creek.

Sam Bland, a town resident, former Hammocks Beach State Park superintendent and North Carolina Coastal Federation employee, said he supports the town acquiring the property, but not the concept of developing nine acres for ball fields or other active park uses.

The problem, Bland said, is that there is very little maritime forest left in Emerald Isle. The other large section is the 41-acre, town-owned Emerald Isle Woods, which is a combination natural park and storm water management facility.

“We need to preserve what’s left,” Bland said. He added that clearing and developing any of the property would likely have some negative effect on water quality in the creek, which flows into Bogue Sound.

Another issue, Bland said, is that the property is prime habitat for wildlife, including raccoons, foxes and especially the resplendent painted bunting, which, in North Carolina, is listed as a federal “special concern” species by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The bird also has been designated as a watch list species by Partners in Flight, and BirdLife International has categorized the population as near-threatened. Experts say the population has been declining for years, in part because it is caught in Mexico and Cuba for the caged-bird trade, but also because its habitat is shrinking.

In his report, Schafale stated that a survey for rare animals and for rare bryophytes – liverworts, hornworts and mosses – “would be worthwhile.”

Closing the Deal

In action at the April 11 meeting, the board authorized Rush to execute a contract for purchase and also set up a “due diligence period” that could result in a closing of the deal at the end of October.

MCAS Cherry Point officials have begun the process to secure federal funds, Rush said, but that’s likely to take several months.

Rush said that based on discussions with officials at Cherry Point, he expects a definitive commitment by September, but the money might not be available for a few months after that. Decisions on the state trust fund grants could also come by early September.

If the state grants come through, but actual cash from the military is not available by the planned Oct. 31 closing date, Rush added, the town could enter into a short-term financing arrangement with The Conservation Fund of North Carolina, part of a national organization whose mission is to assist communities in the acquisition and conservation of public land. The Conservation Fund is serving as the town’s partner on the acquisition. Under the military’s program, Rush said, Cherry Point can provide federal funding only to previously authorized partners, and The Conservation Fund has been involved in similar previous deals with the air station.

The Conservation Fund would be the actual entity that would purchase the property from the owners. The Conservation Fund would then convey the property to the town.

In his memo to the board, Rush noted that if the town does not receive adequate funds for the purchase, “it will likely be possible to have The Conservation Fund proceed with the acquisition on the Town’s behalf. The Conservation Fund would provide the balance of funding necessary to acquire the property, and would then hold the property for some mutually agreeable time period.”

If that were to occur, he wrote, “The town would remain eligible for grant funding, and could apply for funding from the same grant programs in 2018 or could apply for funding through other eligible grant programs.”

The other option, absent sufficient funds by closing, is to simply abandon the effort, he added.

What Kind of Park?

Rush said he’s confident the town can get the two grants, as well as the contribution from the military, but more money would be needed to build athletic fields.

In a memo to commissioners for their meeting, Rush listed potential field uses and sizes:

• Baseball field – about 400 feet by 400 feet, or three to four acres.
• Soccer field – about 300 feet by 400 feet, or nearly three acres, which could potentially be built in the outfield of a new baseball field.
• Tennis court – about 60 feet by 120 feet each; or about one-sixth of an acre.
• Dog park – sizes vary, but likely about an acre, potentially in the natural area of the new park, among existing trees.
• Skate park – sizes vary, but likely a half-acre or less.
• Splash park – sizes vary, but likely one-fourth of acre or less.

“Additionally,” Rush wrote, “it will likely be necessary to provide some amount of additional parking for park patrons.” He said about 80 spaces, along with access to them, would take up close to an acre.

The military’s program will limit the extent of building construction on the property.

Rush noted in his memo to the board the town would likely be able to build a small bathroom building, a storage building, a concession building and “other similar features,” but larger buildings would not be allowed.

Eight or nine residents spoke during the state grant-required public hearing on April 11, and while some expressed concern, none out-and-out opposed the plan.

Ken Stone, chairman of the town’s bicycle and pedestrian advisory committee, was one who spoke at the hearing.

In an interview, Stone said that, like others, he’d prefer that the property be kept mostly natural, with the exception of hiking and bike paths and maybe a small venue for outdoor performing arts.

But, he added, “We have to get the property first. And there are a lot of people who have been interested in having ball fields.” But, he said, protecting 20 of the 30 acres of mostly forested land in a natural state is certainly preferable to 237 condos or even single-family development.

“I guess I’m kind a realist,” Stone said. “If we have a chance to get this land, using grants, and don’t do it, that would be a heck of a missed opportunity.”

Rush said that if the town is able to get the land, nothing would happen fast.

“Ultimately, I would envision the board soliciting additional public input on desired park amenities in the future, and using that public input to develop a specific park plan,” he said.

Learn More

• Read the Natural Heritage Report

PORTSMOUTH ISLAND — It’s not every day you see a big red squid alive on a beach in Carteret County. If it were, folks might be a bit alarmed. They are, uh, different-looking when they’re big. Maybe not the “Creature from the Black Lagoon” different. Weird enough, though.

But Winterville resident Carey Walker, who was driving down Portsmouth Island in late March, wasn’t alarmed, just curious, when he saw the unusual specimen. He picked it up, and like any good visitor to Core Banks, cared enough about marine life to put it back in the water, after getting a photo or two, of course.

He never saw the squid come back. But he has wondered what it was. And so have many others who’ve seen the photos.

“It was low tide, and we were coming back to the cabins at about 5:30 p.m., and I just saw this thing out of the corner of my eye down at the edge of the water,” Walker recalled. “I actually went past it. But I wanted to see what it was, so I backed the truck up and got out and saw that it was still alive. So I picked up and we got a couple of pictures, and then I put it back in the water.”

Walker and his companions were there for a few more days, and never saw the squid on the beach again. Nor did anyone else they talked to.

“We saw some seals and some other things, but we never saw the squid again,” he said. “It was really just a five-minute encounter, but it was pretty cool. It’s not something you see every day, that’s for sure.”

Walker, who works for Barnhill Construction Co., estimated the squid weighed 35 to 40 pounds and was about 3 1/2 feet long, maybe 4 feet including its tentacles.

“I’ve caught some little squid before, but I’d never seen anything this size, and it was really red,” he said.

Walker thought that was the end of it. Eventually, though, through mutual friends, Carey’s photos wound their way to Todd Miller, executive director of the North Carolina Coastal Federation.

Miller emailed the photos to Charles H. “Pete” Peterson, a longtime and renowned marine biologist at the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City. Peterson has been around the watery block a few times, and he’s also a frequent beachgoer.

But he had no clue.

“Todd thought I might know, because he knows I’ve seen some weird stuff on the beach, but I didn’t,” Peterson said. “I’ve heard reports of giant squid around here, but I’ve never seen one.”

Although Carteret County is home to a wide variety of marine biologists and oceanographers – at Peterson’s lab as well as the North Carolina State University’s Center for Marine Science and Technology, or CMAST, also in Morehead City, and the National Marine Fisheries Service on Pivers Island near Beaufort, Peterson didn’t know of any “big squid” experts in the area.

But Miller did some research on the internet, and turned up the name of Steve O’Shea, who, indeed, is a marine biologist and environmentalist known for his expertise on giant squid.

He began working with the creatures with the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, or NIWA, in New Zealand in 1996, and became director of the Earth and Oceanic Sciences Research Institute at the Auckland University of Technology, or AUT, in 2005. He was a Discovery Channel Quest Scholar until 2009, when he resigned to focus on research on coastal conservation, environmental matters and postgraduate supervision and teaching; but has remained involved in squid research and their preservation.

He’s even got a squid named for him: AUT science student Heather Braid, according to the university’s website, discovered a new species in the Mastigoteuthidae family a few years back and named it “Magnoteuthis osheai” for the man who had inspired her, years earlier, to get into squid research. It’s got to be a bit unusual for someone to inspire you to get into squid research.

But O’Shea would be the one to do that. He’s published more than 40 papers on squid, octopus, whales, fisheries and conservation, and has been involved in many documentaries.

So, you think that O’Shea might know the identity of the squid Carey Walker found on the Portsmouth Island Beach, just by looking at an emailed photo or two? Indeed, he did. After a couple of days of back-and-forth emails – it can be difficult to connect consistently with a world-famous man who lives now in Australia – he reported that, while unusual to be seen on beaches in our parts, this was not a particularly unusual squid: It was a diamondback squid, known in scientific nomenclature as Thysanoteuthis rhombus.

T. rhombus, also known as the diamond squid or diamondback squid, is a large species that grows to about 100 centimeters in length, which translates to about 39 inches, and ranges in weight from 20 to 30 kilograms, which translates to 44 to 50 pounds. Which means that, if nothing else, Carey Walker is pretty good at estimating the weight and length of big red squids he picks up on remote beaches.

O’Shea said the species occurs worldwide, throughout tropical and subtropical waters. Its arms have two sets of suckers, while the tentacles have four sets. Its named for its fins, which run in equal length along its mantle, making it look sort of like a rhombus, everyone’s favorite middle school geometrical shape, unless of course one favors parallelograms.

In his email, O’Shea said “There’s a significant commercial fishery for this species in more tropical waters,” and internet sources specifically mention the waters around Okinawa and Japan.

“Every now and then you get a stray, and that may well be the case with this one,” O’Shea wrote. “I’ve had them from (about) 127 metres (466 feet) depth at almost 55 degrees South, subAntarctic waters, south of New Zealand.

“Whether this has anything to do with changes in oceanography, currents, eddies or climate in general I don’t know, but of course anything is possible.”

There could, he said, have been a warm-water eddy, or a general warming of the surface layers of the water in the area, “bearing in mind this squid may have been living at depth. Whatever way you look at it, it is an important museum specimen and I hope it has been saved.”

Alas, it might have been saved, thanks to Carey Walker, but not for a museum, just for a longer life. Surely a squid expert would prefer that …

For his part, Walker conceded the thought of “calamari” crossed his mind when he saw the squid, but those thoughts didn’t prevail.

Nor would it have been worth a whole lot to take the thing to a fish house, because squid just aren’t worth a lot ‘round here. According to North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries statistics, the top year for commercial squid landings was in 2004, when watermen brought in 2,465,394 pounds, worth $522,115. That’s about 21 cents a pound. Landings by 2015 had decreased to 25,516 pounds, worth $22,212. That’s 87 cents a pound. It wouldn’t have been a big payday.

Should mitigation be required for projects that “armor” beaches or inlets against erosion, potentially damaging habitat for threatened and endangered species, as is required in some places for alterations to or development of wetlands?

That’s just one of many questions potentially raised in a tidal inlet and sandy beach “inventory” released recently by the North Atlantic Landscape Conservation Cooperative, which was formed in 2009 as a conservation partnership, consisting of federal agencies, states, tribes, universities and private organizations that work collaboratively to develop scientific information and tools needed to prioritize and guide conservation actions in the North Atlantic Region from southeast Virginia north to Atlantic Canada.

The North Atlantic cooperative is one of 22 members of the Landscape Conservation Cooperative Network, which was launched in 2009 by the U.S. Department of the Interior, primarily through the U.S. Fish and Wildlife

The inventory, which was compiled by Tracy Rice, a coastal geologist who is with Terwilliger Consulting Inc. in Pennsylvania, covers the East Coast from Maine to the North Carolina-South Carolina border, and is based on Google Earth data that show changes in the beaches and inlets from Hurricane Sandy, and by man, from 2012 through 2015. It’s intended to be used by beach managers, local, state and federal agencies and others who are involved in coastal environmental and marine life issues, but it’s freely available to anyone.

“It was a three-year project,” said Rice, who was once a geologist in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service office in Raleigh, “and it contains a wealth of information for anyone who wants to use it. We purposely made all of the data available online, and we hope that it can be of benefit to anyone who needs it and can use it.”

All of this began after “superstorm” Sandy, which devastated parts of the northeastern U.S. coast in 2012.  Money was available through the federal government for recovery efforts, but there was also a need for information about the state of the beaches and inlets before and after the storm. Rice said such information more or less didn’t exist in the region. No one, for example, knew how much sandy beach there was, nor did they know exactly where inlets were, or the state of those beaches or inlets.

Using money from the Department of Interior, Rice and others from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Geological Service and other agencies began a long and hard project to fill in those gaps, under the auspices of the North Atlantic cooperative, which she describes as an organization similar to the Cooperative Extension Service, but on a larger scale, interested in making sure that money is spent wisely, without overlap, on a regional basis.

The effort looked at such things as the location and identification of tidal inlets that were open in 2015; habitat modifications to each inlet open in 2015; armor, or hard shoreline stabilization structures; dredging; inlet mining; inlet relocations; artificial inlet openings; and artificial inlet closures.

Although North Carolina is not in the North Atlantic cooperative region, the state was included in the inventory because the investigators chose to include the entire range of the piping plover, a tiny endangered shore bird. North Carolina is at the southern end of that range.

“Part of what we wanted to do is look at the beaches and inlets prior to Sandy, and then to look at them after Sandy and see how much damage the storm did and what humans did to the beaches and inlets,” she said.

Examples of manmade changes include erection of sand fences, beach re-nourishment projects and other hard structures to prevent erosion, such as groins and jetties.

Somewhat surprisingly, Rice said, they found that while in 2015, 412 tidal inlets were open along the U.S. Atlantic coast from Maine to North Carolina, 68 percent of them had been altered.

“In late 2015 or early 2016, approximately 1,650.68 miles of sandy beach habitat were present from Maine to North Carolina,” Rice noted in the report. “An additional 90.88 miles of sandy shoreline were identified where sandy beach habitat was absent (lost) seaward of beachfront armor in 2015.”

In all, beachfront development of one type or another had modified 45 percent of the sandy shoreline by 2015. Beachfront armor modified 27 percent of the sandy shoreline, with up to 5,144 groins, 235 jetties, 96 breakwaters and 2,886 contiguous sections of seawalls, bulkheads and/or revetments.  At least 23 percent (393 miles) of the sandy beaches from Maine to North Carolina had been modified by sediment placement by 2015.”

The inventory noted 140 sandbag revetments known to be, or assumed to be, present – some are under houses or buried – in 2015. These sandbag revetments had modified an estimated 23,108 feet of sandy beach habitat in 2015. In North Carolina, where the use of sandbags has long been more popular than in most areas, according to Rice, even the Department of Transportation has used them in recent years to protect roads on the Outer Banks.

At least 68 miles of sandy beach habitat in the inventory region were modified by beach scraping in the three years after Hurricane Sandy, and at least 247 miles were modified by sand fencing.

Interestingly, the inventory found that 48 percent of the sandy beach in the region was in public or non-governmental organizational ownership in 2015.

North Carolina’s inlets have almost all been modified over time. There are longstanding terminal groins at Oregon Inlet and Beaufort Inlet, for example, and there is also a jetty at Beaufort Inlet and one at Masonboro Inlet.

Almost all of the inlets have been dredged, from Oregon Inlet to the north to Tubbs Inlet to the far south, with the exception of New Old Drum Inlet, Ophelia Inlet, Bear Inlet and Browns Inlet. And most of the inlets in the state have been “mined” for sand for beach fill.

While Rice was careful to say that her opinions did not necessarily reflect those of the North Atlantic cooperative or others involved in the project, she noted that, taken as a whole, it’s clear that much of the sandy beach and most of the inlets have been modified to some degree by man. That, she said, is cause for concern about not only the representative species in the study – the piping plover – but also for sea turtles, fish and other birds.

While armoring beaches, or doing beach nourishment projects, are moves officials think necessary to protect the beach-driven and crucial coastal tourism industry, Rice said those same practices can affect populations of coastal species that help draw the tourists, especially when cumulative effects from numerous projects are considered. Those cumulative effects are supposed to be considered in permit decisions under the federal Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act, but critics have long maintained that they often are not given enough weight in decision-making.

So, Rice asked rhetorically, are we to the point where those cumulative effects need to be addressed, as are wetlands losses, in permit decisions?

In some places, Rice said, that’s already being done. For example, in Maryland, there have been instances where dunes have been “notched” to allow natural over-wash, which is a critical process for some habitat and some species. So, is it time to consider requiring mitigation for beach hardening measures, or for inlet stabilization?

These, she said, are important questions the inventory’s results appear to raise in relation to the value we place on long-term survival of habitat for species we are supposed to protect.

In the meantime, she said the inventory will be much-used by a number of federal, state and local agencies, ranging from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to state wildlife resources agencies to the Carteret County’s Shore Protection Office, which has a beach re-nourishment master plan awaiting federal approval. And municipalities should also be able to make good use of the data and the imagery; for example, Emerald Isle in 2005 paid more than $11 million to relocate the Bogue Inlet channel to slow erosion of a valuable residential area known as “The Point,” and is looking at the possibility of doing that again in the next decade, if not sooner.

State wildlife agencies, she added, are generally supposed to regularly update their action plans to protect habitat for protected species; piping plovers are on the list for every state within their habitat.

Academics are also free to use the data. But in use cases, Rice said, the participants in the effort would like use of the data to be credited.

“We want people to use this information,” Rice said. “That’s the main reason it has been made available free to anyone who wants to use it.”

The habitat inventories for tidal inlet and sandy beach habitat from Maine through North Carolina, including conditions up through 2015, are now available. Data products include written habitat assessment reports, multiple data layers for Google Earth, and Microsoft Excel inventory databases.

Learn More

• View the Inventories
• You’ll need Google Earth

BEAUFORT – It’s not magic, but what MAGIC has produced in its research based at the Duke University Marine Lab might help conjure a world less dependent upon fossil fuels.

Zackary Johnson, assistant professor of molecular biology in marine science, and his multi-institutional Marine AlGae Industrialization Consortium, or MAGIC, team are on the way to figuring out a way to turn the lipids – essentially, fats – from marine microalgae into high-density liquid hydrocarbon biofuels for the aviation and cargo shipping industries, on a commercially viable scale. Perhaps just as importantly, the biomass left over after the lipids have been removed can be used to make nutritious, high-protein feed for chicken and pigs, plus aquaculture-raised seafood like shrimp and salmon, again in commercial quantities.

“We may have stumbled onto the next green revolution,” Charles H. Greene, a partner in the study and a professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University, said in a news release from that school in November 2016. Johnson agrees.

“I don’t think any one technology will solve the world’s sustainable energy needs,” Johnson said last week. “Each one – solar, wind, microalgae and others – has advantages and disadvantages. But this can be a really important part of an overall solution. It’s probably not going to fuel your car or your home, but it can fuel planes and ships.”

Similarly, using the protein-rich, “defatted” biomass from the algae to produce animal feed, and potentially, high-protein food products for humans, isn’t going to totally replace other products used for those purposes; “None of us are going to be eating 100 percent algae,” Johnson said. “But again, it can play an important role.”

The advantage of algae production is that it can take place in many places – on land or in water – and many of those places can be in areas not used for other agricultural or aquaculture activities. Although MAGIC’s research has focused on growing the algae in loop raceway-like ponds water on land, it can be done anywhere there is sunlight for photosynthesis, Johnson said.

That means that the closer to the equator, the better. But it doesn’t require arable land, or even freshwater, and the latter is a huge benefit, because everyone knows that many areas have dire shortages of potable water for humans and animals. Even the barren desert areas of deserts of Mexico, the Middle East, Australia and North Africa are suitable.

And it doesn’t even require clean water. At least one group – not Johnson’s – got into the effort by using algae to clean the effluent from wastewater treatment plants. And, Johnson said, it’s even conceivable that algae could be grown for these energy and animal feed uses in polluted waters that are usually of little use to anyone, with the side benefit of cleaning those waters.

Growing enough algae to meet the current global liquid fuel demand would require an area of about 800,000 square miles, according to Johnson. That’s a little less than three times the size of Texas.

A paper MAGIC published in the journal Oceanography in December 2016 estimated a commercial microalgae production facility of about 2,500 acres would cost between $400 million and $500 million, the new paper estimates.

“That may seem like a lot of money,” Greene said in the news release after the paper came out. “But integrated solutions to the world’s greatest challenges will pay for themselves many times over during the remainder of this century. The costs of inaction are too steep to even contemplate.”

Like Greene, Johnson noted that growing algae is less land-intensive than growing the crops it would replace, so it could reduce the pressure to convert rainforests to palm plantations in Indonesia and soy plantations in Brazil.

This level of production would also yield nearly 2.4 billion tons of protein-rich byproduct for agricultural or human consumption. According to MAGIC’s paper, that’s roughly 10 times the amount of soy protein currently produced worldwide each year.

So how long before these technologies can be taken to full-scale production and start having an effect in the word?

“That’s a great question,” Johnson said. “All the economic analyses we have done say it can be done now, although we’d like it to be even more favorable. I’d say within five years there could be a viable pilot project.”

Algae’s potential as an alternative oil source was initially explored after the Arab oil embargo in 1973 led to fuel shortages and high prices at the pump in the U.S. As the crisis faded and prices dropped, the interest in algae’s biofuel potential dropped, too.

But in 2007, oil prices began to skyrocket again, finally peaking at $144 per barrel in July 2008. That sparked renewed interest and research.

Johnson, who has been at the Duke Marine Lab for eight years, got involved about that time, working in algae research with a consortium made up of a few universities and Royal Dutch Shell to study oil-producing algae. Other large oil companies, including ExxonMobil and British Petroleum, or BP, were also exploring algae’s potential as a fuel source.

The idea was that algae grow very fast, and some have a large percentage of oil in them. Because oil prices have since dropped, one problem is producing the oil from algae at competitive prices. But again, Johnson thinks it’s viable.

“Another thing we need to do, though, is make sure it’s right from a carbon-footprint standpoint,” Johnson said. It’s not just about making money for whoever eventually does it commercially, he said, it’s “about making sure it’s a good thing” overall for the environment.

Johnson said the astounding thing about the research is that it’s shown that as valuable as algae production for fuels appears to be, the protein for food – essentially an afterthought at time the research began – is even more valuable than oil, at least on paper.

That is particularly intriguing from an economic perspective because any production process can be hamstrung by waste. Algae production for fuel and algae production for protein would, or at least could be, integrated.

Johnson called it serendipitous.

“Going in, we were drawn by the oil, but the protein also has global-scale implications,” he said. “It can really make a difference. I’ve never underestimated algae – there are so many different types, and they do so many different things – but I will say that as we’ve gotten deeper into this, I never cease to be amazed at the new potentials we discover.”

For example, Johnson said, one of the great things about the protein from algae is that it’s very high in iron. As people worldwide have begun to eat less beef and more chicken and pork, people have been consuming less iron, because beef has more iron.

If you feed high-iron protein to chickens and pigs, they ingest more iron than from other agricultural food products. And if people eat those chicken and pigs, they get more iron. That’s an important consideration, when you note that per the World Health Organization, anemia affects about 1.6 billion people worldwide. That’s about 24.8 percent of the world’s population, according to WHO’s website, and highest prevalence of anemia is among preschool-age children.

Chronic anemia may result in behavioral disturbances in children as a direct result of impaired neurological development in infants, and reduced academic performance in children of school age.

So, feed high-iron animal feed to pigs and chickens, and at least potentially you can reduce the prevalence of a major health problem that affects children most frequently, and especially in poor areas.

Again, Johnson said, it’s serendipitous.

This potentially revolutionary research has been backed by a $5.2 million U.S. Department of Energy grant, and, in addition to Duke and Cornell, has involved Archer Daniels Midland, Bentley University, Bucknell University, OpenAlgae, Shell Global Solutions Inc., the University of Hawaii, the University of Nordland (now called Nord University, in Norway), The University of Southern Mississippi and Valicor Renewables.

The researchers have been systematically trying to find the best algae for the process, looking for the ones that successfully grow in larger quantities and produce a high volume of products and co-products, all in an effort to drive down the cost of commercial-scale production.

“Duke is leading the research, and I’m the primary investigator, but it really has been and is a team effort,” Johnson said. “It takes so many different disciplines to do this.”

No one scientist, he said, “knows everything,” but a team of this size and scope effectively combines the expertise of many.

“The team is thinking about this on a large, global scale,” he said when the three-year grant was first announced in 2015. “It’s thinking about how we can make a major dent in the energy demand or the protein demand. We need to do it really big to make a difference. That’s the challenge.”

And he believes the challenge is being met.

“There will be more challenges,” he said. “But I’m very optimistic.”

Learn More

• Marine AlGae Industrialization Consortium

Reprinted from the Tideland News

Audubon North Carolina recently announced two new programs the organization says can help the state’s birds survive as the effects of climate change become more severe.

Curtis Smalling, director of conservation for Audubon North Carolina, said the two programs – Climate Strongholds and Climate Watch – offer ways for state agencies, nonprofit conservation groups and, of course, individual property owners, to make a difference.

In addition, Smalling said, involvement in such bird-related programs and efforts can serve as vehicles to make people more aware of climate change issues in general, and more likely to try to influence public policies that can hurt or help not only birds, but also the crucial ecosystems that those birds – and people – rely upon.

Heather Hahn, Audubon NC executive director, said the effects of climate change on birds are already noticeable.

“We’re already seeing birds shift where they can live due to changes in weather brought about by climate change, with 60 percent of our wintering birds spending their time further north than just 40 years ago,” she said. “We are starting the (new programs) now to identify and protect valuable land and habitat that birds will need in the future to survive and thrive. It’s critical that our birds always have a place here in North Carolina.”

Climate Strongholds

Smalling and Hahn said data gleaned from the 2014 Audubon Birds and Climate Change Report have allowed Audubon scientists to identify five regions of North Carolina where birds are expected to seek sanctuary from the effects of our changing climate. These “climate strongholds” can offer the right mix of temperature and precipitation needed to support a wide diversity of birds now and into the future.

Climate strongholds represent regions of the state that are expected to retain suitable climate conditions required by climate-threatened birds with diverse habitat needs. Audubon NC Climate Stronghold regions include the Blue Ridge Mountains, Capital-Piedmont (greater Raleigh), Roanoke and Chowan Rivers Bottomlands, and the Southern Coastal Plain. Audubon modeled an additional “Coastal Stronghold,” to identify which existing Important Bird Areas, zones deemed important for conservation of bird populations, are most threatened by sea-level rise.

“For the first time, we’re able to apply data to predict where birds will move as the climate changes,” Smalling said. “Knowing where birds are likely to move in response to climate change will guide future bird conservation in North Carolina, and we’ll need lots of partners to be successful and will assist our partners in protecting land and managing bird habitat in the state.”

Working from this future blueprint for conservation planning, Audubon NC will prioritize work with partners to conserve natural areas within these climate strongholds, manage forests in a bird-friendly way and grow bird-friendly native plants to protect our most climate-threatened birds.

Smalling said examples include working with organizations such as the North Carolina Coastal Land Trust or the North Carolina Coastal Federation to preserve critical habitat, and working with state and federal agencies to help make good decisions. He called it a “no-regrets” approach, since the same conservation efforts and policies that can help birds also help the environment.

The coastal climate stronghold, Smalling said, may be facing even more immediate threats than most of the other strongholds, in part because not only is the weather changing, sea level is rising, inundating marshes and reducing flat, sandy beach areas that serve as habitat for shorebirds.

But Smalling stressed that it’s not just up to conservation groups and government agencies. In fact, he said, there are countless meaningful, although seemingly small, ways for property owners to help.

A big way is to rely, as much as possible, on native plants in landscaping.

Smalling said a native oak tree supports 600 insect species, whereas a non-native crepe myrtle supports only three. That makes a huge difference to birds, many of which rely overwhelmingly on insects for food.

Another way is to plant-bird friendly species in gardens. People can also try to reduce bird-window collisions, particularly in urban areas, but keeping lights off at nights. And people everywhere can do birds a big favor by keeping cats inside as much as possible.

Again, he stressed, birds can be a good entry point for conservation in general.

