There’s been a lot of talk and writing about how ocean levels have been rising and will continue to rise. The current projections are that the ocean will rise an estimated 12-14 inches by 2050 and ever higher in the ensuing decades.

With all of the very technical and well-researched and documented writing published about this topic, let’s take a look at what that means for us as anglers and other people who enjoy the coastal waters.

Fourteen inches of rise may not seem like a big deal when accounting for the vastness of the entire ocean, but there will be definite changes. They won’t be great.

Dr. Shintaro Bunya, an avid angler, is also a research scientist at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill’s Center for Natural Hazards Resilience. His work involves hydrodynamic and coastal modeling, specializing in developing and applying numerical models to simulate and forecast storm surges, compound flooding and the general physics of coastal water movement.

His goal is to provide the data and tools that government agencies and local communities need to better understand and prepare for coastal flood risks. This all means that he is right in the middle of what is going on concerning coastal flooding.

First, let’s talk about tides. It will happen gradually but the number of times the tide will rise over the streets in coastal towns will increase.

“The data confirms that sea levels are not just rising; the rate of that rise is accelerating,” Bunya recently said to me.

Obviously, this will make it more difficult for smaller beach towns than bigger cities due to limited resources, but even the biggest coastal cities like Miami and New York will have problems with saltwater in the sewage treatment plants. South Florida towns already see high tides coming into lawns almost every day. Some days the low tide will be what the high tide used to be.

Higher tides will disperse fish over wider areas. With more places to access, fish will be more difficult to locate. It’s likely that they will be less abundant, also because of increased pressure on fish populations from humans and water quality issues. What this means is that fishing will become increasingly difficult and individual anglers will have less and less success.

Access to the water will become increasingly difficult as well. Many of the places we use now may become inaccessible as water rises, as documented by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“According to NOAA’s tide gauge measurements, we have observed about 11 inches of rise since 1950 along the North Carolina coast and we face a unique challenge here because our land is also slowly subsiding (sinking),” said Bunya.

Let’s take boat ramps for example. These are already built upon the lowest ground available in order to accommodate parking next to the water. During high tide conditions, parking lots may become flooded, ironically making the ramp unusable due to there being too much water.

Some communities may become unlivable. In certain areas, high tides will make it impossible to access places. At this time, only the very highest tides cause this flooding. The popular term that has been coined by the TV weather stations is “King Tides.” These are the very highest water level periods, which coincide with the periods of full moon, especially during September and October.

People who live in Down East Carteret County are familiar with having to drive alternate routes or even plan their trips to the grocery store around the tides.

“What was once considered a ‘100-year flood’ is happening much more frequently,” Bunya said. “We are seeing a marked increase in high-tide flooding (often called ‘sunny day flooding’), where coastal streets and yards flood even without a storm, simply because the tide is higher than it used to be.”

Higher tides such as these will occur more frequently. Anglers will find the fish so spread out they will be extremely difficult to locate. In many places, as has been already mentioned, the tides will get so high that locals will find themselves stranded for hours and possibly days at a time. Military-style vehicles with super-high ground clearance will be needed in order to drive around numerous coastal communities. Going fishing will not be a great concern.

Personally, I have been stuck with no recourse a time or two already and have had to either take long detours or find a place to hang out as the water receded. The increased sea levels will make it harder for commercial fishers to make a living in seaside communities because access points will become inaccessible and because the fish will be more difficult to locate. Also just driving from one place to another will be difficult in these places.

According to a 2024 NOAA report, Beaufort will face 60 high-tide flooding days by 2050 and 338 by 2100. Wilmington will experience 30 high-tide flooding days by 2050 and 323 by 2100. This will make it extremely difficult to travel and work in those communities. From there on, the situation only gets worse.

Again, according to Bunya, “By the end of the century, we are looking at a likely range of 2 to 4 feet of rise, though scenarios up to 7 feet are possible.”

So the next several decades will provide challenges to already existing infrastructure such as bridges and culverts that were not built to withstand such saltwater intrusion. The groundwater will be inundated and the tillable soil in areas such as Open Grounds Farm, a roughly 45,000-acre farm in Down East Carteret County operated by a corporation based in Italy, will be threatened. Work and school will be disrupted due to the inability to travel. Tropical storms will be more of a problem in the future because storm surge will be on top of higher water levels than measured historically.

There is a lot to ponder here. Hiding our heads in the disappearing sand will not make the problem go away.

Few things infuriate fishermen more than reeling in a hard-fought saltwater fish only to find it half eaten by a shark.

The phenomenon known as shark depredation has for decades vexed recreational anglers and commercial fishermen.

More than three-quarters of a century have passed since Ernest Hemingway masterfully captured the heartbreak of shark depredation in his Pulitzer Prize-winning novella “The Old Man and the Sea,” a tale about an aging Cuban fisherman’s dayslong battle to reel in a giant marlin only to have it devoured by sharks.

Yet, in recent years, this conflict has seized the spotlight as a modern-day challenge.

A team of researchers took a deep dive into the history of shark depredation, pooling their knowledge and data spanning the course of the last 100 years. Their recently published study in the ICES Journal of Marine Science examined shark depredation across Atlantic recreational fisheries from the waters in Maine to Texas and the U.S. Caribbean.

Researchers focused on three groups: recreational anglers, target fisheries and sharks.

What they found is that, while there is a perception that getting sharked is an emerging issue, the reality is that anglers, the fish they target, and the sharks that target those fish are crossing paths more than ever.

“It appears to be more of an urgent and more of an immediate problem now, not necessarily because shark populations have exploded, but because of this combination of all sorts of factors,” said Dr. Marcus Drymon, a lead author of the study.

Drymon, an associate extension professor at Mississippi State University and marine fisheries specialist with Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant, explained that, yes, shark populations have increased over the past quarter-century, “but it’s just much more complicated than that.”

To understand just how complicated, researchers traced back to some of the earliest instances of documented shark depredation chronicled by none other than Hemingway himself.

Hemingway had already proved himself a literary powerhouse when, in the early 1930s, he sought to become the first angler to reel in an intact bluefin tuna from the vibrant turquoise and electric blue Caribbean waters off the Bimini coast in the Bahamas.

“And, consistently, when he would hook up to one of these big fish, they would get torn apart by sharks before he could land the fish,” Drymon said. “That happened for a few years and then those experiences led him to develop different techniques.”

Hemingway modified his fishing gear to make it stronger, and he switched up his angling tactics.

“When Hemingway did that around 1935, it led him to becoming the first person in recorded history to land an intact bluefin tuna in the Bahamas, and it just shows that this conflict has been around for a long time. It’s just that back in Hemingway’s day, there were very, very few other boats on the water trying to do what he was doing and shark populations, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, were in a relatively pristine state,” Drymon said.

That changed in the 1940s with the onset of World War II. The United States, cut off from shipments of cod liver oil from Norway and Iceland, was in desperate need for a cod liver oil substitute.

The high demand for vitamins contained in cod liver oil, including vitamins A and D, led to the nation’s first shark processing plant in Port Salerno, Florida. The plant closed in July 1950. By that time, synthetically produced vitamins had swept the market, rendering the commercial shark fishery in the country obsolete.

At the same time, recreational fishing was on the rise. Post-war Americans had more leisure time, and a new generation of boatbuilders were turning a product that was lighter and powered by smarter engines.

The surge in recreational shark fishing drove the creation of the National Marine Fisheries Service Cooperative Shark Tagging Program in 1962.

Shark landings by recreational anglers remained low through the 1960s and into the early 1970s.

That would all change in the mid-1970s when (cue the theme music) “Jaws” was released in theaters across the country. The runaway blockbuster captured the imaginations of audiences the world over.

“It would be difficult to overstate the impact of ‘Jaws’ on the public’s perception of sharks, a concept coined ‘the Jaws Effect,’” the study states.

By the early 1990s, heavy exploitation of Atlantic shark populations led the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration National Marine Fisheries Service to introduce its first shark fisheries management plan.

By the early 1990s, shark populations in the Atlantic had been heavily exploited, prompting NOAA to implement the first fisheries management plan for sharks, he said. Shark populations that are overfished take a long time to recover because they are inherently slow growers, late to mature, and have relatively low reproductive output.

“We’ve now had 30 years of really successful efforts on the part of NOAA fisheries to rebuild and recover these shark populations and I would say that what we’re seeing today is a result of those management efforts,” he said. “But, there are downstream effects, because today there are so many more anglers on the water. The way they see it, there’s more sharks than they’ve ever seen. Sure, if they’ve only been fishing for the past 20 years, that is absolutely the case. But I would make the argument there’s nowhere near as many sharks now as there were in the 50s and 60s.”

The study notes that shark depredation is a widespread issue. There are at least 51 target species, notably red snappers and some groupers, vulnerable to predation by 22 species of sharks, according to the study.

Two of those species, the sandbar shark, which is federally protected, and the bull shark, are the worst offenders.

To lessen the impacts of those and other depredators, researchers suggest anglers take a page from Hemingway’s book, figuratively, or course.

“Our specific recommendations in terms of behavior change are relatively simple,” Drymon said. “The first one is, if and when you get depredated by a shark, move spots. I don’t say that lightly. I realize that’s a frustrating thing to have to do, especially if your spot’s a long way out in the middle of nowhere. But that is a good practice to follow.”

Second, try to avoid highly fished areas where there’s constant pressure on target species.

“Sharks are much more likely to habituate and hang out there and learn that depredation provides an easy meal for them,” Drymon said.

Third, be open to using deterrents Drymon and other researchers are currently testing.

“Our objective, our heart, is to give these deterrents to as many anglers as we possibly can, have them help us in the testing process with the hopes that those deterrents can let people fish at their favorite spots without being depredated as much as they normally would have,” he said. “As these deterrents continue to be developed, we’ll continue to try to test those and make our best recommendations to anglers and fishermen as to which ones are effective and which ones are not.”

Drymon said he’s also not opposed to the sustainable harvest of species of sharks that, like the bull shark, are not federally protected.

“If populations are not overfished and are not experiencing overfishing and there’s fishery management plans that allow for quota and harvest of those individuals, I think that’s a great, great option,” he said. “Just like any other fish in the ocean, I think that there is a time and a place for harvest of these animals provided that it can be done sustainably and provided that markets are in place for fishermen to profit from that harvest. I would be happy to help the establishment and the development of sustainable markets for shark products, particularly in the United States.”

If the Coastal Resources Commission Science Panel’s draft report to the state last week was a master class in explaining ocean beach erosion processes along the state’s 320-mile Atlantic Coastline, there may have been some state legislators who were wishing they could cut class.

Lawmakers hustled to get a proposed bill lifting a four-decade ban on oceanfront hardened structures moved to the Senate Appropriations Committee days before Science Panel Chair Dr. Laura Moore, a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill professor in the Department of Earth, Marine and Environmental Sciences, presented the 47-page draft, “Report on the Effects of Hard Structures on Sandy, Open-Ocean Coastlines,” to the commission during its regular meeting Thursday in New Bern.

Senate Bill 1009, which would lift the ban on hardened structures such as breakwaters, bulkheads, seawalls, jetties, revetments, and terminal groins, was advanced by the Senate Agriculture Committee Wednesday to the Appropriations Committee.

Another, related bill, Senate Bill 1001, also was referred to the same committee. The measure would allow use of state funds for permitting, building, or repairing terminal groins, which are sand-trapping walls built perpendicular to the shore at inlets.

Moore, along with her colleagues on the nine-member Science Panel, is a coastal scientist who has done extensive research on the North Carolina coast. The draft report the panel produced, divided into sections — an introduction to shoreline changes and dynamics, and some erosion management practices; effects of sand-trapping and -blocking structures; case studies of some structures and lessons learned; coastal erosion policies of other states; and finally, some recommendations based on best science and engineering — but offered no easy solutions to address the alarmingly severe erosion along parts of the coast, or ways to protect coastal infrastructure.

The report is intended to provide scientific and technical information for policymakers, regulators and legislators.

“Section two is really the meat of the report, and this is where we talk about the effects of structures that trap sand and structures that harden the shoreline … the purpose, the physical effects, adverse effects, ecological impacts,” said Moore. “We frame all of this largely in terms of trade-offs, because there are benefits and there are costs. And really, it’s all about trade-offs.”

Pointing to a slide illustration of a section of coast showing sand moving in and out of an area, Moore explained that whether there is accretion or erosion is a result of the way wave processes and shoreline orientation in the offshore seabed are directed at various sections of beach, and whether more sand is moving in or out.

“When I teach this in class, I tell my students, ‘this is just like your checkbook,’” Moore told the commission. “If you are adding more money in than you are spending, then you have a positive balance, and you’re in the black. And if you are taking out more money than you are actually adding to your checking account, you’re going to be in the red. In this case of the shoreline, we’re going to be eroding.”

Moore said it is not the big hurricanes that lead to the dramatic destruction now most evident on Hatteras Island in Dare County, where 32 houses in recent years have collapsed into the ocean in Rodanthe and Buxton.

“I’ll say that storm impacts are probably what tend to come to mind first for those who are thinking about the problems we need to address along the coast,” she said. “However, it is long-term chronic erosion that makes homes and infrastructure vulnerable to storm impacts. Most of our coastline has been naturally eroding over the long term to varying degrees, with some locations having very high natural background erosion rates, such as the northern flank of Cape Hatteras, which eroded at rates greater than 20 feet per year between 1852 and 1946 and for the many centuries preceding that time.”

But, Moore added, oceanfront construction rules are generally based on a 30-year setback, although buildings last longer than 30 years. Another complication is that large storm impacts are reaching farther landward, an impact that will be seen more in the future, she said, and sea levels are expected to be about a foot higher by 2050, compared with 2000. Along with other climate impacts, “mitigating erosion and protecting or trying to reduce risk to infrastructure will unfortunately become more and more challenging,” Moore said.

During the public comment portion of the meeting, Buxton resident Brian Harris, representing the Hatteras Island village’s civic association, asked the commission to support the proposed legislation and “a responsible, modern approach” to erosion control. While calling Buxton’s devastation “not just a failure of nature, but a failure of man,” he urged the commission to seek a bipartisan approach and work with partnerships for innovative solutions.

“Coastal policies drafted 40 years ago were never meant to be a suicide pact for our coast,” Harris said. “Hatteras and Ocracoke are now in state of emergencies, and as North Carolinians, we can all just simply do better.”

But with decades of flashing lights from early users of seawalls and groins, illustrated by New Jersey’s skinny beaches in front of seawalls, coastal scientists have warned that sand barriers and traps rob beaches of sand by creating down drift erosion or blocking sand travel onto the shoreline.

“North Carolina lawmakers have kept this policy in place for generations because these structures don’t work,” said Zach Wallace, Audubon North Carolina Policy Director, in a June 11 prepared statement. “They rob sand from other parts of the beach, making erosion worse and putting habitat and coastal communities at greater risk. It’s like balancing a budget by moving debt onto someone else’s books.”

In its recommendations at the end of the report, the science panel urged careful consideration of the adverse impacts and use of experts before moving forward on any proposed projects, which are nearly always expensive, long-term commitments. Even urgent situations such as the house collapses on Hatteras Island cannot change the realities of a hardened coast.

“The Buxton case study illustrates that groins can temporarily change where erosion occurs, but they do not eliminate the underlying erosional processes,” as one recommendation stated. “Further, attempting to maintain an intended shoreline position requires regular nourishment and hardened structures deteriorate over time and can be damaged during storms, necessitating repeated structural repair and emergency measures.”

North Carolina lawmakers pushed forward a pair of bills Wednesday that, in tandem, would repeal a decades-old ban on hardened coastal erosion-control structures and secure state funding for terminal groins.

Senate Bill 1009 aims to erase the state’s 40-year prohibition on hardened structures, including breakwaters, bulkheads, seawalls, jetties, revetments, and terminal groins.

A provision in amended Senate Bill 1001 would allow state funds to cover permitting, building, or repairing terminal groins, rock- and steel-constructed wall-like structures built perpendicular to the shore at inlets to contain sand in areas of high erosion.

Both measures were advanced Wednesday morning to the Senate Appropriations Committee, but not without pushback. The next step for these bills is unclear as the Senate Appropriations Committee does not meet regularly.

Before the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Energy, and Environment voted on the bills Wednesday morning, Sen. Julie Mayfield, D-Buncombe, questioned how state rules may be written to equally protect oceanfront properties facing severe erosion and adjacent properties that may be negatively affected by erosion-control structures.

Asking rulemakers, in this case the Coastal Resources Commission, to write such rules would be “asking them to pick winners and losers,” Mayfield said.

“It’s the vast majority of downstream, I say downstream, I don’t know if it’s called something else on the coast, but downstream properties are disadvantaged when these sorts of structures go in,” she said.

Hardened erosion-control structures have long been controversial because they capture sand that travels down the beach nearshore, depleting the sand supply to the beach immediately downdrift of the structure, stripping land that is natural habitat for, among others, sea turtles and shorebirds.

Sen. Michael Lazzara, R-Onslow, one of the primary sponsors of the bill to lift the hardened structures ban, responded to Mayfield by asking whether the many homes destroyed by landslides and floods caused by Hurricane Helene in 2024 should not be permitted to be rebuilt.

“It’s the same thing on the coast. We’re losing a lot of homes due to these erosions and anything that we could do to mitigate that is just responsible, the same that we’re addressing that in western Carolina. I think these natural storms have a lot of erosions, whether it’s in the west or the east and people are affected by it,” Lazzara said.

Mayfield said she appreciated the analogy, but that thousands of homes will not be rebuilt in western North Carolina “because the land that they were on doesn’t exist anymore.”

Furthermore, she said, Hurricane Helene was not a once-in-a-lifetime storm, but rather a “once-in-a-10,000-year storm.”

“But that’s not what happens on the coast, right?” she continued. “On the coast, we have storms much more frequently, not nearly as intense, but much more frequently, much more flooding on a regular basis. And, again, I acknowledge that there are houses standing in the water right this very moment, and we need a solution to that, because having them fall down and disintegrate in the water is not the right answer, but also, using these structures to try to protect homes – Mother Nature is undefeated. I’ll just say that.”

Republican Sen. Bob Brinson, who represents Beaufort, Craven and Lenoir counties, pointed out that Senate Bill 1009 also would direct funding to the North Carolina Collaboratory to update the state’s Beach and Inlet Management Plan. That plan was last updated 10 years ago.

He told the committee that sand nourishment, a method by which sand is typically removed from nearby inlets or offshore and placed on the beach to build up eroded ocean shorelines, is not always an appropriate erosion-mitigation measure.

“As I addressed last week, beach nourishment also is getting more and more expensive and not lasting as long,” Brinson said. “And so, in repealing the hardened structure ban, it’s giving our state the opportunity to explore other options rather than saying ‘no’ or ‘never’, it’s ‘how about this’ and ‘how about’ because it will be site specific.”

Some members of the committee asked whether other alternatives have been explored to address problems associated with escalating erosion along portions of the state’s coastline. On the Outer Banks, more than 30 homes have toppled in recent years on ocean beaches that vanished because of erosion.

“We shouldn’t keep banging our heads against the wall, doing the same thing over and over again,” Mayfield said. “That’s not helping. Homes will continue to be put at risk. Businesses will continue to be put at risk. I think it’s time to start looking for permanent solutions to problems we’re seeing on the coast and the only way that I can see to do that is to have a permanent buyout fund. You know, government works best when it steps in to where the private market doesn’t work, and the private market doesn’t work on the coast right now.”

Brinson said the repeal does not focus solely on homes, but also public infrastructure, including the erosion and overwash-embattled N.C. Highway 12.

“This gives the CRC the authority to drop rules for these hardened structures, which will be informed by the Beach and Inlet Management Plan that we’ve tasked the Collaboratory to do, and also the science board under the CRC and their report that’s coming out,” he said.

The science advisory panel’s report, intended as a guide for coastal managers and policymakers to tackle the escalating erosion along the state’s coastline, is on the CRC agenda for discussion Thursday in New Bern.

“Our constituents are tired of hearing ‘no, you can’t do this,’ and ‘no, you can’t do that.’ Repealing this ban gives the state the ability to say, ‘here’s what you can do,’” Brinson said.

Nearly 15 years have passed since the North Carolina General Assembly repealed the law banning permanent, hardened erosion-control to grant a handful of beach communities along the state’s southern coast the option to pursue installing a terminal groin at an inlet area.

Since then, Bald Head Island and Ocean Isle Beach have been the only local governments to fund and build terminal groins on their beaches.

As the law stands, state funds may not be used for terminal groins.

A provision in Senate Bill 1001 would allow money from the Coastal Storm Damage Mitigation Fund to be tapped for costs associated with the permitting, construction or repair of a terminal groin. In order to receive funds, terminal groin projects would have to meet specific requirements, including a determination that the structure would benefit public lands and that costs to build or repair a groin will “not include the costs of financial assurance or costs of implementation of any component of the applicable inlet management plan.”

Lazzara indicated Wednesday morning that the language pertaining to state funding for terminal groins in Senate Bill 1001 may be revised.

Coastal Review will not publish Friday in recognition of the Juneteenth holiday.

Dr. Joel Fodrie has been named the new director of Duke University Marine Lab in Beaufort.

Most recently director of University of North Carolina Chapel Hill’s Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City, Fodrie will succeed outgoing director Andy Read, who was in the leadership role for 10 years and will remain on the faculty once Fodrie comes aboard, Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment said Wednesday.

“The Duke Marine Lab is a gold standard among centers of coastal and marine research, both in the social sciences and the natural sciences. Its coastal setting is ideal for exploring how humans and natural systems affect one another. I’m very excited about working with the faculty, staff and students to support, and even enhance, place-based research and teaching that has local and far-reaching impacts,” Fodrie said in a statement.

Fodrie will join later this summer the lab that “has centered on field-based discovery, immersive learning and close mentorship” for nearly nine decades, the university said.

“As director, Joel will build on Andy’s legacy and further strengthen strategic connections between Beaufort and Durham while guiding the Marine Lab’s next chapter as a world-class leader in marine science and research,” said Lori Bennear, Stanback Dean of the Nicholas School.

Fodrie earned his bachelor’s degree in biology and history from UNC Chapel Hill, and his doctorate in biological oceanography from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at University of California, San Diego.

His research focuses on coastal and estuarine ecosystems, fisheries ecology and the resilience of marine communities and his scholarship includes more than 100 peer-reviewed publications and extensive external grant support.

“Joel has the research, academic and leadership expertise we were looking for in a director. But beyond that, he brings a reputation as a trusted community partner deeply appreciative of and knowledgeable about North Carolina coastal ecosystems,” said Erika Weinthal, the Nicholas School’s John O. Blackburn Distinguished Professor, who chaired the Marine Lab director search committee

Among various honors, Fodrie received recognition as an Early-Career Research Fellow with the Gulf Research Program, part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. In 2024, he was named one of five recipients of the Thomas Willis Lambeth Distinguished Chair in Public Policy, a five-year term professorship to recognize and honor outstanding teachers and scholars.

“On a personal level, I grew up in Beaufort, North Carolina, and have known about the significance of the Marine Lab essentially my whole life,” Fodrie said. “I certainly view this as a one-of-a-kind opportunity to help shape the direction and impact of the Lab to ensure wise and sustainable use of our coastal and marine ecosystems.”

While state lawmakers consider two bills that would eliminate the state’s longstanding ban on hardened structures along the ocean shoreline, a report providing details about the effects and effectiveness of coastal erosion-control structures is expected to be presented this week during the regular meeting of the North Carolina Coastal Resources Commission.

The commission, which meets at 10 a.m. Thursday at the DoubleTree in New Bern, had assigned to its science advisory panel in February the task of creating the document that is intended as a guide for coastal managers and policymakers to address increasingly destructive erosion along the state’s 320 miles of coastline — dramatically illustrated in recent years by more than 30 houses on the Outer Banks falling into the ocean.

Two measures in the North Carolina General Assembly, Senate Bill 1008 and Senate Bill 1009, had not advanced as of the time this story was published, with some legislators expressing caution about taking action prematurely.

“I guess I’m a little concerned about putting the provisions of these two bills in place before that study comes out,” said Sen. Julie Mayfield, D-Buncombe, Wednesday during a meeting of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Energy, and Environment. “My instinct is, ‘Let’s just see what happens there, see what they say, see what that leads us to do that’s different than what’s here.’”

Impacts of climate change on long-term erosion rates are also a factor to consider, said Wake County Democrat Sen. Lisa Grafstein, noting that the topic may be covered in the CRC Science Panel report.

Sen. Bob Brinson, R-Beaufort and also representing Craven and Lenoir counties, told the committee while introducing the bills that while coastal communities suffer direct economic and personal losses from severe erosion, the general public is also affected. Alluding to safety concerns from fallen house debris spreading along public lands and waters, he said that there are also losses to the local tax base and tourism revenue as well as to visitor access to the seashore.

The two bills are different sides of the same coin, that is, the stated goal of allowing the option to build hardened structures that are now banned, if deemed appropriate.

The primary sponsor of the bills is Sen. Bobby Hanig, a Currituck County Republican who also represents Dare County in Senate District 1, which includes the Outer Banks’ beaches in both counties. Hanig did not respond to messages left on his cellphone seeking comment.

Senate Bill 1008 would establish a pilot program that authorizes construction of shoreline-stabilization projects at locations where oceanfront houses are at imminent risk of collapse. A limited number of projects would be evaluated and recommended by the North Carolina Collaboratory, which the General Assembly authorized in 2016 to apply scientific scrutiny to projects in the state that may serve the public good.

Senate Bill 1009 would eliminate the prohibition of temporary or permanent erosion-control structures and create regulations to ensure the structures “will not result in significant adverse impacts to private property or to the public recreational beach.”  In addition, the bill would require funding the Collaboratory to update the state’s 1,000-plus-page Beach and Inlet Management Plan, which was last fully updated in 2016.

Brinson told committee members that whatever pilot projects are approved would include strict limitations and monitoring requirements and would not be funded by the state. Still, in defending the need to eliminate the ban to allow the erosion-control structures, he cited the hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ dollars spent in maintaining and repairing N.C. Highway 12 on Hatteras and Ocracoke islands. But Brinson was referring to areas where virtually none of the typical hardened structures would work for long — if at all. Even if seawalls or other structures were affordable at those locations, the intensity of the coastal conditions would either soon undermine or pummel the structures, or create worse situations at the site or downstream.

Sandbags, which are considered temporary structures under coastal law, have been widely used for decades on the Outer Banks and coastwide. In a sign of the increasingly difficult challenges created by rising seas, shifting channels, and steeply and rapidly eroding beaches, today’s larger and tougher sandbags also often fail to hold back destructive surging surf for long. Protective coastal management measures have been evolving toward more nature-based solutions such as living shorelines, as well as combined measures, such as beach nourishment and one or more of various types of structures, according to an April 2025 study, “Challenges and lessons learned from global coastal erosion protection strategies,” published in the journal iScience.

And while erosion-control structures may buy time, coastal scientists warn that consequences are not always quickly evident. For instance, in one of the few success stories Brinson noted among the handful of existing hardened structures on the North Carolina coast, the terminal groin at Oregon Inlet also has had a significant, albeit slower moving, negative impact.

While providing the intended protection of the Bonner Bridge, now the Marc Basnight Bridge, and the tie-in to N.C. Highway 12, the groin has also caused a hazardous shoal to grow into the navigational channel, which is at risk of becoming much narrower and deeper as it is pushed closer to the groin. That could present a huge issue to Dare County and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which share responsibility and costs of maintaining channels in the inlet, the only sound-to-sea passage between Virginia and Hatteras.

North Carolina’s ban on hardened structures first went into effect in 1985, when the Coastal Resources Commission put rules in place restricting their use to very few instances, such as protection of historic structures. After a court ruling upheld the ban, it was put into law in 2003.

In a recent social media post, Rob Young, the director of the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines at Western Carolina University, wrote that the both political parties in the General Assembly voted in favor of the law because they recognized the harm the structures had done in other states, as well as in North Carolina.

“It was, and still is, good science and good policy,” Young wrote. “Seawalls destroy beaches and increase erosion on neighbors’ properties. Seawalls on individual parcels create a nightmare for coastal managers.”

But Young pointed to the provision in Senate Bill 1009 that would “ensure” no adverse impacts to public and private property, creating “an impossible standard to meet,” he noted.

“The bill would open the door to a coastal management free-for-all,” he wrote.

Second in a series

SNEADS FERRY – The easy chatter of shellfish farmers gearing up for another day of work broke through an otherwise quiet morning landside of the lower New River’s sun-gleamed waters.

The air that early June day still hung cool over the small marina a handful of shellfish growers share as their waterfront hub in this storied fishing village in Onslow County.

Though they run independent shellfishing businesses, this tightknit group supports one another, sharing a passion for what they do for a living and the hardships that come with it.

“This just happened naturally,” oysterman Cody Faison of Ghost Fleet Oyster Co. said before firing up the motor of his well-weathered skiff. “Oyster farming, they’re stronger as communities. What you find here is five farmers who help each other out.”

Like Faison, many of the folks working shellfish leases in Onslow and Pender’s coastal waterways are first-generation aquatic farmers, men and women in an industry challenged by seasonal shellfish mortality events, water quality impacts, and, as of late, fewer areas in which they can farm.

“Part of the reason that all these farms are here is because they can’t go north and they can’t go south,” Faison said.

Temporary and permanent shellfish lease moratoriums in coastal counties to the north and south of Topsail Island have pushed growers to the waters of Topsail Island. The steady increase in shellfish leases has amplified concerns among property owners, boaters, and recreational fishers who argue shellfish farms, particularly those with floating cages, restrict access to prime fishing locations, obstruct scenic waterfront views, and create navigational hazards.

This is the second year in which local officials are pushing for a temporary shellfish lease moratorium in the waters behind Topsail Island.

On Tuesday afternoon, the House Rules, Calendar, and Operations Committee passed proposed House Bill 1113 sponsored by Rep. Ted Davis, R-New Hanover. The bill aims to extend New Hanover County’s shellfish lease moratorium by another five years, appropriate a one-time, $10,000 fund for public education activities related to that county’s lease pause, extend a leasing moratorium in Bogue Sound to July 1, 2028, and impose a two-year moratorium on new leases in parts of Onslow and Pender counties until July 1, 2028.

“This will not prohibit people from going out and getting oysters,” Davis said in the committee meeting Tuesday. “What this prohibits is any more of these new things being put into the water. And, I will say that one of the concerns is the fact, you know, people have the right to use the water. It’s a public trust, and when these cages are put up, it can inhibit people’s enjoyment of that public trust. I know where I live, if a boat was to hit one of these cages, it could be bad. If somebody water skiing on a jet ski, or anything else, hits one of these cages, it’s going to be bad.”

Growers argue a moratorium in Stump and Topsail sounds would only put the squeeze on areas that do not have moratoriums, including waters around Newport, Morehead City and Beaufort.

Faison is not alone in worrying that language in the proposed bill, which currently targets the sounds directly behind Topsail Island, might be changed to include all waters in Pender and Onslow counties, a move that would shut down new leases in bays and creeks in the New River.

“What if this moratorium goes from two to 10 years?” Faison asked during a recent tour of shellfish leases in the lower New River, where he farms a 4-acre water column lease in Traps Bay.

Faison worked his way up to this lease, starting out in the business roughly six years ago by subleasing from a fellow farmer in Topsail Sound. He personally believes the state should promote subleasing. He encourages anyone considering entering the business to go that route.

He doesn’t judge which types of gear or leases other growers use. Farmers who use Seapa baskets, which are smaller and weigh less than typical, heavy-duty wire-mesh floating cages, suspend the baskets from lines that they attach to PVC pipes. That’s why some water column shellfish lease farms are so populated with the pipes, Faison explained.

Faison’s lease is dotted primarily with low-profile floating bags, a method he has found that works best for him.

“This is the future,” he said as he coasted his boat next to a line of bags in his lease. “I think this is going to be my success. I’m not saying this is right for every other farmer.”

For North Carolina oyster farmers, floating gear is the only method for producing the much-sought, high-quality oyster that looks just as pretty on the plate as it tastes, he said. Oysters must be symmetrical, their outer shells clean and barnacle-free.