When “people feel like they can actually do something that makes a difference,” he said, they start taking personal responsibility, and personal responsibility can and often does lead to advocacy, things like contacting local officials and legislators and urging them to take steps that help habitat, as well as urging them not to take steps that result in habitat destruction.

Examples of policy decisions include beach nourishment and the use of groins or bulkheads to slow erosion along the coast. In that sense, it’s not just climate change that threatens birds and habitat, but man’s response to climate change. Such hardening of the coast reduces habitat, whereas living shorelines can slow erosion and preserve or even create habitat.

One of the goals, Smalling said, is to simply make people more aware of the threats climate change poses. Sometimes these changes aren’t obvious.

For example, people may say, “I still see birds” on the beach, but might not notice that their numbers are lower than in the past, or that they are around at different times, or not around for the same length of time.

Climate change has always happened, he noted, but the “pace seems different now,” and one of the goals of climate strongholds is to slow the effects of those changes enough to give birds more of an opportunity to adapt, as organisms have always done.

Climate Watch

The Climate Watch effort is a program that builds upon more than 100 years of Audubon “citizen science” to track and document the health of bird populations. It aims to track the response of individual bird species to climate change to inform future conservation planning.

Audubon recently announced that its 2014 Birds and Climate Change report revealed three species of North Carolina nuthatches – red-breasted, white-breasted and brown-headed – that are among 170 bird species in the state whose ranges are expected to shift and significantly shrink because of a changing climate.

In the program, volunteer Audubon members and other lay scientists count nuthatches during two observation periods, Jan. 15-30 and June 1-15. The volunteers then report their data to a national database for analysis.

“Projects like this one keep the ledger of how birds are being affected by climate change,” said Kim Brand, Audubon NC field organizer. “Over time we’ll be able to see how bird populations respond to climate change and adjust our conservation strategies accordingly.”

Learn More

• Climate Strongholds
• Climate Watch
• Audubon North Carolina

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

CARTERET COUNTY – Researchers from North Carolina State University in Raleigh, working with the National Park Service and other partners, are using the Cape Lookout National Seashore as the site for a study to determine how climate change might affect key cultural resources over time, and what can be done.

Cape Lookout is a particularly interesting choice for the study because many folks who live nearby have deep emotional and ancestral ties to the islands that make up the park. Lead investigator Erin Seekamp, an associate professor and tourism extension specialist in the Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management at NCSU, says she and the others involved are quickly learning a lot.

“Many of the people we’ve talked to so far have deep connections to the islands and the places and structures on them, and they care about them a lot,” Seekamp said. “Part of what we and the park service want to know is what they think climate change endangers the most. But we also want to know what structures they view as most important, and which ones they view as most important to protect, and how best to do that.”

The Cape Lookout National Seashore preserves a 56-mile-long section of the southern Outer Banks, running from Ocracoke Inlet on the northeast to Beaufort Inlet on the southeast. Three undeveloped barrier islands make up the seashore: North and South Core Banks and Shackleford Banks. It includes two historic villages on Core Banks, Shackleford’s wild horses and the Cape Lookout Lighthouse, which is one of the most iconic in the country.

But a real key, to folks who don’t come to the seashore from “off” – Down East Carteret County residents’ term for many visitors – is historic Portsmouth Island Village, on wind- and water-swept Core Banks, the ancestral home of many residents of the area. It was founded in 1753, and was key “lightering port,” where oceangoing vessels could offload cargo for transport on smaller vessels through Ocracoke Inlet to villages along Core and Pamlico sounds. There was a key lifesaving station there, and by 1860, it was home to nearly 700 people. During the rest of the 1800s, the island village was beset by numerous hurricanes, shoaling in the inlet and the closure of the lifesaving station and the post office. By 1967, it had become part of the national seashore, and the last two residents left in 1971.

The national seashore was authorized on March 10, 1966, and the park service took over the properties that once belonged to those “ancestors.” There’s still bitterness.

Seekamp said she and the others involved realize the importance of the history to many folks whose ancestors once lived and worked there, and they’ve been working with the Core Sound Waterfowl and Heritage Museum on Harkers Island and other stakeholders to get their opinions. That’s part of what the study is all about.

They’ve done oral surveys of many, including those visiting at the lighthouse, at the national seashore’s visitor center on Harkers Island and in Portsmouth Village, and have asked those surveyed what they’ve been most interested in as an attraction and most interested in protecting.

Modeling based on projected climate change shows that not only the lighthouse but almost everything in the park is within the “high vulnerability” range by 2100, some by 2050. About the only thing that looks close to safe within that time range is the old Coast Guard Station, which is in the in the “moderate” risk zone.

Seekamp and others are evaluating 17 buildings in all on the seashore, and are also working with the State Historic Preservation Office. The research team, which includes U.S. Geological Survey analysts Mitch Eaton and Max Post van der Burg, is combining this information with earlier research by Western Carolina University’s Rob Young at the Center for the Study of Developed Shorelines.

Seekamp said the goal is to help the park service prioritize which structures residents and visitors consider most important to protect, and what steps to protect them they would support.

The researchers have asked about such options as beach re-nourishment, elevating structures or moving them, or simply fencing them off and letting nature takes its course.

Interestingly, so far, Seekamp said, relatively few respondents seem invested in elevation; they feel that option would undermine the things that underpin their attachments. Nor, she said, do they seem particularly interested in moving structures. Other options include using traditional, or even non-traditional, materials to “shore up” the structures to enable them to withstand bigger and more frequent flood events.

“I’m glad that someone is trying to determine what might be done,” said one descendent of so-called “Ca’e Bankers.” “These places aren’t just buildings. They are heritage, roots, to lots of people. But at the same time, some people don’t really want the park service or anyone else to mess with them.”

But the studies also involve the Southeast Climate Center at NCSU, which is affiliated with the U.S. Department of the Interior. It is one of eight regional Climate Science Centers managed by the U.S. Geological Survey National Climate Change and Wildlife Science Center, and works with natural and cultural resource managers to gather the scientific information and build the tools needed to help fish, wildlife, and ecosystems adapt to climate change.

In other words, it’s not just about Cape Lookout. An abstract of the effort puts it this way: “Climate change doesn’t just threaten our natural resources – it threatens our cultural resources, too. Cultural resources represent evidence of past human activity, such as archeological sites, or are of significance to a group of people traditionally associated with the resource, such as Native American ceremonial sites.

“Climate change is challenging the long-term persistence of many cultural resources. For example, those located in coastal areas, such as historic lighthouses, are threatened by sea-level rise, shoreline erosion, and more frequent severe storm events. While climate change challenges managers of both natural and cultural resources to make decisions in the face of uncertainty, far less work has been done to identify the impacts of climate change on cultural resources, compared to natural resources.”

The Cape Lookout study is an attempt to develop a planning model, of sorts, based on a “subset” of buildings at the national seashore that are listed on the National Historic Register, according to the project abstract.

“Cultural resources hold multiple and diverse values to local communities, visitors, and the general public,” the abstract states. “These resources are irreplaceable, and their meaning is often tied to their specific location. This project will contribute significantly to our understanding of the vulnerability of cultural resources to climate change throughout the southeastern U.S. and the role that historic significance should play in management decisions – information that is vital for developing strategies to conserve these resources into the future.”

All of this is important because there is a tremendous backlog – some say as much as $11 billion – in needed repairs in national parks.

“It’s certainly not isolated to Carteret County or eastern North Carolina,” Seekamp said. Cape Lookout made a good study area because it is a system of barrier islands, particularly vulnerable to harsh weather, and now, increasingly, to sea-level rise associated with climate change.

There will be workshops, Seekamp said, “to try to find ways to optimize decision-making on a larger scale, not just North Carolina.” Analysts will use vulnerability models for the next 30 years to try to plug in costs, a way to make decision-making more efficient and effective, year-to-year.

Seekamp said the project should wrap up by September, with a series of reports, and a public meeting on Harkers Island, site of the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center and the national seashore’s visitor center.

Harkers Island also is the epicenter of the modern history of the seashore; the island saw an influx of new residents after hurricanes in 1896 and 1899 devastated the communities established on the nearby Core Banks and Shackleford Banks. Mostly fishermen and whalers, the people began debating the merits of moving after an 1896 hurricane, but the big exodus came after Diamond City on Shackleford Banks – then the largest town on North Carolina’s barrier islands – was almost completely destroyed by a hurricane in 1899. Many families used boats to move what was left of their houses, plank by plank, from the banks to the better-protected Harkers Island, where they rebuilt, and many others went and did the same thing in the area of Morehead City now known as the Promise Land.

Karen Amspacher heads the Core Sound museum, and said that while she’s glad someone is looking at the cultural and historic significance of the buildings, she wishes “it had been more community-oriented,” as many who should have been interviewed haven’t been, yet. “The community can and will help them more if they’ll let us,” she added.

Still, Amspacher said, “The Core Sound Museum fully supports Cape Lookout National Seashore’s efforts to prepare and plan for the preservation of the historic structures on Core Banks.  Those buildings tell the story of Core Sound in a way that no picture or recreated exhibit can relay.

“These homes, camps and community buildings are the primary reminders of this proud way of life and the rich history that played out along these shores, and we welcome the opportunity to work with the NPS and the local communities for the resources needed to ensure their resilience in the future.

“Our sincere hope is that the National Park Service will commit the time and resources needed to keep these structures in place with repairs and restoration for their preservation during future storms. History tells how much these structures have already withstood, and with careful planning and preparation they will continue to be the important historic markers they have always been.”

Mike Gauthier, acting superintendent at Cape Lookout, did not respond to requests for comments.

The U.S. Geological Survey (U.S. Department of the Interior) and Southeast Climate Science Center funded this study. An overview of Seekamp’s research is part of a National Park Service report titled Cultural Resources Climate Change Strategy.

Learn More

• Protecting Cultural Resources in the Face of Climate Change
• Cultural Resources Climate Change Strategy

From a Tideland News report:

EMERALD ISLE – Town officials here have applied for a state grant to purchase a nearly 30-acre tract behind the old town hall and recreation center for a mix of preservation and recreational use.

Town Manager Frank Rush has applied for a $545,000 grant from the state Clean Water Management Trust Fund, He’s also working with the military, because the property is in the flight path for Bogue Field – an auxiliary landing field for the Cherry Point Marine Corps Air Station – and the Marine Corps is trying to discourage development, especially high-density development, in flight paths.

The tract, which has frontage on Archer’s Creek, is zoned for multi-family development, and is large enough for as many as 237 condominiums, Rush said.

The property is owned by Surfside Realty Co. Inc. of Emerald Isle, and the registered agent is Georgia Ricks. It has been appraised at $3 million.

Rush said that despite common belief, the property is very usable, with 26-27 acres of high land, much of it covered with maritime forest.

The town, he said, would almost surely preserve two-thirds of it in its natural state, and would, at some point, most likely use the remaining third for fields for sports like soccer and baseball. That could be a few years, maybe more, down the road after acquisition. Rush said the two-thirds that would be left natural are ideal for hiking trails.

“It’s really beautiful property, with a lot of great trees,” Rush said, and people would love it for nature walks and other passive recreational activities, such as bird watching.

All of this fits well with the mission of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund, which receives money in budget allocations from the state General Assembly.

The agency’s main purpose is to help local governments protect water quality, but Rush said it also has a stated goal to help provide buffers for military facilities.

At least part of Archer’s Creek, which borders the property, is classified by the state as Outstanding Resource Waters, the state’s highest classification. And the creek is a tributary of Bogue Sound, which also is classified ORW.

Grant awards are expected to be announced in September.

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

This story has been corrected from its original form, which incorrectly attributed the National Science Foundation’s seismic testing to the U.S. Geological Survey.

MOREHEAD CITY — Almost anyone who’s thrown a hook in the water to catch a fish in a quiet atmosphere probably knows intuitively that loud noises spook them: you don’t scream at fish to bite, after all, you wait patiently.

But intuition isn’t science, and seismic airguns don’t make just any loud noise, so when University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences doctoral student Avery Paxton and some colleagues got the opportunity to do some real science on an issue that’s germane to the hot topic of oil and gas exploration by seismic surveys, they jumped at the chance.

What they found, back in September 2014 when they did a study during a National Science Foundation seismic mapping effort in the Atlantic Ocean off Beaufort Inlet, not only confirmed intuition, but surprised them in its degree: 78 percent of the fish on a reef near the seismic survey “went missing,” compared to counts at the same time the three previous days during the evening hours, the peak time for fish, such as snapper, grouper and angelfish, to gather there.

“There had been hundreds of fish in the evenings before the survey took place,” Paxton said. “The numbers had been low to moderate in the morning and afternoon, but what we found was that after the survey, it (fish numbers) did not peak like it usually does in the evening.”

They got the numbers by painstakingly counting the fish on the videos, even by species. They had collected 10-second-long videos every 20 minutes for three days, before and through the day when the seismic surveying occurred.

“Noises from seismic surveying were audible as discrete airgun shots in video recordings, allowing us to associate any observed behavioral responses with timing of individual shots. To prevent observer bias, fish were first counted with video sound turned off; then sound was turned back on to detect whether shots were present,” the paper states.

It was, Paxton said, as if only one of five members of a human family came home in the evening after school and work. You’re not sure where they went, or how long they stayed away from the house, but they sure weren’t where they usually were.

The peer-reviewed study was recently published online in “Marine Policy,” a science journal that focuses on ocean policy studies, and is due to be published in the paper version of the journal in April.

While researchers have long known much about the effects of seismic activity on whales and dolphins and other marine mammals, this was, according to Paxton, a student in Pete Peterson’s lab at UNC-IMS, the first study to document how multiple species of fish respond to seismic surveys in their natural environment.

Paxton noted that more research is needed before conclusions should be drawn about how long the fish stayed away, or where they went. The researchers surmise they went to a nearby, quieter reef, but the study shows that, “we need to consider fish when we think about seismic surveys. We can’t ignore it.”

The research was funded by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the federal agency that permits seismic surveys for oil and gas deposits, as well as drilling. Colleagues involved in the project included Peterson of UNC-IMS, Chris Taylor of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Ocean Service, Julian Dale of the Duke University Marine Laboratory, Elijah Cole of the Duke University Pratt School of Engineering, Christine Voss of UNC-IMS and Doug Nowacek of the Duke lab. Nowacek is one world’s leading experts on marine mammals, and has been outspoken in expressing concern about the potential effects of seismic surveys on the feeding, mating and migration of whales, including the endangered right whale.

Paxton and the others conducted their study at a natural rock reef and popular fishing spot – the “210 rock” – about 30 miles offshore from Beaufort Inlet, at a depth of 100 feet.

They had learned, shortly beforehand, that the National Science Foundation’s mapping effort was going to be in the area, and managed to get microphones and video cameras posted to monitor the reef and the fish populations. The academic objective of the seismic survey was to study the formation and evolution of the Eastern North American Margin, and involved use of an airgun array of similar volume to those used during oil and gas exploration. Most of the survey occurred in deep waters off the continental shelf, although it continued across the continental shelf and into shallow shelf waters of northeastern Onslow Bay. The area, according to the paper, supports hard-bottom reefs that sustain an abundance of fish, including tropical, subtropical, and warm-temperate species.

“It was a rare opportunity, and we’re grateful to get the opportunity and grateful that BOEM provided funds,” Paxton said. During the whole marine mammal-driven seismic survey debate – President Obama finally banned it off the Atlantic Coast right before he left office in mid-January – “I had wondered what was happening to the fish,” she added.

It’s a particularly important question at reefs, because they are crucial to some species of fish, many of which are valuable to commercial and recreational fisheries. The fish eat there, reproduce there and seek shelter from potential predators

A one-time event like the mapping survey likely just moved the fish away temporarily, Paxton noted, but she wonders for how long, and she, like other marine scientists, such as Nowacek, is concerned about the cumulative effects on things that live in the water when oil and gas surveys take place for days, almost continuously, sometimes by multiple vessels.

At one point, eight seismic survey firms had applied for permits to search for oil and gas off North Carolina. They fire their multiple airguns as often as every 10 to 12 seconds, sometimes more than 7,000 blasts in 24 hours. Experts say the sounds can carry for hundreds or thousands of miles.

Research shows that the blasts’ intensity exceeded 170 decibels, so loud it overloaded the microphones.

Often seismic sound levels are compared to jet engine noise, but Paxton said the comparison isn’t fair, because sound is different in water than in air. She said an exploding grenade may be a more accurate comparison. A jet engine at 75-80 feet away can be about 140 decibels. Sounds louder than 85 decibels can cause permeant hearing loss in humans. The Natural Resources Defense Council says, “a substantial and growing body of research now indicates that ocean noise pollution negatively affects at least 55 marine species, including several endangered species of whales and 20 commercially valuable species of fish.”

Reefs are normally quiet, with just the sounds of shrimp “crackling” and other marine species eating.

Seismic Industry Disputes Study

Gail Adams-Jackson, vice president for communications for the International Association of Geophysical Contractors, called the study incomplete and limited, noting it was one day at one site.

“Second, the effect is no different from what has been reported elsewhere where fisheries and seismic have coexisted for decades: the Gulf of Mexico, the North Sea, West Africa and throughout the world,” she said. “Marine seismic surveys have been conducted since the 1950s and experience shows that fisheries and seismic activities can and do coexist. There has been no observation of direct physical injury or death to free-ranging fish caused by seismic survey activity, and there is no conclusive evidence showing long-term or permanent displacement of fish.”

Further, she said, the seismic industry works with local fishing organizations to coordinate activities.

Still, Adams-Jackson said, the seismic industry “takes these concerns seriously, even if the substance behind them is of variable quality. While no harmful effects on ecosystems or fisheries have been found from seismic surveys, we continue to encourage and support additional study and monitoring.”

The seismic industry, along with oil and gas companies, are supporting more than $1 million worth of research on the topic.

Regulators Support Research

Connie Gillette, a spokesperson for BOEM, said the agency funded the study because “BOEM is very interested in research on sound as it relates to fish and marine mammals. Since 1998, BOEM has invested more than $50 million on protected species and sound-related research, including fish and marine mammals,” she added.

BOEM is a leading contributor to the growing body of scientific knowledge about the nation’s marine and coastal environment. The bureau regularly relies on the expertise of universities and other science organizations.

“This study is a snapshot in time but didn’t follow up on what was happening on the reef after the surveys were taken. We’re funding an additional study with NOAA to learn more about​ ​the effects of sound on fish and fish populations.”

Gillette said there had been few studies conducted in the open ocean focused on how fish respond to human-produced sound.

“BOEM has funded laboratory-based experiments to address the consequences of sound exposure to fish, but these experiments have limitations as to how they represent what happens in the real world,” Gillette said. “As with any scientific investigation, these field-based observations add to our understanding of how fish may respond to sound, but like many scientific efforts, more questions are often raised than answered. We’re funding an additional study with NOAA to learn more about the effects of sound on fish and fish populations.”

That study is looking closely at black sea bass, which according to BOEM, “show affinity” for certain habitats within oil- and gas-lease areas. In addition, black sea bass produce sounds, such as grunts and thumps, which have been associated with feeding and escape.

“Commercial and recreational fishermen have expressed concern that noise produced during sub-bottom surveys, pile-driving, and operation of renewable energy facilities may have a negative effect on the behavior of black sea bass ranging from catchability to long-term sub-lethal behavioral impacts. This species is known to utilize mid-frequency acoustics to communicate during spawning and feeding but their sensitivities to anthropogenic sounds, and their behavioral responses to them is not understood.”

The study summary also notes that black sea bass could be vulnerable to sounds generated by offshore wind development, because the fish are known to use acoustic communication and because their habitats overlap within renewable energy lease areas.

Expectations Validated

Paxton acknowledged the validity of some of the criticism, and she expected it. She and her colleagues would love to participate in follow-up studies, but Paxton stands by the conclusion that the results generated by their work show in clear terms that concerns about effects of seismic surveys on fish are warranted.

“Although working with limited data, this study provides evidence that during exposure to seismic noise, the prevailing pattern of heavy fish use of reefs during the evening was suppressed,” according to the report. The finding is notable because it goes well beyond detection of a startle response from individual fish, instead suggesting a multi-species response to airgun noise.

The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 2007, the nation’s main fisheries-protection law, “mandates protection of reefs, including those studied here, as Essential Fish Habitat,” the paper adds. “Reducing opportunities for fish to aggregate causes concern as this could reduce options for foraging, mating, or other important life history functions. Though there are no observations to indicate the duration of the observed effect, these research results augment and confirm issues raised by marine mammal experts and suggest that concerns associated with marine seismic surveys appear to be realistic and well-founded.”

Reef before seismic surveying

Reef during seismic surveying

Learn More

• Read the study
• Visit Avery Paxton’s website
• Research by the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers

MOREHEAD CITY — When John Fussell was a young boy growing up here in the 1950s, his father taught him how to pish. Not fish. That’s not unusual on the coast. Pish. Not a typo.

Don’t hold it against him; it served him well.

Pishing, you see, is a sound technique birders use to draw birds closer so they can see them. Fussell, now 67, says his dad did it by sort of “kissing” the back of his hand, but some just use their mouth alone to make the “pish” sound. Either way, if you do it right, birds, especially small ones, take it as a sign of danger, and move toward it too see what it is, and often to try to drive it away, in sort of a group rush. You don’t want to do it too much, ’cause you don’t want to perpetually scare birds, but it works, Fussell says, and not just on birds. Once he learned to bring birds in to see them up close, he was hooked.

And thus began a lifelong quest and eventually a plethora of birding-related jobs, including working as a consultant for various agencies, and writing and publishing, in 1994, a book, “A Birder’s Guide to Coastal Carolina,” which, despite the passage of more than two decades, remains the bible of birders in these parts.

It was the first guide to the prime bird-watching spots of the Tar Heel coast, and it still gets read. Written for casual and serious birders, it’s held up well. There are new roads, of course, and less habitat, and maybe fewer places to go, but the birds haven’t changed that much. Fussell is proud of it, and says he doesn’t have plans to do an update. He’s plenty busy, thank you, doing what he loves.

He was hooked early on our “fine feathered friends.”

In the third grade, he says, “the kids in the class had to pick a project – birds butterflies or rocks or something – and I picked birds.”

Then, in the fourth grade, he got a pair of pretty high-powered binoculars, and his fascination grew. In the seventh grade, he got to go on a birding expedition to Ocracoke through a contact his mother, a teacher, had in the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission. It was probably the turning point; a birder was born, for sure.

In those days, the insecticide DDT had decimated the pelican population, and Ocracoke Inlet was one of the only places in the state you could see them. It rained for three days, and the “party” was pretty much holed up inside.

“But it was still great,” Fussell recalls. “I got to hang around with birders.”

One man on the trip was Harry Davis, director, at the time, of the North Carolina Museum of Natural History. Davis was born in Buxton on the Outer Banks, but moved with his family to the mainland and graduated from Beaufort High School before going to UNC-Chapel Hill. Davis, Fussell recalls, “gave me a year’s subscription to the Carolina Bird Club magazine.”

The first issue contained an article on the annual Christmas Bird Count. Fussell, inspired, started a Carteret County Christmas Bird Count that year.

“I think there had been one before, maybe 1959, but I guess the one we (he and a couple of others) started that year was the beginning of the ‘modern’ count in the county,” Fussell says. “We’ve only missed a couple of years, because of weather, since then.”

Fussell’s birding zeal tapered off a bit in high school in Morehead City; it was a victim of competition for his time. He was a bit of a runner and an avid surfer. Good surfing time was also good birding time.  He still indulged his interest some, though, and when he went off to college at North Carolina State University, he majored in zoology. There were, of course, avid birders in that department, competitive ones who kept life lists of the birds they’d seen. Inevitably, Fussell’s bird bug came back with a vengeance, and it’s never been cured. He’s now seen 435 species in North Carolina; as of 2011, 473 species were believed to regularly appear in the state.

Professional Birder

Almost every day, Fussell’s out in the woods or fields or along the shore, looking or listening for birds, either for work or for pleasure. He’s worked as a consultant for many federal and state agencies and some private firms, and for the military, principally in the wilds of the sprawling Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base in Onslow County. Yes, there are lots of “wilds” within the boundaries of the base, and yes, the Marine Corps does care about them, and the creatures in them. They don’t want to blow them up, especially if they’re federally protected, like the red-cockaded woodpecker.

He’s also worked at Bogue Field, near Cape Carteret, in the town of Bogue. It’s an auxiliary landing strip for the nearby Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point. And he’s been a consultant for the North Carolina Sierra Club during recent planning for the Havelock bypass of U.S. 70, the main road from Raleigh, through eastern North Carolina, to the coast at Morehead City. There’s lots of forest and bird habitat there.

He spends a lot of time in the Croatan National Forest, which he loves and knows like relatively few others do.

“I’ve been very fortunate,” Fussell says. “I’ve really only worked one job with ‘regular’ hours, and that was for a short time, 1976-78, when I was a historian/naturalist at Fort Macon State Park” in Atlantic Beach, right across Bogue Sound from his home on the fringe of the “Promise Land,” a neighborhood along and near the Morehead City waterfront.

He’s seen some amazing, rare things, even spotted some things few if any have seen in the area or state before.

For example, he spotted a black-backed wagtail at the Cedar Island Ferry Terminal on May 15, 1982.

“It breeds in Siberia and Alaska and winters in Vietnam,” he said. “It wasn’t supposed to be here.” Apparently, the bird messed up on its migration pattern.

He and others also saw a kind of swift, much bigger than a common chimney swift – which was supposed to be on the West Coast – at the Outer Banks. Alas, swifts are among the fastest of birds. “That might top the wagtail,” Fussell says. “It might be the most unusual (bird) I’ve seen in North Carolina, and as it went by, I remember thinking ‘Damn it,’ because I didn’t get a photo, so we’ll never know for sure what it was.”

Over the years, he’s seen great changes in the bird habitat in Carteret and the surrounding area; when he was a boy, Fussell recalls, there was almost nothing but maritime forest west of Atlantic Beach on 26-mile-long Bogue Banks, the barrier island that was then connected to the mainland only by a drawbridge from Atlantic Beach to Morehead City, which was much, much smaller than it is now. There were long stretches of undeveloped land between Morehead City and Newport to the west; there’s much less now.

Those maritime forests on Bogue Banks have been lost to development almost everywhere, with the best remaining stands in Pine Knoll Shores, particularly around the North Carolina Aquarium, and in a few spots, such as Emerald Isle Woods Park, in Emerald Isle.

The Croatan, which was established in 1936 and covers the covers 159,885 acres bordered on three sides by the Neuse River, Bogue Sound and the White Oak River, has become increasingly fragmented by roads and altered ecologically by increased developed on its fringes.

Fussell sees the birds and plants – he’s also a botanist – in the forests and fields and on the beaches as indicators of general ecological health, and of the changing climate and man’s continued march into wild places. For example, when Fussell was young, it was rare to see a white ibis on the North Carolina; it was mainly seen far to the south, along the Gulf Coast and in Florida. Now, “its common all year long on the central and southern coast of North Carolina.

By contrast, black rails were once very numerous in Carteret, particularly in the Down East area northeast of Beaufort, but Fussell says their numbers have dropped dramatically in the past 10 years.

Rails nest on the ground in high, dry areas of marshes; as sea level has risen, many believe, there are fewer and fewer of those high, dry places, thus fewer rails.

The same is true of the endangered piping plover.

“There was a very high number of plovers back in the ’70s and ’80s near Beaufort Inlet, comparable to the numbers you saw farther south,” Fussell says. “I’d say it’s down from 100 or so (nesting pairs) to six, maybe as many as nine.”

The piping plover breeds on coastal beaches, and high tides, on top of water levels that have risen in many areas, can inundate nests. But the plovers’ numbers also are harmed simply by man’s continued spread into once-wild and largely uninhabited areas. Human disturbance curtails breeding success, and foot and car traffic crushes the nests and the young. Dogs – brought by humans – are predators – as are foxes and raccoons, which are drawn by the food humans throw away. Feral cats, which many humans feed, are also a big problem.