“We’re all growing oysters for the raw bar, and you can’t do that on the bottom,” Faison said. “There’s no other way to do it. We don’t have enough tide swing.”

Floating gear allows farmers to replicate low tide, giving oysters a twice-daily dry spell that helps them build stronger shells, deter barnacles, and extend their shelf life.

Those North Carolina-grown, presentation-perfect oysters served to customers at area raw bars cost a pretty penny to cultivate.

“Oyster farming is a very tough way to make money,” Faison said. “I think people think we’re out here just killing it.”

According to an economic analysis published in 2024, the average startup cost to launch an off-bottom oyster farm ranges from less than $60,000 for a single line of floating bags to more than $200,000 for 24 lines.

“The total annual cost, including depreciation and interest on invested capital, labor, fuel, seed and other expenses, is estimated to range from approximately $50,000 to operate a single line of floating bags to approximately $250,000 to operate twenty-four lines,” the study states.

As boats go, the 19-footer that Faison bought off a local fisherman is about as basic as they come. There’s no console. No seats — just a couple of stacks of colorful baskets placed to one side of the otherwise flat-bottomed, open vessel.

“Is the better way to look at this a lot more moratoriums or more strict on the DMF side?” Faison said, referring to the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, which permits shellfish leases. “I don’t know the answer. I don’t know that any of us quite yet know how to bridge this gap. Instead of trying to fight for really positive change, we’re just fighting. We’re strong as this big, massive group of people working together for a common goal.”

Nearly a dozen new and amended state fisheries rules touching on everything from false albacore management to shellfish leases and franchises are now in effect.

The N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission’s rule changes became effective June 1.

Under the new rules and amendments, North Carolina is now the second East Coast state behind Massachusetts to manage the false albacore, or “little tunny” fishery.

Rule 15A NCAC 03M .0523 authorizes the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries director to issue a proclamation to manage the false albacore fishery if landings exceed a predetermined threshold. The director must be given prior approval before issue a public notice regarding that fishery.

“The rule establishes means to manage this fishery in North Carolina in case the fishery continues to expand,” according to a division release.

Under one of the new amendments, fishers who use pots are required to mark their pots with one, not two, forms of identification.

Amendments to shellfish leases and franchises that codify current procedures and align with state laws include the following:

• Removing franchises from productions requirements and termination procedures.
• Clarifying that production requirements for shellfish leases are based on the date a shellfish lease was granted or last renewed.
• Clarifying who determines eligibility for additional shellfish lease acreage, the time at which the determination of eligibility for additional acreage occurs, what is considered additional shellfish lease acreage and what is considered acres under a shellfish lease.

Also in effect are amendments to five permit rules, including:

• Requiring seafood dealers that reports trip tickets electronically to report quota monitoring logs electronically.
• Codify four permits in permanent rule that have been required by proclamation, including a dealer permit for the estuarine flounder fishery and the Estuarine Gill Net Permit. There are no changes to the permit requirements.
• Clarify a fish dealer is required to submit a trip ticket for fish not sold, consistent with the North Carolina Mandatory Harvest Reporting law and Marine Fisheries Commission rules for commercial harvest reporting requirements.
• Codify into rule a permit condition that has been required by proclamation that makes it unlawful to refuse to allow Marine Fisheries Commission employees to obtain data for the conservation and management of marine and estuarine resources.
• Broaden the definition of “educational institution” to include schools and educational organizations.
• Add links to webpages in rules for supporting information that can change frequently.
• Repeal the Horseshoe Crab Biomedical Use Permit due to lack of use. Harvest continues to be allowed during the open commercial bait harvest season.
• Add email as an additional means to satisfy call-in requirements for the Scientific or Educational Activity Permit and Weekend Trawling for Live Shrimp Permit.
• Remove the requirement to notarize a permit application and, instead, require only the initial permit general condition form to be notarized.

Fittingly, it was a Carolina blue sky that greeted University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Chancellor Lee H. Roberts as he joined Institute of Marine Sciences researchers for a boat ride Tuesday morning to Cape Lookout National Seashore’s undeveloped barrier islands, a stark contrast to the celebratory gridlock on Franklin Street that the Orange County city can expect after a big win.

Roberts was in Carteret County to meet with faculty and students and learn more about their research at the lab in Morehead City, one of the handful of stops for the chancellor’s second summer tour this year in eastern North Carolina.

The first summer tour in 2025 covered the western part of the state. The 2026 tour began May 29 with two days at Fort Bragg. After Carteret County, he stopped in New Bern, UNC Pembroke, UNC Wilmington and the USS Battleship North Carolina.

Roberts told Coastal Review Tuesday afternoon from inside the institute that these tours are the university’s connection to the state, and its people are “the source of our strength at Carolina.”

Because most of the state’s people do not live in Chapel Hill, Roberts explained that “it’s important to get out around the state and see people where they live and work and see as many communities across the state as we can.”

Roberts continued that most communities don’t have a facility like this one, “where we’ve made a large investment for a for a long time, and so this has been a particularly important part of Carolina’s history, having the physical outpost here, but the work Carolina scientists and researchers are doing is in every nook and cranny of the state, trying to help move the state forward.”

His visit Tuesday included a tour of the lab with a small group, including area media, led by Institute of Marine Sciences Director Dr. Joel Fodrie, a professor in the Earth, marine and environmental sciences department.

Fodrie said that the institute is approaching its 80th year, and the existing building was built about 25 years ago to house research for environmental processes, like water quality, biogeochemistry and geology.

Throughout the tour, Roberts was able to observe research as it was happening and speak to the scientists as they analyzed microbiomes on the coast’s shark species, collected data on how much sediment flows downstream from inland waterbodies, and harvested seagrass seeds for large-scale seagrass restoration. Fodrie also made a point of introducing Roberts to the facilities and administration staff as well, highlighting their important role in keeping the the lab running smoothly.

During a pause by the office of Dr. Rick Luettich, former institute director, the alumni distinguished professor out of his office to talk about an ongoing flood data collection initiative called the Sunny Day Flooding Project.

Luettich said they’ve been working with people on campus, in city and regional planning, and with N.C. State University on the project that uses sensors installed in storm drains and ditches to record water levels.

Luettich pointed to the neighboring office where research specialist in physical oceanography Tony Whipple was building the sensors that measure in real time how “frequently flooding is occurring now, not when a big storm comes, but just when it’s a King Tide, or with sea level rise.”

Luettich said there are sensors in New Bern, Beaufort, Carolina Beach and Down East Carteret County, and there’s a website that shows in real time what the water levels are in these understudied areas.

“We haven’t been really paying attention to whether they flood, but we’re seeing that they flood very frequently, and more and more often as sea level’s rising. So really interesting collaborative project that we’re kind of right at ground zero for,” Luettich said.

On the second floor, UNC Institute for the Environment Director Dr. Michael Piehler paused working on what he called a “really cool experiment” looking at salinity intrusion in farms to chat with Roberts.

Piehler said the “experiment is working on a farm where salinity is coming in and seeing how that affects both the way that the farmers experience the soil and the way we see it as a processor of nutrients, so it’s just another great case of IMS being a beautiful thing.”

When Fodrie directed the group outside of the facility, he gestured to what looked like abstract sculptures with concrete-saturated rope as the medium.

He said these were different types of structures used to build living shorelines, and the university is collaborating with the companies that make these alternatives for hardened bulkheads and seawalls for shoreline restoration.

“We get to play a valuable role,” Fodrie said. “We’re engaging a lot of companies that are doing that to help them refine their projects and protect shorelines better, and in more environmentally friendly ways” he said about what he called the bourgeoning industry.

Fodrie also used the tour to show the chancellor existing needs at the research lab.

The outdoor experimental tanks are high on Fodrie’s list to be modernized and be more accessible to all students for experiments and research, and they’re looking to expand the 2,100-square-foot dormitory that sleeps about 20.

“We would love to have students here,” for the semester, Fodrie said from inside the cramped living space beside the lab, and want to expand the dorm to accommodate about 32 beds. “We have the footprint. We have the space” and plans have been drawn.

“Our grad students have had an increasingly hard time finding a place to live,” Fodrie said. They used to rent beachfront homes and “that game is over. So, we have a real housing crunch.”

In the past, students could pool their resources and together rent the larger beach houses for a reasonable amount, but the by-owner vacation business has priced the students out.  

In the shorter term, Fodrie said IMS is going to invest in turning the existing dorm into four apartments that sleep four each.

“We’re going to actually reduce capacity to 16,” and the apartments will be small, but they’ll be perhaps livable for a whole semester. That only gets us to 16 and we’re trying to get to 32. It’s a good short-term fix, but not a long-term solution,” Fodrie said.

Roberts told Coastal Review after his tour of the lab that the university has had a presence on the coast for 80 years, and “when you spend time here, you realize why. How important it is to undertake the kind of research that our scientists and faculty are pursuing.”

The coast is crucial to the state and to its future, from standpoint of fisheries and the environment, the research into sustainability, oyster farms, and dozens of other areas of research everywhere you look.

“We have 75 people here year-round. It’s a remarkable effort supported by the people of North Carolina, and, and for a good reason, because what’s happening here is integral to North Carolina’s future,” he said.

In a follow-up interview, Fodrie told Coastal Review that the facility serves as UNC’s vanguard for meeting challenges facing the coast, as well as for discovering solutions in focal areas that include coastal resilience, water quality, human health, and fisheries.

“Knowing how broad and diverse the chancellor’s responsibilities are, we are very gratified and appreciative that he would choose to visit the Institute to learn more about our ongoing efforts to serve North Carolina and also explore with us ways to expand our capacity in research and teaching/mentoring,” Fodrie said.

Roberts’ choice to visit the institute also highlights the unique and high-impact role that it has played in UNC’s mission over the last 80 years, since the institute was created, Fodrie continued.

“In this regard, one telling statistic we discussed related to the Impact Awards that UNC uses to recognize graduate students that conduct research focused on serving the needs of North Carolina,” Fodrie said, explaining that IMS-based graduate students represent less than 0.2% of all UNC graduate students during the last decade but represent about 14% of all award recipients over that same period.

“In turn, we also appreciated the chance to learn more about the chancellor’s broader goals and priorities for UNC during his team’s visit, and therefore how IMS might continue to grow our impact within and beyond the university.”  

SNEADS FERRY — Nearly a dozen abandoned marine vessels left to rot in North Carolina’s coastal waters are expected to be removed by July.

Crews this week pulled a dilapidated commercial fishing trawler and a sunken cabin cruiser from Wheeler Creek, a working waterway nestled off the New River in Sneads Ferry.

Mainstream Commercial Divers Inc., an underwater construction, maintenance, inspection and commercial diving company headquartered in Murray, Kentucky, also removed two rusted, battered barges from waters in the Onslow County fishing village.

On Monday, crews removed two vessels from the waters around Carolina Beach. Removal of the stranded commercial shrimper Claire Skye is scheduled for later this year. The vessel, currently stranded in Stump Sound near Morris Landing Clean Water Preserve in Holly Ridge, cannot be moved until its resident osprey chicks leave their nest built atop one of the trawler’s outriggers.

This marks the latest wave of abandoned and derelict vessel, or ADV, removals spearheaded by the North Carolina Coastal Federation through a $450,000 grant from the BoatUS Foundation, a nonprofit that focuses on safe, accessible recreational boating for all Americans and promotes environmental stewardship.

The Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, was awarded the grant earlier this year to oversee the removal and disposal of 12 ADVs littering waters in Carteret, Chowan, New Hanover and Onslow counties.

Ted Wilgis, the Coastal Federation’s marine debris program manager, said Wednesday that the organization is actively working to remove another 30 ADVs.

“There’s probably another 10 to 20 more that we know of that we can’t get funding for,” he said, noting that money the organization has received through a four-year, $4.5 million federal grant, state appropriations, and BoatUS Foundation for ADV and marine debris removal is expected to run dry by late summer.

Along with seeking state funding for ADV removal, the organization is working with state lawmakers on legislation to establish a formal North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission abandoned and derelict vessel program, grant liability immunity to the commission, it’s agents and contractors, and other state agencies during removal operations, and permit emergency removals during declared emergencies.

“There are hundreds of vessels out there that haven’t been investigated yet,” Wilgis said. “There are areas where there are a lot of vessels that are kind of in a limbo state. There’s a big demand for removals and, especially in this economy, there’s going to be more and more.”

Unwanted and derelict vessels are often left by owners who can no longer afford to maintain them. During severe storms, some vessels break from their moorings and are either left adrift only to sink in tidal areas or strand in marshes, on shorelines or in reefs.

ADVs obstruct waterways and pose serious pollution risks because of their potential to leak fuel and other hazardous materials such as hydraulic fluid and oil. Most recreational boats are made of fiberglass, which can break down over time in the water.

ADV removal is usually a painstaking process that in some cases can take up to a couple of years to complete, depending on the location and condition of the vessel. Removal can cost anywhere from a few thousand dollars for smaller recreational vessels to more than $100,000.

“It varies on where it is and how long it’s been out there,” Wilgis said.

BoatUS Foundation launched a national initiative supported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program to remove hundreds of ADVs from coastal waterways. The project also includes the development of a national database to track ADVs.

More than $7 million in grants have been awarded to cover the costs of direct ADV removals in Alaska, Guam, Oregon, Washington, Louisiana, Maine, the U.S. Virgin Islands and North Carolina, according to BoatUS Foundation Project Coordinator Michael Moore.

The organization is hosting in early December its Turning the Tide Summit, a four-day event where government agencies, environmentalists, marine professionals and recycling and waste management experts from across the country will gather to discuss ways to responsibly and sustainably remove and dispose of ADVs and boating-related debris, and share new technologies and innovative recycling programs.

More than 450 ADVs have been removed from North Carolina’s coastal waters either through the Coastal Federation’s marine debris removal program, local governments, the North Carolina Division of Coastal Management or the Wildlife Resources Commission, Wilgis said.

In 2020, the North Carolina General Assembly authorized and funded the commission to inspect, investigate and remove ADVs associated with Hurricane Florence and other coastal storms. The agency also publishes a database that identifies ADVs and prioritizes their removal.

Beach towns and coastal counties have also in recent years taken steps authorizing their law enforcement agencies to remove abandoned vessels within their jurisdictions.

The unoccupied oceanfront structure at 46000 Ocean Drive in Buxton that collapsed Tuesday night is the fifth to collapse this year, and the 32nd house since 2020 to be demolished by the Atlantic on Cape Hatteras National Seashore beaches.

The collapse will not cause any delays for the beach renourishment project scheduled to begin later this month for the Dare County village.

Because varying amounts and sizes of hazardous debris is scattered along the beach to the south of the collapse site, National Park Service officials are “strongly urging” visitors to avoid the beach and stay out of the water from the Village of Buxton south to the Cape Point area.

Officials also have temporarily closed beach access from the north end of Buxton through the lifeguarded beach to access the situation.

Dare County Manager and Attorney Bobby Outten told Coastal Review Wednesday morning that the collapse will not affect the planned Buxton beach nourishment project.

The contractor for the project is a few weeks from mobilizing and the beach will be cleaned up by then, he added.

Catherine Kozak contributed to this report.

This story has been updated to correct the name of Duke University’s Jackson Ewing.

As part of a potential coupling of two regionally powerful electric utilities, a proposed agreement between Virginia-based Dominion Energy and Florida-based NextEra Energy includes a small corner of North Carolina territory in the state’s northeast. But Dominion’s main attributes lie over the border to the north, with its access to a slew of data centers in Virginia as well as what will be the nation’s largest offshore wind energy operation off Hampton Roads.

NextEra Energy, already the nation’s largest electric utility by market value, announced last month that it had reached a $67 billion, all-stock deal with Richmond-based Dominion Energy to essentially absorb its business.

“It’s too soon to tell if this will be overall good thing for North Carolina,” Director of Energy and Climate Policy Jackson Ewing at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment and Sustainability, told Coastal Review in a recent interview. “There are several reasons to think that it might be.” But, he added, the opposite may also be true.

As the regulatory process plays out, including securing approval from the North Carolina Utilities Commission, the details and consequent ramifications of the massive deal will become more evident.

“The combined company will be more than 80% regulated, serve approximately 10 million utility customer accounts across Florida, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina and own 110 gigawatts (GW) of generation across a broad mix of energy sources,” the companies said in a joint press release on May 18.

With a market value of about $190 billion, NextEra’s marriage to Dominion, which is valued at about $59.4 billion, would become the “world’s largest regulated electric utility,” according to the release, allowing the business to “drive affordability in the long term by leveraging scale and … efficiencies as the company makes smart investments on behalf of its customers to meet growing power demand.”

The agreement still requires approval from the companies’ shareholders as well as federal and state regulators.

“We have not received any filing,” Lucy Edmondson, chief counsel with the public staff at the North Carolina Utilities Commission, told Coastal Review in late May.

Once it is filed, she explained, the commission would issue a procedural order that issues a docket number. At that, the details of the process moving forward would be publicly available online to view in the docket. By law, the cost-benefit to customers would be investigated, and the commission typically would schedule public hearings.

Although Edmondson said that there is no legal requirement on how long the process should take, the companies said in their announcement that they expect the transaction to close in a year to 18 months.

Ewing, with the Nicholas Institute, agreed that when scale is increased in utility industries, gains in efficiency can follow. For instance, the ability to streamline processes across a larger scale can lead to operational efficiencies, he said, and those can lead to cost savings for customers.

“So, with the larger scale, it’s certainly possible that the merged NextEra-Dominion entity could put more investment into modernizing the grid and developing clean energy sources,” he said. “NextEra has a really well-established track record of building out utility-scale renewable energy. With a greater capital base, potentially lower borrowing costs, and with more influence over their supply chains, you could have some dividends that come from that.”

On the other hand, Ewing said, negative consequences could be lying in wait down the road.

“When scale increases, you also risk having utility policies and approaches that are less appropriate for a particular small service territory,” he said. “In the case of Dominion, just being the northeastern part of North Carolina, this is going to become a relatively small piece of a much larger puzzle with the merger.”

In other words, Ewing elaborated, being a little fish in a big pond could decrease opportunities to innovate development of infrastructure tailored to the local environment or limit creation of programming that responds to those particular customers.

Dominion Energy North Carolina currently provides electricity to about 130,000 customers in much of the northeastern area of the state, including parts of Dare, Pasquotank, Currituck, Hertford, Pitt and Washington counties, among others.

As part of the proposal, $2.25 billion in bill credits would be spread, after the deal closes, over two years to Dominion Energy customers in Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina, according to the announcement.

The newly reorganized power provider would also fund an additional $10 million annually in charitable support for five years in communities within the three states. And it promised to continue “robust” utility assistance programs for customers facing hardship.

Additionally, Dominion Energy would continue to operate with the same moniker, relative to each of the three states, such as “Dominion Energy North Carolina.”

But the titles at the top will change. John Ketchum, the current chief executive officer at NextEra will become chairman and CEO of the combined company, and Robert Blue, the current CEO at Dominion, will become president and CEO of regulated utilities and a member of the board of directors.

In light of industry-wide electric bill increases, critics have noted bloat in CEO salaries. According to an April 21 article in Energy & Policy Institute that analyzed CEO salaries at investor-owned electric and gas utilities, in 2025 Ketchum was paid $24.2 million, the third highest salary, and Blue was paid just over $16 million, the 10th highest.

Even absent bumps in the regulatory road, electric utilities have been in the crosshairs of public ire as consumer’s power bills continue to climb upward. Mixed in the dismay with growing costs, data centers, which are typically large facilities that can be noisy and often strain local resources such as water, are popping up in communities, sometimes without residents’ previous input or even knowledge.

Nationwide, data centers, which are critical to power the boom in artificial intelligence, or AI, have become such a huge public concern that famed citizen activist Erin Brockovich has gotten involved, creating a website, brockovichdatacenter.com, to collect reports from consumers.

Virginia has some of the highest numbers of centers in the country. Numerous public reports estimate that there are more than 600 data centers in the state, mostly in Northern Virginia. According to an Oct. 25, 2025, article in Inside Climate News, citing a report from Cushman & Wakefield, as of last June, the state had 6,247 megawatts of data centers and an additional 2,610 megawatts under construction.

The existing centers are not the only asset the Florida company will gain in the proposed utility coupling.

When Dominion’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, aka CVOW, is completed in 2027, the 2.6 GW project will become the largest offshore wind farm in the United States. With 176 turbines, the project would generate enough energy to power as many as 660,000 homes and is expected to save customers about $3 billion in fuel savings in its first decade, according to Dominion.

While the result of NextEra’s environmental stewardship remains to be seen, Ewing said that an important point in its favor is the company’s record as an aggressive developer of renewables.

“Their integration with the supply chains for renewable energy and batteries and their capital base will allow them to build that out more aggressively than Dominion would have been able to,” he said. “And so there it is kind of a shot in the arm to big renewable and battery storage builds, which is positive for the environment.”

On the flipside, he said, large utilities tend to seek significant centralized control. For instance, NextEra has been resistant to compensating rooftop solar users in Florida for the energy it produces, and he expects that approach could carry over to North Carolina.

“It’s not dismissed those things out of hand, but it has not given many of the consumer advocates what they wanted in terms of compensation on that metering,” he said. “And it has been much more on the side of, ‘Well, the utility controls the grid, we’re responsible for this infrastructure, we don’t want to socialize those costs.’”

NextEra is also showing more of an appetite to build natural gas plants, Ewing said. Still, those types of sites take about five years to come online, where renewables can usually produce energy quicker and at less cost.

“So that’s the thing we all need to be watching, is how that actually progresses in reality in coming years,” Ewing said.

With this year’s Atlantic hurricane season beginning Monday, which is forecast to have below-normal activity, state officials are urging residents to prepare now for tropical weather impacts because “North Carolinians know that it takes only one storm to affect communities statewide.”

Gov. Josh Stein said Monday in a press release marking the start of hurricane season that this time of year brings uncertainty for families across the state.

“I encourage all North Carolinians to make a plan now to keep themselves and their families safe in case of a storm,” he explained. “Just as you prepare your family for hurricane season, the state emergency management team is preparing by closely monitoring forecasts, updating response plans, and coordinating with federal and local partners.” 

Related: Don’t get complacent with tropical outlook; ‘it only takes one’

The State Emergency Response Team has been preparing for the hurricane season that ends Nov. 30 by reviewing lessons learned from past storms, updating response procedures, meeting with all levels of government, coordinating with the private sector and nonprofit organizations, and conducting exercises.

“Preparation is the key to resilience during hurricane season. We encourage all North Carolinians to take time to develop plans and take proactive steps with their loved ones before a storm impacts our state,” N.C. Emergency Management Director Will Ray said Monday. 

Ray added that preparation includes “creating evacuation plans in case you must leave your home, securing all important documentation in a waterproof container, and checking your insurance policies to make sure you are properly covered. Home and flood insurance are especially important resources in returning to normalcy after a disaster.”

Officials recommend taking the following steps to be prepared before disaster strikes:  

• Put together an emergency kit with up to a week’s supply of nonperishable food, including one gallon of water per person per day, and prescription and over-the-counter medication.  
• Be aware of any unique needs for babies, elderly, or disabled members of the household, as well as pets.  
• Have multiple ways to receive severe weather warnings such as a weather alert app on your phone, a battery-powered or hand-crank radio or other device and extra batteries to listen to NOAA Weather Radio, or app or radio access to local news outlets. 
• If you live along the coast or are planning to visit the beach this season, Know Your Zone! This is how local governments order evacuations along the coast when storm surge is a threat. Visit KnowYourZone.NC.Gov to search by address.  
• Establish an emergency evacuation plan and meeting point if your group becomes separated.
• Have a printed list of family member’s phone numbers, social media handles, email addresses, and medical information in case mobile devices lose power or otherwise become disabled.
• Have copies of important papers such as birth and adoption certificates, driver licenses, or military IDs. 
• Meet with your insurance agent so you know what is covered should a storm affect your neighborhood. 
• Prepare a full list of personal items, along with photos and videos of every room in your home, to help with insurance settlements or tax deductions.  
• Be sure you know how to shut off your utilities safely. Water, electricity, and gas are key services that can also cause special problems during an emergency. Do not try to turn the gas back on yourself. Call a trained expert. 
• The N.C. Flood Inundation Mapping and Alert Network, or FIMAN, features access over 700 flood gauges across the state. Visit Fiman.NC.Gov to search for the flood gauges closest to your home and to sign up for alerts.  

To become involved in preparedness efforts where you live, officials recommend learning about schools, workplace, and neighborhood emergency plans and join in preparedness exercises and drills.

Other ways include volunteering with a Community Emergency Response Team, or CERT, to learn about disaster preparedness and receive training in basic disaster response skills, or contacting N.C. Volunteer Organizations Active in Disaster at ncvoad.org for more ways to help.  

For more information on how to prepare for hurricane season, visit ReadyNC.Gov. 

The Hatteras-Ocracoke vehicle ferry route has been switched to an alternate schedule while dredging operations are underway in Sloop Channel.

The temporary schedule went into effect Saturday and is as follows:

• From Hatteras to Ocracoke: 5:30 a.m., 6 a.m., 7 a.m., 8 a.m., 8:30 a.m., 9 a.m., 10 a.m., 11 a.m., 11:30 a.m., noon, 12:30 p.m., 1 p.m., 2 p.m., 2:30 p.m., 3 p.m., 3:30 p.m., 4 p.m., 5 p.m., 5:30 p.m., 6:30 p.m., 7:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m.
• From Ocracoke to Hatteras: 6:30 a.m., 6:45 a.m., 7:30 a.m., 8:30 a.m., 9:45 a.m., 10 a.m., 10:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 1 p.m., 1:30 p.m., 2 p.m., 2:30 p.m., 3:30 p.m., 4 p.m., 4:30 p.m., 5 p.m., 5:30 p.m., 6 p.m., 7 p.m., 8 p.m. and 9 p.m.

The federally contracted dredging operation is expected to take about one month to complete pending weather conditions, according to a N.C. Department of Transportation release.

The ferry route will return to its full summer schedule when dredging is complete.

Sloop Channel, which provides the entryway to the ferry’s South Dock terminal on the north end of Ocracoke Island, is being dredged by a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contractor.

Ferry users may sign up for real-time text or email updates on weather and mechanical delays through the Ferry Information Notification System at www.ncdot.gov/fins. 

In 1973, three young children were racing up the sand dunes of Jockey’s Ridge in Nags Head when they heard the squeaky treads of a bulldozer as it leveled the sides of the slopes. Stunned, they raced home, tearfully sounding the alarm to their mother, Carolista Baum.

Ms. Baum rushed over to the dunes and defiantly stepped in front of the bulldozer, stopping the destruction of this iconic geographical monument. For good measure, she later returned to remove the distributor cap to disable the mechanical beast.

With the town starting to trend as a tourist destination, real estate was booming. This enormous pile of sand was coveted, a target in the crosshairs of ambitious developers. With her bold act of protest, Ms. Baum threw a monkey wrench into the development plans of Jockeys Ridge, protecting a unique coastal landmark. In a short time, Jockey’s Ridge would soon become a state park, setting in motion the life work of one George Grantham Barnes, who died April 23. He was 73.

A geologic wonder, the grains of sand that form the Jockey’s Ridge dune system began piling up thousands of years ago. Ancient quartz sands from the Appalachian Mountains flowed down into the Atlantic Ocean. Hurricanes and storms eventually washed the sand up and onto the beaches. Their howling winds pushed the sand inland, creating monstrous dunes along a section of the North Carolina coast now known as the Outer Banks.

On Jockey’s Ridge, the salty winds blow life into the dunes, constantly reshaping the sand, creating a dynamic living system. These dunes have micro ecosystems of dune grasses, maritime shrub thickets, maritime forest, ephemeral ponds and an estuarine shoreline along the Roanoke Sound. It’s a place so unique that it was designated as a National Natural Landmark in 1974.

A native of Lumberton, George Barnes attended the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Not long after college, in the late 1970s, he first donned the green and gray uniform of a fledgling park ranger at Goose Creek State Park near Bath. Under the moss-laden live oaks that lined the quiet north shore of the Pamlico river, George settled in to the life of a park ranger.

Just east of Goose Creek, at Nags Head, the juggernaut of Ms. Baum and the nonprofit, People to Preserve Jockey’s Ridge, were successful with their “Save Our Sand Dune” initiative. Working with the N.C. Division of State Parks, the emergence of a new state park was now a reality. Truly a grassroots effort led by the residents of Nags Head. Their advocacy work, raising funds and lobbying politicians, was rewarded in 1975 when the North Carolina General Assembly appropriated funds to establish the park.

Private donations, federal funds and The Nature Conservancy also helped bankroll the purchase of the initial acreage.

During its inception, the first park ranger to patrol the dunes was Phyllis Goodwin. Her time at the ridge was brief, and by 1980, Ranger Barnes was selected by the superintendent of state parks to be the ranger in charge. At first, he commuted from Goose Creek, returning home each day. A real lone ranger, he was the only staff member at the park.

Starting from scratch, George was handed the metaphorical keys to a brand-new park. Given the opportunity of a lifetime, he was now the steward of a natural and cultural landmark so beloved that folks demanded its preservation — a daunting task that must have seemed overwhelming.

In the early days, when the dark summer thunderheads rolled in, he was lucky to have a fickle pickup truck to take shelter in. Ms. Baum checked in frequently to catch up on park operations and to let him know that he was not alone and that the community was there to help.

Carolista Baum’s feisty tenacious nature was buffered by George’s cool, laid-back style. They developed a mutual admiration for each other build on respect and their shared interest in making Jockey’s Ridge the best park it could be.

Ann-Cabell Baum and her siblings were the children who tattled on the bulldozer operator to their mom, Carolista. She remembers, as a child, riding over to the park with her mom on her visits to see George. Over time, she recalls, “he became one of the family, eating many meals with us outside under the shade of the porch.”

On occasion, George and Carolista clashed over their views on issues concerning the park. Recalling her mother, Ann-Cabell said, “She held his feet to the fire.” But despite any disagreement, “she always had his back.”

In 1981, George received some much-needed help when he hired Fran Crutchfield as an additional ranger for the park. She remembers the green, bare-bones, state-contract Chevy pickup truck with a “three on the tree” transmission. They shared the cramped truck cab as the park’s first unofficial office, along with a tiny windowless shed that housed a rotary-dial phone, manual typewriter and a makeshift assortment of tools.

Weekly staff meetings were held, just the two of them, at a local restaurant that served as their conference room. Fran remembers, “We would catch up on things, problems, concerns, and goings-on at the park, over lunch at Sam & Omie’s (Restaurant in Nags Head).”

For many years, the only incoming calls on the shed phone were from N.C. State Parks District Superintendent Cliff Phillips. As George’s longtime supervisor, Mr. Phillips told me that Ranger Barnes faced unique challenges not found at other parks.

With the sand dune ridge now a park, many past activities there conflicted with the philosophy, values and regulations of a state park. It was Ranger Barnes’ duty to curtail those uses.

He also had the unenviable task of enforcing new opening and closing hours in an area that once had 24-7 access. Both changes were unpopular. When neighbors complained, George and Fran had to even shovel windblown sand from private property back onto to park property. Try as he might, George was unable to control the wind.

With the park falling completely within the town limits of Nags Head, it was understood that the performance of the new park staff would be highly scrutinized. At times, George was feeling the heat as if in a pressure cooker. His calm and good-natured demeanor was often taken to task. This iconic dune was important to the Outer Banks beach community. Individual special interests were not shy about expressing their thoughts on how the park should be managed. He tangled with commercial, recreational and civic concerns. At times, he felt political pressures as well.

Undaunted, Barnes seemed as comfortable in the presence of state senators and representatives as he did with his fellow surfers as they sat in the lineup waiting for the swells to roll in. His decisions were made in the best interests of the park to maintain the integrity and dignity of the resource. He operated from a legal mandate straight from the North Carolina Constitution to “… preserve as a part of the common heritage of this State its forests, wetlands, estuaries, beaches, historical sites, openlands, and places of beauty.” During these times, Ann-Cabell Baum said, “He never wavered. It must have been tough for him.”

Mr. Phillips also remembered, “He rolled with the punches,” of which there were many.