All this troubles Fussell.

“The more diversity you have – birds and plants – the more stable the environment is, the better for mankind, too,” he says. “If things are out of kilter, if this diversity is gone, are we really ourselves anymore? But we like what we like, and we protect what we like. Some people like horses, or feral cats, so that’s what they want to protect.”

Birders like birds, so they want to protect birds and habitat. Others, however, often don’t care as much about birds and habitat as they do about the things that threaten them and displace them: stores and houses and roads, to name a few.

“That’s what it boils down to,” Fussell said. In other words, it’s all about choices.

Still, Fussell says he isn’t totally pessimistic about birds or natural habitat, particularly in the area where he lives.

“There’s a fair amount of public, protected land,” he says, including the Croatan, Cape Lookout National Seashore,the Rachel Carson Estuarine Reserve and the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s North River Wetlands Preserve. The federation, through grants, has transformed the former North River Farms farmland back to its natural state, primarily to enhance and protect water quality, and Fussell often takes tours there to see the flora and fauna.

Of those, he’s probably most worried about the Croatan, which he says has been “nickled-and-dimed” in recent years. Even development near the forest, not in it, causes problems.

“When you get homes and businesses near the edge of the forest, it makes it harder to do (controlled) burns, which are crucial for the forest’s health and for habitat,” Fussell says. “The eastern segment of the Croatan is already pretty fragmented.”

Fussell believes it’s very important for nonprofits, such as the federation and the North Carolina Coastal Land Trust – both of which he praised – to continue to take advantage, when possible, of any opportunity to obtain and protect significant valuable habitat, to preserve water quality and wildlife, including birds. He’s on the board of director of the land trust.

The future, Fussell says, depends in part upon the level of our desire to protect diversity in the environment. He does his part, encouraging conservation and counting birds and trying to create awareness of problems. He spends a lot of time watching, and listening, out in nature.

There are some birds, he says, that you almost never see, but you know they are there because you hear their distinctive calls. If you’re around birds enough, you can do that. In well over half a century of birding, you can be assured Fussell knows what he hears, likes it, and will do what he can to help preserve it.

Learn More

• Carolina Bird Club

Wanted: $150,000 to $175,000 to help fund continued monitoring of water quality and to promote effective analysis and dissemination of data from Pamlico Sound, the nation’s second largest estuarine system and the largest in the Southeast. Program is FerryMon, a state ferry-based data-gathering system that helps to ensure the health of one of the country’s most valuable commercial and recreational ecosystems. Contact Hans Paerl, UNC Institute of Marine Sciences, Morehead City, N.C. Special attention: North Carolina General Assembly, North Carolina state agencies, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

MOREHEAD CITY —  Hans Paerl didn’t really place a classified ad, but he let it be known, by emails earlier this month, that FerryMon, which he and Joe Ramus of the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort started back in 2000, will be kaput if someone doesn’t come up with some cash. And if that happens, the state and nation will lose a unique, cost-effective water quality monitoring system, one that has been a model for similar efforts in Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New York, California’s San Francisco Bay and Washington’s Puget Sound, as well as European countries.

It was, back in the late 1990s when Paerl and Ramus hatched the simple concept. Several North Carolina-owned-and-operated passenger ferries crossed the state’s vast and crucial “inland sea” several times a day, every day, every year. Why not outfit those vessels with equipment to collect information on water temperature, pH, salinity and algae content? Little was known then about such things in Pamlico. It happened, thanks, in part, to money from the state legislature, which was rightfully concerned about the effects on water quality after Hurricane Floyd sent untold and unmeasurable levels of stormwater runoff and pollutants rushing down rivers to the coast in the fall of 1999.

Since then, FerryMon has survived, albeit on a shoestring budget much of the time, with the ferries crisscrossing the sound and silently sending data back to the lab, where it’s been dutifully logged, analyzed and disseminated to fisheries and water quality managers, who use it daily, as do science classrooms in some of the state’s public schools.

That stopped at the end of 2016, when a two-year, $143,000 grant from the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries expired. That grant came from a program that awards money from the sale recreational fishing licenses, but it can’t be renewed. So, Paerl said recently, the bottom line is, “We need money to cover operational costs. The instruments will still take the measurements, but we can’t pay the people to log that data, to analyze it, to get it out to the people who use it.”

And numbers without users are just, well, numbers.

“What we’d love to see is state support,” Paerl said of the $150,000 or so needed. “But we’d also like to see the state ‘go to bat’ for us in trying to get support from the Environmental Protection Agency.” EPA, after all, is responsible for the health of the nation’s estuaries, and spends a lot of money, Paerl said, on water quality monitoring and improvement in the Chesapeake Bay, not that far to the north of the Albemarle-Pamlico system. He doesn’t understand why the Chesapeake has gotten so much more federal attention. Maybe it’s because Virginia and Maryland deem it more important?

“We’ve been fortunate over the years to get some state support, including the N.C. Department of Natural Resources (DENR, now the Department of Environmental Quality or DEQ) and from North Carolina Sea Grant,” Paerl said. “We’ve also been fortunate to get funds for specific things from the National Science Foundation.”

But the foundation generally funds only specific research, not the basic measurements that FerryMon provides. And state support – at least from the legislature – dried up years ago. FerryMon, in fact, started with support from Sea Grant and the state Hurricane Floyd Relief Fund to document the effects of the hurricane’s floodwaters on the Pamlico Sound. At one point, most of the $300,000 per year was coming from the General Assembly’s annual budget appropriations.

When that stopped, the fisheries division grant, eventually, filled the gap, temporarily. But Paerl said the Pamlico system is too valuable – worth $4 billion in fisheries and recreational economic benefits – to let monitoring of its crucial parameters to fall by the wayside.

“It just makes too much sense – it’s so economical from a cost-benefit standpoint – for someone, the state, the EPA, a partnership of the two, not to pick this up and ensure that it continues,” he said. “The operational costs are very reasonable for the data that the program yields.”

The way FerryMon works is simple:  Water taken in by the ferries to cool their air conditioning systems is diverted through a black box below deck. A set of sensors constantly monitor water temperature, acidity, salinity and algae content. The data are sent to the lab over the Internet. The data are charted so officials with the state agencies, including but not limited to the Division of Marine Fisheries, can monitor it and react and know what to expect and tell the public.

FerryMon can, for example, provide information to let the fisheries division know where fish kills are likely to occur because of low salinity levels or low dissolved oxygen levels. And the information on nutrient levels – phosphate and nitrogen, which in sufficient levels lead to algae blooms and other water quality problems – help the state agencies monitor the total maximum daily load, or TMDL, which has been set for the nutrient-sensitive Neuse River, which feeds into the Pamlico system. A spike in nutrient levels noted by a ferry, for example, can clearly signal that something’s badly awry in the Neuse.

As recently as 2016, after Hurricane Matthew swept through the area, FerryMon provided important data about the water flowing toward the coast from torrential inshore rains. Although major problems didn’t occur, the data generated from the ferry’s monitors could explain that. In addition, Paerl said, the instruments collected water quality data for all but 36 hours during the passage of Hurricane Isabel in 2003. When compared to Hurricane Floyd, the program increased basic knowledge of how different storms have different effects. FerryMon, Paerl said at the time in an article in “Coastwatch,” a North Carolina Sea Grant publication, “showed us that windy but low-rainfall hurricanes like Isabel exerted much less severe and shorter duration of negative impacts on water than high-rainfall hurricanes like Floyd. During Floyd, floodwaters caused multiple algal blooms and led to stressful conditions for fish and low oxygen conditions throughout the sound system for more than a year.”

That same Coastwatch article, Paerl pointed out, detailed how measurements from FerryMon after Tropical Storm Ernesto in 2006 showed that high amounts of chlorophyll in the Neuse River, resulting from increased nutrients flowing down the river in the storm’s rainwater runoff, led to a mid-estuary bloom of the toxic dinoflagellate that was closely linked to fish kills reported after the storm.

It might be hard, Paerl said, for some to understand the importance of the basic, baseline knowledge that FerryMon and programs like it provide. But knowledge inevitably informs policy, and policies in large part determine the water quality that will affect the quality of life of future generations in and around the Pamlico Sound region. In general, Paerl said, the more information we know about a gigantic estuary that is critical to the state’s fisheries and its economy, the better decisions we can make.

He remains optimistic that somehow, some way, he’ll find funds to keep FerryMon operational. He calls it a “suspension,” not a “termination” of the program.

Paerl said he’s contacted the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership and is trying to work with state legislators as well as Gov. Roy Cooper’s administration.

Cooper is widely seen by environmentalists as more friendly to environmental initiatives and funding of programs, and Paerl agrees, but said FerryMon has had bipartisan support in the past, especially from coastal legislators who have understood its value.

“This shouldn’t be political,” he said of the program and its generation of basic knowledge about one of the state’s most crucial environmental/economic resources. “It’s cost-effective, it’s been a model for many others, and it works. The concept has caught on. We’ve been pioneers: First in Flight, first in FerryMon?”

In the meantime, the Paerl Lab at UNC-IMS continues to use other grants funds, from Duke Energy Foundation, to keep FerryMon up-to-date in hopeful anticipation of its continuation.

The foundation last year provided $95,000 to UNC-IMS to construct two portable, ferry-based water quality monitoring systems for ongoing assessments of water quality along the Neuse River and Pamlico Sound ferry routes.

The idea is that the equipment will be transferrable in the event ferries are disabled or must be replaced.

“I have to be optimistic,” Paerl said. “It’s a good program, and an important one.”

It’s particularly important in light of growing threats to marine ecosystems as the world’s climate grows warmer and more unstable.

For example, the EPA recently proposed standards for cyanobacteria, which can, in sufficient quantity and under the right conditions, produce liver toxins called microcystins and cylindrospermopsin, which is toxic to the kidneys.

Paerl is an expert in the field, and recently said both toxins are increasingly common worldwide, including in North Carolina, and threaten not only recreational waters, but also water supplies.

Problems like than one put more of an impetus on water quality monitoring: Cyanotoxins found in August 2014 in a water-treatment plant in Toledo, Ohio, forced the governor to declare a state of emergency and issue a boil-water advisory that lasted for several days. That water came from Lake Erie.

“Water quality monitoring is crucial,” Paerl said. “I’m not going to be around forever, and I’d like to leave it (FerryMon) in good shape for the future.”

Learn More

• FerryMon
• UNC-IMS Paerl Lab

MOREHEAD CITY — The Environmental Protection Agency is developing standards to protect swimmers and other recreational users of the nation’s waterways from toxins produced by what are believed to be among the oldest microorganisms on the planet.

Hans Paerl thinks that’s a good thing.

Paerl, the Kenan Professor of Marine and Environmental Sciences at the University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City, is one of the world’s leading experts on cyanobacteria. Sometimes misleadingly called blue-green algae, cyanobacteria can, in sufficient quantity and under the right conditions, produce liver toxins called microcystins and cylindrospermopsin, which is toxic to the kidneys.

Unfortunately, as Paerl said recently, both toxins are increasingly common worldwide, including in North Carolina, and threaten not only recreational waters, but also water supplies. Paerl has been studying the problem for years in China, where Lake Taihu, the drinking water supply for millions of people, has been threatened by microcystin.

It’s the same toxin that in August 2014 was found in a water treatment plant in Toledo, Ohio, forcing the governor to declare a state of emergency and issue a “boil water” advisory that lasted for several days That water came from Lake Erie.

“Cyanobacteria are basically the cockroaches of the aquatic world,” Dr. Timothy Otten, a postdoctoral scholar in the Ohio State University College of Science and College of Agricultural Sciences, said after the incident in Toledo. Paerl put it this way: “They are the true ‘cell from hell’” under the right conditions.

It’s a classic case of “too much of a good thing,” Paerl added, because cyanobacteria are believed to be the first organisms to produce oxygen on earth, some four billion years ago.

“They figured out how to split water and, through photosynthesis, produce oxygen,” Paerl said. “We have them to thank for that, because unless something else had figured that out, we wouldn’t have oxygen.” In other words, we wouldn’t have “we.”

The problem, he said, is that other substances – mostly phosphorous and, especially, at least in recent years, nitrogen – dramatically stimulate the growth of cyanobacteria. And the increased use of nitrogen-based fertilizers to grow crops has helped to rapidly proliferate cyanobacteria almost everywhere.

Since the organisms are bacteria, they also thrive on heat. And Paerl said, no matter what “climate-change deniers” say, temperatures almost everywhere in the world are setting new records. The bacteria also are tolerant of salt, so some can thrive in saltwater as well as freshwater.

“Climate change provides an additional catalyst for their expansion,” Paerl wrote in a recent paper on the subject. “Rising global temperatures and changing precipitation patterns both stimulate (cyanobacteria and their toxins) … and their maximal growth rates occur at relatively high temperatures, often in excess of 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit). At these elevated temperatures, cyanobacteria routinely out-compete (algae and other organisms in the water).”

In addition, the cyanobacteria, which thrive in calm waters, shade organisms below them, such as phytoplankton and aquatic vegetation, from the sun. And as higher temperatures last longer during the average year, blooms are likely to start earlier in spring and last longer into fall. Even without toxin production, they can be harmful, reducing oxygen levels in waters as they age and die.

Cyanobacterial surface blooms can locally increase surface water temperatures, because of light energy absorption, according to the paper written by Paerl and Otten. And since climate change is increasing the frequency of extreme rainfall events, “This will lead to larger surface and groundwater nutrient dis-charge events into water bodies.”

When there’s excessive freshwater discharge, blooms may be prevented by flushing, at least in the short term. However, when the water stays put longer, the nutrient load from rainfall can then be sequestered.

So, according to the paper, conditions most likely to result in excess cyanobacteria can be expected to begin with elevated winter-spring rainfall and runoff, followed by protracted periods of summer drought. Examples can be seen in the Neuse River and its estuary, the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay.

The EPA’s proposed standard for microcystins, the more ubiquitous of the two toxins, is 4 micrograms per liter, which Paerl called reasonable. The toxin can cause problems not only for humans, but also for pets and fish. For cylindrospermopsin, the proposed standard is 8 micrograms per liter.

The World Health Organization sets the standard for microcystins in drinking water at 1 microgram per liter, Paerl said, so it’s clear that the toxin is a serious threat.

The EPA’s recent announcement states that if the proposed standards are approved after the 60-day comment period ends on Feb. 17, they could be used by states in water quality standards, and as the basis for swimming advisories at beaches.

According to the EPA’s notice in December, “Certain environmental conditions, such as elevated levels of nutrients, warmer temperatures, still water, and plentiful sunlight can promote the growth of cyanobacteria to higher densities, forming what are called harmful algal blooms (HABs). Elevated cyanotoxin concentrations in surface waters can persist after the bloom fades, so human exposures can occur even after the visible signs of a bloom are gone or have moved downstream.”

Cyanotoxins, according to the EPA, “are released into the water as cyanobacteria grow and die. You can be exposed to elevated levels of cyanotoxins if you swim, play in, or recreate on or in a water body where cyanobacteria may reproduce rapidly. Toxins can be ingested, inhaled or absorbed through the skin. The toxins’ persistence in the environment can potentially affect downstream users, such as drinking water utilities and swimmers and boaters, where the bloom may not be directly observed.”

Health effects from cyanotoxin exposure in pets can include vomiting, diarrhea, seizures and skin rashes. Pets may be exposed to cyanotoxins if they drink water contaminated by cyanobacteria, lick their fur after swimming in contaminated water or ingest toxin-containing algal scum or mats. Pets can also be exposed if they drink tap water contaminated with cyanotoxins.

Because children spend more time in the water than adults and often swallow more water per body weight while swimming, EPA derived the recommended criteria based on children’s recreational exposures.

Paerl said that once the EPA approves standards, he hopes North Carolina will follow suit.

“It is a real problem here, and it’s growing,” he said. “In fact, when I arrived here back in the late ’70s, the first project I took on was a massive (outbreak of cyanobacteria) in the Chowan River.” That one was traced back to phosphate and nitrogen from fertilizer and ineffective treatment at a wastewater-treatment plant. Eventually, the phosphate discharge was greatly reduced, and it helped alleviate the problem.

Back then, Paerl said, no one was paying much attention to the toxins from cyanobacteria, so not much if anything is known about microcystins from that event. But he has no doubt there were toxins present.

There have also been cyanobacteria problems in Jordan Lake, the water source and an important recreation site for many in the Raleigh area, and in the Cape Fear River.

There’s also little doubt that those toxins are dangerous. The sites of the worst cyanotoxin/microycystin problems in China are known also to be areas with high incidences of liver disease, including liver cancers.

“In fact,” Paerl said, “China is one of the best places in the world to study the issue,” because, while liver tumors can take decades to show up, people in those areas of China tend to stay there their entire lives, drinking from and recreating in the same waters for decades.

North Carolina, Paerl said, has done a good job limiting phosphorous, and has done a particularly good job in the Neuse River Basin, which was declared “nutrient sensitive” years ago. But the state has not done nearly so good a job on nitrogen, which is increasingly the main factor in production of cyanobacteria and their associated toxins.

While some farmers still use too much nitrogen-based fertilizer too close to the water, that problem has been ameliorated significantly by public education. And, Paerl said, farmers and individual property owners who use fertilizers have been receptive to that education.

But, he said, waste-treatment plants can, and should, do a better job of reducing nitrogen discharge, though it’s expensive.

“They (treatment plants) are really the low-hanging fruit,” he said. “Sure, it would be expensive. But I’d argue that it’s well worth the expense. We’re talking about our water supply.”

In addition, he said, urban development has become a proportionally larger part of the problem. Too many want to develop lawns and golf courses, for example, right down to the water.

Paerl said developers in places like Raleigh and Charlotte are likely the largest pressure point in recent legislative discussions about reducing or eliminating vegetative buffers along streams. Vegetative buffers are the best “low-tech” method to keep nitrogen from flowing into streams via stormwater runoff.

Whether a state legislature averse to environmental regulation would buy into efforts to further address the nitrogen problem is “anyone’s guess,” Paerl said. But he said the public already understands the need to protect not just coastal waters, but also drinking water supplies and recreational waters.

North Carolina, he added, is not alone in the need to do more.

“When I went to Ohio after the Toledo event, I headed up a mitigation discussion, and I was surprised to find out how little buffering there is around agriculture there and in the Midwest. North Carolina is at least ahead in that respect.”

Paerl would like to see more urban developers and planners make use of constructed wetlands, like the recently converted ponds off N.C. 24 in Cape Carteret, because wetlands plants are very efficient at taking up nitrogen. He credited the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which took on the Cape Carteret project to improve water quality in nearby Bogue Sound, for effectively promoting and helping to create buffers and constructed wetlands.

The whole cyanobacteria/toxin problem, Paerl reiterated, is likely to be exacerbated by climate change. He’s especially worried about increasingly hot areas of the United States, such as Florida and Southern California. Blooms have already plagued Lake Okeechobee in Florida and Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana, and there are big concerns regarding lakes used for recreation and water supply in Oklahoma and Texas.

But Paerl and others are also worried about cooler regions; San Francisco Bay, for example, has suffered from microcystins. High levels of the toxin were detected in mussels in the bay in October, and low levels have been found in oysters. Back in 2010, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife reported that sea otters had died of microcystin poisoning – otters eat shellfish. The bay is fed by numerous rivers that roll through agricultural lands and industrial areas.

There’s also a need, Paerl said, for better monitoring of the problem. For example, FerryMon, a project Paerl and colleagues set up in 2000 to monitor water quality in North Carolina’s Pamlico Sound, the nation’s second-largest estuary, has run out money from one of one of its major sources of funds, a grant from the Division of Marine Fisheries (See related story).

The program, which Paerl said Tuesday can no longer operate because of the lack of funding, has used specially equipped Department of Transportation ferries that cross the Neuse River, Pamlico River and Pamlico Sound to determine water quality effects of storms, hurricanes and nutrient and pollution discharge, and to establish a database which can monitor water quality status and trends.

The end of the project could make the data less available to managers. Paerl said it’s an inopportune time for that to happen. The state needs to do a better job of obtaining federal funds for water quality monitoring, as officials in Virginia and Maryland do for programs in Chesapeake Bay, he said.

“This (cyanotoxins) is a real thing, not a figment of anyone’s or any agency’s imagination,” Paerl said. “European countries have been involved for some time. It’s something we all need to address, and protecting our water supply and the health of humans who enjoy using the water for recreational purposes is something EPA is supposed to do.”

Comments to the EPA are due by Feb. 17.

Learn More

• EPA notice and information on submitting comments
• EPA fact sheet on proposed criteria for water quality and swimming advisories

Reprinted from the Tideland News. 

SWANSBORO — After more than nine years of legal maneuvers and negotiations, the state of North Carolina finally owns all the 290 acres of mainland property it has long sought to add to Hammocks Beach State Park just outside of town.

Bill Holman, North Carolina director of The Conservation Fund, an organization based in Arlington, Virginia, said on Dec. 29 that the group had just before Christmas sold the state for $1.3 million the last 45.36 acres of Hammocks Beach property formerly owned by John Hurst and Harriet Hurst Turner. The appraised value was about $1.59 million, so Holman called it a good deal for the state.

“We’re delighted that state parks completed acquisition of the last 45-acre tract in the centennial year of the State Park system, and we all look forward to more public access and more public use of Hammocks Beach State Park,” Holman said.

Likewise, Charlie Peek, spokesman for the state parks department, said officials there were grateful.

“Once again, The Conservation Fund has proven to be an invaluable partner of North Carolina State Parks with its assistance in adding this property to Hammocks Beach State Park,” he said. “We look forward in 2017 to completing a master plan for all the additional mainland property that will properly balance protection of its rich natural resources with its recreation potential.”

David Pearson, president of the Friends of the Hammocks and Bear Island, the park’s volunteer support group, said he, too, was glad the sale was complete.

Pearson, who was instrumental in the long negotiations and the final settlement of the court case over the property, added that he hopes the public will soon be allowed to make use of the land. The state, The Conservation Fund and Hurst and Turner, heirs to a piece of waterfront property once used as a retreat for black teachers and their families, had closed on the deal in April.

The sale required two transactions. In one, the state paid Turner and Hurst $6.9 million for 200 acres of the tract, using a combination of funds from the state’s Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, money appropriated by the legislature, and from the sale of bonds designated for the purpose.

In a second sale, The Conservation Fund paid $3.1 million for the remaining 90 acres, which it immediately leased back to the state. The original terms called for a payback period of no more than three years. The money for this final purchase came from the Parks and Recreation Trust Fund.

The state is in the process of deciding how to use the property. It hired SageDesign, a Wilmington firm, to develop the master plan, which is expected to be complete by this spring.

It remains unclear whether a proposed boat launch will be built on the new property.

The controversial boat ramp proposal, which Pearson said had been around in one form or another for years, came fully to the attention of area residents around the time that voters approved a $2 billion state bond referendum in March. The bond included $75 million for state parks, of which $1.125 million went to Hammocks Beach.

Proponents said the ramp is much needed in the area and would fit well in the park, which now has four islands, including Bear Island, site of the popular and recreational ocean beach that is accessible only by state ferries and private boats.

But many in the area didn’t know that money was earmarked for a boat ramp, which wasn’t listed in the legislation that authorized the referendum. Those opposed to the idea said the ramp would ruin the tranquility of the park, increase traffic on Hammocks Beach Road and, if built on the 290 acres the park acquired on Queens Creek, damage the fragile ecology of the stream.

Members of the park’s volunteer, nonprofit Friends group, met on Oct. 27 and voted 23-7 to oppose construction of a boat launch in Hammocks Beach State Park.

SageDesign had already held a public meeting to get input on the plan, on Sept. 29. Attendees indicated their preferences for potential uses they’d like to see on the land, ranging from hiking and biking trails to educational facilities, from volleyball and bocce courts to boat ramps.

Hiking and biking trails were the choice of the most people that night, along with fishing. The boat ramp had its fans, too, but not in such great numbers.

Sara Burroughs of Sage Design said in December that the plan-development process was on schedule to be complete by spring.

“We’ve received a lot of input, and we’re putting that into charts so we can see those commonalities and differences,” Burroughs said.

Some of that input came from the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which in November sent Sage Design a letter in which executive director Todd Miller and Sam Bland, a former superintendent of the park and now a coastal specialist for the federation, urged that great care be taken not to change the natural state of the land. The area includes important forest habitat for plants and wildlife and functions as an important watershed for the area, according to the letter.

State officials have said the fate of the boat ramp idea hangs on public input, and Sage plans another public meeting in February.

Terms of the land sale, which took place in April 2015, included a provision that Harriet Turner be allowed to develop a camp on the site for underprivileged children. Pearson said he hopes that still happens, as it has long been the desire of the Hurst heirs, but there has been no movement on that front.

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

Learn More

• Hammocks Beach State Park

Some local governments in North Carolina and elsewhere are struggling with the increased costs of recycling as prices for the materials have dropped in the past couple of years, but the head of the state’s recycling program says the industry will soon stabilize.

Scott Mouw, chief of the recycling section of the state Department of Environmental Quality, said prices industries pay for recycled glass, aluminum, paper and other products have been in a “trough,” and recycling companies have been forced to renegotiate some contracts. But he added that the fee increases are normal and necessary in a worldwide economy in which commodity prices fluctuate.

“We’re coming out of that trough,” Mouw said recently. “I know we’re seeing some price issues and some adjustments between companies and local governments, but I don’t think these (prices companies charge local governments) are going to continue to go up, year after year. I think that once the companies make these adjustments and ensure that they are able to stay in business, things will stabilize.”

Swansboro, a growing town of about 3,500 people in Onslow County, has a fairly robust recycling program with weekly, curbside pickup of large roll-out containers. But falling commodities prices recently prompted about a 10 percent increase in the town’s recycling contract with Sonoco, a publicly traded firm that’s a major player in the industry.

The new deal, signed in November, will cost the town about $5,000 extra this fiscal year. That might not sound like a lot, but in a town with a total general fund budget of just over $4 million, a relatively high property tax rate of 35 cents per $100 of assessed value and a solid waste fund of $278,000, it’s a significant hit.

Swansboro signed a five-year contract with Sonoco of Jacksonville in 2011, but agreed to a $30-per-ton surcharge on recycling items in the renewal of the contract in November, said Scott Chase, town manager. The town had budgeted about $48,000 for recycling for fiscal year 2016-17, which began in July and ends in June. Town officials are considering eliminating glass from the list of materials accepted for recycling, since that’s one of the major problems in the commodities market.

Other towns are considering smaller recycling containers. This comes as many, including Swansboro and Morehead City, have moved in recent years from small bins to the roll-out containers – but Mouw doesn’t think either reaction is a good one.

“Glass is very heavy,” he said. “If a household recycles 600 pounds of materials in a year, probably a fourth of that is glass. That’s 150 pounds.”

That, he said, adds up over time. And that weight, no matter how insignificant it might seem, is far costlier for a town to dispose of in a landfill, where tipping fees apply, than it is through increased recycling service fees.

All of this, Mouw said, is incredibly complicated, affected not just by the needs of municipalities and counties and the companies that do the recycling, but also by worldwide commodity prices and the economies of countries like China, which is a major buyer of recycled materials for use in its industries.

When China’s economy slowed recently, demand for recycled products decreased. And when oil prices dropped worldwide, that also hurt demand for recycled materials, especially those made in part from oil. Plastic, for example, is derived from oil, so recycled plastic becomes less attractive when oil prices are low.

Part of the problem, Mouw said, is that when many local governments signed contracts with recycling and waste firms, the world was a different place. When oil prices were much higher, it made recycled materials much more attractive.

Recycling took off in the 2000s, especially after about 2011, but demand for the products has since declined. It has been, Mouw said, “a perfect storm” that has demanded a bit of a “reset.” But it’s nothing to be alarmed about; there’s no real “crisis” in recycling, he said, just a maturing of what is still a very young industry.