George set about developing a park to address visitor interests while keeping intact the core park values of stewardship, conservation, recreation, education and safety. His easygoing demeanor, along with his trademark dark sunglasses, often hid the drive he had for his work. Slowly, the infrastructure commonly associated with a park began to grow: parking lots, restrooms, a staff office and maintenance shop, boardwalks, picnic shelters, a visitor/interpretive center, hiking trails and a recreational concession center.

Under his leadership, the staff grew. Rangers trained in environmental education, resource management, emergency medical, and law enforcement now patrol the park to service the growing visitation.

He also initiated coastal resiliency projects with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, including a living shoreline project along the Roanoke Sound boundary. Working with Southern Shores resident Peggy Birkemeier, a junior ranger program was established along with the Friends of Jockey’s Ridge, a nonprofit group supporting the park since 1990.

But George knew he didn’t accomplish all this on his own. He was quick to credit his supervisors, excellent rangers and the community that supported his vision of what the park could be. Throughout it all, Mr. Phillips said, “George Barnes led the way. He was loyal to the preservation of this park and was a dedicated person who can be given credit for his leadership in all areas of operations for Jockey’s Ridge.”

John Fullwood, who worked with Superintendent Barnes as a ranger at the park for 15 years, remembers George’s passion for his job.

“George had a big heart,” Fullwood said in a recent phone conversation. “If he loved something he gave 100 percent, and he loved Jockey’s Ridge.”

Over the years, George mentored hundreds of seasonal employees that wanted to work at this alluring state park. Many of these employees went on to work in careers involving management, protection and education fields related to environmental and natural resources. On such employee was Ben Wunderly, who worked at Jockey’s Ridge in the mid 1990s.

“His mentoring instilled in me an appreciation for the state park system and a deeper understanding of the connection one can have with a place, like the large sand dunes of Nags Head, or any natural area for that matter,” Ben said.

Ben has also gone on to have a long career, including as a park ranger. He is currently the central sites manager with the N.C. Coastal Reserves and National Estuarine Research Reserves.

As the tallest sand dune on the East Coast, its golden sands glow like a beacon on the horizon. For years, the ridge guided early sailors as they sought passage through the hazardous waters of the Graveyard of the Atlantic. Visible from the U.S. Highway 64 Virginia Dare Bridge, the dunes now flash like a neon sign guiding visitors to a natural oasis within a sea of rental cottages, hotels, restaurants, gift shops, outlet malls and miniature golf.

Here, visitors can learn about the park’s geology, weather, plants, wildlife, habitats and cultural history. Children — and adults — still race up to the top of the 80- to 100-foot-tall dune much like thousands before them. From the top, one can see far out to sea, catch the flicker of the Bodie Island Lighthouse and watch the endless swells as they race to the beach. In the evening, under the golden warmth of the setting sun, time seems stop, if only for a second. Over a million visitors a year are now drawn to the lumpy dunes of Jockey’s Ridge State Park, arguably the premier attraction for visitors to the Outer Banks.

After 32 years at the helm, George retired from Jockeys Ridge in 2009. He continued to keep his ear to the ground with his hand on the pulse of the park. Now, as a park watchdog, he continued to speak out on park issues that concerned him, as well as serving on the board of directors of the nonprofit Friends of Jockey’s Ridge.

Jockey’s Ridge had become part of his identity; it was who he was.

In retirement, he could often be found not far from the ridge, sitting on the beach at the end of Conch Street. In the good company of his family and dogs, he would be reading a novel, soaking in the beach life that he treasured so much. Wearing his Wayfarer sunglasses, with the wind in his hair and the sun on his face, George was in his nirvana.

George loved the Outer Banks. He didn’t need to go anywhere else, as he was already where he wanted to be.

In late April, George passed away after a long illness. Even though his footprints on the sandy slopes of Jockey’s Ridge have long since been erased, he is well remembered.

“The visitors that hike and play on the sands of Jockey’s Ridge may never know that this special place is intact due in large part to the hard work, long hours and dedication of this good man,” said District Park Superintendent Scott Daughtry, now retired, upon learning about Superintendent Barnes’ passing. “Thank you, old friend, for helping make the joy of the ridge part of the lives of uncounted people that you never knew.”

George’s good friend and Fort Macon State Park Superintendent Jody Merritt, also now retired, told me, “George had three main loves in his life: his family, the beach and state parks. These three things were all that George needed.”

Mr. Merritt added that the wind will always reshape the sands, “but the impression George left on the ridge is permanent. He spent his life guarding the shifting sands. His legacy is written upon the hearts and lives of those he served and the land he protected”.

We are all benefactors of the gift of his legacy. A legacy that the Outer Banks community, the Division of State Parks, the State of North Carolina and George Grantham Barnes can be proud of for generations to come.

Celebrations of George Barnes’ life are set for 2 p.m. May 30 at First Presbyterian Church in Lumberton, and 2 p.m. June 20 at Jockey’s Ridge State Park in Nags Head.

Dr. Jared Bowden wanted to be the man you tuned your television to each day for a weather update.

His sole aspiration when he stepped onto the campus of North Carolina State University as a freshman in the mid-1990s was to become a broadcast meteorologist.

Today, that dream is but a fading memory for the Rocky Mount native who was recently named director of the North Carolina State Climate Office. Bowden’s new post became effective May 1.

That title, and the responsibilities that come with it, bring full-circle his passion for climate research, his love for his home state, and his desire to educate and serve his fellow North Carolinians.

“I take it very seriously that I want to do things to benefit our state,” Bowden, 47, said in a recent telephone interview. “What I love about this job is that it’s a public service center, so I’m serving the public and I’m trying to help the public with their problems related to climate.”

The State Climate Office is North Carolina’s leading scientific partner for understanding weather, climate, and atmospheric data. Its mission is to deliver climate-related services to local governments, state and federal agencies and businesses and residents.

The office was established in 1976 and originally housed at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. In 1980, the office was relocated roughly 25 miles east from the Tarheels’ campus to the home of the Wolfpack, Bowden’s three-time alma mater.

Bowden was about 2 years old at the time, toddling around in his parents’ house where his father, Donald Bowden, was presumably already kindling his oldest son’s desire to pursue a career in weather meteorology.

Up until his dad’s death in November, “everyone considered him the weatherman of the family despite me having the degree,” Bowden later wrote of his father in an email.

Bowden earned bachelor’s degrees in meteorology and marine sciences at the end of an academic year that, about a month into its beginning, exposed him and thousands of fellow eastern North Carolinians to one of the most destructive hurricanes in the state’s history.

After making landfall near Wilmington in September 1999, Hurricane Floyd dumped rain for more than 60 consecutive hours in some areas of eastern North Carolina, where just 10 days earlier rain from Tropical Storm Dennis had inundated waterways and saturated soil.

Bowden vividly recalls seeing rescue crews — swift water rescue teams and helicopters — temporarily stage in an area that was a short two-minute walk from his parent’s home near Stony Creek, a picturesque stream that converges with the Tar River.

His childhood home was ultimately spared from flooding, but his hometown would be changed forever.

The Tar River crested at more than 31 feet in Rocky Mount, where flooding claimed lives, wiped out local businesses and homes, and damaged Tarrytown Mall, eastern North Carolina’s first enclosed shopping mall, beyond repair.

“It was really an eye-opening experience to be honest with you,” Bowden said. “People that have experienced this type of flooding know firsthand of how devastating it is and it’s not just you, but also the broader community that’s impacted.”

That experience instilled in Bowden a drive to better understand extreme weather.

His senior year at State would be one where, as he put it, he got “sucked into the research world.” There, he discovered he was particularly good at atmospheric modeling.

Bowden went on to earn a master’s and doctorate in atmospheric science, landing a job as a postdoctoral researcher at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Research Triangle Park office, where he worked with “some of the best atmospheric modelers in the world.”

From there, he settled into a world of research related to atmospheric modeling, eventually accepting a job as a research assistant professor at UNC Chapel Hill.

“But that kind of took me away a little bit from my passion of climate,” Bowden said.

When the position of associate director opened up at the State Climate Office in 2024, he applied for the job, one that would get him back to not only his love of climate research, but climate research specific to his home state.

Bowden was named interim director of the State Climate Office in August 2025 following former director Kathie Dello’s departure to become the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s assistant secretary for resilience.

The North Carolina Office of Recovery and Resilinecy was established in the fall of 2018 in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence, a storm that dumped more than 35 inches of rain in parts of eastern North Carolina and racked up an estimated $22 billion in damages in the state.

“We’ve seen quite a number of events over the years, and even in Rocky Mount there’s been events that haven’t been related to tropical systems that have created some really big flood problems,” Bowden said. “I didn’t see those types of things growing up. It is what I would say is a new normal that eastern North Carolinians are facing. But, as you know now, no place is safe within our state. From the mountains to the coast, everybody’s experienced something.”

Portions of western North Carolina continue to recover from the devastation of Hurricane Helene, a Category 4 storm that made landfall at Florida’s Big Bend and swept north. Wind and rain generated from the storm claimed the lives of more than 100 North Carolinians and caused an estimated $78.7 billion worth of damage.

Within just the last decade, the state experienced its hottest year on record in 2019. Last year, more than 5,000 heat-related emergency room visits were reported in North Carolina.

As of May 19, more than half of the state’s 100 counties are experiencing extreme drought. Most of the 20 coastal counties are under severe drought.

“The pendulum is swinging much more aggressively both ways and that’s what our state has to be prepared for,” Bowden said. “We have to work closely with our partners, we have to reach out to various groups to understand what those challenges are so that we’re able to serve them better.”

The office, which is comprised of 10 staff, is in the process of creating HANC, or Heat Atlas for North Carolina.

“It looks at, if you were to think about a hundred-year, three-day heatwave, what would that temperature be for your locations,” Bowden said. “That’s something I’m really excited about and we’re thinking about how to extend it to a broader footprint into South Carolina and possibly Georgia.”

The Division of Marine Fisheries wants to bring the public into the blue crab stock assessment development process.

The division’s stock assessment scientists plan to review what a stock assessment is and how this data set is developed during a WebEx meeting from 6-8 p.m. Thursday, May 28. Register online to attend the webinar or attend the listening location at the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries Central District Office in Morehead City.

The Marine Fisheries Commission, which puts in place rules, policies, and management measures for fisheries, adopted the original North Carolina Blue Crab Fishery Management Plan in late 1998, Amendment 1 in 2004, and Amendment 2 in 2013, according to the division’s website. The division, under the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, acts as staff to the commission.

A review of the management plan was scheduled for July 2018, but the commission decided in August 2016 to begin a formal review, assess the status of the blue crab stock and identify more comprehensive management strategies, and began developing amendment 3.

As part of that amendment, the division used data from 1995 to 2016 for a benchmark stock assessment, which is a comprehensive assessment conducted every five years by reevaluating data and modeling methods. Results indicate that the state’s blue crab stock was classified as overfished in 2016, according to the division.

The 2018 benchmark stock assessment shows the state’s blue crab stock is overfished, which means that the population size is too small, and overfishing is occurring, or the removal rate is too high.

Amendment 3 was adopted in February 2020 to rebuild the blue crab stock. All Amendment 3 management measures have been fully in place since January 2021.

The division attempted to update the stock assessment in 2023, but staff and external peer reviewers had concerns with model specifications and the results and decided not to use the update to manage the species.

Existing data from division sampling and monitoring programs indicate a continued decline of blue crab stock.

The division’s stock assessment team is going through data now to develop a new benchmark stock assessment and gave an update to the Marine Fisheries Commission during its business meeting May 14 in New Bern.

Stock Assessment Program Manager Matt Damiano explained that part of his motivation to hold the webinar at this stage in developing the assessment is because a member of the fishing community brought to his attention that historically, the only public-facing part of the division’s process has been the peer-review workshop, when the stock assessment is essentially done.

“This webinar is something of a halfway point to where I would like to go with our stock assessment process, which is to make it more public facing,” he said, adding that he has been planning the webinar for several months.

Damiano said that he and Stock Assessment Scientist Matt Zink, the other member of the program’s team, have made progress on the stock assessment update.

“We have been able to analyze all the sources of data that we’re interested in including in the stock assessment, that essentially involves Matt and I digging through the data and determining whether it is usable and what it is telling us,” he said, adding that they’re using data collected through different programs.

The estimated pattern for 1974 through 2024 has fluctuated quite a bit, as marine populations tend to, and saw the highest abundance during the 1990s followed by a marked decline in blue crab abundance after around 2010.

“There have been some modest increases toward the end of that time series, but overall, there is a negative trend for the last 14 years,” Damiano said.

During the same time, the size of blue crabs in the Pamlico Sound have gotten smaller in general, while blue crab size in Albemarle Sound has been stable.

The fishery-dependent data from fish houses points to the size structure being stable, “which is likely more a function of people bringing a really stable set of sizes of crab to market than it is having to do necessarily what’s going on in the population,” Damiano said.

“Another interesting feature is when we looked at abundance over space, it has declined most in the Pamlico Sound, but the Albemarle Sound is still essentially the one big hot spot for blue crab,” he added.

“If you are fishing in Albemarle Sound, things may seem better than they actually are for the population,” but Damiano stressed that “two things can be true at the same time. You can be doing very well if you’re fishing in a particular area, but the population throughout the whole state can still be moving in a different direction.”

Damiano told the commission that for the webinar May 28 he plans to give a brief review of what a stock assessment is and spend some time on what happened with the peer review of the 2023 updated stock assessment.

“I get a lot of comments on why that did not pass peer review and wasn’t recommended for use and management,” Damiano explained, but those who reviewed the assessment left a “clear roadmap for how to improve it,” he said. “It’s those exact steps that they recommended that Matt and I have been taking with this stock assessment and that’s going to give a lot of context to why we did the analyzes we did, and why we’re considering the methods we are for the stock assessment.”

Damiano added that while the peer reviewers did not recommend the model for use in management, and the division decided to heed that advice, “I think the peer review was actually a success in that sense, because they identified really clear problems that we need addressing in the next model.”

The peer reviewers were Dr. Jie Cao, assistant professor at N.C. State’s Center for Marine Sciences and Technology, or CMAST, and Dr. Yan Li, at Duke Cancer Institute Biostatistics Shared Resource at Duke University.

In an interview before the commission meeting, Damiano, who has been with the division about a year, pointed out that the only opportunity for the public to really engage with a stock assessment during the peer review, which is at the end of the process.

“That’s the only workshop that’s technically open to the public, and so I am trying to change that kind of incrementally as I learn what the communication needs are related to stock assessment. And it starts with this webinar,” he said.  

“We’re trying to create a space where we can be transparent about the work that we’ve done so far on the blue crab stock assessment, which is still ongoing, and solicit some feedback from the people,” such as their concerns about population, other sources of data to consider and give the public background for “some of the choices that we’re making while we’re doing the analysis. Really, it’s more just me trying to show my work and begin the dialog where we previously really haven’t had.”

He added that he hopes the webinar opens a line of communication that wasn’t there before.

The below-normal activity predicted for the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season doesn’t give North Carolinians a pass on preparation this year.

“For the Atlantic hurricane season, NOAA is predicting a below-normal season for 2026, with roughly a 55% chance of being below normal, a 35% chance of near normal, and a 10% chance of above normal,” National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association Administrator Dr. Neil Jacobs said during a media conference Thursday morning from NOAA’s Aircraft Operations Center at Lakeland Linder International Airport in Lakeland, Florida.

“This equates to eight to 14 named storms with winds at or above 39 miles an hour. Of these, three to six hurricanes with winds at or above 74 miles an hour, and one to three major hurricanes, that’s your Category 3 to 5 with winds at or above 111 miles an hour,” he added.

Jacobs is referring to the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale, which categorizes maximum sustained wind speeds for tropical storms. Categories 1 and 2 are windspeeds between 74 and 110 mph, categories 3 to 5 are major hurricanes with speeds from 111 to 157 or higher, according to NOAA. Hurricane season begins Monday, June 1, and ends Nov. 30.

“Even though we’re expecting a below-average season in the Atlantic, it’s very important to understand that it only takes one,” Jacobs said, adding there have been Category 5s that made landfall in the past during below-average seasons.

During the news conference Thursday morning, Jacobs said that “what’s driving this forecast is largely an El Niño event. There’s a 98% chance of El Niño conditions occurring later this season, and an 80% chance that this El Niño will be moderate to strong.”