It’s also important to remember, Mouw added, that recycling is not just a green “service” provided by local governments. It’s now an important part of the world economy, with thousands of jobs dependent upon it, especially since the development of material-recovery facilities like Sonoco. The rise of these facilities about five years ago has made recycling a big and successful business, Mouw said.

In the past, consumers did the work, separating the recyclable materials – paper, glass, aluminum – themselves. When recovery facilities arose, then folks could just throw all those materials into one big container and let the companies do the sorting. It became easy, almost like tossing stuff in the garbage can, and the number of materials accepted increased. That’s when recycling really took off. It’s also when jobs in the industry multiplied, Mouw said.

States and local governments, concerned about the increased cost of feeding ever-growing landfills, also recognized the value of recycling. State laws were passed to require recycling of certain items.

North Carolina passed laws to prohibit disposal of aluminum cans, as well as many plastic and glass containers.

If you can’t throw these items away, but the demand for them is low, a glut arises and the prices paid for the material go lower.

Mouw said he doesn’t think any state laws need to change to address the current situation. There’s no need to panic, he said; recycling isn’t going away.

Indeed, according to statistics from the Environmental Protection Agency, more than 34 percent of American’s garbage is now recycled, a gain of more than 400 percent since 1960. 

Not Just Glass and Plastic

And it’s not just the prices of glass and plastic that have fallen. Recently, bales of aluminum cans that not so long ago were selling for $2,000 per ton were selling for only $1,100 per ton, according to industry figures. Demand was down. There have been gluts – oversupply – in paper, as well.

Again, though, Mouw thinks things are rebounding. While drivers might not like higher oil prices and higher gas prices at the pump, the higher oil prices make recycled commodities more appealing.

It’s crucial to remember, Mouw said, that for local governments, recycling service, like other town services, isn’t supposed to be a money-maker.

Lisa Rider, assistant solid waste director for Onslow County, said the county, which has a recycling program that includes 10 free drop-off sites, isn’t planning any changes in its program. While it’s not supposed to be a big money-loser, she said, nor is it supposed to be profitable.

“There’s no way that recycling costs will exceed the cost of the landfill costs,” she said.

Rider, who is an ardent environmentalist deeply involved in not just recycling, but also in the worldwide effort to remove trash from oceans, believes, like Mouw, that despite adjustments in costs to local government, recycling as a service – and a benefit to the environment – is here to stay and will continue to grow. Where would all that stuff go, she said, if it were not recycled? Also, many people are enthusiastic about recycling, and it’s a routine part of their lives.

“We are all struggling a bit with the market at the moment,” Rider said, but Onslow isn’t looking at any changes in its service. 

Economic Importance

Sonoco and many smaller companies play important economic roles.

“Everybody thinks it (recycling) is just about being ‘green,’” she said, “but it’s really just as much about the economy now. Yes, it’s a good thing for citizens and local governments to do, but it’s also about jobs and the impact on the overall economy.”

Recycling can significantly reduce household waste disposal costs. Onslow County’s solid waste disposal convenience sites charge $1.50 for a bag of garbage. Rider recycles so thoroughly that she generates only one bag of garbage per month, and she and her husband don’t need curbside garbage pickups. This amounts to $15 to $20 a month in savings, which especially helps those with low or fixed incomes.

Consumers, Mouw and Rider said, can help keep costs low by paying attention to what they put in recycling bins and roll-out containers. Things that don’t belong – plastic bags, for example – stop sorting machines from working, which increases costs. It’s also best, they said, if consumers make at least some effort to ensure that the things they recycle are relatively clean.

Mouw also said the company he works for, and other recycling firms, are very sensitive to the effects price increases have on the local governments, and work hard to limit those effects.

For example, the new contract with Swansboro covers only one year, and the surcharge could change over the course of the contract. If commodity prices go up, the surcharge could be reduced.

During a November board of commissioners meeting, Chase, the town manager, said that after discussions with Sonoco, he came away thinking “the trend is favorable.”

He noted that the town’s garbage and recycling costs are paid out of an enterprise fund, akin to collecting a fee from residents that accurately reflects the cost of the service.

“This is always going to be a moving target,” he said of the town’s trash and recycling expense. “But we have to cover the costs.”

Not Everyone is Affected

Some local governments have yet to see any problems. Emerald Isle, a summer resort town on Bogue Banks in Carteret County, isn’t looking at any changes, in large part because of a very favorable contractual arrangement.

Town manager Frank Rush said Emerald Isle’s residential solid waste service is contracted to Simmons and Simmons, based in Swansboro, but another firm, Waste Industries, takes – at no cost to the town – all of the recycled materials collected by Simmons and Simmons. That could eventually change when the contract runs out, but for now it’s a win-win for the town and its residents and thousands upon thousands of summer visitors.

Similarly, Morehead City Manager David Whitlow said his town was not experiencing any problems.

Morehead City recently went to the roll-out containers, which hold about four times as much as the old bins, and expanded the products residents can toss in. At the same time, the town went from weekly service to every other week. That, and the elimination of the need for workers to pick up the bins – it’s mechanized now with the big carts – kept the city’s contract with Waste Industries relatively stable. And, Whitlow said, if the market is having any effect, Waste Industries hasn’t reflected that in talks with the city.

All in all, Mouw said, he’s confident in the health of recycling programs.

Recycling facilities need local governments, Mouw said.

“They need to be connected to local governments. What we’re seeing right now is an effort to hit the mark that allows them to stay in business” without overcharging local governments. “I think they will hit that mark.”

Learn More

• North Carolina’s landfill bans

CAPE CARTERET — By all accounts, the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s years-in-the-making project to transform two ponds here into a tidal wetlands stormwater-management system this past summer was a big success.

Of the 18,000 or so wetland plants placed by hand in the basins of the former ponds this past spring, Lexia Weaver, the federation scientist who managed the project, estimates only 5 percent were lost, and the rest have met or even exceeded growth expectations.

Better still, the constructed wetlands have adequately handled the runoff from several significant rainstorms this fall, including the deluge of several inches over a 48-hour period when Hurricane Matthew moved through the area in October.

“Everything has worked as planned,” Weaver said recently. “We couldn’t be happier.”

In addition, there are already plenty of small baitfish in the system, which is just off N.C. 24 in front of Cape Carteret Baptist Church and Cape Carteret Presbyterian Church. And since the fish are in there, so are birds, including pelicans and egrets.

It’s been a long time coming. Longstanding problems with the ponds were exacerbated in November 2012 when a water control structure failed and the water drained into Deer Creek, which is a tributary of Bogue Sound. Cape Carteret officials contacted the federation to see what could be done, and the organization suggested that the ponds, which were choked by non-native water hyacinths, be turned into wetlands.

The state Division of Water Quality had surveyed the larger pond but said it would not take responsibility to help restore it. The state Department of Transportation also declined to help, despite having four pipes that bring water into the pond from N.C. 24. The Army Corps of Engineers said that the pond pre-dated its permitting process, but if the Corps became involved in fixing the pond, a permit would be needed before any work is done.

Then the federation closed on the sale of an easement at its massive North River Farms wetlands project east of Beaufort, and collected $3 million. Because the farm project was funded with a state Clean Water Management Trust Fund grant, the proceeds from the sale must be used for similar restoration projects. Federation executive director Todd Miller thought cleaning up the ponds would be a neighborly – and environmentally significant – thing to do with a portion of proceeds.

Eventually, the federation started working in earnest with the town and with the churches, and agreements were reached and all the necessary state and federal permits were obtained. The town’s planning board and board of commissioners signed off on the project early this year, and work to drain the ponds began last winter. Once that was done, Andy and Carson Wood of Habitat Environmental Services of Hampstead, hired by federation, came in and set traps and removed countless fish and many turtles and frogs that had called the ponds home, relocating them to nearby suitable habitat.

That’s when the real work began; with the ponds drained, workers using heavy equipment began “mucking” out the basins, removing mud, vegetation and debris in preparation for planting, operating under a plan designed by Kris Bass of Kris Bass Engineering of Raleigh.

When the mucking was complete, workers began putting in the plants during the last full week of May. The organization worked with an expert, Wes Newell of Backwater and Lumber River Nursery Plants, who has also worked with the federation on the North River Farms property.

Finally, workers removed a filter that had been keeping silt from the project from flowing into Deer Creek and countless fish swam into the newly created wetlands, as did crabs.

Since then, the system has been the beneficiary of daily tidal flows from the creek, and the carefully selected plants have thrived.

Bass, who planned and executed the federation’s 6,000-acre farm-to-wetlands conversion at North River Farms, has called the project “unique” for the state.

The stormwater enters the smaller, upper (farthest from Deer Creek) of the two basins, on the Baptist property, which was rebuilt to have sand and rock layers below the planted vegetation and serves as a bio-retention area, filtering as much of the pollutants as possible from the collected stormwater. The water that remains flows, as a creek, to the larger basin on the Presbyterian property. And the real innovation is that this part of the system is a tidal salt marsh, flooded regularly by water from the creek, which connects to Bogue Sound. The goal, eventually, is to improve the water quality in Deer Creek and to preserve the nearly pristine quality of that section of Bogue Sound.

Weaver said the state Shellfish Sanitation office, which is responsible for monitoring pollution and open and closing shellfish harvest waters, has already been taking samples of the water coming into and leaving the system. Although the data is not yet available, she’s confident the results will show improving water quality.

“Already,” she said, it’s obvious that the “water (in the system) is not coming out as fast as it did,” which means pollutants have more time to settle out and are taken up by the wetlands vegetation.

The next step, Weaver said, will come next year, when the federation and its cadre of volunteers plant oyster shells in the system, in the hope that oyster larvae will attach and grow. Oysters would further clean the water, as they are filter feeders and remove pollutants as they eat.

Bass said he has visited the site in recent weeks and is more than pleased with the results after the first growing season.

“What we are seeing is typical of estuarine creeks, but the growth of the vegetation has actually exceeded our expectations,” he said. “It’s done very well, and we’re looking forward to it (the vegetation) filling in more over the next year or two.”

Bass said the project benefited from a summer and fall growing season that was long, but not overwhelmingly hot for long periods of time, or terribly dry or wet. The tidal flow has been strong, bringing in the saltwater and nutrients that plants need to grow.

Like Weaver, Bass said he’s been pleased by the ability of the system to handle the tremendous amount of stormwater runoff from N.C. 24 and the big commercial parking lots on both sides of the road. But he and Weaver also noted that there have been a couple of erosion problems, one at each basin. Work to fix them has started, as more dirt and rocks are being added to stabilize the banks.

“With a project of this size – it was a pretty major reconstruction – it’s not at all unusual to have a few issues of this type,” Bass said. “The key thing is to watch for them and take care of them before they cause real problems, and that’s what we’re doing.”

The Rev. Ben Burroughs, pastor of the Presbyterian church, said he, too, is pleased, and added that the response from his congregation has been overwhelmingly positive.

“It looks great and of course it seems to be doing what it was supposed to do, which his give us cleaner waters,” he said. “That was what we were primarily after. And we’re looking forward to seeing the vegetation fill in even more over the next year or two.”

Members of the church community, Burroughs said, enjoy the herons and egrets and other wildlife that visit the wetlands, and like seeing the little “winding creek” that runs through the system.

“The federation has been a great partner, and we’re thrilled with the results,” he said. “I’m also pleased that they are paying attention to the little erosion problem and are taking care of it.”

Cape Carteret Mayor Dave Fowler said it was fun to watch the project take shape, and added that he’s heard positive comments from the town’s residents and the board of commissioners.

“I’d say it’s been very successful,” he said. “It looks nice and it will eventually look even better. And most importantly, it’s working the way it was supposed to work.”

The town, he said, is very concerned about water quality, as well as drainage, and officials and residents are very grateful to the federation for taking on a project that didn’t cost taxpayers or the churches any money. He also thinks the project can serve to educate people about ecosystems, another benefit.

“It took a while, but there were a lot of details involved, but it was much more important to get it right than it was to get it done fast,” Fowler said. “We all really appreciate what the federation did.”

When the project was conceived, the cost estimate was around $200,000, but it ended up approaching $500,000.

Learn More

• Work begins on stormwater ponds
• Pond project progresses
• From eyesore to functioning wetlands

Despite what some experts view as significant problems in some coastal areas, the program director of the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping office believes the proposed new flood insurance rate maps are good, but will get better before final adoption next year.

John Dorman said he knows of the issues raised in recent weeks by coastal engineer Spencer Rogers, co-vice chair of the state Coastal Resources Advisory Council, and Rudi Rudolph, advisory council chairman and Carteret County shore protection office manager. Dorman appreciates them pointing out areas that in recent storms have flooded far worse than the maps appear to indicate they should.

“We have talked to Spencer and Rudi … but we feel like the maps are generally very accurate,” Dorman said. “We did about three years of studies on storm surge … and we’ve checked and re-checked and re-checked our models.

“We know there are some areas that flooded along the coast (in Hurricane Matthew in early October) more than the maps might indicate. But again, generally, we think the maps are good. And we are talking to and listening to those who raise these issues.”

Rogers and Rudolph spoke during Carteret County Beach Commission’s meeting last month, and have recommended that the state put together an ad hoc group to review and try to solve what they view as potential conflicts between state rules and the most recent flood maps, which were produced by the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. They pitched the idea earlier this fall to the council, which advises the state Coastal Resources Commission, and will pitch it again to the full commission during its meeting Nov. 30-Dec. 2 at the Hilton Doubletree in Atlantic Beach.

Their PowerPoint presentation shows clear contrasts between where some flood elevations would be set in the new maps, and where some flood levels have been in storms in recent years. Specifically, it shows numerous instances in which buildings that have flooded in recent storms – some severely damaged or destroyed – have been rezoned in the proposed new maps from the highest hazard areas, along the oceanfront or soundfront, to a non-flood zone, or at least into lower-risk zones. In other instances, Rogers told the beach commission, flood risks appear to have been overstated.

That, he said, sets up some potential conflicts with setback requirements under the state’s Coastal Area Management Act, and possibly some conflicts with state building codes, which govern what kinds of things can be built in flood zones and whether buildings must be elevated or not in those locations. For example, some properties that would be moved from the VE (wave zone) could, under the new zone they are in, be allowed to have buildings that are not elevated, or could have basements.

But the state has to use the maps once they’re adopted, and the local communities and insurance providers do, too.

To examine those kinds of issues, Rudolph and Rogers would like to see the state get members of the commission and its advisory council, the state Building Code Council and representatives of the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program, together to talk.

The rate maps show the flood risks in various areas of communities in the United States and designate high-risk areas (areas with a 1 percent or higher annual risk of a flood, known as a 100-year flood) and moderate to low-risk areas (areas with a less-than 1 percent annual risk of a flood).

On rate maps, areas of moderate to low risk are zoned B, C or X. Higher-risk areas are in zones that begin with either the letter A or V. Areas of undetermined risk are zoned D.

In high-risk areas, flood insurance is mandatory for federally backed loans. In moderate to low-risk areas, flood insurance is recommended, but optional.

Rogers and Rudolph point to structures in locations such as Hatteras and Wrightsville Beach that Rogers said don’t meet the “smell test” for accuracy. They also show examples in Carteret County, including one in Emerald Isle, but said most of the major problems appear to be in Wrightsville Beach and in Hatteras.

In years past, FEMA did all the work on the maps for the state, but that has changed in recent years. After Hurricane Floyd exposed major problems with the maps in 1987, he said, efforts to improve the maps began, but proceeded very slowly, only one county per year.

More than half of the maps at the time were older than 10 years, and three-quarters were at least five years old. But most counties didn’t have the money or staff to do their maps on their own.

Then in 2000, as a result of prodding by then-Gov. Jim Hunt, 22 federal and local community entities joined North Carolina and FEMA in an agreement to work together to update and maintain accurate, up-to-date flood hazard data for the state, and North Carolina created the Flood Plain Mapping Program.

Eventually, the state took over the program lead, with FEMA’s OK, and most feel it’s done a much better job, in part because it depends more on locals who know the areas better, but also because the technology used is much better.

Scientific models created over the past few years, incorporating storm surge and other data from more than 20 named storms since the early 1980, helped hone the maps.

While models are fine, Rogers said, it’s also important that real-world judgment augment those models. “But what we are getting is “modeled maps, for better or worse.”

Dorman, on the other hand, remains confident that the maps his office has and is producing are better than the feds did on their own, but is open to help.

“If anyone has better models or data, we’re certainly interested in seeing it,” he said. “We’re willing to sit down and listen to anyone.”

The state will take comments next year on the draft maps, which, so far, are expected to go into effect sometime in 2018. There is an appeal process, but appeals, if they happen, aren’t likely to come from people who have been moved out of flood zones or moved to lower hazard zones. Rather, they’ll come from areas – often on the sound sides of coastal counties – where the new maps place some homes and businesses in higher-hazard zones.

While no one has formally appealed yet, there have been major concerns expressed by residents and government officials in towns, including Jacksonville and Morehead City.

In Jacksonville, more than 800 additional structures in the downtown region would be placed in various flood zones, and many that were already in flood zones would have be elevated, some as much as 10 feet, largely because of the storm surge modeling.

In Morehead City, nearly 900 buildings would be added to the A zone, while there would be a slight decrease in buildings in the V zone.

In both towns, the changes would affect where new homes and businesses could be built, and how, and some people who had no flood insurance before would face thousands in annual premium costs.

Dorman said his office is making special efforts to meet with officials in such places and try to resolve differences and come up with the best maps possible; they’ve already had meetings to get input from residents and officials.

“Our goal is to use the best data available to produce the best, most accurate models possible,” he said. “If we get better data, we can make adjustments. We want everyone to be as satisfied as possible with the maps that are eventually approved.”

Dorman said he realizes that farther inland, in Kinston and other towns, Matthew caused torrential rains that triggered devastating flooding of areas that the maps indicate shouldn’t flood in 100-year storms.

But, he added, there’s really no way to map for a rainstorm that is generally considered once in a lifetime, if 12 to 18 inches of rain, and in some cases more, fell in less than two days.

“We’re pretty confident in that inland mapping, too,” he said. “We have studied 30,000 stream miles. But there were areas in seven or eight counties that experienced close to a 1,000-year rainfall event over a 24-hour period.” Again, though, he said his office is willing to listen.

But, Dorman said, most folks appear to be relatively happy with the proposed maps. Coastwide, more than 10,000 structures were either moved out of flood zones or placed in zones considered less hazardous, changes that would result in lower insurance premiums. For example, in Emerald Isle, in Carteret County, the number of buildings in the VE zone – the highest danger zone for flooding – will decrease from 1,135 to 441 if the new maps are approved as is. Some were moved out of the flood hazard zones entirely.

In the latter case – buildings moved out of flood zones – Dorman said the state is not saying there is no flood risk at all, and many factors affect where flooding will occur. Strength of a storm comes into play, but so does the storm’s angle of approach and the duration of the event.

“So many structures are still at some risk,” no matter what the maps indicate, Dorman said. “We saw that with Matthew in some cases in some areas. But in those instances, it was greater than a 500-year event (a 500-year storm event occurs, on average, once in 500 years, or has a 0.2 percent probability of occurring or being exceeded in any given year).

Dorman said the office still encourages those who might be near hazardous flood zones to buy insurance, as premiums for them would be much lower than those who are in hazard zones.

Rogers noted that all of those “events” – 100-year storms, 200-year storms, 400-year storms – merely reflect probabilities and averages and can, and do, occur more frequently, particularly if you consider effects in specific local areas.

In addition, he said, the category of a hurricane – 1 is weakest, 5 is strongest – doesn’t always correlate to storm surge. Some weaker storms generate higher surge than stronger storms.

Still, he agreed the state’s mapping efforts are much more accurate than the previous ones undertaken by FEMA, and said he doesn’t expect the ad hoc group conversation he and Rudolph are encouraging to add regulations.

Back in the 1980s, “we made some significant improvements in the building code” as a result of such efforts, he said. If the new maps are not adjusted to take care of the problems he and Rudolph noted, the idea is to find ways to better apply existing regulations to the new maps.

Rudolph said he understands that it would be very difficult for the state to make big changes; the mapmakers would have to run more models with different storms, and it would be very time consuming and expensive, to change the results of years of work. And, like Rogers, he praised the improvements the state has made, compared to the old FEMA maps.

On the other the hand, Rudolph noted that planners in some of the coastal counties, including Dare, have indicated they are concerned about the large number of structures moved out of the hazard zones.

The bottom line, though, Rudolph said, is that he and Rogers hope that with the Coastal Resources Commission’s blessings, talks among the various offices involved can “make the best of the situation.”

Learn More

• North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program

SWANSBORO — April Clark, an entrepreneur and member of the North Carolina Coastal Federation Board of Directors, has mastered the enviable task of working for a living, having fun and doing good things for her community and its environment.

And it all came about, not so much by design, but by, well, if not happenstance, maybe intuition. Or maybe necessity. Or some combination of all that. But it happened.

Clark, who owns and operates Second Wind Yoga and Eco-Tours in Swansboro, was born in West Virginia, but grew up nearby, in Jacksonville. Her father was in the Marine Corps, and she went to Jacksonville High School and graduated in 1980. It was a pretty normal Onslow County life.

But eventually, April’s father got transferred to Guantanamo Bay, in Cuba, and she discovered waters that were, well, nothing like she’d seen back home. It’s not that the waters of Onslow were filthy, it’s just that those Cuban waters, the Caribbean, were so … unspoiled, so clear. You could dive and see all that was around you, April recalls, and it was unforgettable, when she started diving, there and in south Florida. By her early 20s, she was a certified diving instructor, though she never did it for a living. She did, however, use the skill to clean boat hulls. That, she recalls, was hard work. But the job, and diving in general, were eye-openers.

“It was so quiet, and you could see all of the life on such a micro-level,” she said. “It gave you such an appreciation for what was there, for what so many other people don’t get a chance to see. You don’t forget that.” She also visited the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands, which, again, offered unspoiled views of marine life.

Clark eventually returned to North Carolina and earned her college degree from East Carolina through Mount Olive, and got a master’s degree from UNC-Wilmington. Her master’s thesis was on the present and future of a coastal North Carolina town: namely, Swansboro.

Clark concedes she drifted a bit, having fun, living the party life, and eventually found her way into corporate sales, working for 16 years for U.S. Cellular and other tech firms. It was a turning point. The pressure of the corporate life convinced her she needed stress relief, a whole lot of it, and she found in it in yoga. She took to yoga like a fish in water, learned it, mastered it and learned to teach it.

Later, when Clark got laid off from U.S. Cellular, she received a severance package, and she used that money to start Second Wind, with a few kayaks to rent and the idea that kayaking and yoga somehow fit. Second Wind was both literal and figurative.

“It made sense to me,” she says now, looking back. “There was something about being out on the water, floating, sometimes calmly, but getting exercise, and being in the natural environment, and combining that with yoga, that just felt right.”

Slowly but surely, that combo led her into activism. She saw trash in the water during the paddles she led, and started picking it up and encouraging others to do so. It became part and parcel of Second Wind. It fit, especially for someone who’d always prided herself on fitness and a holistic lifestyle. She was also a big believer in collaborative work, which she believed, and still believes, creates synergy; as such, her first partner in her work was the North Carolina Coastal Federation, working on fundraising events. Talk to her long enough and you’ll hear lots of talk about collaboration and synergy.

Clark also credits her work with the Swansboro Rotary Club for her success in both business and activism; Rotary’s motto is “Service above self,” and she believes in that wholeheartedly. Rotary also is great for networking, and while some might think of the organization as conservative and almost totally business oriented, she’s managed to get Rotary clubs in the area involved in cleanups of area waterways, getting members to hit the water in kayaks to pick up trash. It is service, she says, and they get that.

It was, after all, a natural extension of both her personal and business life. Kayakers want clean waterways, and yoga practitioners in general celebrate and honor their surroundings; they want to be a positive part of the web of life.

“I love having the ability to offer something unique to our customers, to let them know that while they are kayaking or canoeing, they can do something good for the community,” she said. “And there’s just something beautiful about being able to do yoga on an island in the middle of a clean waterway. It’s a way to de-stress and do some good at the same time, to leave the area better than you found it. We’ve found that it works well together.”

The whole business has worked out far better than Clark expected, but it’s been and still is a challenge, as for all. Many other kayak tour businesses have opened in the area since she started Second Wind, and she works hard to stay ahead of the curve, expanding into massage and wellness programs, offering Tibetan singing bowl performances and different kinds of yoga – including yoga on stand-up paddleboards – to keep folks coming back to learn and participate in new things, and in environmental efforts.

She’s also expanded her role in the community, joining the board of directors of the White Oak-New Riverkeeper Association, again, primarily in the role of a fundraiser, but also giving advice and helping in other areas, as needed. For the past few years, she’s led a New Year’s Day “polar plunge,” in which folks donate a small fee to kayak from Swansboro out to Pelican Island, maybe do some yoga there, then dive into the cold waters, albeit briefly. And maybe take home some trash. It is fun, but purposeful.

Her fundraising efforts have helped raise awareness of the riverkeeper association, which has been around for about eight years but hit troubled financial times and went for a few years without a waterkeeper until hiring Nicole Triplett in October 2015. The association is still struggling a bit, and Clark wants to help, but she thinks it has a great chance for a solid future, thanks to collaboration and synergy, those two words she likes a lot and values greatly.

The federation and riverkeeper association, she said, are not and should not be, competitors for resources and volunteers, but should and do complement each other. Riverkeeper groups, she said, are historically a bit more outspoken and at least, in public, more aggressive, more willing to use tough words and hard-hitting, confrontational tactics against polluters.

There are essential roles, Clark said, for the behind-the-scenes, often bureaucratic work that groups like the federation do – commenting on projects, lobbying in the legislature and in Congress and obtaining grants for things like natural shorelines and land purchases for conservation – and for the in-the-water, nitty-gritty, sometimes confrontational work that the riverkeepers’ groups do. Sometimes, of course, the roles overlap. And there again is that word she likes: synergy.

Clark thinks the federation and others involved in the environmental efforts along North Carolina’s long and varied coastline have made a huge difference and will continue to so. Sometimes, she said, progress is more measureable by what hasn’t happened – intense development in areas where it’s not appropriate – but there are also hopeful signs of proactive measures, such as increased use of natural living shorelines to protect against erosion instead of bulkheads, which destroy habitat for shellfish and other marine life.

“I feel like we are all, together, making a difference,” she said. “There a lot of people involved who work well together, and I think play an important and effective role in educating the public on what needs to be done and how they can be involved.”

She tries to incorporate those educational efforts into her business, and recalled a recent conversation with a woman – a conservative one might normally not expect to be receptive to environmental messages – while teaching yoga at the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce.

“We were talking about the emphasis Brazil put on climate change during the (opening ceremonies) for the Olympics this year,” she said. “She said she didn’t believe in that. But we talked about the fact that things are changing, species are disappearing, habitat is disappearing. She said she’d look at it again.”

Clark said, that’s how environmental efforts grow, and how they become more effective over time: Getting a person, or a few people, at a time, to look at things from a different perspective.

But as a business owner in a small town, Clark knows there’s a balancing act necessary to foster environmental protection and improvement and economic success – livelihoods – for those who live in the small coastal towns. And she thinks the federation has, and is doing, a great job in fostering that balance, convincing developers, whenever possible, to do things that might cost more in the short term, but might save money and effort in the long term, and in between preserve the environment that draws folks to the coast in the first place.

The success of her business, she said, is proof that there are jobs to be created, money to be made, in enterprises that don’t hurt, and in fact, help, the ecosystems around them. She started in 2010 with about 10 rental kayaks and now has 30, plus 10 stand-up paddleboards. It’s not unusual for almost all of them to be in the water.

She’s also proud that her town, Swansboro, has become more environmentally friendly in recent years, changing its unified development ordinance to more carefully address stormwater management and even implementing a stormwater management fee to help pay for improvements where needed, both for flood control and pollution abatement.

Swansboro, she said, is not unlike many of North Carolina’s coastal towns. Faced with tough economic times, it’s in a bit of a tug-of-war between those who think the environment can be sacrificed, at least somewhat, for jobs, and those who think that protecting and enhancing the environment is the key to maintaining jobs and creating new ones in an area dependent upon those who arrive looking for clean waters on which to fish and play.

“We as a community have to decide what we want to be, like so many others do,” Clark said. “Where is the balance? I’m willing to do my part, to call my town commissioners, to write letters and to use some of the money I earn. It’s very important to me.”

WILMINGTON — The chairman and one co-vice chairman of the 20-member panel that advises the state Coastal Resources Commission has called for creation of an ad-hoc group to review and try to solve what they view as potential conflicts between state rules and the most recent flood insurance rate maps produced by the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Coastal Resources Advisory Council Chairman Rudi Rudolph, head of the Shore Protection Office in Carteret County, and council co-vice chairman Spencer Rogers, a coastal engineer with North Carolina Sea Grant and UNC-Wilmington, pitched the idea during PowerPoint presentations at the council’s most recent meeting in September in Wilmington. They hope to pitch the idea to the Coastal Resources Commission when it meets again, Nov. 30-Dec. 1 at the Hilton Doubletree in Atlantic Beach.

The slideshows show contrasts between where some flood elevations would be set in the new maps, and where some flood levels have actually been in storms of recent years.

Part of the problem, according to Rogers, is with the maps themselves, which are in draft form, but which, based on historical data and incidents, seem to have overstated flooding risks in some areas and understated those risks in others. That, he said, sets up some potential conflicts with setback requirements under the state’s Coastal Area Management Act, and possibly some conflicts with state building codes, which govern what kinds of things can be built in flood zones and whether buildings must be elevated or not in those locations. For example, some properties that would be moved from the VE (wave zone) could, under the new zone they are in, be allowed to have buildings that are not elevated, or could have basements.

“There’s no clear pattern,” Rogers said, and in some cases the decisions seem to defy logic.

But the state has to use the maps once they’re adopted, and the local communities and insurance providers do, too.

“It might be that we need to look at changing some things,” Rudolph said.

To examine those kinds of issues, Rudolph and Rogers would like to see the state get members of the commission and its advisory council, the state Building Code Council and representatives of the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program together to talk.

Rogers said he thinks that if that can happen, most of the issues can be resolved fairly quickly and easily.

The rate maps show the flood risks in various areas of communities in the United States and designate high-risk areas, or areas with a 1 percent or higher annual risk of a flood, known as a 100-year-flood, and moderate- to low-risk areas, or areas with a less-than 1 percent annual risk of a flood.

On rate maps, areas of moderate to low risk are zoned B, C or X. Higher-risk areas are in zones that begin with either the letter A or V. Areas of undetermined risk are zoned D.

In high-risk areas, flood insurance is mandatory, though rating options may be available to create savings. In moderate- to low-risk areas, flood insurance is recommended, but optional.

Back when the maps were first released for review in early summer, officials in several local governments contacted by CRO said they were surprised by some of the areas removed from the highest-hazard flood zones, particularly along the oceanfront, and either placed in lower-hazard zones or not placed in any hazard zone.

“They’re just maps, and people need to realize that lines on paper don’t mean there won’t be floods,” said Donna Creef, director of the planning department in Dare County.

In Dare County, the proposed rate maps would remove thousands of properties from flood zones altogether and move many others to lower-danger zones.

“Mother Nature doesn’t necessarily do what maps and lines say she will do,” Creef said.

In other areas, such as Emerald Isle in Carteret County, the changes might have something to do with beach-nourishment efforts and dune stabilization projects, but also the fact that there simply hadn’t been many hurricanes in recent years.

In Emerald Isle, the number of buildings in the VE zone – the highest danger zone for flooding – will decrease from 1,135 to 441 if the new maps are approved without change. Some were moved out of the flood hazard zones entirely.

In New Hanover County, planning director Ken Vafier did an analysis this past summer and concluded that, “the maps are changing to less restrictive zones on many properties around the county. Of course, this is not the case for every single property.”

Beaufort County doesn’t have an oceanfront, but it does have a long shoreline along what in recent years has come to be called the state’s “inner banks.” Beaufort County planning director Seth Laughlin sounded a lot like Creef.

“What we saw was very much unexpected,” Laughlin said of the new maps.

The unincorporated parts of the county, he said, saw likely improvements in flood insurance rates for 4,000 to 5,000 properties, and relatively few that would see negative changes.

Like Creef, Laughlin said he’s grateful that many property owners will likely see insurance rate cuts and might be able to do different things with their property, but he wonders about the complacency the maps might induce.

In years past, FEMA did all the work on the maps for the state, but that has changed in recent years. After Hurricane Floyd exposed some major problems with the maps in 1987, Rogers said, efforts to improve the maps began, but proceeded very slowly, only one county per year. More than half of the maps at the time were more than 10 years old, and three-quarters were at least five years old. But most counties didn’t have the money or staff to do their maps on their own.

As a result, in 2000, 22 federal and local community entities joined North Carolina and FEMA in an agreement to work together to update and maintain accurate, up-to-date flood hazard data for the state, and North Carolina created the Flood Plain Mapping Program.

Eventually, the state took over the program lead, with FEMA’s OK, and many feel it’s done a much better job, in part because it depends more on local folks who know the areas better, but also because the technology used is much better.

Scientific models created over the past few years, incorporating storm surge and other data from more than 20 named storms since the early 1980s, helped hone the maps.

Rogers said he isn’t contending that the state didn’t do a good job once it took over the lead role; in fact, he said the state improved the process and generally improved the maps. But that doesn’t mean the maps are perfect, or that they mesh perfectly with existing state rules and codes. And consistency is important because the maps are used by local government officials to make decisions on permits.

Rogers said he isn’t too worried about the potential “apathy” or “complacency” mentioned by folks including Creef and Laughlin, especially along the oceanfront areas of barrier islands. Structures there might end up removed from the VE zone under the new maps.  He said most who build there realize that no matter what the maps indicate, there is risk, and it can be quite significant. But, he added, removing inconsistencies among the maps, the state’s building code and CAMA rules is important.

Rudolph said he believes it would be valuable to get people from all of the agencies involved together, and hopes he and Rogers will be on the commission’s agenda in November to make much the same presentation they made to the advisory council.

“I don’t want to say the maps are wrong,” he said. “I think it needs to be a cooperative effort to resolve some of the issues we see in terms of conflicts.”

Rogers said there is a precedent for the type of cooperative discussion he and Rudolph would like to see take place. Back in the 1980s, “we made some significant improvements in the building code” as a result of such efforts, he said.

“I think what Rudi and I are talking about is not something that would create additional regulations,” he said. “What we’re talking about, really, is doing a better job of applying the regulations we have now under the new maps.”

Note: Rudolph said on Monday he and Rogers plan to present the slideshows again during a meeting of the Carteret County Beach Commission at 2 p.m. Oct. 24 at the Pine Knoll Shores town hall. — The Editor.

Learn More

• North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program

From a Tideland News report

SWANSBORO — If the crowd at an “open house” meeting last week on the Hammocks Beach State Park master plan for 290-acres of new property is any indication, folks around here care deeply about what happens to the land along Queens Creek.

Dozens of people – a steady stream from 4 p.m. to after 6 p.m. on Sept. 29 – filed into the park’s visitor center to look at maps of the property, fill out a survey and place dots on photos of potential uses they’d like to see on the land, ranging from hiking and biking trails to educational facilities, from volleyball and bocce courts to boat ramps.

The meeting was organized by Sage Design, the Wilmington company the state hired to create the plan for the property.

Views were mixed on a proposed boat ramp at the park.

One who was for the boat ramp was Swansboro resident John Schmitt. He said what he loves most about the park is that it is quiet, peaceful and secluded, with great fishing and beautiful marshes, but added that the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission ramp at Cedar Point is inadequate and sometimes dangerous, and a boat launch at Hammocks Beach State Park would be a good drawing card for the park.

Schmitt said many people support the ramp.

Marillyn Cullison, also from Swansboro, came to the meeting specifically to voice opposition to the boat ramp concept.

“I adamantly oppose it,” she said, in large part because she believes it would damage the same things Schmitt said he loves about the park. In addition, she just doesn’t think the new property is right for a boat ramp, because it would require extensive dredging to create an adequate channel in an area that is generally accessible only by kayaks and very shallow-draft powerboats.

Annette Corkey of Swansboro said she was concerned about how much space a boat-launching facility might take up; proposals have ranged to as many as five ramps and a parking lot for up to 100 vehicles. But she said she wanted to get more information.

Nicole Triplett, waterkeeper for the White Oak-New Riverkeeper Alliance, said she was at the meeting in part to learn about what kind of environmental studies would be done, and by whom, before any new development would take place on the property. Whatever happens, she said, needs to be well thought out and carefully planned so that the environment in and around the park isn’t damaged.

Another public meeting will be held in January or February, and a third will be in March or April and is intended for the presentation of the final recommendations. State parks and recreation division officials have said the effort is likely to take eight or nine months.

The public has until Oct. 28 to complete the survey. Officials have said no decision has been made on the boat ramp, and public input during the planning process will help guide that decision.

To Learn More

• SageDesign
• Hammocks Beach State Park plan
• Hammocks Beach State Park survey

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

BEAUFORT — A new guide, co-written by a Duke University professor, has been released in an effort to help energy companies and governments reduce the potential harmful effects of underwater seismic surveys on marine life.

Doug Nowacek, a professor at the Duke Marine Lab whose research focuses on the effects of sound on ocean animals, said the guide, published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, is intended as a practical tool for those who use intense impulses of compressed air to search for oil and gas under the sea floor.

“We were trying to be really pragmatic,” said Nowacek, who co-authored the guide with Brandon Southall of Southall Environment Associates Inc. and the University of California at Santa Cruz.

“If you live on the coast of North Carolina, that can be a little hard,” Nowacek said, given current sentiments. “But if it (seismic surveying) is going to happen, our thought was, we should help those who are going to do it do it as responsibly as possible, with the fewest possible impacts.”

In seismic surveys, air guns towed behind ships emit bursts of sound under the water over long periods of time and large distances. Onboard sensors then measure the sounds’ return echoes to reveal details of the sea floor and its underlying geologic structure.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature, founded in 1948 in France and now based in Switzerland, works in nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. It is involved in data gathering and analysis, research, field projects, advocacy, lobbying and education. The union’s mission is to “influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve nature and to ensure that any use of natural resources is equitable and ecologically sustainable,” according to its website.

The guide, “Effective planning strategies for managing environmental risk associated with geophysical and other imaging surveys,” came out in early September. While the Obama Administration this year pulled the Atlantic Ocean out of the 2017-22 offshore oil and drilling plan, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, or BOEM, has not pulled the plug on seismic testing.

The work on the guide grew, in part, from two papers Nowacek previously wrote, one in 2013 and the other two years later. The union, Nowacek said, thought the work was good, but “not very accessible” for individual managers. So the idea behind the new guide, he said, was to create something that could be used by companies preparing to do a seismic survey.

To that end, Nowacek and Southall engaged in a comprehensive review of literature on the subject. “Our guide is based on the best available science and methods,” Nowacek said. “It draws on observations of operations and associated monitoring and mitigation efforts over several decades of geophysical and other industrial surveys.”

Nowacek had the draft of the guide reviewed by anonymous experts, as well as by peers, including representative of non-governmental organizations and industry.

The new guide recommends the assessment of the potential risk of various surveys on marine life and emphasizes that surveys must take into account the specific circumstances related to the site. Key factors for consideration include the life history and population status of local species, environmental features and history and nature of other operations in the area.

Some of the guide’s key recommendations include:

• Having a systematic, risk assessment-based means of conducting effective monitoring and mitigation;
• Reducing the survey area and sound source transmissions to the minimal size necessary;
• Using the smallest source (e.g., smallest number/size of air guns) necessary to accomplish the exploratory goal;
• Avoiding redundant surveys in the same area;
• Pursuing alternative, lower energy sources;
• Ensuring transparency and dialogue with interested stakeholders as well as open access of environmental data in a reasonable time frame.

All of those, Nowacek said, are good precautions for marine mammals, which depend so much on hearing for navigation and for feeding, as well as for pinnipeds, turtles, fish and possibly other marine creatures able to hear the loud sounds produced by seismic surveys.

But the recommendations, he said, could also benefit the companies  doing the surveys by reducing conflicts with environmental and conservation stakeholders. It could save time, and time is important when companies are planning extensive surveys that cost considerable amounts of money.

Nowacek said the guide tries to present this risk-assessment as just another part of responsible planning for a project, not as a sore thumb that sticks out, but as something that managers could, in a sense, “sell” to superiors who make the decisions.

Southall put it this way in a press release: “Undertaking a structured approach for planning and conducting environmentally responsible seismic surveys and other forms of seabed mapping is now more feasible than ever thanks to the lessons learned from previous operations, sustained research, and improvements in technology. This guide will help managers and policymakers navigate this process.”

The guide, Nowacek said, also includes a comprehensive extensive online resources that will continue to be updated.

In the news release, Carl Gustaf Lundin, director of the union’s Global Marine and Polar Programme, praised the guide.  “The noise from seismic surveys can disrupt the essential life functions of marine species, such as breeding, nursing and foraging,” he said. “It is therefore critical to turn down the volume and ensure the surveys are conducted in an environmentally responsible way. The new IUCN guide will help in achieving this.”

Seven companies have pending applications for seismic testing in the Atlantic, according to the BOEM website.

A bill has been introduced in Congress, aimed at protecting the Atlantic from such activities. The Atlantic Seismic Airgun Protection Act is sponsored led by Sens. Cory Booker, D-NJ, and Robert Menendez, D-NJ and by Reps. Don Beyer,D-VA, and Frank LoBiondo , R-NJ in the House.

It would impose a moratorium on geological and geophysical activities related to dangerous oil and gas exploration along the East Coast.

Grassroots efforts against seismic testing have also continued. More than 1,100 elected officials, roughly the same number of businesses and fishing groups have publicly opposed offshore drilling and seismic testing. Many towns in coastal North Carolina have adopted resolutions of opposition.

Nikki Martin, president of the International Association of Geophysical Contractors, wasn’t very impressed with the guide. Her trade group represent companies that acquire or process geophysical data, equipment manufacturers, industry suppliers and consultants.

“The IUCN guidance appears to rely on only one source of management information and fails to consider a breadth of regional and international sources of environmental management information,” including the United Kingdom, NOAA, Brazil, Ireland and New Zealand, she said. “The authors of this particular ‘guidance’ are not sufficiently expert in all necessary subjects needed for a well-informed decision-making and planning document.

Martin said not enough time was provided for comment and experts were not convened to offer technical input” Martin added. “It is especially important to take into account the experience of five decades of seismic exploration in the oil and gas industry and more than a decade of dedicated research into potential effects of seismic surveys on the environment,” she said

Nowacek said he and Southall considered every national and international source of management information. “We recognize that nobody can be an expert in everything, which is why we solicited input from industry, NGO and government folks who represent varying expertise and experience,” he said.

To Learn More

• Read the guide
• International Union for Conservation of Nature
• International Association of Geophysical Contractors

As the U.S. and other countries have ramped up development of bio-energy as an alternative to fossil fuels, demand is rising for trees for wood pellets, or biomass, and agricultural products for liquefied biofuels.

A recent multi-year study by researchers at North Carolina State University and the U.S. Geological Survey, detailed in two papers printed in August in the journal “Global Change Biology Bioenergy,” indicates that the increased demand could come with a cost: a loss of forested land, especially mature pinelands, and because of that, less habitat for wildlife.

Nathan Tarr, one of the researchers and a co-author of one of the papers, “Projected Gains and Losses of Wildlife Habitat From Bioenergy-induced Landscape Change,” said the team didn’t go into the study with a preconceived notion of what they’d find, but like most scientists, they had a suspicion.

“We wanted to better understand the potential impacts of bio-energy demand in North Carolina and the southeastern U.S.,” he said. “It really hadn’t been done before.”

Tarr, who is a research associate in the Biodiversity and Spatial Information Center, North Carolina Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, at NCSU, said that as a scientist, he didn’t want to draw any conclusions about whether the study should have implications on development of biofuel resources in North Carolina; those decisions are for policy-makers and resource managers, he said. But the work by the research team “clearly points out that as demand for the resources increases, there are trade-offs to consider,” he said.

And those trade-offs are important not only for the forests in the state and the region, but also for the economy. Enviva Holdings is building a wood pellet export facility at the Port of Wilmington, which has been estimated by state officials to have a potential for $1.25 million in annual revenue.

When it becomes operational, according to reports, the Wilmington terminal is expected to sustain up to 70 jobs, and to add about $16.9 million annually to the local economy and pay annual state and local taxes of about $425,000.

Enviva is a Maryland-based manufacturer and supplier of wood pellets to buyers in the United Kingdom and the entire European Union. It currently operates two wood pellet mills in North Carolina — one in Ahoskie, and one in Northampton.

And with U.S. production of wood pellets expected to increase from 3 million tons annually a few years ago to more than 10 million annually in the near future, North Carolina’s vast pine forests figure to make it an even bigger player in the industry.

In their study, the researchers, led by Robert Abt of the NCSU Department of Forestry and Natural Resources, simulated landscape changes from 2010 to 2050 under five scenarios of woody biomass production for wood pellets and liquid biofuels in North Carolina.

Scenarios included harvest of natural and planted forests  and planted woody crops grown on marginally productive forestland.

Generally, the work concluded that meeting demand for biomass from conventional forests resulted in more total forestland compared with a baseline, business-as-usual scenario.

“However,” the report writers added, “the remaining forest was composed of more intensively managed forest and less of the bottomland hardwood and longleaf pine habitats that support biodiversity.”

The results show that the regions most likely to be affected by bio-energy production are also critical for biodiversity, a challenge in terms of sustainability.

Tarr said there were four more specific conclusions:

• Species that inhabit newly regenerating forests may benefit from bio-energy demand.
• Species that rely on a single, mature type of habitat – such as bottomland hardwood forests – are at risk if that type of habitat is harvested for bio-energy.
• Bio-energy demand could exacerbate habitat loss for species that are losing habitat to urbanization.
• Species with small ranges deserve special consideration because they can be more sensitive to landscape changes related to bio-energy harvesting.

What it all points out, Tarr said, is that future of bio-energy development and production in the region comes with trade-offs that are often complex.

“None of the biomass sources that we looked at were good or bad for all species, nor was a single mix of biomass sources consistently the best or worst for all species,” Tarr said.

The models showed that increasing the amount of forests harvested in the state resulted in projected losses of habitat for the prothonotary warbler, a tiny bird beloved by birders, but harvesting forests increased habitat for the yellow-breasted chat. The warbler likes mature forests; the chat likes regenerating ones.

According to the researchers, “The area of forest in the region was relatively stable through much of the 20^th century, because the amount of forest converted to urban land uses over time was offset by reforestation of agricultural land. In recent years, the reforestation of agricultural land in the region has lessened, and the net result has been the loss of forestland over time.”

The region was recently designated a global biodiversity hot spot, and according to one of the papers, the use of biomass for energy hinges on its sustainability. Minimizing overall loss of forests and biodiversity and maximizing the area of habitat have been suggested as criteria for sustainable bio-energy production.

“Results from the scenarios we examined suggest that simultaneously achieving the best outcomes for these sustainability criteria under a single biomass production future may not be possible,” according to the report.

However, there may be a middle ground. To avoid the negative effects on critical habitats, restrictions on biomass harvesting in longleaf pine and bottomland hardwoods will be necessary.

Jennifer Costanza is lead author of one of the papers on the work, “Bioenergy Production and Forest Landscape Change in the Southeastern United States.” She stressed the potential the study cites for replacement of natural forests with “managed” ones that don’t provide the same level of habitat for rare species. The endangered red-cockaded woodpecker, for instance, prefers old longleaf pine trees, generally at least 80 to 100 years old, over very open areas maintained by frequent fires.

“What we found is that we need to pay very close attention to the potential for the loss of natural habitat,” Costanza, a research assistant professor of forestry and environmental resources at NCSU, said in an interview. “And the greatest potential for loss is in the area with the greatest biodiversity.” In other words, planting forest to harvest for energy could result it more actual forested land, but less good habitat.

“If there is potential to threaten natural habitat, it should be avoided,” Costanza said, and production of biomass for energy purposes would be best concentrated in places that are already cut.

“This highlights the importance of setting priorities for wildlife conservation,” said Matt Rubino, co-author of “Projected Gains and Losses of Wildlife Habitat From Bioenergy-induced Landscape Change.”

Rubino, a research associate in the North Carolina Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at NCSU, noted in an NCSU News story that, “Because any mix of biomass sources is likely to benefit some species and harm others, it is important to identify which species are priorities for conservation so that policies can be designed to minimize negative impacts on those species.”

Abt said he’s not particularly worried about how the wood pellet industry will affect forests on a regional scale, across the Southeastern U.S., because it’s less than one-tenth of the pulp-paper demand on the same general resource.

But, he added, “everything is local,” and if you live in the northeastern part of North Carolina, you might view the industry as a great thing if you are a forestland owner or if you think of it strictly in terms of job creation, but there’s a concern, on that local scale, about clear-cutting that might occur.”

Kent Jenkins Jr., vice president of communications for Enviva, said the company is committed to conservation and to alternative energy.

“Enviva has invested heavily in North Carolina because of its abundant, healthy and growing forest resources and its strong communities and great workforce,” he said.

Enviva, Jenkins said, is committed to the sustainability and growth of U.S. forests. He said independent scientists and policy-makers have concluded that wood pellet production does not pose a threat to forest health or harm biodiversity.

He noted a recent study by Chris Moorman, coordinator of the Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology and also a forestry professor at NCSU, that found that wood pellet production does not harm biodiversity in Southern pine forests.

Moorman and his students looked at the wood biomass left over from logging operations and used to make wood pellets and found that removing it didn’t affect the populations of small animals, such as mice, toads and birds at clear-cut loblolly plantations.

However, Moorman has previously said clear-cut logging is known to affect biodiversity by displacing forest-dwellers such as deer and nesting birds.

Jenkins said Enviva takes steps to protect the forests and natural habitats where the company works.

“We produce wood pellets using wood that is left over from a traditional saw timber harvest that cannot be used for high-value products such as like furniture and lumber. We meet the standards of major forest sustainability organizations,” Jenkins said.

Enviva also has also developed sustainability initiatives that go beyond what the company is required to do.

The company does not accept wood from four environmentally sensitive forests that were independently identified by a number of academic and conservation organizations. The company has a “track and trace” system that identifies the source of every truckload of wood used.

Also, the Enviva Forest Conservation Fund, a 10-year, $5-million program, was set up to protect bottomland forests in the North Carolina-Virginia coastal plain.

In 2016, the company has awarded a total of $500,000 to four conservation organizations to assist in acquiring sensitive forestland.

Reprinted from the Tideland News

SWANSBORO — SageDesign, the firm chosen by the state to do the master plan for the mainland area of Hammocks Beach State Park, has posted on the park website a survey designed to get opinions about the future of the park.

The Wilmington-based consultants have also set Sept. 29, as the date for the first public meeting to gather additional input and ideas.

The meeting will be from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m. in the park’s visitors’ center, and those interested can drop in at any time. A second public meeting will be in January or February, and a third will be in March or April and is intended for the presentation of the final recommendations.

The survey asks respondents to provide basic information about themselves, including age and race and how many times they have visited the park and why.

But the meat of the survey seeks visitors’ and area residents’ ideas about what they’d like to see on the mainland property, most notably the 290 acres added as the result of a court settlement with the previous owner, the Hurst family.

It asks about such things as hiking trails and bike trails; camping, whether primitive or cabins or trailers and RVs; and lists other possibilities, such as an amphitheater, a rope course, disc golf, leash-free dog area, a playground, event space, sports courts, a swimming area and, the most controversial idea that has surfaced so far, a regional boat launch.

It also asks about “non-motorized” boat rentals, and such things as programs to inform visitors about the history and culture of the park.

David Pearson said he’s glad the process is getting started and that the idea of the boat-launching facility has been around at least since 2009. He is president of the Friends of the Hammocks and Bear Island, the park’s volunteer support group, and also executive director of the statewide Friends of N.C. State Parks group.

“It’s not been a secret,” he said. “It’s been discussed for years, and until recently, hasn’t been controversial.”

However, the idea, which was never a possible feature of any state plan for Hammocks Beach, came to public attention last year during the debate surrounding a $2 billion state bond referendum that passed in March. The sum included $75 million for the state parks, of which $1.125 million went to Hammocks Beach. Neither the bill authorizing the referendum nor the resulting bond earmarks money for the boat ramp.

Opponents of the ramp say it will affect the tranquility of the park, increase traffic on local roads and damage the ecology of Queens Creek, a shallow stream adjoining the park. They’d rather see the money used for trails and maintenance of existing facilities within the park.

Pearson, on the other hand, has countered that a ramp is needed in the area, and that park is a good place for it because almost all of the park is made up of islands accessible only by boat.

All of this has quite a history. The private corporation that owned the 289 acres adjacent to the park’s headquarters on Queen’s Creek, considered a boat launch as far back as 2006, Pearson said. Though the corporation approached Onslow County Parks and Recreation and the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission, the launch was never built. But neither did the idea die, Pearson said.

After a protracted court battle, the state acquired the property from the corporation in legal settlement in 2014.

The addition of the boat ramp is likely to resurface both during the master plan public meetings. State officials continue to say the fate of the boat ramp hangs on public input.

“If the master planning process shows that a boat ramp is not needed or desired or is not feasible on the property, we can request that the bond funding be reallocated to a different project on the new property at Hammocks Beach,” Brian Strong, chief of the planning section for the parks division said recently.  “It’s important for the decision on the boat ramp to be made as part of the overall master planning process. This will ensure that all viewpoints are heard and considered, and it will ensure that all relevant engineering and environmental information is available for the evaluation of feasibility.”

Pearson said the planning process is funded by $125,000 from the state Parks and Recreation Trust Fund.

The Learn More

• SageDesign
• Hammocks Beach State Park plan
• Hammocks Beach State Park survey

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

OCEAN — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has given preliminary approval to a $1.3 million grant to the N.C. Coastal Federation for oyster restoration in Pamlico Sound, boosting the organization’s multi-decade efforts to turn the state into what founder and executive director Todd Miller believes can be “the Napa Valley” of oysters.

The money is part of $9 million for 17 habitat-restoration projects in coastal states. NOAA recommended all of the projects last month. Final approval depends on a legal review and on NOAA’s budget for the new fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. The federation could receive as much as $4.3 million over a three-year period.

Miller said he believes that will happen, because even though federal budget appropriations have been uncertain in recent years, this program has been consistently well-funded. Either way, he said, it’s one of the most significant grants his organization has received, both in amount, but especially in potential effects on the state’s economy and a crucial part of its marine the environment.

In large part, that’s because the money leverages existing state appropriations to increase the acres of reef restored in North Carolina’s sounds. This year the state legislature appropriated $1.3 million for oyster restoration efforts in the state. The federal grant doubles the total funds available for oyster restoration in the next year.

As a result, Miller said, the federation and the state will embark on a joint effort that will be “industrial in scale” and will undoubtedly create jobs, both now, during construction, and in the future, as the oysters attracted to the reefs are harvested and sold.

“It’s truly a win-win-win,” Miller said. “What we’ll be doing is building environmental infrastructure. It’s like building highways and bridges and other infrastructure on land. There will be jobs for people who mine the rocks, for truck drivers, and for those who actually build the reefs. And down the road, there will be economic impacts for commercial fishermen, recreational fishermen and restaurants and other businesses.”