NOAA National Weather Service Director Ken Graham, who spoke after Jacobs, reiterated that “it just takes one,” and urged the public during the press conference not to “let words like ‘below average’” change the way you prepare.

“Now’s the time to start thinking about your hurricane preparedness,” Graham said. “Early preparedness is absolutely everything. Period. End of story. The actions that you take today really get you ready for the hurricane season.”

Especially a season like this, “there’ll never be a Hurricane Just-a. We’ll never make that a name. There’s no such thing as just a Cat 1, just a tropical storm, just a Cat 2. That is absolutely not the case,” Graham said. “It doesn’t matter what it is, you got to look at the size, the forward motion, little wiggles matter on the impacts. Even the smallest storm, if it’s slow enough and big enough, it’s going to create catastrophic flooding and storm surge.”

Graham said that the public needs to pay attention to every single one of the storm “systems, and the actual impacts, not the category, not the name, but the actual impacts associated with that storm, and that includes the tornadoes, heavy rain, damaging winds, even the high surf and rip currents, as well, including storm surge.”

Erik Heden, warning coordination meteorologist in the National Weather Service’s Newport office, said in an interview with Coastal Review that just because the forecast calls for a below-normal season, residents shouldn’t let their guard down.

“Just because the outlook says it’s going to be a low year doesn’t mean we won’t be impacted,” he said, adding “It just takes one storm. The graphic says a 55% chance below-normal year, but if we get one storm, it really doesn’t matter what the prediction was, it could be a big deal for us.”

Heden also warned in the interview against making decisions based on the category of the storm.

“Categories are only wind,” he said. Wind is to be respected, but the other storm impacts are more likely to be more frequent in terms of issues in our area.

“Water is what kills people. About 85% of people that die in hurricanes, it’s water related — nothing to do with the wind. but it’s, it’s things like rip currents, storm surge, and flooding. Those are the three things that would get us if we get a storm.”

Two years ago, the Southeast faced a potential tropical cyclone that didn’t have a name. No. 8 resulted in almost 20 inches of rain in the Wilmington area, and last year Tropical Storm Chantal produced six to 10 inches of rain in Raleigh.

Steven Pfaff, meteorologist-in-charge for the National Weather Service’s Wilmington office, in an email to media partners Thursday morning, also expressed concern that the forecast for below-normal activity can cause messaging challenges because people may misinterpret what it means for any potential local impacts.  

“All it takes is one storm to define a hurricane season regardless of the outlook,” his emphasis, “Given southeast NC’s and northeast SC’s hurricane history our communities must prepare the same way every year,” Pfaff continued. “Now is the time to prepare for hurricane season, and remain vigilant this summer and fall.”

Jacobs said during the press conference that for official forecast guidance, go to hurricanes.gov.

“June 1 is almost here. Be ready, have a plan, listen to your state and local emergency managers. Preparation is essential. You can learn more at ready.gov,” Jacobs added.

Heden told Coastal Review that the best way to stay informed in eastern North Carolina is to remember “if it’s the weather you love, it’s weather.gov,” where there’s up-to-date information, as well as on the office’s website, Facebook or X.

Coastal Review will not publish Monday in observation of Memorial Day.

An Outer Banks nonprofit has a two-day program planned for next weekend that digs into historic and modern-day agricultural practices as part of its mission to honor the indigenous Earth ethic.

The Secotan Alliance … and Beyond’s “In the Spirit of Wingina 3: Seeds of Wisdom and Sustenance,” begins at 9 a.m. Friday, May 29, and continues starting at 9 a.m. Saturday, May 30, in the Virginia S. Tillett Community Center in Manteo.

There is no charge to attend, but organizers ask those interested in attending to register online through the website. There are also volunteer opportunities listed as well.

Gray Parsons of Frisco is a descendent of the Machapunga-Mattamuskeet, and is president of the Secotan Alliance … and Beyond.

Parsons founded the Outer Banks-based nonprofit in 2023 to honor Chief Wingina and indigenous environmental history. Wingina was chief of the Roanoke-Secotan tribe that inhabited Roanoke Island and the nearby mainland. Wingina established the Secotan Alliance with other village leaders to resist English colonization. The alliance territory included current-day Dare, Hyde, Beaufort, Washington and Tyrrell counties and its inhabitants were of Algonquin culture and spoke what has been called a “Carolina Algonquin” dialect. The chief’s attempt to expand the alliance farther inland resulted in his beheading by the English military in 1586, the website explains.

The mission of the nonprofit “is to educate the public on the traditional indigenous principles of the Secotan Alliance under the leadership of Chief Wingina specifically in terms of their application and value in today’s world…and to educate the public regarding the need and the methods to protect Mother Earth through individual, community, corporate and government actions based on the traditional indigenous earth ethic.”

Parsons explained to Coastal Review that this year’s program is following a similar outline as the first two events, though the focus has changed a bit.

The dual mission doesn’t change, “that will always be paramount, but the focus of how we accomplish that will change from year to year,” Parsons said. The inaugural program in 2024 focused on indigenous environmental history and last year’s program emphasized the unique leadership roles of women.

“This year it’s on Seeds of Wisdom and Sustenance,” Parsons said, and will focus on agricultural patterns with an emphasis on ancient, indigenous agricultural methods on May 29, and modern-day gardening with some connectivity to the ancient on May 30.

The keynote speaker for the two-day event is retired professor Dr. Tom Shields, who will speak Friday morning about the “Images of Sustenance: Writings and the Archaeology of Foodways from the 1580s.”

Shields taught early American and frontier literature, at East Carolina University. His publications focus on the Spanish and English literature of colonial North America, particularly the “Lost Colony” and 17^th century English explorer and writer John Lawson. Shields helped establish the Roanoke Colonies Research Office at ECU in 1993, according to the university.

Shields told to Coastal Review that the first idea that many of us had of what Native American life was like along the Outer Banks in the 1580s came from the John White watercolors and the Theodore de Bry engravings based on those drawings. He referenced the website, Virtual Jamestown, where the watercolors and engravings are indexed and compared.

John White, who was eventually made governor of the “Lost Colony,” was an English artist and cartographer who accompanied Sir Walter Raleigh on his voyage to the Americas in 1585. He was brought along to create a “visual representation of the people, plants, animals and way of life in the New World,” according to the National Park Service. Based in Germany, de Bry engraved a set of plates to illustrate scientist Thomas Harriot’s account of the 1585 journey to the Roanoke colony, “A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia,” published in 1595.

“These were done about the same time that Ralph Lane, governor of the 1585-86 English colony on Roanoke Island, wrote the line promoters of North Carolina still like to use, that this is ‘goodliest soil under the cope of heaven,’” he said, adding it’s just as often given as “the goodliest land under the cope of heaven.”

“Whether ‘soil’ or ‘land,’ the emphasis tends to be agricultural — how well maize (corn) grows, sometimes along with beans and squash, the classic Native American Three Sisters companion planting,” he continued.

“The idea of a North American agricultural paradise created in these works influenced how Europe viewed Native America back then, and it continues to influence how people think of that past even today. The pictures and writings from the 1580s English expeditions are still important primary sources about the Algonquian tribes that lived in the region.”

However, Shields explained, archaeological work along the Outer Banks and “throughout the inland Sound Country of northeastern North Carolina paints a more complex picture. The various Algonquian settlements of the inner and Outer Banks shared a language and culture. At the same time, the foods that dominated people’s diets — an important part of any culture — differed according to where the various settlements were located in the region,”

New to the lineup is North Carolina Extension Master Gardener Cheryl Anby of Manteo. She will speak the second day on “A-Maizing Corn.” Anby is the alliance’s secretary and is of French-Canadian indigenous ancestry.

Parsons said that there are a handful of return speakers this year, including Dr. Gabrielle Tayac, associate professor at George Mason University and Piscataway tribal citizen, will speak about “Gourds and Thunders: A Piscataway Return to the Water.”

Dr. Arwin Smallwood, of Tuscarora descent, is Dean of the College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities at North Carolina Central University, and will present, “War, Enslavement and Migration: The Tuscarora Diaspora and its impact on the Tuscarora Nation 1711 to 1722.”

David Rahahę́·tih Webb, a member of the Tuscarora Indians of Kahtenuaka Territories, will present on “Relational Living: Lifeways Rooted in Responsibility.” The Kahtenuaka Territories include the Roanoke, Neuse, Trent, Tar, Cape Fear and Pee Dee river basins, Lake Mattamuskeet territory, archeological sites and traditionally occupied lands throughout the coastal plains of present-day North Carolina and South Carolina, according to the territories website.

Sara Hallas, education and outreach director for the North Carolina Coastal Federation will give a talk on “Environmental Stewardship: Future Engineers and Innovators.” The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Her focus has been to bring in public school students who have achieved either recognition or some type of honor within the scope of environmentalism, Parsons explained.

Parsons added that presenter, Sound Rivers Pamlico-Tar Riverkeeper Katey Zimmerman, will speak about the effects of agricultural runoff into the water in her presentation, “The Impacts of Modern Agriculture on our Rivers and Communities.”

“Because of our geography, because we’re surrounded by water, water will always be part of the theme or the content, but each year, there will be a theme that sort of expands that,” he said.

Last year, organizers brought in the jazz band, the Benjie Porecki Trio, based in the Washington, D.C., area, and invited the band to return this year. The performance is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Friday at Jennette’s Pier in Nags Head.

Alliance Board Member Erica Lewis said about this year’s programming that she feels everybody can get something out of the concept of seeds and how it connects with their own family history that of the region.

“People should be able to walk away with newfound information about the parallels of a seed like a native plant in the Outer Banks, and then the seeds of their family,” Lewis said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is moving ahead with plans to strike down the nation’s first-ever health standards for chemical contaminants found in the drinking water sources of millions of North Carolinians.

The proposal, announced Monday, comes just shy of the one-year mark from when EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said he would eliminate and reevaluate enforceable standards for four per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, including the compound branded GenX. The agency also wants to push the deadline in which water utilities must comply with enforceable standards for PFOA and PFOS, chemicals that are no longer manufactured, by two years from 2029 to 2031.

In what it describes as a “comprehensive PFAS strategy,” the agency explains in a five-page release that drinking water systems would be given the option to opt in for the two-year extension, giving them more time to sample source water for contaminants, test new controls, and train their workforce to manage those controls.

The agency states that the proposed rule to rescind current federal standards for HFPO-DA, commonly referred to as GenX, PFNA, PFHxS and PFBS, would follow the letter of the law in establishing regulations for drinking water standards. The Trump administration argues that the Biden administration failed to follow the proper statutory requirements under the Safe Water Drinking Act when it established the drinking water standards for those four chemical compounds.

Under the proposal, the EPA would provide nearly $1 billion in new funding to states to address PFAS in drinking water and another $1 billion through the Emerging Contaminants in Small or Disadvantaged Communities program.

“The Biden administration cut corners and failed to follow the law,” Zeldin said in the release. “We are fixing that error with standards water systems can actually implement and that will hold up to scrutiny, while addressing PFOA and PFOS, two the best-studied PFAS with well-documented health impacts.”

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stated in the release that PFAS contamination is “a serious public health challenge that demands rigorous science, clear standards, and practical solutions. Across HHS, we are advancing gold-standard research to better understand PFAS exposure, toxicity, and long-term health impacts on Americans.”

Critics of the proposed rules immediately hit back, calling the announcement a “PR stunt” to try and shade the more than 100 million people across the country whose drinking water sources have been contaminated by PFAS.

“Zeldin and Kennedy are trying to sell potions out of the back of a covered wagon,” Dr. Anna Reade, Natural Resources Defense Council Director of PFAS Advocacy said in a Monday release. “The millions of Americans demanding safe drinking water are not going to fall for their hocus pocus. By repealing and delaying PFAS standards, EPA is abandoning communities in desperate need of drinking water protections, especially those who live near polluting industries.”

News of the proposed rules particularly smacked the Cape Fear region where residents, environmental organizations and public water providers have banded together to fight for regulations that would put the onus on dischargers to keep PFAS out of drinking water sources.

Almost nine years have passed since the Wilmington StarNews broke the news that Chemours, a DuPont spinoff, had for decades been directly discharging PFAS, including GenX, from its Fayetteville Works facility into the Cape Fear River. GenX is specific to Chemours’ Bladen County plant more than 70 miles upstream from Wilmington.

Today, more than 1,000 residents living near the Cape Fear River Basin are participating in a study where researchers measure the levels of GenX and other PFAS in people’s blood.

PFAS are a group of chemicals used for their ability to repel water, stains and grease to produce a host of consumer goods like food containers, waterproof-gear and makeup.

These chemicals are ubiquitous because they do not naturally break down in the environment.

The EPA now categorizes nearly 15,000 PFAS, an overwhelming majority of which have yet to be studied for their potential effects on human health.

Some of the known human health effects of PFAS include weakened immunity, low birth weight in newborns, thyroid disease, and certain types of cancers.

“Our community was ground zero for the discovery of GenX in public tap water, impacting over half a million water users across ten counties in southeastern North Carolina,” Clean Cape Fear Co-Founder Emily Donovan stated in a Monday release. “The United Nations Human Rights Council investigated our contamination crisis and publicly named chemical companies like DuPont and Chemours, along with state and federal regulators, for failing to protect us from business-related human rights abuses. We believe today’s announcement perpetuates those abuses. It does not fix our growing PFAS contamination crisis. It stops monitoring it. You don’t cure a fever by breaking the thermometer.”

Related: Public hearings set on proposed wastewater discharge rules

Earlier this month, the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission wrapped a series of six public hearings hosted throughout the state on proposed monitoring and minimization rules for discharges of PFOS, PFOA and GenX, and 1,4-dioxane into the state’s surface waters. The EPA classifies 1,4-dioxane, which is primarily used as a solvent in industrial manufacturing, as a likely human-carcinogen.

An overwhelming majority of people who spoke at those hearings argued that the proposed rules would do little to protect drinking water sources because the rules do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for PFAS dischargers found to be in violation of those rules.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality is accepting written comments on the proposed rules through June 15. Most of the thousands of written comments already submitted to DEQ concur with those made at the public hearings, according to department officials.

Public water utilities that serve residents in the Cape Fear region have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to treat PFAS from their raw water sources.

The Biden-era PFAS drinking water standards established in 2024 are in litigation in a lawsuit brought by chemical companies and water utility associations. A decision on that case, which is in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, is not expected before sometime next year.

“By abandoning and delaying enforceable limits on dangerous industrial chemicals like GenX and other PFAS, the agency is putting polluters’ profits over people and sending a clear message that corporate interests matter more than human lives,” Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney and Water Program Leader Kelly Moser stated in a release. “This reversal is a slap in the face to every community that has fought for clean drinking water. EPA’s decision isn’t grounded in science or law – it’s a political choice that endangers families throughout America.”

The EPA will accept written comments on the proposed rules for 60 days after they are published in the Federal Register. The rules will be published at www.regulations.gov under Docket ID: EPA-HQ-OW-2025-1742 and Docket ID EPA-HQ-OW-2025-9654.

The agency has also scheduled a virtual public hearing for July 7. Those who wish to speak must register online.

Questions related to the public hearing may be directed to PFASNPDWR@epa.gov.

If the tide’s ebb and flow have appeared more extreme than usual over the last few days, it’s because of the king tide event that began Friday, the everyday term for exceptionally high and low water levels that happen when the moon is either full or new and orbiting at its closest to the Earth.

The Sunny Day Flooding Project, a group of researchers who studies chronic flooding in Eastern North Carolina, has a particular interest in these natural and predictable tides because they illustrate what average tidal cycles may look like as sea levels change.

While sunny day flooding sounds counterintuitive, it is a chronic issue coastal communities are facing more often, especially during king tides.

“As local sea-level rise, land subsidence, and development continue to increase in coastal areas, so does the frequency of flooding,” the project website explains. “The tidal cycle now takes place on higher average sea levels, resulting in ‘sunny day’ flooding of roadways during high tides. Sea water also infiltrates stormwater drainage systems at normal tidal levels, such that ordinary rainstorms lead to flooding. While these minor floods draw less attention than catastrophic storms, their high frequency imposes a chronic stress on coastal communities and economies by disrupting critical infrastructure services.”

Two of the project’s leaders, scientists Katherine Anarde and Miyuki Hino, told Coastal Review in an email response that sunny day flooding is inundation that happens without any rain or storm taking place.

Anarde is an assistant professor in North Carolina State University’s Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, and Hino is an associate professor in University of North Carolina Chapel Hill’s City and Regional Planning and an adjunct assistant professor in the Environment, Ecology, and Energy Program.

“It can be a perfectly sunny day, but due to tides or wind, water levels in the ocean are high enough to cause flooding,” they explained. “King tides occur during the coincidence of perigee and spring tides – when the moon is closest to Earth in its orbit and in alignment with the Sun, which exerts the largest tide generating force on the world’s oceans.”

The Sunny Day Flooding Project launched in 2021 “to understand and address the incidence and impacts of chronic coastal flooding, which includes sunny day floods but also ‘flash floods’ from routine rain events coinciding with high tides” and is currently funded by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration, the National Science Foundation and NASA, or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

“We partner with communities to monitor how often floods are occurring, measure their impacts, and evaluate potential adaptation responses,” Anarde and Hino explained.

The team collects measurements, holds interviews and conduct surveys to better understand the effect of floods on residents, economies and human health. They communicate the flood risks through its flood alert system and king tides program.

While king tides “are not a new phenomenon,” the higher sea levels combined with sinking land, called subsidence, allows tides to rise relatively higher and higher, inundating low-lying infrastructure that was built decades ago, they said.

“The most visible impact is flooding on roads, often due to water backing up through stormwater drainage networks. However, the high water levels can also affect other aspects of infrastructure, such as septic tanks and underground sewage pipes,” the two continued.

A now-retired researcher at UNC Institute of Marine Sciences based in Morehead City started about a decade ago the North Carolina King Tides Project to study the floods that historically occurred during king tides, in association with the international King Tides Project. The global initiative began in Australia in 2009 and asked the public to document and share their photos showing how these higher tides affect shorelines.

North Carolina’s project began releasing a calendar with predicted high tides and encouraged the community to photograph and submit their observations of shoreline water levels.

The Sunny Day Flooding Project absorbed the N.C. King Tides Project after the researcher retired a few years ago and now publishes the calendar of when to expect king tides each year. The project also encourages the public to upload photos and details through the free Coastal Observer app.

The first king tide of this year was April 17-19, the current king tide is supposed to end Thursday, and more are expected June 13-16, July 12-15, Aug. 10-13, Oct. 25-31, Nov. 23-27, and Dec. 24-25, according to the calendar.

The calendar notes king tides as well as amplified tides, which they define as a nonscientific term for when higher and lower water level events are expected that “result when perigee and spring tides almost co-occur, yet are offset by a day or more.”

On the project website, the team offers the caveat that the calendar “does not predict coastal flooding.” Floods are often caused by wind and pressure, seasonal changes in sea level, and land-based factors like high groundwater, rainfall, and existing infrastructure.

“With sea-level rise, flooding during the perigean spring tides has become more and more common, but flooding is also occurring during moderate tidal cycles in some communities,” the website states.

Researchers recommend checking the NOAA Monthly High Tide Outlook for flooding probabilities.

The team also communicates flood risks through its flood alert system available for Beaufort, Carolina Beach, Down East and New Bern, where there are water level sensors. Those interested can sign up to receive an email whenever water levels overtop the roadway at the chosen sensor location.

On the project website, researchers explain that the chronic flooding affects people differently than extreme events like hurricanes because it is not as deep and widespread as storm surges from hurricanes, but it is more frequent. The high rate of constant flooding interrupts travel and could also increase infrastructure maintenance costs for coastal communities.

Anarde and Hino said that there are ways to address the impacts of chronic coastal floods, and the right response is going to differ from place to place.

“Elevating infrastructure can help keep it dry and reduce damage from saltwater. Scheduling trips to avoid the highest tides can help avoid flooded roads and keep travelers safe. Given that this type of flooding is projected to become more frequent in the future, it’s important to consider both immediate, short-term responses and longer-term strategies,” they said.

There’s something almost poetic in how Thomas Marcinowski describes his plans for his final farewell.

Whenever that time comes, the U.S. military veteran wants to be cremated and put to sea.

“That way my ashes touch every continent my boots walked on,” Marcinowski said.

That long-carried thought surfaced when Marcinowski, on a commercial flight returning to Wilmington from an organizational event in 2019, read an article about people taking the ashes of their loved ones to be interred in an artificial reef off the Miami coast.

By that time, several years had passed since he’d retired from service, rounding out a military career spanning more than 20 years that began when he enlisted in the Air Force as a teenager and ended after becoming an officer in the Army National Guard.

Marcinowski, a physician assistant at Wilmington Veterans Administration Health Care Center, wasted no time after reading the article. He began bouncing an idea to friends and colleagues about a nonprofit organization that would build a living legacy beneath the waves where those who’ve honorably served would be memorialized, their stories preserved and their mission of service continued.

“The motto that I like to use is, ‘Those who served continue to serve,’” Marcinowski said. “They’ve passed away, but yet they’re still giving back to the nation and to the world by being out there to create something even greater and protect for future generations.”

Just two years after he first pitched his idea around, Veterans Memorial Reef held its first ceremony honoring veterans whose cremains were interred in eco-positive reef modules that were placed on the seafloor about 5 miles off the coast of Carolina Beach.

The nonprofit hosted its sixth annual three-day event this past weekend at the Fort Johnston Museum and Visitor Center in Southport, interring the ashes of nine people – six veterans and three spouses of veterans – in memorial markers to be lowered into the sea on Monday.

Those memorialized Saturday joined 30 others whose cremated remains are preserved in aquatic urns that are sealed into the square-shaped markers, each of which has a plaque engraved with the name, branch of service, and birth and death dates.

Veterans whose cremations are interred in the reef represent every branch of service – Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard. Some served decades. Others, like Marine Corps Pfc. Ethan Eldrige, who died at age 21, served only a matter of months.

Several served in combat, veterans of World War II, Korea, Vietnam and Desert Storm.

Then there’s Felix Bigalke, a Coast Guard service K-9, also memorialized at the reef.

This is Marcinowski’s passion project, one that goes beyond recognizing veterans to educate the general public about the military, rehabilitate and protect natural ocean reef ecosystems, and provide researchers opportunities to study how the environment and the organisms that live within it respond to an artificial reef.

“Working at the VA, just hearing the stories and having served in battle, having lost me of my own in battle, brings it home for me because I see the internal scars that they bear. It’s moving to me because I understand those scars,” Marcinowski said. “So, to be able to give them honor and share their stories that they may never have told their families, it is very rewarding.”

And, for the veterans memorialized at the reef who either have no family or are estranged from family, “It becomes really important that they not be forgotten,” he said.

The Veterans Memorial Reef website includes a Fallen Heroes tab where viewers can read veterans’ biographies, along with any medals awarded to them. Users can simply scroll over a ribbon bar or medal and click to learn more about that award.

“Those are things people don’t understand the meaning behind what they do, the risks they take to earn something like that or to be recognized for that,” Marcinowski explained.

Today, fewer than 1% of the country’s population serve as active-duty military.

“It’s dwindling,” said University of North Carolina Wilmington Director of Military Affairs Bill Kawczynski. “As our population grows and less and less folk either consider going in the military or even qualify for the military, it’s getting worse each year. And so, as director of the office of military affairs it gives me great satisfaction when I can connect students and others to things such as VMR or other military and veteran resources.”

On Saturday, Armed Forces Day, the nonprofit hosted in Southport a “Fallen Heroes Ceremony” for those whose remains will be placed in the sea. The honors-packed military tribute typically includes honor guards, the presentation of a 13-fold American flag to one member of each veteran’s family, taps, and a bagpipe rendition of “Amazing Grace.”

In a final sendoff, usually two days after the ceremony, families are invited to board the Vonda Kay, a 72-foot head boat based in Carolina Beach, to watch their loved one’s memorial marker get submerged and placed onto the Veterans Memorial Reef.

To honor and to serve (research)

The North Carolina Division Marine Fisheries determines where the memorial markers will be placed on a large, open sandy bottom anywhere below 30 to 50 feet of water.

Veterans Memorial Reef has partnered with Raleigh-based Natrx that creates artificial reef structures called ExoForms, which are designed to promote habitat growth and ecological benefits and produced using 3-D printers.

The memorial reef is in what Troy Alphin, a senior research associate with the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Center for Marine Science, describes as a dynamic environment with strong currents. Alphin was one of the people Marcinowski initially contacted for validation of his memorial reef idea. The two have known each other for several years and Marcinowski knew Alphin had studied the effects of underwater structures on the environment off other coasts.

Alphin thought an offshore monument for veterans a novel, innovative idea, one that not only honors veterans, but also offers a host of research opportunities.

“This is a passion project to meet the needs of veterans that’s providing us with an opportunity to address some questions that are really relevant for local marine science and in our coastal area,” he said. “This provides an interesting palette for researchers to come in and propose different questions. Are fish going to be attracted to it? Are other organisms going to be attracted to it? What’s that development through time? The Center for Marine Science and UNCW are well positioned to address a lot of those questions.”

This year, students in the university’s coastal engineering program launched a capstone research project to try and answer the question of what the wave energy is like around the Veterans Memorial Reef.

Students used the university’s wave flume, 9,500-gallon-capacity glass and steel tank that can be programmed to imitate varying degrees of wave energy, to collect data that will help in future studies of the artificial reef site.

“We’re going to put some sensors on some of these monuments that are being deployed and start gathering data on what that looks like in the real word,” said Alphin, who sits on the Veterans Memorial Reef board of directors. “We want to know what that flow environment around these structures is really going to be.

“We’re really at the very beginning,” he continued. “There’s a lot of potential right now. I’m hoping that we’ll get a lot of students in the future and a lot of researchers that will be able to go out there and do some work around these structures.”

Guest Commentary

To stimulate discussion and debate, Coastal Review welcomes differing viewpoints on topical coastal issues.

When I was a little kid, my aunt used to point to the foam washing up on the beach and tell me it was whale poop. I wasn’t sure I believed her. I kept a cautious distance from the foam, just in case, but the idea stuck with me.

Sea foam, of course, isn’t whale poop. She knew that. But years later, I learned that my aunt wasn’t entirely off in spirit: Whales really are ecosystem giants, fertilizing the sea and fueling the plankton blooms that support everything from the fish we catch to the oxygen we breathe. Remembering that early sense of wonder now, it’s impossible for me to look at the decline of one species, the North Atlantic right whale, with anything but urgency.

These gentle giants called our North Carolina waters home long before our coastal towns had names. Today, though, these critically endangered whales are facing a crisis they can’t outswim — and a recent move by the federal government threatens to make a dire situation even worse.

Lethal cost of speed

On March 4, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issued an advance notice that it is considering deregulating the very rules designed to protect these endangered whales from boat strikes.

North Atlantic right whales are particularly vulnerable to ship strikes. They spend long periods near the surface, and they are hard to spot because they are dark in color and lack a dorsal fin.

The problem is simple but deadly: The faster a vessel is moving, the greater the chance that a collision will injure or kill a whale. Even a strike from a midsize boat can be fatal. And these impacts can be dangerous and devastating to boaters as well, including sinking boats and injuring passengers and crew.

That’s why in 2008, NOAA issued the Vessel Speed Rule. It established two types of management tools to slow large boats and protect North Atlantic right whales from boat strikes. First, the rule required boats 65 feet or longer to slow down to 10 knots in Seasonal Management Areas (SMAs) where North Atlantic right whales are expected to be present. Second, the rule established a voluntary speed limit of 10 knots in Dynamic Management Areas (DMAs), which are triggered by North Atlantic right whale sightings and acoustic detections. Off North Carolina, the SMA near Cape Fear is active from Nov. 1 through April 30 — the months when North Atlantic right whales migrate through our waters on their way to calving grounds farther south. The rule was designed to reduce the risk of collisions. Studies suggest boats traveling under 10 knots are less likely to kill North Atlantic right whales should they collide.

These seasonal protections cover a narrow window of time, but they align with when whales are expected or detected, and they remain one of the few safeguards the species has as it moves through some of the busiest shipping and recreational boating corridors on the East Coast. It’s a proven strategy. It works.

Mirage of technology vs. proven solution

Despite this, NOAA’s recent notice suggests that mandatory speed limits could be replaced with “advanced, technology‑based, strike‑avoidance measures.” While innovation is welcome, there is currently no technology proven to protect these whales at the scale and speed of East Coast boat traffic.

Relying on unproven technology while weakening mandatory speed limits is like removing a school zone speed limit because we hope one day cars will have better sensors. The only practical, proven, and scalable measure to protect right whales, particularly when they are migrating with their new calves, is the Vessel Speed Rule.

There are plenty of ways to strengthen the rule now, including updating the times and areas of speed zones to align with the whales predicted path today – not what it was in 2008, all speed zones mandatory, and including smaller boats in the protections. But to weaken or eliminate it all together will only hasten this species’ extinction. We cannot take away one of their best chance of survival.

More than just a whale: an ecosystem giant

The case for protecting right whales isn’t only about compassion for an endangered species. It’s also about safeguarding the health of the Atlantic. North Atlantic right whales act as ocean engineers, cycling nutrients as they migrate along the East Coast, which fuels the growth of phytoplankton, or plant-like organisms in the ocean.

When I think back to those childhood days on the beach with my aunt, I’m pretty sure she wasn’t trying to teach me anything profound about the ocean. She was probably just teasing me, the way adults do with kids who take everything a little too seriously. But the joke stuck, and so did the feeling that the ocean was full of mysteries bigger than I could understand.

Now, years later, I know that whales really do shape the ocean in ways that are just as surprising as anything she could have made up.  Losing them would mean losing far more than a species. It would mean losing a piece of the ocean that shaped us — the same ocean where I learned wonder, caution, and responsibility long before I had the words for any of it.

We have a choice now. We can let the North Atlantic right whale slip quietly into memory, or we can act with the urgency this moment demands. Defending and strengthening the Vessel Speed Rule is one of the simplest, most effective steps we can take to protect these whales and the ecosystem they support.

My aunt may have been wrong about the foam, but she wasn’t wrong about the ocean. Everything out there is connected — and right now, the North Atlantic right whales are depending on us.

Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of Coastal Review or our publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation.

Dr. Reide Corbett, executive director of the Coastal Studies Institute on the East Carolina University Outer Banks Campus in Wanchese, is the featured lecturer this month at the institute’s “Science on the Sound” lecture series.

The public is encouraged to attend Corbett’s lecture, “Holding the Line? Coastal Change and Barrier-Island Dynamics on the Outer Banks.” The program is set for 6 p.m. May 28 at the institute and there’s no charge to attend.

From collapsing oceanfront homes to repeated beach nourishment projects, coastal change is becoming increasingly visible across the Outer Banks. But what do these changes reveal about how barrier islands function — and how different management approaches interact with these naturally dynamic systems?

Corbett will discuss the science behind erosion, storms, overwash, sediment transport, and sea level rise, while exploring how shoreline management strategies influence beaches, infrastructure, and long-term resilience.

“Rather than focusing on simple solutions, the discussion will examine the tradeoffs, time horizons, and challenges associated with managing development on a constantly changing coast,” organizers said in their announcement.

Whether you work in coastal science, policy, planning, or simply care deeply about the Outer Banks, this presentation offers an opportunity to better understand the processes shaping one of the most dynamic shorelines on the East Coast.

The program will also be livestreamed on YouTube.

Corbett is a coastal oceanographer and geochemist whose work focuses on coastal change, sediment dynamics, shoreline processes, and the geomorphic evolution of barrier island systems.

Born and reared on the North Carolina coast, he earned his bachelor’s in chemistry and his master’s and doctorate in chemical oceanography from Florida State University before beginning his academic career at Tulane University in New Orleans. He later returned to North Carolina to join ECU, where he serves as dean of Integrated Coastal Programs, executive director of the Coastal Studies Institute, and professor in the Department of Coastal Studies.