Oyster reefs are designated as essential fish habitat for at least 26 species of crabs, shrimp and fish that are important to North Carolina’s commercial and recreational fishing industries. It is estimated that every acre of reef annually produces $1,600 in commercial landings of finfish and crustaceans.

The federation is working with the state Division of Marine Fisheries to determine exactly where in Pamlico Sound the reefs will be built, Miller explained. They will be in water that’s 12 to 20 feet deep, so as not to pose any threats to navigation. The Army Corps of Engineers will be responsible for permitting.

“I think the most gratifying thing about this grant is that we will be working with the state, effectively doubling the work they can do,” he said. “It’s a great example of a public-private partnership.”

Through the NOAA project, at least 15 acres of oyster reef are to be created each year, with a total of 45 acres by the end of the three-year period. Miller said the state has a plan to create up to 500 acres of oyster reef, and this will significantly bolster the meeting of that total.

“We in North Carolina are in a great position to become the leader in oyster production,” he said. “Our waters have not gotten to the point that they did in the Chesapeake Bay, where they not only had to rebuild reefs, but also seed them. We are fortunate in that, if we build the reefs, the oysters will naturally reproduce.”

Beyond oyster production, of course, oysters have incredible value to the marine environment. An adult oyster can filter up to 1.3 gallons of water an hour as they feed. Scientists estimate that when oysters were at peak population in the Chesapeake, they could filter the volume of the whole bay in less than one week.

And, Miller said, a healthy oyster population is viewed as the proverbial “canary in the coal mine.” If the oyster population is healthy, so, almost surely, is the ecosystem.

Steve Murphey, chief of the Habitat and Enhancement Section for the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries, agreed with Miller’s assessment of the grant, the project and the potential impact.

“We’re excited,” he said. “We did receive a good deal of money from the legislature this year for oyster reef rehabilitation and for sanctuary work, and this will enable us to double what we could have done otherwise. It is a really good example of what a public-private partnership can do to maximize use of funds. A lot of work has gone into this program and into getting the grant, and we are very appreciative.”

The reefs, Murphey said, will be high enough to be above low oxygen-level water, but low enough not to cause problems for boats. And, like Miller said, there’s no doubt that once constructed, the reefs will attract oyster larvae, and will become not only productive harvest areas for oystermen, but also for commercial and recreational fishermen seeking other species.

The NOAA grant is merely the latest step in a long effort by the federation to enhance the state’s oyster population. The organization has planted, with volunteers and staff, countless oyster shells and other materials to attract larvae, many of them in “living shorelines” that limit erosion along public and private land that borders estuaries. It has also held oyster summits that bring experts together to talk and exchange information about the best methods to increase the stock.

The organization also took the lead in developing a five-year plan for oyster stock rehabilitation between 2015 and 2020.

The idea, Miller said, is that through efforts on both fronts, the state should eventually be able to overtake Virginia as the nation’s top producer. “There’s no reason that can’t happen,” he said.

Oyster landings in North Carolina peaked in 1902, at 1.8 million bushels. But by 1994, plagued by development and pollution-laden stormwater runoff, habitat loss and Dermo, a parasitic disease that kills the shellfish before they reach the legal harvest limit, the state’s watermen harvested less than 35,000 bushels, worth a meager $632,000, according to state Division of Marine Fisheries figures. Landings didn’t crack 100,000 bushels again until 2009, and the recent peak was 198,674 bushels in 2010. It’s been uneven since, but consistently above 100,000 bushels; the 2015 total was 119,298 bushels, worth $3.9 million.

Many coastal property owners should save money if newly proposed federal flood insurance maps are adopted, but some officials fear that the maps’ changes might lead to complacency.

“They’re just maps, and people need to realize that lines on paper don’t mean there won’t be floods,” said Donna Creef, director of the planning department in Dare County, where the proposed maps would remove thousands of properties from flood zones altogether and move many others from to lower-danger zones.  “Mother Nature doesn’t necessarily do what maps and lines say she will do.”

Dare has the largest number of rental units and second homes on the ocean and sounds in the state. Changes in the proposed maps, Creef said, would positively affect the insurance rates and or required elevations and flood-proofing of close to 16,000 buildings.

“Obviously, that’s a very good thing for a lot of people, homeowners and business owners,” she said.

The proposed maps move the 100-year flood zone along the oceanfront significantly landward, Creef said. That will result in lower flood-insurance premiums or remove any requirement for that type of protection. “But we are a little concerned that some people who get moved out of a flood zone altogether might think they no longer need flood insurance,” Creef said. “That might be the case, but there’s always a margin for error with maps, and again, storms don’t always do what the maps indicate they will do.”

The proposed maps also lower the base flood elevation, in some areas by almost half. That could allow property owners to enclose and convert to living space areas underneath houses that are on stilts.

The concern, Creef said, is that people might do those kinds of things, or simply not renew flood insurance policies when they expire, then be surprised.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency requires that each state produce the maps about every 10 years. According to Creef and others, one reason for the changes appears to be that the state was more involved in the mapping process this time, and state officials might well have more intimate knowledge of areas that have been flood-prone.

In other areas, such as Emerald Isle in Carteret County, the changes might have something to do with beach nourishment efforts and dune stabilization projects, but also the fact that there simply haven’t been many hurricanes in recent years.

In Emerald Isle, the number of buildings in the VE zone – the highest danger zone for flooding – will decrease from 1,135 to 441 if the new maps are approved as drawn.

“For the vast majority of properties, there would be no change,” town manager Frank Rush said, but in some cases, properties have been completely removed from a VE zone and are no longer in a flood zone, while in other cases the property has been changed from a VE zone to an AE zone, which is generally less restrictive than VE.

An analysis by Josh Edmondson, the town’s planning director, shows that 99 would be added to a flood zone as a result of the new maps. As a result, the town doesn’t plan to appeal, but would help those individual property owners who choose to do so.

In high-risk areas, flood insurance is mandatory, though rating options may be available to create savings. In moderate to low-risk areas, flood insurance is recommended, but optional.

The story is different, however, in scattered pockets in Carteret County, where there are new V zones in the eastern end of the county in Smyrna, Marshallberg, North River and Straits, and more properties in flood zones in parts of Morehead City and Beaufort.

Farther south in the much more urbanized New Hanover County, planning director Ken Vafier did an analysis and concluded that the proposed maps will include more property in less flood-prone zones.

The VE zones along the Intracoastal Waterway are narrower than they are in the current maps, with more las in the less restrictive A zone, Vafier explained. Base flood elevations are also slightly reduced, he said.

“Again, this is a general trend and there are certainly some sites being proposed to change to a more restrictive zone,” Vafier explained. “Whether changes are detrimental or beneficial to a property owner will depend on each specific site, as well as the property owner’s perspective.”

Steve Stone, deputy county manager for Brunswick County, said that in general, the new maps are favorable for those concerned about flood insurance and flood insurance rates. Stone said some property in the county appear to have been removed from flood zones entirely, but the larger shift is from zones that indicate serious risks to those that predict less damage.

There are a few properties, he said, particularly along inland streams, that are placed in higher-level flood zones but “the overall, net result, I’d say, is positive for Brunswick County property owners.”

While some of the municipalities have engaged in some beach nourishment activities since the last maps came out, he doubts that impacted the maps, Most likely, it’s just more accurate mapping.

Up to the north, between roughly midway between Carteret and Dare, Beaufort County doesn’t have an oceanfront, but has a long shoreline along the Pamlico River. County planning director Seth Laughlin sounded a lot like Creef in Dare County.

“What we saw was very much unexpected,” he said of the new maps.

The unincorporated parts of the county, he said, saw improvements for 4,000 to 5,000 properties, and relatively few that would see negative changes.

Like Creef, he said he’s grateful that many property owners will likely see insurance rate cuts and might be able to do different things with their property, but he wonders about the complacency the maps might induce.

People might not renew their flood-insurance policies, he said, and could be surprised when storms don’t conform to the lines drawn on the maps. “We’re happy for people who would benefit, because flood insurance is expensive, and that cost can be a real deterrent to people who want to develop properties than contribute to the tax base, too,” Laughlin said. “But I’d be hesitant to tell people not to buy flood insurance.”

At least one coastal North Carolina county official involved in flooding issues, said some in the field were so surprised they wonder about the motives. “Is it an attempt to get the federal government off the hook for damage?” said the official, who didn’t want to be named. “The thought is, if people don’t have to buy policies, and don’t, then they have damage, the federal program doesn’t have to pay.”

But Rudi Rudolph, who as shore protection manager for Carteret County is responsible for monitoring flood insurance changes, said he believes the changes, particularly along the oceanfront are logical and based on good data, especially because the state got involved and has more and better information about specific areas along North Carolina’s coast.

He said there is some danger, however, because some hurricanes that aren’t expected to be massive 100-year storms when they hit can still surprise people, either because of direction or duration, and cause flooding one might not expect from the maps.

But Rudolph doesn’t expect widespread abandonment of flood insurance policies in areas where the new maps might indicate that possibility. Mortgage companies, he said, are not likely to let too many folks put their loans at risk.

“It’s their money that is at risk, too,” he said. “Even if you’re not in a flood zone according to the map, they can require you to have flood insurance.”

To Learn More

• N.C. Flood Mapping Program
• FEMA flood data for North Carolina
• National Flood Insurance Reform Act of 1994
• Flood insurance basics
• Flood insurance fact for coastal landowners
• Note: For the proposed flood maps check the website of the county you’re interested in.

Update: The nonprofit groups seeking to challenge the permit for Sunset West LLC have been granted a hearing. Learn more.

SUNSET BEACH — With just a few days left before the deadline, the North Carolina Coastal Federation and the Sunset Beach Taxpayers’ Association are still waiting to hear whether they will be allowed a formal appeal of a developer’s Coastal Area Management Act permit for a 21-unit oceanfront residential project in the area of a former inlet in Brunswick County.

N.C. Coastal Resources Commission Chairman Frank Gorham of Wilmington technically has the final say – other than the court system – on whether the appeal of the Sunset Beach West permit issued by the state Division of Coastal Management on June 20 can go forward. The deadline for a decision is a Saturday, but a decision will likely come by Friday. Gorham has delegated the decision to the commission’s vice chairman, Renee Cahoon of Nags Head.

Gorham lives in Wilmington and fills a commission seat representing coastal property owners and land development, while Cahoon’s seat is for representatives of local government; she is a Nags Head town commissioner.

If the appeal does go forward, an administrative law judge will decide whether the division improperly issued the CAMA major development permit for the project, which is proposed by developers Sammy Varnam and Greg Gore on nearly 25 acres of land that stretches between the last developed lots on the west end of Sunset Beach and the Bird Island Reserve.

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Geoff Gisler filed the appeal on behalf of the federation and the taxpayers’ group. Division staff recommended that Gorham not allow the appeal to move on to the administrative judge. Gisler has said the organization will appeal to state Superior Court if Gorham or his designee accepts that recommendation.

Gisler’s appeal of the permit claims that Varnam and Gore’s company, Sunset Beach West LLC, doesn’t own the land and that the town of Sunset Beach does. The appeal also asserts that the permit is in violation of state rules and the town’s land-use plan.

Gisler and the town base the ownership claim on a 1987 deed, and the town is pursuing that claim in court. Both contend that without solid proof of ownership of the land, the CAMA permit application filed by the company and approved by the division on June 20 should not have even been considered.

Division officials have said it’s up to the court system, not the agency, to determine ownership. Gisler says that’s not the case and that the general warranty deed on file with the application fails to meet statutory requirements because it was prepared without an opinion of title.

“Under the rules, they (the developers) have to demonstrate title to the property,” he told CRO last week. “The town has filed suit to assert ownership. The application should never have been allowed to proceed, much less a permit be issued.”

Varnam maintains that his firm does own the property and will defend its rights.

The debate goes back to 1987, when Ed Gore, the original developer of Sunset Beach, deeded a portion of the land to the town on condition the town use it to build a public parking lot within three years. The parking lot was never built. Gore died in 2014.

In 2004, the town council adopted a resolution declaring that a parking lot would be too expensive because the town would have to either buy the last developed, oceanfront lot at the west end of West Main Street or build a bridge to access the land on which a parking lot could be paved. The town board decided then to return the deed, but now says it never did.

Gisler said environmental concerns and land-use issues are just as important as the ownership question.

For example, he said, the town’s land-use plan requires that all structures along Main Street – the road in question – be within 150 feet of the street, and the proposed new homes would violate that rule. In addition, he said, the homes would be built seaward of the oceanfront dunes, which would violate state statutes intended to protect life and property.

It’s particularly hazardous, he said, because even though Mad Inlet isn’t there now, it has opened and close numerous times over centuries. But the land is not in the state’s inlet hazard zone. The commission removed it from that designation based on a determination that the inlet would not likely reopen.

Varnam on Thursday continued to maintain that the appeal is “frivolous.” The groups that oppose the project are “spreading propaganda that we’re going to bulldoze all the dunes,” he said.

“It’s just a scare tactic to sway the public against us to believe the lies,” he added. “It is not our intention to destroy dunes. The people who are spreading these lies should be ashamed of themselves for the misinformation they’re putting out.”

Gisler also cited the development’s proximity to Bird Island, which he called a “beloved” sanctuary enjoyed for its scenic beauty by locals and tourists. Development so close would threaten its value.

Until the early 1990s, when the inlet most recently closed, water separated the west end of Sunset Beach from Bird Island. Now there’s a roughly 1,600-foot stretch of sand between the end of Main Street and the reserve.

DCM staff recommended denial of the appeal hearing because it said the conditions under which the permit was issued allow no development seaward of the frontal dune and no frontal dune destruction. Further, the staff contended that the project doesn’t violate the town’s land-use plan because none of the proposed lots abut Main Street. Instead, they extend from a private road that is connected to Main Street via the authorized wooden bridge.

“Petitioners further argue that the development is contrary to (a land-use plan policy that states that) Sunset Beach desires as much as practicable that all development be designed and sited so as to be compatible with its existing coastal town and residential character,” according to the staff opinion prepared by DCM attorney Christine Goebel. Also, because the proposed use for this development is residential, the division staff contends that the permit is in line with policy, adding that this policy “is not so much an enforceable policy as a statement of desire …”

Gisler said he believes the appellants will eventually prevail.

“We’ve won some of these and we’ve lost some, and each case is different, but I think we have a good shot in this one,” he said. “The facts are on our side.”

Varnam said the local opposition is being hypocritical about coastal development.

“If coastal development is such a bad thing, then why did the Sunset Beach Taxpayers Association members develop and build houses on the island of Sunset Beach? Now they are against me and my company doing the exact same thing that they have been a part of. It all comes down to don’t block my view. That is nothing less than hypocrisy,” Varnam said.

No one knows for sure when it first showed up. No one knew where it came from, but they thought they knew what it was, and they were right.

A small, rusty boat, apparently made from sections of steel drums, found in early June and since removed from a beach on South Core Banks in the Cape Lookout National Seashore, at one point carried refugees, probably fleeing Cuba.

“The Coast Guard did, in fact, interdict this boat at sea, somewhere off South Florida, in May 2016,” said Nathan Littlejohn, a public affairs officer at the Coast Guard’s 5^th District headquarters in Portsmouth, Virginia.

Littlejohn had spent the better part of a week trying to track down information about the boat after being given a couple of pictures of it. He hit pay dirt when he talked to someone at the Coast Guard’s 7^th District in Miami. It was in the “derelict vessel log.”

“What makes it so hard is that while it’s unusual to see something like this in North Carolina, it’s an everyday occurrence down there in South Florida,” Littlejohn said. “Sometimes they get dozens in a day.”

What happens, he said, is that when a patrol interdicts a vessel at sea, personnel take those aboard it off and begin the proceedings to send them back where they came from.

“We then mark it – the vessel had 5-16/OK painted on it – and set it adrift as ‘derelict,’” Littlejohn said. “This one just happened to end up in your national seashore. It most likely came up by way of the Gulf Stream.”

Tropical Storm Bonnie had passed nearby at the end of May, and could have sent it toward Core Banks. Those who saw the little boat called it “sad,” but also “beautiful.” Obviously, whoever set off in the boat had hope at one time; “Dios,” Spanish for God, was hand-painted on it.

The person who built the boat also knew at least a little about the sea, for he or she had attached inner tubes, filled with Styrofoam, as outriggers, to the vessel for stability. The tiller was made of rebar.

It also had an inboard engine, which is much quieter than an outboard and more fuel-efficient, better for avoiding detection and making a long journey across the Florida Straits without stopping.  In Coast Guard parlance, it’s called a “chug.” A similar vessel without a motor of any kind is termed a “rustic.”

Jennifer Miller of Orange County was with four other women on June 9 when they saw the “chug” on the beach on South Core Banks near Ophelia Inlet. They passed by, but on their return trip, they couldn’t resist to go ashore and examine it.

“It was beautiful … and horrible,” Miller said. “It was made of ‘poor people’s’ materials. It was very deep but very short. But whoever put it together had the sense to attach those inner tube outriggers for stability. It was heartbreaking to see, so rough and handmade. But it was beautiful.”

Just seeing it, she said, made one think of what kind of life would compel a person, or people, to risk a voyage in such a craft. And, of course, what happened to them? What was their journey like?

Indeed. One of the most recent Cuban refugee boats to make the news was in March, when a cruise ship spotted a 30-foot “rustic” 130 miles west of Marco Island in southwest Florida.

It had carried 27 people. Nine had died and been thrown overboard. The 18 remaining passengers had been at sea for 22 days when they were rescued and, according to an Associated Press news story, were dehydrated and could barely walk off the vessel.

And that was a 30-footer, a luxury vessel, compared to the one found on the banks.

One might wonder, since President Obama renewed diplomatic ties and eased travel restrictions to and from Cuba in December 2014, why so many would still risk such a venture, which even under the best circumstances can take days in shark-infested and often turbulent waters.

But they have.

According to The Center for Immigration Studies, an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit research organization founded in 1985, the number of Cuban aliens arriving at U.S. ports of entry, without visas, has been growing since 2009, reaching 43,154 in 2015. As of Feb. 24, the number for the current fiscal year — 25,806 Cuban aliens — had already exceeded the 24,000 who arrived in 2014.

According to a Coast Guard news release in early June, attempts by Cuban migrants to reach the southeastern United States by sea increased 155 percent in May from the same time last year. The total number of Cuban migrants taking to the sea in May 2016 totaled 673.

According to the immigration center, many of those who make the trip think that since Obama announced diplomatic ties with Cuba last year, the U.S. is going to change policy and make them adhere to the same rules as other immigrants. They believe it even though the administration has made it clear that it has no intention of changing current policy, which allows Cubans to stay if they make it to U.S. soil.

Jill Jaworski, chief ranger at Cape Lookout, said the park service had hauled the vessel off the beach and taken it to Harkers Island, the seashore headquarters. But the boat, she said, “was a big talking point for everyone who saw it. I know I’d never seen anything like it.”

Pat Kenney, seashore superintendent, said it was definitely unusual. “We do get a good bit of strange marine debris coming in, but we’re not like Florida, where you get these kinds of things fairly often,” he said. “We have had some calls from people who saw it and wanted to know what they thought might have been a refugee boat, but our staff didn’t figure anything out. There really wasn’t much to go on: no vessel number or anything. So we plan to use it for scrap.”

JACKSONVILLE — Earlier this month, Nicole Triplett went to the 2016 national conference of the Waterkeeper Alliance in Wilmington, and got to hear the organization’s founder, president and senior attorney, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. speak three times.

She returned to Onslow County triply inspired, and that’s good news for the White Oak and New rivers, because for the past seven months, Triplett has been the riverkeeper for the White Oak-New Riverkeeper Alliance, a Jacksonville-based environmental watchdog group that’s enjoying a rebirth.

“I came back with a lot of new ideas, and new energy,” said Triplett, who the group hired in October after going several years without a keeper. “I feel like we’ve made a lot of progress as an organization, but there’s a lot more we can do.”

The group was founded in 2008 and made a good name for itself, mostly behind the scenes, with such things as water quality testing in its namesake rivers and some of their tributaries.

More publicly, the organization gained acclaim for starting Operation Medicine Cabinet, a twice-a-year effort to collect and properly dispose of unwanted prescription drugs that otherwise might get into criminals’ or addicts’ hands or into rivers and streams through septic tanks and municipal sewer systems.

Medicine Cabinet, which was started by then-riverkeeper Tess Smallridge, went statewide and major corporations, such as Food Lion and Walgreens, have been big supporters, as have local police departments, which safeguard the collections and handle the disposal of the drugs according to state laws.

But Smallridge eventually moved to Chicago, and the organization went into a decline. It got so bad that in 2012, the group wasn’t really even involved in its signature event. Then came new blood, in the form of a new president, Dale Weston, who made rejuvenation his mission. He knew people.

The first thing Weston did was recruit new board of directors’ members, including April Clark, owner and operator of Second Wind Yoga and Eco Tours of Swansboro. She also knew people, and she knew how to get them involved. Her kayak customers routinely pick up trash in the water and on islands in the White Oak. It’s an integral part of the company ethos.

Clark, a terrific fundraiser, had raised money for the group through an annual New Year’s Day “polar plunge” and other events, including a recent auction at Second Wind. Clark’s arrival also signaled a crucial shift for a group that had long centered its attention on the New River near Jacksonville. It would now also focus on the White Oak River near Swansboro.

And it wasn’t all Weston did. He started planning to get a new riverkeeper. “It was something we had to do, for visibility and for effectiveness,” he said. “We didn’t have the money to do it right away, but if we were going to be successful, it was something we had to find a way to do.”

Another key was to associate with Rick Dove, a founding member of group who rose to fame in the 1990s fighting hog farms as the riverkeeper for the lower Neuse River. He’s now a senior adviser for the Waterkeeper Alliance. He also knows people.

Eventually, all the connections paid off. Support from the Waterkeeper Alliance and from Fred Stanback of Salisbury, who supports many environmental groups in the state, enabled the riverkeeper group to hire Triplett, who had interned with The Conservation Fund.

She hit the water paddling and hasn’t stopped. Wherever there’s trash in the water in the area, she’s been there, working with the Swansboro Rotary Club, for example, to organize cleanups all over Onslow County this year.

She’s also worked with Lisa Rider of Keep Onslow Beautiful on projects such as the Paddle Trash Fishing Tournament that launched from Topsail Island in May 14. Name a trashy waterway, and Triplett’s been there, or plans to go.

Triplett also has gone to meetings all over the area, establishing contacts and developing the kinds of connections that are essential to a watchdog group’s success.

She’s also been looking for new and innovative ways to attract folks to her group. For example, with the Zika virus making headlines all around the world, she’s planning an anti-mosquito campaign to tell people that trash and litter play a role in mosquito propagation. The organization is continuing its efforts to find and encourage abatement of pollution from corporate hog farms in the region and is beginning water sampling and testing efforts in the White Oak, working with the North Carolina State University’s Center for Marine Science and Technology in Morehead City. She’s also working with the White Oak River Chapter of the Izaak Walton League of America on projects in and near the NCSU-owned Hofmann Forest in Onslow and Jones counties. It’s the site of the headwaters of the White Oak and New rivers, a natural place for the group to work.

“I think we’re making a lot of progress in terms of visibility,” Triplett said earlier this month. “We’re up to 267 members, and I think we’ll have enough money to keep me on board. But we still need some more members who can be more active. There’s a lot of work to do, and that takes people who have the time and the energy.”

One of those new and younger and energetic members, and board members, is Doug Toltzman, an avid kayaker and outdoorsman who has connections to scores of paddlers and trail hikers. He’s a computer whiz – he makes his living doing websites – and completely redid the group’s site.

Toltzman is also the group’s secretary/treasurer, but he hopes that’s temporary.

“I want to be out on the water, picking up trash, doing stuff that makes a difference,” he said. “But I really do think we’re making progress. We’re growing. But I’m impatient. To be honest, I thought that after having a riverkeeper for six or seven months, we’d be a little ahead of where we are. But we’re getting there, we’re making progress, and I think we’ll be able to keep Nicole after this first year.”

One key, Toltzman said, will be getting Triplett “out on the water” more. To that end, he’s looking forward to seeing her, and maybe others, do more river and creek patrols in WONRA’s power boat, with the name emblazoned upon it.

“The more visible you are, the better off you are,” he said. “People need to see us out there. I think before too long we’ll have some sort of patrol schedule, so people will see us more and know who we are and what we’re doing.”

Another new board member is Tom Mattison, one of the founders of the New River Foundation, which formed in 1995 in the aftermath of the discharge of more than 25 million gallons of hog waste into the New River. The group folded last year. Mattison, a retired Marine who did two combat tours in Korea and a couple in Vietnam, is a firebrand and longtime outspoken activist who doesn’t mince words. He knows a bit about clean water, and dirty water, too; he’s been installing and inspecting septic tanks for decades. He also learned lessons from the foundation’s demise.

“I was very happy to get on the board at WONRA,” he said. “Nicole is doing a great job. Me, I like to stir things up a bit. I’m kind of an agitator, like a clothes washer. A washing machine doesn’t clean clothes without an agitator, and you need an agitator to clean up a river, too. I have a knack for raising hell.”

The group, he said, has great potential, but it needs to get the community more involved. To do that, “we’ve got to get more board members who are willing to work more, to associate with the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts, the churches, the civic organizations, everybody, even more than now,” he said.

“There’s a lot of work to do to get these rivers back where they should be, and there’s no way we can do it all ourselves,” he continued. “The community, the people, have to get involved. If they see something wrong, they’ve got to tell people. And they have to go to meetings and stand up against the polluters. It’s work, and you can’t be afraid to speak out.”

Weston also helped get Jim Simpson, one of group’s original board members, back on the board, providing more continuity. “He’s a very good board member,” Weston said. “He has a lot of knowledge.”

Clark, whose recent auction at Second Wind raised close to $2,500 for WONRA, is optimistic about the group’s future. “Nicole came in with a lot of good ideas, and she’s been very active, getting out in the community and talking to groups and getting out on the water and doing cleanups,” she said. “I think WONRA is getting much more visible. More people know about us, and I think that’s going to continue to improve.”

But the organization, she said, needs to work with some people and groups with which it might not, on the surface, seem likely to see eye-to-eye. “I think everybody wants our waters to be clean,” she said. “It’s the key to the economy here. Not everyone is going to agree with us on all issues all the time, but we have to look for commonality. I think we can find it on a lot of issues.”

Weston said he wants to highlight and work on state coastal and water quality issues that affect the two rivers, such as recent actions by the state General Assembly to weaken some environmental rules.

He wants the group to get involved in aquifer protection, and to engage more with local governments, as the group did with the town of Maysville after its waste treatment plant released nearly 10,000 gallons of partly untreated sewage into the White Oak in Jones County in July 2015.

He said he’s encouraging Triplett to start working harder on membership recruitment now that she knows the area and is getting to be well known in the community.

“We have to be the eyes and ears and the voice for the rivers,” he said. “We need to help restore what’s been lost because of pollution. We have to work with people to reduce storm water runoff, which is something the coastal federation does very well. There’s a lot of work to do, and we have to get the community more involved. But I think we’re on the right track.”

To Learn More

• White Oak-New Riverkeeper Alliance
• Waterkeeper Alliance

CAPE CARTERET — The N.C. Coastal Federation’s transformation of two Cape Carteret ponds into an innovative, tidal marsh stormwater management system is complete, though people will have an opportunity to add the finishing touches at a community planting Sunday that will also serve as an open house of sorts.

Workers from Backwater Environmental of Pittsboro, implementing a plan developed by Kris Bass of Kris Bass Engineering of Raleigh, put in 18,050 plants, by hand, over a three-day period during the last full week of May.

That effort finished a project that began over the winter, when Backwater started draining the ponds. Once the drainage was finished, the firm used heavy equipment to dig out layers of muck that had supported growth of water hyacinths, which choked the ponds at the Cape Carteret Baptist and Presbyterian churches, severely curtailing their ability to work effectively to hold and treat stormwater runoff from N.C. 24 and many nearby commercial properties, including a shopping center across the road.

Once the plants were in, Bass said last week, workers removed a filter that had been keeping silt from the project from flowing into Deer Creek, which is connected to the ponds through a culvert. Immediately, he said, countless fish swam into the newly created wetlands, as did crabs.

“It was like they were waiting to get into their new home,” Bass said.

Their new home, Bass said, is a first-of-its-kind stormwater project in North Carolina. Water enters the system in the upper part, on the more westerly Baptist church property, which has been reconstructed to have sand and rock layers below the planted vegetation. It serves as a bio-retention area, filtering as much of the pollutants as possible from the collected stormwater. The treated stormwater then flows underground for 200 feet through a massive rock filter field, before discharging into the new saltwater creek on the Presbyterian property.

The federation hopes that keeping bacteria and other stormwater pollutants out of Deer Creek should preserve and eventually, enhance quality in the waters of the sound.

The nonprofit group that has headquarters just down the road in Ocean is paying for the project, which is estimated to cost about $500,000.

Thursday was warm and sunny, and it hadn’t rained since the weekend, but Bass estimated that 100,000 gallons of freshwater a day were entering the system, although some of it is groundwater. When it rains, the volume will be much higher.

Bass said the tidal range in the eastern end of the system will likely be about two feet, enough to give the carefully selected marsh plants good growing conditions. The freshwater plants at the western end can be kept moist by an engineered system.

All of this, Bass said, will be especially crucial until the marsh is fully established. The plants were spaced at an interval of about two feet.

The soil conditions are good, but Bass said it will probably take two or three growing seasons before the spaces between the plants will fill in with additional vegetation.

A tremendous number of sea shells were found in the muck during excavation, which means the area was almost surely a natural wetland at some point, so it’s a suitable place for a new one to take root and flourish, Bass explained.

Seashells weren’t the only things found in the ponds, either.

Andy Wood of Habitat Environmental Services of Hampstead, hired by the federation, said his company caught and transferred to new homes 93 turtles – snappers and box turtles mostly – 25 frogs and toads and about 300 fish, including a few largemouth bass and plenty of sunfish. They also trapped five American eels and three amphiuma, which are large eel-like salamanders than grow to more than three feet long.

The frogs and toads, eels, amphiuma and fish went to nearby freshwater ponds, although some of the larger fish were held, at least temporarily, at the N.C. Aquarium in Pine Knoll Shores. The turtles went into upstream, freshwater portions of the White Oak River.

As far as he knows, none of the turtles he handled – catching them in bucket traps placed in the ground around the ponds – died.

The critters were hauled to their new homes in buckets and tanks, and the sites were not far away and were approved by the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission.

Wood believes the turtles will be fine, although some might try to find their way back to the church ponds. “All turtles – terrestrial and sea – have kind of a GPS system, like they’re hooked up to satellites,” he said. “They know where ‘home’ is.”

Lexia Weaver, a federation scientist, said she was more than pleased with the project.

“It looks great, and the contractors went above and beyond to address any issues, anticipated or unanticipated,” she said. “We’ve very excited that all of this stormwater is going to be naturally treated before it enters the creek.”

The whole concept of the project goes back to November 2012 when a water-control structure failed and the water drained into Deer Creek. After discussion with the state, Cape Carteret officials enlisted the federation’s help, and planning began.

Money for the project came from the federation’s 2013 sale of a permanent conservation easement for land at North River Farms to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, a part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

OCEAN — One normally thinks of all of Japan as a noisy, bustling place, home to some of the world’s most populous and crowded cities, including Tokyo and Yokohama.

But according to the president of the island nation’s largest conservation group, the Japan Ecosystem Conservation Society, much of the country – its mountainous forests – is virtually silent, at least if you’re listening for birds.

Hobun Ikeya, who founded the 30,000-member society more than 30 years ago, was one of six of its 100 staff members and administrators who were in Carteret and Onslow counties Thursday and Friday of last week, visiting with counterparts at the N.C. Coastal Federation and touring some of its projects.

The goal was to learn about what the highly-successful federation does and how it does it. While here, they also visited the federation’s living shoreline project along Jones Island in Hammocks Beach State Park and the its 6,000-acre wetlands restoration project in eastern Carteret County. They also visited the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Beaufort lab and the Duke University Marine Laboratory on Pivers Island.

During a lunch break on the two-day tour, Ikeya talked, through interpreter Ken Yoshia, the society’s executive director, about how different Japan is from the perception of many who haven’t been there.

Mountains make up about 80 percent of Japan, with many of them covered by forests, Ikeya said. But don’t think of them as national parks, like those preserved in the United States.

“It’s mostly tree farms,” Ikeya said.

After the World War II, Ikeya said, most of the natural forests were cut down and replanted with cedar and a few other species deemed essential for industry, including the paper industry. The practice was so widespread, he said, that the faux forests rarely serve as good habitat for birds.

As a result, when you’re in those trees, “you cannot hear much (bird) song,” Ikeya said. “It’s literally like silent spring.”

Ikeya was referring, of course, to Rachel Carson’s seminal 1962 U.S. book, which many credit with launching the environmental movement in the United States.

As Ikeya and the other members of his group talked during lunch at federation’s office in Ocean, Todd Miller showed the group a photo of pelicans on Beacon Island, an eroding nesting site in Pamlico Sound that the federation has helped by building living shorelines made of oyster shells and marsh grass.

Still, he pointed out, there are only six major real pelican nesting areas in North Carolina. But the site of the picture of the pelicans – the Japanese indicated they’d never seen one live – drew oohs and aahs from the group.

A photo of a painted bunting, the astoundingly colorful bird that frequents Hammocks Beach State Park – drew a similar response. The group hadn’t seen one during their visit to the park.

The bird situation is important in Japan, not only because the avian species serve as indicators of ecosystem health, but also because the Japanese have traditionally revered birds, Yoshia said.

Ikeya said a visitor to Tokyo, where the society has its headquarters, would often be hard-pressed to see a single bird. And in response to a question, he noted that the white ibis was driven into at least unofficial extinction in the country a few years back, and the white stork, the country’s most sacred bird, has almost disappeared.

To highlight those problems, the society has produced a beautiful towel, with a drawing of both birds soaring in front of Mt. Fuji, another revered national symbol.

“We want to show that (the national government) failed, even to protect our beautiful birds, and that we can’t make another mistake like this,” Ikeya said.

One of the society’s major goals, he said, is to preserve what remains of the country’s remaining natural habitat and to use birds from other countries to gradually bring back those species.

None of this will be easy, Ikeya said, largely because the focus of Japan’s government has long been on economic growth, to the exclusion of efforts to preserve natural habitat. That’s been especially true since the beginning of the 1990s, when the former economic powerhouse entered a long period of economic stagnation. But, he added, it’s really been more-or-less true since the country “opened up” to the west 100 or so years ago.

“The government since then has concentrated on modernizing society and the economics and the political system, but has neglected the traditional Japanese values of maintaining our natural resources,” he said. “That has fundamentally continued through today. But we are trying to change it.”

The country’s fisheries resources have been devastated by unsustainable harvests, Ikeya said, in part because government has often encouraged the watermen to “harvest as much as possible, as fast as possible.”

Projects such as the federation’s efforts to encourage North Carolina residents to use living shorelines instead of seawalls along privately-owned waterfronts, are not likely to gain any traction in Japan until a major philosophical change takes hold, he said.

“The Japanese people in general think environmental projects should be done by the government,” Ikeya said through Yoshia. “The individual property owner does not think he has anything to do with it, unfortunately. It’s totally different than what we are seeing here.”

Still, the group thinks it’s making slow headway. For example, there has long been a government policy to straighten rivers and channelize them with concrete to provide water and to prevent flooding.  Ikeya said some government bureaucrats, at the urging of his group, now see that as a bad thing. Efforts are being made to restore some rivers to their natural “meandering” state, he said.

“They are gradually accepting the concept,” Ikeya said. “But that is a small achievement and we have many major challenges.”

The staffers who talked Friday were well-versed in the issues and seemed well-equipped to tackle them. For example, Takeshi Seki, the secretary general and manager of the Tokyo office, spoke of the need to convince government officials that better environmental laws are essential. Others noted that protecting the remaining intact ecosystems can actually lead to economic development of a different type: people want to see nature, and will pay to do so.

To that end, the group has staffers who do the field research necessary to look for and identify endangered plants and animals, and to work with the government to try to ensure that new road construction avoids, or at least mitigates, disruption or destruction of the habitat those species depend upon. The basic idea is to convince the government and the powerful corporations that “development can co-exist with nature,” if it’s done properly.

“We started as a small NGO about 30 years ago,” Ikeya said. “We believe we have to fundamentally change our way of life to protect and restore our natural environment.”

The group, he said, works not only with government bureaucrats, but also with teachers and elected officials and other NGOs to try to educate the Japanese public about the need to reverse longstanding policies that favor economic development.

“We come here (to the federation) and to other groups and areas in the United States and Europe to learn more about how we can do it,” he said. “We also try to act as an information source for the Japanese people.”

Others from the group on the trip were: Ayako Niwano, Yusuke Kumagai and Erina Kakimoto.

Learn More

• Japan Ecosystem Conservation Society

HARLOWE — Gene Huntsman had to check the weather forecast before he’d agree to a date for an interview about his impending induction into the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, North Carolina’s top civilian honor.

“The first rule of retirement is not to do anything that interferes with fishing,” said the retired National Marine Fisheries Service biologist. “OK. Wednesday looks good. North wind, and maybe thunderstorms.”

It worked out just as planned; it was foggy, misty and cool that Wednesday morning, and Gene and Susan, his wife and fellow honoree, sat amiably and chatted happily for 90 minutes. But presumably, the weather won’t dictate whether the Huntsmans will show up for their induction ceremony, which is Sunday at 3 p.m. at The Train Depot in Morehead City. One thing is certain: they won’t have any trouble getting there, no matter what obstacles might be in the path; they are, in every sense of the word, trailblazers, and that’s precisely why they got nominated for the award by the Carteret County Wildlife Club and approved by Gov. Pat McCrory.

Bob Simpson, longtime club member and family friend, and for decades the state’s premier outdoor writer at the Raleigh News & Observer, put it this way in his nomination letter:

“Possibly the best known of their accomplishments would be their heroic efforts establishing the nationally recognized Neusiok hiking trail, 22-plus miles of public pathway pushing through seemingly impenetrable wilderness regions.”

Neusiok Trail

The trail, which runs from the Neuse River to the Newport River in the Croatan National Forest, was recently recognized by the state as an outstanding segment of the Mountains-to-the-Sea Trail.

“Consider for a moment the effort required to find and create over 22 miles of trail,” Simpson continued in his letter, “convince associates to explore, mark and clear a pathway through dense forest laden with fallen trees, rotting logs, dead branches, dense entanglements of thorn-laden devils claw, assortments of vine, while being limited to the use of hand ax, saws and machetes, while relying on spinal and leg muscles and mud-laden, failing feet, while exploring potential routes through dark, dense forest, wading creeks, skirting swamp, seeking higher grounds, followed by the toting of timbers and bridging material before the actual  construction could  begin.”

Seated in their rustic home on a seven-acre plot of woods adjacent to the Croatan National Forest near Clubfoot Creek in Harlowe in Craven County, the Huntsmans insisted they weren’t heroic, but grudgingly acknowledged that the task was as difficult, in many places, as Simpson indicated.

“We mostly used machetes to hack through at first, and it was very slow going, very tough,” Susan recalled of the beginning of the effort, back in the early 1970s.

“We’d send Mary (Bob Simpson’s wife) out ahead with a compass reading and a flag attached to a tall stick, and she’d walk until we couldn’t see her, and then we’d chop to the flag, and then we’d do it again, and again.” Gene said.

Sometimes, Susan added, “We’d blow bugles to stay in touch. We did anything that worked.”

Susan often carried cooking supplies and food for miles to feed the hungry volunteer workers.

They and other Carteret Wildlife Club members toted lumber, thousands and thousands of two-by-sixes, for long stretches to form a stable path through the wettest areas.

They got grants from the state and from the American Hiking Association. They sought and received donations. It was a consuming passion. They convinced the forest service it was a worthy thing, necessary, important.

When bridges were needed to cross streams in areas too remote to get the lumber in by foot, the Huntsmans and the club somehow convinced the Marine Corps to fly tons of boards in by helicopter.

“They thought we were crazy when we asked them to do that,” Gene said. “They said, ‘No, no, no.’ But we talked to a colonel and eventually they agreed, and we are forever grateful.”

It took about five years, until 1976, to get the trail mostly complete, and the Huntsmans credit the National Forest Service for its cooperation and help. They also remember, however, when the forest service burned a couple of the shelters the club had built for hikers who wanted to rest or even spend the night.

“They were doing a controlled burn and they forgot they were there,” Gene recalled. “Whoops.

But they bought what we needed to rebuild them.”

Raving Success

Almost from its first opening, the Neusiok was a raving success. Susan said there are log books in the shelter signed by folks from all over the world, particularly Canada and Germany. Almost all are highly complimentary.

“It’s really a winter hiking trail,” Gene said. “When it’s too cold to do the Appalachian Trail, people come here. And it’s a great trail. It goes through every type of coastal habitat imaginable: salt marshes, cypress swamps, longleaf pine forests and pocosins. You can do the whole thing at once, but most don’t. It’s challenging, but not impossible for casual hikers. You can do a segment, just a nice afternoon in the forest. And the three shelters are spread out so you can just do one segment at a time. You don’t have to carry your whole house on your back.”

There is a source of water and a place to have a fire at each shelter.

The idea for the trail started, Gene said, when the son of a friend asked him about the best places to hike in the eastern part of the state. As members of the wildlife club since 1970, the Huntsman knew something about local trails.

“I remember I told him there were lots of nice logging roads to walk in the Croatan,” Gene said. “And he told me he didn’t want to walk on roads, he wanted to hike trails. And that’s when I realized that I didn’t think I’d been around a national forest that didn’t have hiking trails. So the club got involved and we started working with the forest service.”

The members did not, he said, have enough sense to think it was impossible. And it wasn’t. One of the goals was, of course, to simply provide a great trail in a national forest that badly needed one. But the ulterior motive, Gene admits, was always to get people out in the woods, to learn to appreciate them as the club members did, and to value them and the conservation values that are instilled simply by being in nature.

“That’s the real reason, in a nutshell,” he said.

Love of Nature

The Huntsmans came by this quest, well, naturally. Gene grew up in East St. Louis, on the Illinois side, and recalls spending lots of time outdoors as a boy, particularly after his father bought a farm in 1948. The family lived there for a time, and Gene’s love for the outdoors was forever cemented.

Susan was born and raised in England, where her family lived on 13 acres, and she was always fascinated by nature and drawn to the ocean.

They met while undergraduate students at Cornell University, Gene studying fisheries biology, Sue studying biochemistry. They got married in 1963. From there, both went to Iowa State University, where Gene earned his masters and Ph.D. in fishery biology. Susan got her Ph.D. in botany there.

But they knew they didn’t want to stay in Iowa. Gene recalls measuring, one winter, the ground frozen 36 inches deep. The toilet stopped working. It was not pleasant, even for grad students, who generally are accustomed to relative deprivation.

Eventually, they made their way to the University of Miami, where they studied marine biology at what is now the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences. Florida wasn’t right for the couple either. Gene calls it boring. The weather was always the same, and it took too long to get anywhere else from Miami.

Gene had read The Old Man and the Boy, a classic Robert Ruark novel, first published in 1957, about growing up in the Southport area of North Carolina. Ruark, a journalist, author and hunter, made North Carolina seem like a good place to call home for outdoorsy types. The Huntsmans looked for jobs at the marine labs near Beaufort.

Gene ended up at NMFS on Pivers Island in Beaufort in 1967, working in its menhaden program and later heading up crucial reef fish work that eventually led to national efforts to save stocks of fish like snapper and grouper. Susan landed first at the Duke Marine Lab nearby, working with renowned oceanographer Richard Barber. Eventually, she moved to the NMFS lab. She specialized in trace metals in phytoplankton, the building block of much marine life. She’s also retired.

Ford “Bud” Cross, a former NMFS-Beaufort Lab director and a close friend, said the Huntsmans’ honors are richly deserved, even based only on the work they did at the lab.

Groundbreaking Work

Gene’s reef fish work was groundbreaking for the management of the species, Cross said. He combined surveys of head boats and recreational and commercial fishermen with analytics and fisheries population models. It had never been done before, Cross said, and has since been used by regional fisheries managers to develop plans to preserve and enhance the commercially and recreationally valuable species.

Susan, Cross said, did equally groundbreaking work to characterize the chemical speciation – when it’s toxic and when it’s not – of heavy metals in the water, such as copper. The idea was to determine the effects on phytoplankton and other marine organisms. “It was and is very important work that really changed the thinking,” he said.

Gene and Susan, 75 and 74 respectively, have lived in their Harlowe home since 1969. They have a couple of horses, lots of chickens, a year-round garden and two dogs, Pybr, a Welsh Springer spaniel, and Cadger, a Gordon setter. Both run happily outside but settle down peacefully at their owners’ sides in the house. It’s a picture of woodsy tranquility, with guns and all the other accoutrements of outdoor life on shelves and in nooks and crannies everywhere one looks.

Susan said Gene – true to his penchant for checking the weather before scheduling any lengthy indoor activity – can’t stand to be inside or any length of time. “He’s always in the garden, always, if he’s not out fishing or hunting,” she said.

Hunting remains one of Gene’s great joys. He likes woodcock hunting. It’s a challenge, he said, in part because they’re tiny birds. Susan isn’t so fond of eating them, though. But hunting is a big part of what led him and others in the Carteret County Wildlife Club to embark on creation of yet another Croatan National Forest hiking trail, the Weetock.

It’s basically a circle, close to 11 miles long. It begins (or ends) on N.C. 58 just south of the Hillfield Road, heads west for almost two miles on low bluffs along Hunters Creek, then proceeds mostly north, somewhat paralleling the White Oak River, for more than five miles to Haywood Landing. The last (or first) section traverses bluffs above Holston Creek about 3.5 miles east to the junction of N.C. 58 and the Haywood Landing Road.

It’s an area where Gene frequently hunted, and that’s when the idea hit him. “It’s much more open, not as dense as the Neusiok, and it was easy to envision a trail there,” Gene said. “Plus, it’s in an area that’s really growing in population, and there was a lot of demand for a trail.”

Again, too, there was that philosophical goal of simply getting people out in the woods, in nature’s glory, and to encourage them to be good stewards.

Gene still hikes, but he concedes he’s not quite as limber as he once was, and he also says he’s never been one of those “carry your house on your back” hikers. He’s always been more about making that possible, in the Croatan, for those who desire to take advantage of the opportunity.

He and Susan are still involved in the wildlife club, which also promotes hunting safety, and stay quite busy on their stunningly beautiful property.

Fun Life

It’s been a fun life, lived to the fullest, and while both defer credit for their accomplishments to the many who have helped, Gene and Susan both ended the interview with a quiet, partial retraction of their statements, at the outset of the talk, that they didn’t really know what they had done to deserve induction into the Order of the Long Leaf Pine. It’s an honor previously bestowed upon their great friend, Simpson.

“We certainly couldn’t have done any of this alone, by any means,” Gene said. “But I will say I’m proud that we all got it done.”

Simpson, in his nomination, also noted that the Huntsmans’ contributions to the state, nation and people also “include scores of other philanthropic works, including organizing the building and distribution of various forms of bird houses, including wood duck, owl and bluebird nesting sites, insect-devouring bat houses by the score, constructed by and sold at cost (and in demand) by assorted conservation organizations, garden clubs, scouting groups and individuals.

“Unselfish, honest, generous to a fault, selected as non-compensated consultants to several national and regional educational and conservation organizations, the Huntsmans have proven themselves among the most unselfish assets within this state and nation,” Simpson concluded.

To Learn More

• Order of the Longleaf Pine
• Carteret Wildlife Club
• Neusiok Trail
• Weetock Trail

Last of a two-part series

SWANSBORO – A lot of people hate the idea of building a public, five-ramp boat launch on new land acquired for Hammocks Beach State Park. Some like it. Others aren’t sure.

Those opinions and others should shake out during when park official amend their master plan to include the 290 mainland acres along Queens Creek that the state acquired through a legal settlement two years ago.  That process should begin later this year. Nothing will happen on the land until it’s complete, probably a year later, state park officials said. They assure everyone that their voices will be heard.

Tom Roulund is all in favor of a boat launch either at the park’s maintenance ramp near the visitors’ center or on the new property. The new property, he thinks, would be best, because the vehicles pulling boats would not go by some of the homes on Hammocks Beach Road.

Rouland, who lives in a nearby subdivision, said he takes his boat out every weekend during the summer, and currently goes all the way to the Emerald Isle to put it in the water. “I could go to the ramp in Cedar Point, but it’s small, always very busy and a lot of the boaters there don’t obey the no-wake zone,” he said. “It’s dangerous. I don’t see why a ramp in the park couldn’t be a good fit.”

Bill Gerdsen, a longtime avid boater who lives near the park, might be described as being on the fence. He said the state boat ramp in nearby Cedar Point is crowded, and tough currents can be dangerous, particularly when lots of folks are out on the water and see a storm approaching and head for the ramp all at once.  “It can be a mess, chaos, scary,” he said. “I’ve seen it.”

The same, he said, can be true at the state launch on Bogue Sound in Emerald Isle and at Onslow County’s Shell Rock Landing ramp at Bear Creek. A new public launch is needed in the area, Gerdsen said.

On the other hand, Gerdsen said he understands the environmental issues raised by opponents of a ramp at the park. They fear that such a large boat launch will disturb the natural beauty and serenity of the park, create large volumes of stormwater that will pollute the creek and require dredging through fish nursery areas.

Queens Creek, Gerdsen also noted, is far from “boat friendly.” It’s wide, subject to strong winds, has numerous tiny islands and oyster reefs that appear and disappear with the tides, and there’s not that much deep water near shore for a ramp or ramps.

Dredging May Be Issue

On the issue of dredging, state officials confirmed that portions of the creek are designated as primary nursery areas. That means that only dredging of existing channels are allowed. Ryan Davenport of the state Division of Coastal Management said it was impossible to speculate without a specific proposed site, but acknowledged there are potential problems, particularly since there are multiple state and federal agencies, including the National Marine Fisheries Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries, that would review a permit application.

Phil Keagy, a Swansboro commissioner, said he’s worried not only about traffic, but also about the other big needs at the park. “I understand the desire for more boat launches; they are all crowded,” he said. “But $1 million is a lot for a boat ramp and a parking lot, and there are a lot of maintenance needs at the park.”

Keagy is referring here to the $1.2 million earmarked for the park in the Connect NC bond that voters approved in November.

Keagy said at least a couple other town commissioners share his concerns, and if the state or anyone else seeks the town’s endorsement for the boat ramp, he’s not sure they’ll get it.

“I’m not totally against it, but I do have a lot of questions,” he said, and “we don’t really know what the plans are. I do know that I’m a firm believer that there are other needs that probably should be taken care of at the park first. It’s a great park, but it needs maintenance.”

Swansboro Mayor Scott Chadwick said he generally favors a ramp at the park because more water access is needed in the area and it would be good for businesses in town. But, he added, he, too, has concerns about the increased traffic in town.

“I think that before I could be 100 percent for it, I’d need to see a plan for how the state would handle the increased traffic so it wouldn’t be such a headache for the people who live out there,” he said.

What’s Next?

Brian Strong, the planning chief for the state Division of Parks and Recreation, said the park must update its master plan to include what it will do with the new land. That planning process, funded by $125,000 from the state Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, is out for bid, and consultants have responded with proposals.

The chosen contract will lead a public process that will take eight or nine months, he explained. There will be plenty of opportunities for people to participate, Strong added.

“If the master planning process shows that a boat ramp is not needed or desired or is not feasible on the property, we can request that the bond funding be reallocated to a different project on the new property at Hammocks Beach,” he said. “It’s important for the decision on the boat ramp to be made as part of the overall master planning process. This will ensure that all viewpoints are heard and considered, and it will ensure that all relevant engineering and environmental information is available for the evaluation of feasibility. The master planning process is open to everyone, and we welcome all ideas and comments.”

State Sen. Harry Brown of Jacksonville is the majority leader who was instrumental in putting together the financing package to buy the Queens Creek land and also was a key in the bond legislation’s adoption. He doesn’t think the legislature needs to get involved in how that bond money is spent at Hammocks Beach.

“There was nothing specific in the legislation about how that money would be spent,” he said. “It’s up to the public and the parks department, through the planning process, to decide.”

The boat ramp at the park is a tough issue because there are always more boaters than ramps, Brown said. “This is just me, but I’d think there’s got to be as solution, a way to find a compromise,” he said. “Maybe we could put a smaller facility in there that wouldn’t have so much impact, if we could find the right place. I know not everyone would be happy, but that’s normal. I think there’s an answer. But I don’t think the legislature needs to be saying ‘You need to do this,’ or ‘You need to do that.’”

State Rep. George Cleveland, a Republican whose district includes the park, agreed that it’s not the legislature’s job to decide how the money gets spent, but said the park isn’t the place for a public boat ramp.

“I don’t think a boat ramp facility fits in with the park’s mission or in any way would enhance the park,” Cleveland said. “You’ve got this beautiful new property in a state park and you’re going to use a big piece of it for a boat launch and a big parking lot? I’m not saying there’s not a need for a boat launch in the area, but there are other places.”

One thing does appear certain, though: The opposition isn’t going to go away, said Mary Ellen Yanich, a Swansboro resident and a frequent park volunteer. “I’m at the park a lot, on the ferries, and I never talk to anyone who wants a boat ramp there,” she noted “People like it – love it – the way it is. They want trails and campgrounds, things that will fit in with the environment.”

Paul Donnelly, a former Hammocks Beach superintendent, said that he hopes people will make their feelings known during the planning process. “The number one thing I’ve heard that people want is hiking trails,” he said.

Sam Bland, another retired superintendent, also encouraged those who love the park to speak out during the process. “There are a lot of needs in the park,” he said. “The bathhouse on Bear Island is showing some signs of deterioration, as is the visitors’ center on the mainland,” he said. “And we don’t need the habitat destruction you’d get with a boat launching area. They already destroyed some habitat at the visitors’ center last year when they cut the thicket along the shore. We don’t need to lose any more. It’s all important.”

Strong said that public input would be a major factor in deciding what gets done with that new land.  “We obviously don’t want to build something that no one wants,” he said. ““There are all kinds of things that could be done there – primitive camping, trails, picnic areas, other kinds of outdoor recreation. That’s what we want to find out through the planning process: What do the majority of the people want?”

David Pearson, president of the Friends of the Hammocks and Bear Island, said that’s been his intent all along. He said that when he’s mentioned a boat launching facility, he’s prefaced his remarks by insisting it’s only his idea of what he thought would be a good thing to make the park more of a drawing card, more of a year-round destination, more of a tourism-generator, more of a boon to the local economy.

“All I’ve been trying to do, all I’ve ever tried to do, is get funds to make this park the best park it can be for all the people who want to use it,” he said. “I want it to be the park the citizens want it to be.”

The bottom line, Pearson said, is that the master planning process will determine how the Queens Creek property will ultimately be used.

First of two parts

SWANSBORO – Call it the Tempest on Queens Creek.

An idea is afloat to build a public boat launch with five ramps and acres of parking lot for 100 vehicles and trailers on undeveloped land along the creek in Onslow County. The state recently acquired the property as an addition to Hammocks Beach State Park. The idea’s origins are a mystery – no one will say who first came up with it. But fueled by desires for more boat access and the tourism dollars that follows, the idea has slowly taken shape over the last few months as park officials prepare to decide how to use the land.

And it has roiled the waters of this usually languid creek.

County officials would like to see a regional boat ramp on the property, as would some influential park allies. Former park superintendents, though, are opposed, as are park employees and volunteers, though most are fearful to speak out. Some neighbors of the park aren’t thrilled with the idea either. Neither is the state representative whose district includes the park. Some Swansboro town commissioners and the mayor worry about the additional traffic it will generate on already crowded roads and the stormwater runoff that will have to be controlled and the dredging that may be required.

From Trails to Trailers

No one talked about boat ramps back in 2014, when a court settlement allowed the state to buy 290 acres along Queens Creek to add to the park near Swansboro. Then, lots of folks talked about nature trails, campsites and kayak launches.

David Pearson is president of the Friends of the Hammocks and Bear Island, the park’s volunteer support group. He helped put that deal together after an eight-and-a-half-year legal saga. When the state finally reached a settlement with the Hurst family to acquire “The Hammocks,” Pearson said that most people in the community would want to keep it as natural as possible. There should be primitive camping areas, he said then, and at least one large campground suitable for major events by Boy and Girl Scouts.

Carol Tingley, the deputy director of the state Division of Parks and Recreation, had the same concept in mind two years ago. She, too, talked about trails and possibly a campground. State Sen. Harry Brown, the Jacksonville Republican and Senate majority leader who championed the purchase in the legislature, waxed nearly poetic back then about preserving the environment and providing educational opportunities for kids.

Fast forward to June 30, 2015, when Gov. Pat McCrory visited the park to urge area residents to vote for Connect NC, a general obligation bond that eventually came to include $75 million for state parks. It includes about $1.13 million for Hammocks Beach. McCrory didn’t mention a boat ramp in his speech.

But Mike Murphy, the director of the Division of Parks and Recreation, noted in an interview before the governor’s arrival that day that money earmarked for the park would go “largely” to build a new a boat launch. He said the ramp was “very much in demand.”

That boat ramp was just the subject of talk back then, but now almost a year later  a five-ramp launch is considered a serious option. Pearson now wants it considered when the park devises a new master plan. The Onslow County Board of Commissioners has committed $1 million towards the land’s purchase, and county officials have expressed their desire for a major boat ramp there. Parks officials now claim that the money for Hammocks Beach that’s included in the bond, which voters approved in November, is earmarked for the boat ramp, though the legislation authorizing the bond makes no mention of it.

Paving Paradise

Chuck Roberts, a longtime member of the Friends group and a resident near the park, references an old folk song, calling the ramp idea “paving paradise to put up a parking lot.” Mary Ellen Yanich, a Swansboro resident and frequent park volunteer, said people pretty much want to keep the park natural, low impact and quiet.

“At a state park in the mountains,” she said, “you wouldn’t clear cut a forest to put in a ski slope.”

State Rep. George Cleveland, a Jacksonville Republican whose district includes Swansboro and the park, strongly opposes a big ramp facility. He’s told angry constituents who have called him to “start raising hell.”

Two Onslow County commissioners – Jack Bright of Hubert and Paul Buchanan of Swansboro – said a ramp is needed somewhere near Swansboro but the park might not be the best place for it. They want to hear from their constituents.

Swansboro Commissioner Phil Keagy also is not totally opposed, but is worried about the traffic the ramp would generate on Hammocks Beach Road, a two-lane stretch of asphalt that leads to the park from N.C. 24 — a Walmart is slated to be built at that intersection – and about the effects on the park’s quiet beauty and pristine waters.

Frank Tursi, another town commissioner, said the low-lying land and surrounding shallow water is ill suited for a regional ramp that will be equivalent in size to the state boat ramp in Emerald Isle. “Stormwater control will be a major problem, as will dredging through fish nursery areas,” he said. “Those are issues that I hope will be considered during the coming planning process.”

Pearson remains a supporter of the boat ramp, but only as part of that soon-to-start master plan update for the park. “We’re a park of islands,” he said. “We’ve got Bear Island, Huggins Island, part of Jones Island and soon, Dudley’s Island. The boat ramps in this area are very crowded in the summer months. If you have waterfront property and you can keep a boat there, it’s not a problem. But if you don’t, and if those other facilities nearby are full, as they often are, how are other people with boats going to get to the islands?”

He said the park could “tuck” the ramp somewhere on the 290 acres without disruption. “I know it won’t be simple, but it can be done,” he said.  “Again, though, when I have mentioned a boat ramp, I’ve always said it would be something people would decide as part of the master-planning process.”

Paul Donnelly, who retired last summer after a 10-year stint as park superintendent, said he never wanted the ramp and doesn’t know of anyone at the park who does. The park, he noted, has much bigger needs, including maintenance of existing facilities and the creation of trails and camping areas.

Sarah Kendrick, a longtime ranger who is now superintendent, said she couldn’t comment.

Sam Bland, a naturalist with the N.C. Coastal Federation and Donnelly’s predecessor as superintendent, is more adamant, saying a ramp on that Queens Creek property would destroy precious habitat, and the parking lot would increase stormwater runoff and impair the waters.

Cleveland, the legislator, said he knows members of the friends group who are strongly opposed to the idea.

Mysterious Origins

So how did it get to this point?

Let’s start with House Bill 943. That’s the bill that the legislature passed last year to authorize the bond. It doesn’t list specific projects for any of the state parks that were to get money, just the amounts of money they were to receive.

Brian Strong, chief of planning and natural resources for the parks division, said last week that the boat launch was in the legislation and it would take legislative action to get it out. When informed it wasn’t in the bill, Strong later said by email that, “At the time the list of bond projects was being compiled, no planning or design work had been done for the newly acquired property at Hammocks Beach. It was clear funding would be needed for development of visitor facilities on the new property, so that was included as a component of the bond project list. At that time, our preliminary understanding was that a boat ramp was needed and desired by the community, and that a boat ramp was feasible on the new property.”

So, Strong said, the boat ramp was on the list of state park bond projects submitted to the state Office of Management and Budget, and he provided that list last week.  But he didn’t say who, if anyone other than the parks department, put that ramp on that list.

Pearson, who also is executive director of the statewide Friends of State Parks, said that “senior leaders” in the department “solicited suggestions” from the state parks staff. “Somebody put it in there,” he said. “I have no idea who.”

Donnelly said he certainly didn’t do it, and Kendrick wasn’t superintendent until December, well after the bond package had been put together. Strong said the list had been in the works for at least two years.

Some have speculated that Onslow County might be behind the boat ramp idea, because the county has pledged $1 million over the next four years to the park, and county officials have made it no secret they’d like to see more boating access.

But County Manager Jeff Hudson said that money was never tied to the boat ramp. “We made that commitment because they (Pearson and Parks Department Director Murphy) came to us in person and asked us for help with funds for the purchase of the property,” he said. “All we asked was that we be given the opportunity for input into the planning process.”

Hudson, though, put the county’s desires a little more directly in an email to a newspaper columnist in March. He wrote that the county had told park officials that additional water access was needed in the county and that “we would like for a portion of the property to be set aside for public motor boat access.”

Million Dollar Access

The sale required two transactions. In one, the state paid Harriet Hurst Turner of Raleigh and John Hurst of Onslow County $6.9 million for 200 acres of the tract, using a combination of money from the state’s Parks and Recreation Trust Fund, which is appropriated by the legislature, and from the previous sale of bonds designated for this purpose.

In a second sale, the Conservation Fund, which is based in Arlington, Va., and has an office in North Carolina, paid $3.1 million to the Hurst family members for the remaining 90 acres. The family had claimed to have inherited the land and had fought state efforts to take it without what they considered just compensation. The Conservation Fund immediately leased the land back to the state for the park’s use. The state will repay the Conservation Fund over the next three years. That’s the money Hudson said the county committed to help provide.

The court settlement set aside 27 acres that include the site of a long-abandoned 4-H Club camp, and gave Turner three years to set up a youth camp there. Near that property is the area Pearson and others have frequently mentioned as a good site for a ramp. Turner did not return phone calls seeking information about her progress on the camp.

Bland, the former park superintendent, said he didn’t think it was right, and was potentially a bad precedent, for the state parks to accept a donation of up to $1 million in exchange for boat access or a seat at the table in the planning process.

Hudson, however, said the county’s request shouldn’t be taken as a demand for more access to the planning process than that available to the general public. The county, he added, would like to see a boat launch in the area near Swansboro, because there’s great demand, but “it’s not the county’s place” to endorse or request a ramp facility at the park.

The money, he said, comes from the county’s occupancy tax, which is intended to foster tourism development. Buying the property along Queens Creek for the park surely qualifies, Hudson said.

“We would have input whether or not we provided any money,” he said. “But this money was certainly not pledged for a boat ramp.”

He added that only $250,000 of the money is in the county’s current budget. It will be up to subsequent county commissioners to provide the three other installments pledged, Hudson noted

Strong also denied the county was getting anything “special” for its contribution.

“The county’s $1 million contribution toward acquisition of the property, to be made over four years, is definitely not in exchange for the opportunity to provide input to the master plan,” he said by email, after he had been interviewed by phone. “The county’s input during the planning process is welcome, as is input from all stakeholders, partners and the public. The planning process will include multiple opportunities for everyone to provide input and is completely separate from the county’s contribution for land acquisition.”

What the People Say

Bright and Buchanan, the Onslow County commissioners, said they were told by county staff that the county’s money was for the property purchase, not for a boat ramp. But Bright said that good access to the planning process would ensure that the county can adequately represent county residents’ desires.

“I’ve had a lot of calls from citizens,” he said. “There are people in the Friends of Hammocks Beach on both sides of the fence, and probably some who are on the fence. I didn’t think this was going to be a big issue, but it obviously has become one. I see the need for more boat launching facilities, for sure, but if people don’t want it at the park, we need to know that.”

Buchanan, likewise, said he would like to see a survey of area residents and park users, and said he always tries to follow the desires of his constituents.

Pearson in March said the Friends’ group had begun such a survey, but the results have yet to be posted on the group’s website.

Roberts, the Friends member, opposes the ramp, said most of the responses he’s collected support hiking trails, camping areas and low-impact improvements, but don’t mention a ramp as something they’d like to see at the park.

Roberts said he understands the perceived need for a new boat launch in the area, but is unconvinced that the park is the right place for it. “I’m not a Luddite or a tree-hugger,” he said. “I just think there are better places for this than at a state park. It would take a lot of clearing, probably a lot of dredging in Queens Creek, and it’s just not what people want to see in the park.”

Thursday: Where to go from here

Learn More

• Hammocks Beach State Park
• Connect NC Bond
• Friends of Hammocks Beach

Reprinted from the Tideland News

Offshore leases for oil and natural gas off the N.C. coast are almost surely off the table through at least 2022, but seismic testing is not, and conservation groups are waiting to see if they’ll need to continue to fight.

The Obama administration’s decision to remove the East Coast from the next proposed offshore leasing plan would seem to relieve the immediate need to blast sound waves through the ocean floor to find likely sources of fossil fuels. But none of the companies that have sought the seismic permits have withdrawn their applications with the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, or BOEM, yet.

“We haven’t received any indication yet that they plan to do that (withdraw),” John Filostrat, an agency spokesman said recently. “They might well just want to see what’s out there.”

As a result, opponents of the testing are in wait-and-see mode. But they’re hoping, and even doing a little planning.

“Now that offshore drilling won’t be considered in the Atlantic for years, there is absolutely no reason to move forward with seismic air gun blasting, which would put our fisheries and marine mammals in harm’s way,” said Claire Douglass, spokesperson for Oceana, the international conservation group that led the opposition against including the East Coast in the proposed leasing plan.

But, she added, Oceana is still pondering what to do, and is working behind the scenes, talking to federal officials and members of Congress. Some members, including Rep. Walter B. Jones, a Republican who represents coastal North Carolina, have already opposed the tests.

Currently, eight applications to conduct seismic testing are winding through the federal permitting process. The National Marine Fisheries Service, part of NOAA, is considering issuing authorizations that will allow the ships used for the testing to harm or harass, or “take” in language of the law, whales and other animals protected under federal laws.

While there have been reports that NMFS could act within weeks on some of those permit applications, Filostrat said it’s also possible that those decisions might not be made “until summer or even later in the year.”

North Carolina has already determined that four permit applications are consistent with the state’s coastal-management laws. Positive “consistency reviews” are needed before NMFS and BOEM reviews could begin. The N.C. Division of Coastal Management granted in April 2015 the permits for Spectrum Geo and GX Technology. Within two months, the division approved CGG Services and TGS for seismic surveying.

One other, TDI-Brooks, didn’t require a consistency determination because the firm uses sonar, not seismic guns.

Many of the most prominent marine mammal scientists in the world, including Doug Nowacek of the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, have argued against seismic testing, which they believe can disrupt the mammals’ communications and alter migration patterns, feeding and, potentially, even mating. For some mammals, such as the endangered right whale, those disruptions could be devastating to the population.

Nowacek said recently that he doesn’t foresee “whales and dolphins dying and floating to the surface and washing ashore” if the testing occurs. He remains worried, though, about the considerable number of incidental takes typically allowed as a part of the practice elsewhere.

He’s especially worried about the right whales, and that although the now-dropped East Coast drilling plan banned wells inside 50 miles, seismic testing would be allowed within three miles of shore, plenty close enough to cause problems for the dolphins that frolic in our waters.

Two regional fishery management councils, the Mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic, have also expressed great concerns in official letters to BOEM, saying testing would affect benthic ecosystems, fish habitat and fishermen. The councils, combined, manage fisheries in federal waters, from three to 200 miles offshore, along most of the East Coast.

The industry has countered that there is no scientific evidence that directly links seismic sound waves to the deaths, stranding or other harm to whales and other marine creatures. It notes that it has conducted similar tests around the world with few incidences.

Nowacek, who through his work has close ties to people in the oil industry, doubts the testing firms will proceed, but concedes there’s no way to know for sure.

“It’s hard to imagine the oil companies paying for it, when (Atlantic) drilling is out of the 2017-22 plan and there’s no guarantee it will be in the next plan,” he said. “The (testing) companies could do it on their own, but who are they going to sell it (the resulting data) to?”

Filostrat said there are some potential buyers – the data can be used to help site offshore wind turbines, to locate sand deposits for mining and beach projects and for pure science – but said oil companies might be interested anyway, because they think in times much longer than five or even 10 years. Conceivably, they might pay for the data and then hold on to it until the times change and there is more demand and support for drilling.

Congress, he noted, could even mandate that the East Coast be placed back in the 2017-22 plan. And a new president who takes office in January 2017 could also do that or could simply put it back in the next plan.

Douglass said that while Oceana was grateful the Obama administration listened to coastal communities on the drilling issue, “I hope they will continue to listen and stop seismic air gun blasting in the Atlantic.”

Forty-three East Coast local governments adopted resolutions opposing seismic testing, she said, and 52 adopted resolutions against testing and drilling.

Filostrat said that no matter what happens next, the process, so far, has worked well.

“Dealing with the public was good and informative,” he said. “A lot of smart, well-informed and concerned residents made their voices heard. I personally went to at least a dozen public meetings, and the commitment was impressive. In the end, the (U.S.) Interior (Department) Secretary (Sally Jewell) made a tough call.”

The official interior department press release explained it this way: “Many factors were considered in the decision to remove this sale from the 2017-2022 program including: significant potential conflicts with other ocean uses such as the Department of Defense and commercial interests; current market dynamics; limited infrastructure; and opposition from many coastal communities.”

Learn More

• Science: A Review of the Impacts of Seismic Air Gun Surveys on Marine Life
• BOEM draft environmental study

This story is provided courtesy of the Tideland News, a weekly newspaper in Swansboro. Coastal Review Online is partnering with the Tideland to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast. You can read other stories about the Swansboro area here.

WILMINGTON — New Hanover County launched about two years ago an ambitious project to create a comprehensive plan to help guide development decisions in the rapidly growing and quickly urbanizing coastal county during the next 25 years.

At the time, Carolinas Cement Co., a subsidiary of Titan America LLC, was seeking various approvals necessary to dramatically expand its terminal and mining operations off Holly Shelter Road, near the Northeast Cape Fear River, to a massive cement-production plant. But on March 10, Titan pulled the plug on that plan.

While the company cited market conditions as the reason, few doubted that the decision was likely made more feasible by a bruising, nearly eight-year battle, led by the N.C. Coastal Federation, which questioned the effects the plant would have on air quality, water quality and life in general in the Castle Hayne area of northern New Hanover.

Ruth Smith, communications officer for the county, insisted recently that Titan’s decision has had “no impact” on the comprehensive plan’s progress. “We’re not looking at specific projects,” she said, but others see an opportunity to recalibrate for the future.

“We’d like to see the whole community look at the possibilities of that corridor along the Northeast Cape Fear River corridor,” said Mike Giles, the federation’s coastal advocate in Wrightsville Beach, a few minutes’ drive from the Titan site. “The area could be an unbelievable economic engine for the community.”

Giles said the federation would like to see discussion of ways to develop the area with a focus on quality of life.  “Rather than focusing on a single, heavy, polluting industry, or polluting industries, we’d like to see a vision that would encompass good jobs that would also protect the natural resources,” he said.

Titan’s site covers more than 1,000 acres in total, and Bob Odom, general manager of development for the now, at least temporarily abandoned expansion project, said there are no plans to sell any of the land or to develop it. Neither, he said, are there are any plans to seek or support any efforts to change the allowed use of the property, which is zoned I-2, or heavy industrial. Instead, he said, the company would strongly prefer that the county not allow any significant residential development nearby, since that kind of development is incompatible with mining operations.

Odom said he doesn’t foresee any short-term end to those operations.

The company, Odom said, hasn’t participated in the comprehensive plan project, nor has it been asked to do so. But, he said Titan is following the process.

So, of course, is Karen Dunn, who is the clean communities’ coordinator for the federation’s Wrightsville Beach office. She has served on comprehensive plan committees throughout the process and has been relatively pleased by the work, which is near the point where it will go to the county planning board for a recommendation to the county board of commissioners.

“I see it (the comprehensive plan) as a great opportunity,” she said recently. “It’s a chance for people to come together, as part of a visioning process, to say what they would like to see happen.”

She said the federation, as part of the coalition that fought the Titan expansion, should be at the forefront of that process. “We will continue to press for public participation,” she added. “That’s my passion.”

The real key, Dunn said, might be what happens after the comprehensive plan is approved and adopted. The next step is turning the county’s piecemeal development rules into a unified development ordinance. That could include rezoning certain areas, the possibility to which Odom referred.

The county’s zoning map shows property to the west of Titan’s industrial site, close to the river, as a conservation district. Land to the southwest is zoned general residential, and to the south, it’s shown as “community, mixed use.” The process for developing a unified ordinance will include opportunities for residents to weigh in.

Dunn noted that the county’s zoning classification system dates back to the late 1960s, and there have been relatively few significant changes since then. That was a period before the U.S. Clean Water Act, even before the state’s ground-breaking Coastal Area Management Act, which required land-use plans in all 20 coastal North Carolina counties.

Thinking has changed, Dunn said, and so have philosophies of what kinds of development should occur in specific locations.

Ideally, she said, the county’s development ordinance would include entirely new zoning classifications to reflect the philosophical changes regarding proper land uses in specific areas, particularly those close to water, and even more particularly those close to rivers as environmentally and culturally significant as the Northeast Cape Fear River. The county, she said, should also strongly consider incorporation of conditional-use zoning, which countless communities have used to require specific measures in exchange for development approvals.

“It’s critical,” she said, “to get a good comprehensive plan in place, because that will guide what happens with the UDO (unified development ordinance).”

Giles said the federation wants a more inclusive discussion about the region’s overall economic strategy. He called for a focus on sustainable development that takes advantage of, but doesn’t adversely affect, natural resources. A community discussion of the future and economic and environmental strategy for the entire lower Cape Fear River is needed, he said. Improvements to the special-use permit process in the county, especially with regard to industrial development, are key. The federation has taken the lead in that effort, presenting ideas to the county manager, Chris Coudriet.

The federation, with money from a $25,000 grant, developed ideas that would allow the county more control of industrial development. The proposal would amend the existing special-use permit process, which until fierce opposition arose appeared to pave the way for the Titan project and allowed existing industry to expand without special permitting.

Finally, Giles said, the federation is focused on a task force strategy, which it has used, “to address protection of groundwater aquifers as one of the primary sources of clean drinking water.”

The U.S. Geological Survey, he said, has identified the southeast coast of North Carolina as one of six areas of concern in the U.S. in terms of sustainable water supplies for the future. Meanwhile, the state-level Lower Cape Fear River Study bill report, championed by Rep. Rick Catlin, R-New Hanover, is due out for comment later this year. This research is important, not only because the Titan project would have used untold amounts of water, but also because New Hanover is growing so quickly.

Officials estimate that in the next 25 years the county will gain about 123,000 new residents, bringing the total nearly 337,000. That’s roughly equivalent to adding another Wilmington.

The plan, according to county officials, is to finish the comprehensive plan this summer, and to begin implementing it. Developing the new development ordinance is expected to take two or three years, with the help of an outside consulting firm.

Dunn said she thinks that’s a good idea, as an outside firm will help ensure not only fair play, but also avoid even the appearance of bias, a critical factor in dealing with the residential, commercial and industrial development community, as well as environmentalist and conservation groups, such as the federation.

Although the comprehensive plan development has slowed in recent weeks because of unexpected issues raised by developers and other business interests, Dunn said she remains convinced the process has been a good one because it values public participation.

“It’s better to have a broad-based stakeholders’ group involved, and a lot of public discussion,” she said.

Smith, the county spokesperson, said public hearings on the comprehensive plan should be announced soon, but there is no set timetable for the plan to go to county commissioners for approval.

Learn More

• New Hanover County’s comprehensive plan
• The Titan decision

This week may provide a glimpse into the future, a look at what our coast could be as sea level continues to inch up because of climate change.

All the planets will line up just right to produce “king tides,” the catchy moniker for highest tides of the year. They occur each fall and spring. The first ones this year will be Thursday through Sunday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is partnering with states and academics across the country in a citizens’ science effort – the King Tides Project – that’s encouraging people from all walks of life to go out during these tides and take photos, and sometimes measurements, and send the photos in to a Flickr account. It began in 2012 in Australia and has since spread around the world.

In North Carolina, the effort is through the UNC Institute of Marine Science in Morehead City. Christine “Chris” Voss, a research assistant, coordinates the work. It’s a part of a larger NOAA-funded research project on the ecological effects of sea-level rise, and she says it’s a natural fit. Voss, who works in the lab of Charles “Pete” Peterson, said the king tides project mostly just provides and seeks information.

“First, we just want to raise awareness,” she said. “We want people to be aware of what’s going on around them, to notice what’s happening. People know what happens in their neighborhoods far better than anyone else. Are there places where flooding occurs now where it didn’t occur in the past? Are there changes in the marshes? Do the floods happen more often?

One way to gather information is collect photographs of the flooding that the extreme high tides cause. “That’s what the project is about,” Voss said. “We want people to be safe when they do it – we don’t want them to take any chances – but we would love them to take these photos and send them in. It’s not difficult; almost everyone carries a cell phone with a camera these days.”

But the second goal of the project, Voss said, is to give people an awareness that what they see in these unusually high tides, caused by lunar cycles, is quite possibly what we might see as normal if sea-level rise continues, as most scientists believe it will.

The N.C. Coastal Resources Commission requested a 30-year forecast in 2015 after the General Assembly rejected a 2010, 100-year report that envisioned a 39-inch sea-level rise. Legislators shelved that report and passed a bill banning state planning for sea-level rise. The scaled-back 30-year report predicts as little as a two-inch rise along the southern coast to as much as 10 inches along the northern Outer Banks.

Regardless of what figures one uses, Voss said, it’s clear that more information is needed, and that the information gleaned from looking at “king tides” as a possible scenario for flooding as sea-level rise continues can help policy-makers. “We’ll make better decisions, do better planning, if we have more information about what could happen,” she said. “We need to know how we might have to adapt, what kinds of choices we might have to make. There might well be a time when we have to make hard choices about how we use our land differently.”

Flooding of streets and neighborhoods will likely get worse, she said, and will require careful planning to avoid. “We still have some time in these places, even very low areas like Down East Carteret County, to do that planning,” Voss said. “But it’s much better to look at what might happen than to close our eyes. And the concept is that the king tides project can help do that.”

King tides are a normal occurrence once or twice every year when the alignment of the Earth, moon, and sun combine to produce the highest tides.

The last major floods in Carteret County occurred in October 2015, when those astronomically high king tides, combined with heavy rainfall and persistent onshore winds, flooded streets in Beaufort and Morehead City. Water levels rose two to four feet across Eastern North Carolina. On the northern Outer Banks, N.C. 12 was closed at Kitty Hawk because of ocean over wash and dune breaches. Many streets in and around downtown Columbia flooded, and water rescues were needed for people near Hobucken in Pamlico County. Charleston, S.C., had some of the highest water levels ever, even compared to hurricanes, and southeastern Florida neighborhoods flooded multiple times.

Voss said she doesn’t expect the king tides this week to be extraordinary. But the key word is “expect,” because these events in North Carolina are notoriously hard to predict. North Carolina extreme tides, she said, are driven more by wind than by lunar phases, and the prevailing southwest winds of late spring through summer can actually reduce tides rather than raise them. In fact, she said, some of the lowest tides in the state can happen in spring. But she’s interested in photos and measurements of those, too.

“I’m more interested in ‘interesting’ events than in just high tides,” she said. “One thing we hope to be able to do is look at measurements and photos and sees if we can match them up to meteorology.”

The goal, of course, is to increase predictability: If you can see what weather conditions do to these major tidal events, you can fine-tune predictions of what might occur, given the conditions, and fine-tune the actions that people might need to take.

Voss hopes people will get more involved in the king tides project. So far, she said, participation has been fair, but not what she’d like to see. It’s pure citizen science, at the grassroots level, she said, and people have a chance, if they participate, to make a difference.

“We want to be able to continue this effort for a long time,” she said. “Right now, it’s funded through 2018, but we’d like to see it last much longer.”

Greg “Rudi” Rudolph keeps tabs on tides – king and otherwise – as the manager of Carteret County’s Shore Protection Office, which is responsible, among other things, for monitoring the beaches and dunes and determining when and where beach nourishment projects are along Bogue Banks.

1
King tides can show us our future.

Like Voss, he doesn’t expect these king tides to be very extreme, but he also can’t be sure. With the April 7 new moon, he said, everything – Earth, moon and sun – “will be aligned as close as they can and in a straight line. If we have a storm on top of that, then that’s worse, but not the end of the world I would hope.”

He’s not so sure that it’s all that accurate to look at king tides as a precursor to the near-term future – this one is expected to be about a foot higher than usual – but he sees value in the project.

“That (one foot) would be a heck of a lot of sea-level rise,” he said. “The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an international group under the auspices of the United Nations) doesn’t have us reaching that much of rise until past 2050 in their worst scenario. However, this is where the nuisance flooding comes to play. A few inches more of sea-level rise and the king tides become more problematic.”

The research project will have value if it highlights those types of problems, Randolph said, and educates people about how weather affects the tides.

“If the project can also accentuate that it would be much worse if we have unfavorable weather conditions in addition to king tides – for example, a 35 mph northeast wind on April 5-7 – that’s also good,” he said. “If the project can demystify exactly what a king tide is, that’s good, too. It needs to be explained scientifically, so it’s not a mystery.”

 Learn More

• King tides project in North Carolina
• King tides calendar
• King tides and climate change
• King tides of 2015