Corbett’s research examines the dynamic interface between land and sea, from estuaries and continental shelves to barrier islands and polar coastlines. His work has taken him from North Carolina and Puerto Rico to New Zealand and Antarctica, with a particular focus on how storms, sea level rise, sediment movement, human activity, and long-term geologic processes shape coastal environments. Through the lens of North Carolina’s coast, he helps communities better understand shoreline change, barrier island evolution, and the choices needed to adapt to a changing coastal future, organizers said.

BUXTON — Large amounts of underground oil contamination left behind decades ago at a former beachfront U.S Naval facility may finally be gone after the recent completion of an intensive seven-month excavation project, but additional sampling will still need to be done in the fall to confirm that petroleum is no longer a threat.

By month’s end, Army Corps of Engineers contractors, after removing tons of tainted soil and untold gallons of polluted water, will have restored dug-up areas off Buxton Beach and removed the heavy equipment.

“We’re hoping to be out of your hair when the tourists get in your hair,” joked Hillary Weber, program manager for contractor Bay West, at the April 30 quarterly update held in Buxton.

In a presentation at what is officially known as the Restoration Advisory Board, or RAB, for the Buxton Naval Facility Formerly Used Defense Sites (FUDS) property, Weber provided details about the latest challenge in the decades-long effort to clean up the former Navy base, with sporadic, reoccurring incidents since September 2023 of petroleum odors, sheen and shoreline tar balls on the eroded beach and nearshore ocean area after storms.

In the wake of a report of sheen by Cape Hatteras National Seashore last August, the Corps’ Savannah District awarded a contract for petroleum containment, limited soil removal, and monitoring, and then another contract in September for removal of petroleum-contaminated soil.

“It takes quite a bit of effort to get to this site,” Weber said. “A lot of man hours were put in in September and October to get us ready for a successful season.”

Inherent project challenges weren’t helped by heavy rain that saturated the site in November, she said. Still, the first load of soil was able to be removed starting in December.

“Our goal was to minimize our footprint before the holidays,” Weber told the RAB members and a small audience at the Cape Hatteras Anglers Club building. By January, “we really hit our stride,” she said, with excavation at the areas of highest impact.

The site demobilization was originally scheduled to be completed by May 7, but the exit was delayed until just before Memorial Day to allow more time to bring in additional sand to restore the site.

Although Weber reported that 17,000 cubic yards of affected soil and 315,000 gallons of water were removed, Sara Keisler, the Corps’ Savannah District FUDS Program manager, said in a later interview that those numbers were merely estimates. But the exact amounts, which have specific contractual maximum volume limits, were still being calculated, she added. 

“So the intent of this action was to remove a majority of that contamination that potentially could be eroded away and washed out to sea,” Keisler told Coastal Review. “And that’s what we accomplished during this this response action.”

All told, Keisler confirmed, the project consumed about 31,500 labor hours, required 10 “pieces of yellow iron” — heavy equipment — and removed an estimated 275 feet of asbestos pipe, 5 million pounds of concrete, and 2,800 pounds of infrastructure debris.

As Keisler explained, the contaminated soil was sent to a regulated hazardous waste landfill in Canada. The Emelle, Alabama, Subtitle-C landfill that the Corps used in 2024 to dispose of earlier excavated soil from Buxton was not currently available, she said.

Much of the Corps’ time and resources have been dedicated to cleaning up the former top-secret submarine-monitoring facility, which operated from 1956 until 1982 through a special-use permit with the National Park Service, the property owner.

Starting in 1989, the Corps, the federal entity designated to clean up FUDS properties, removed above-ground storage tanks. Next, the FUDS office handled removal of below-ground storage tanks. Subsequent years involved testing, sampling, removing, and monitoring contaminated soil and/or water at various areas of the 50-acre site.

There was a lull, except for some monitoring, after September 2009, when the Corps determined that no further action was warranted. But in September 2023, severe shoreline erosion associated with a series of storms exposed chunks of buried infrastructure and evidence of even more petroleum contamination. Since then, the Corps has spent parts of every year investigating and cleaning up the site.

In the fall, another contractor will sample soil and groundwater within the project area to determine if and where any additional petroleum contamination remains.

Much of the petroleum contamination removed in the recent excavation had been at the site of a former heating plant, Keisler said, which lines up to where there was a previous fuel pipeline.

“That was where the bulk was that we were able to find,” she said. But because the extent of the contamination at that location in the polygon used to delineate areas at the site wasn’t initially known, a modification had to be made to the contract.

“The comprehensive sampling contract was awarded prior to this response action that we’re working on right now,” Keisler said. “When we awarded it, we were basing it upon other data. Then we had to award this response action because we were actively seeing releases again.

“And so, because in that whole polygon, the soil was all mixed up,” she elaborated, “because we were digging it and removing and putting new soil in. We went and modified that contract so that it would be a more evenly dispersed amount of borings across the entire polygon so that we would get the data we need, since the site conditions change due to that response action.”

If further remediation is required, the Corps would have to address it in an additional response action, she said.

Meanwhile, once funding is obtained, the Savannah office plans to return to Buxton for yet another project, known as “a Military Munitions Response Program,” which would address lead contamination at the former small arms range. Compared to decades of environmental cleanup of petroleum and other dangers, remnants of some ammunition almost may seem innocuous. 

“It’s located on the southwest side of that pond,” Keisler said. “It’s a very small area. It’s got a whole bunch of growth on it. It’s not accessible.” 

A crew on Monday began removing a storm-battered, dilapidated waterfront boardwalk near Jacksonville’s Northeast Creek Park boat launch area.

The removal marks the first step in a series of park improvements and additions, including a new boardwalk, fishing pier that will be built out into Northeast Creek and parallel to the shore, and an Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant kayak launch.

The Northeast Creek Park restoration project also entails construction of a new living shoreline and wetlands restoration.

Work to rebuild and expand the site is expected to begin in later winter into the spring of 2027, according to a city release.

“We are excited to be able to get this project underway,” Jacksonville Stormwater Manager Pat Donovan-Brandenburg stated in the release. “Having a safe boardwalk and pier as well as adding a kayak launch for public is important to improving quality of life here in Jacksonville. Equally important, is addressing the erosion we see along our waterways due to storms and water rise. Expanding on the wetlands and installing a living shoreline will work to preserve this.”

The project has been funded through a multi-year, $16 million National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grant the city was awarded in October 2024. Funds from that grant are also being used to expand the city’s Oyster Highway project, Scales Creek flood mitigation and watershed restoration, and shoreline and wetland restoration for Phillips Park and Chaney Creek.

These projects will be headed by the city’s stormwater and engineering divisions.

The May meeting of the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission is scheduled for next week in Raleigh.

According to the commission’s Thursday, May 14 draft agenda, members will consider a federal petition to incorporate National Ambient Air Quality Standards into state air quality rules.

When newly enacted Environmental Protection Agency air quality standards take effect, the new rules effectively apply to state standards, which must be revised to align.

The proposal before the EMC would omit the state from having to go through the process of updating its rules every time a federal air quality standard changes.

The commission will also receive an update on the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Flood Resiliency Blueprint.

DEQ released on April 1 improved advisory flood maps for the Cape Fear, Lumber, Neuse, Tar-Pamlico and White Oak river basins. These maps are designed to help local governments, agencies and non-governmental partners develop, evaluate and prioritize resilience actions, and plan and secure funding to implement those actions.

The commission’s committees will meet beginning at 9 a.m. Wednesday in the Archdale Building’s ground floor hearing room, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh.

Those meetings will be livestreamed by Webex, meeting number/access code 2427 265 5562, password NCDEQ (62337).

The full commission will meet at 9 a.m. on Thursday in the Archdale Building. The meeting may also be viewed via livestream, meeting number/access code
2429 624 8234, password NCDEQ (62337).

To listen to the meetings either day by phone dial +1-415-655-0003.

Agendas for the committees and the full commission are available on the EMC’s website.

Ms. Doris Creecy has been a familiar face to locals on Roanoke Island for a long time.

This 90-year-old “Senior Delight,” the official title she is called by one of the several organizations she supports, is known by many. She is a frequent presence at events, especially programs close to her heart and those that include youth.

Standing tall, typically wearing a beautiful hat, a colorful outfit, and with cane in hand, this elegant lady cannot easily be missed. She and her daughter, Coquetta Laverna Conyers Brooks, are frequently seen. They are an often-noted twosome at community, church, and school events,

Ms. Creecy is not letting her age slow her down. She is always ready to encounter new experiences, learn more, and to talk about history, a topic she loves.

Born Aug. 1, 1935, in Wilmington, and a graduate of Clifton University in South Carolina, she was licensed to teach in four states: South Carolina, Virginia, New York, and North Carolina. On Roanoke Island, where she moved after teaching in Wilmington, she taught third and fourth grade students and served as a reading specialist at Manteo Elementary School from 1977 to 1990.

Thousands she taught in her lifetime have become educators, entrepreneurs, first-time homeowners, musicians, pastors, nurses, fishermen and so much more. The pivotal role Black educators played in Wilmington and the surrounding area during challenging historical times influenced her decision to teach.

She is a lifelong and proud member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. (AKSA) the first intercollegiate historical Black sorority. She has been a former board member of several organizations, including presently serving as an honorary board member for our organization, the Pea Island Preservation Society Inc.

Ms. Creecy can most easily be found at church each Sunday morning, sitting faithfully in her favored spot, front-row pew and left side of the sanctuary at Haven Creek Missionary Baptist Church. There she serves as a deaconess and as a Sunday school and vacation Bible school teacher.

This church is connected to the story of the Freedmen’s Colony on Roanoke Island, where thousands sought freedom and a safe haven during the Civil War. Her faith and love of God have always been primary in her life and teachings.

Ms. Creecy is perhaps best known as the founder of the Echoes of Heritage, or the shortened Echoes they are called, an a cappella singing group she formed shortly after moving to Roanoke Island. She is the directress and leader of the group.

Originally 12 singers, the Echoes have had three different sets of singers over time. Over the years they have performed at countless events under her guidance.

Ms. Creecy is the heart and soul of the group known for singing spiritual songs. Once she and a singing partner even had a regular Tuesday spot on a local radio station. Although the Echoes are not as active or big in number as in the past, still today at 90 years old, Ms. Creecy continues to receive requests to perform.

Today she and her daughter Coquetta, typically with two, three or four additional singers, occasionally delight audiences at selected events with spiritual songs. In recent years, they have performed at several events. This includes events held at the College of the Albemarle – Dare campus and other locations for programs sponsored by our organization, Dare County, and the Town of Manteo. Many of the programs she attends result in her warmly greeting adults who were former students.

As a born educator, she especially enjoys sharing her own experiences, including the joys, challenges and difficulties she faced as part of her own personal journey.

In recent years she and her accompanists have performed at three of our five annual Juneteenth “Sounds of Freedom” celebrations held at the Pea Island Cookhouse Museum, where the story of Keeper Richard Etheridge and the surfmen he commanded at the historic Pea Island Life-saving Station is told.

Ms. Creecy is a devoted supporter, always ready to raise awareness of this history. On several occasions theEchoeshave performed at the annual Dr. Martin Luther King Day celebration held on Roanoke Island.

These events are two of her favorites. Seeing and watching her so passionately sing songs that serve as living history and which reflect her own personal journey is touching. It is also an important reminder of how the music inspires and unites.

Past members of the Echoeshave included many with roots on Roanoke Island. The late Dellerva Collins, who served as mayor pro tem and as a Manteo town commissioner for years, was part of the original 12. Likewise, the late Virginia Tillett and Naomi Augusta Collins, both pioneering community leaders and educators on Roanoke Island, sang with the Echoes.

Images showing women joyfully singing along with her who were known advocates for voices most often not seen or heard. Several through the years, past and present, are the descendants of those who lived on the Freedmen’s Colony or who are part of Ms. Creecy’s beloved church community.

When asked the most important lesson her mother has taught her, Coquetta quickly says, “to choose kindness always in spite of others.”

Her son Damian, a Manteo High School and Elizabeth City State University graduate, and who currently is pursuing a master’s in the computer engineering field, is someone Ms. Creecy is especially proud of.  She and her grandson are very, very close, Coquetta adds. 

When asked what lesson his grandmother has most taught him, Damian says, “never remain stagnant and to pursue improvement daily,” two lessons that also reflect the guidance Ms. Creecy has passed along to her many students over the years.

All are encouraged to help celebrate Mother’s Day this year by sending Ms. Creecy (or Ms. Pledger as some know her by her late husband’s last name) a special card. She has no idea of this request so please also help us to keep it a surprise! Without a doubt, the avid reader she continues to be, she will greatly enjoy reading these special cards on Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day or any greetings may be sent to: Mrs. Doris Creecy, P.O. Box 1068, Manteo, NC 27954.

NEAR BEAUFORT — Officials wielded ceremonial gold-painted shovels Monday to break ground on an economic development project specifically tailored to the needs of coastal communities, a plan that one advocate likened to successful technology-incubation hubs but instead intended to support shellfish aquaculture jobs.

When construction begins at the recently cleared site this summer, the Shellfish Mariculture Hub will feature a 2,500-square-foot structure on county-owned land next to the boat ramp at Straits Landing, just across from Harkers Island. The building will be outfitted with cold storage, equipment, an outdoor workspace and crucial water access — shared resources for shellfish growers, officials said.

Tom Looney of Wrightsville Beach, a former vice president and general manager of Lenovo North America and a longtime board member with Coastal Review’s publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation, said he had been involved a decade ago in developing the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, which works to recruit new business, assist existing businesses, help companies with international trade, promote the state as a tourist destination and counsel small companies and startups.   

“Today, it’s the number one workforce engine in the country for the last three out of four years,” Looney said. “We know how to attract businesses. We know how to create new businesses. What I learned in that role was, some of the most economically challenged regions in our state were our coastal communities. We had to find new ways to create jobs for people to feed their families, grow a business, have opportunity.”

Looney, who was an IBM man for more than 30 years, said that, since 2013, North Carolina’s oyster industry has grown more than 500%. Today, the state boasts one of the fastest-growing oyster industries in the country, generating more than $300 million annually.

“And let me tell you, folks, this hub will set it on fire, as far as North Carolina as a state,” Looney said.

That success will be the result of combined forces, including the shellfish aquaculture program at Carteret Community College, and provide a good return on the investments made by the legislature, the county, the Coastal Federation and others, he said. Looney praised Coastal Federation staff, including Chief Program Officer Ana Zivanovic-Nenadovic for shepherding the project.

“We’re doing it the right way. We’re creating jobs while protecting the culture and our coastal waters,” Looney said.

He said the mariculture hub would apply the same principle as American Underground, a Google tech hub for startups in Durham, but with oysters.

Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis said the hub project was “about putting down roots for an industry that has been proving its worth in eastern North Carolina and across the country for a long time now.”

Shellfish mariculture, Davis said, combines economic opportunity, environmental benefits and a unique cultural heritage in a way that few other industries can.

“It creates jobs, it supports working waterfronts, and it keeps seafood production local, which is fantastic,” Davis said. “And at the same time, our oysters are out there every day, quietly doing their work, cleaning the water, filtering the water, improving clarity and water quality across the coast. So, that all together is a combined return on investment that you rarely find and few industries can match. It’s driving economic growth while actively improving water quality and protecting the coast.”

Also on hand for the event was Sen. Norm Sanderson, R-Pamlico, and who also represents Carteret, Chowan, Halifax, Hyde, Martin, Warren and Washington counties. Sanderson explained how his district has a “very important role to play in our seafood industry,” as producers and consumers. He noted the move to transfer the Division of Marine Fisheries from the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality to the Department of Agriculture as part of the Republican-led legislature’s regulatory reform efforts. “Because too many times, it hinders the growth that we could use here on the coast to create jobs and to make our economies more stronger and more prosperous.”

Sanderson described his district’s rankings in the state Department of Commerce economically distressed counties tier system. Under this system, the department ranks the 100 counties’ economic well-being and assigns a corresponding tier number, 1-3. Commerce designates the 40 most distressed counties as Tier 1, the next 40 as Tier 2 and the 20 least distressed as Tier 3.

“I have four counties, five counties that are Tier 1s, which is the most economically distressed counties in the state of North Carolina. And so anything that we can do to help those counties is going to be a blessing,” Sanderson said.

He said the Mariculture Hub was one of the few projects to get legislative support from all corners.

“This one is an easy one to sell, because I think people, first of all, they love seafood,” Sanderson said, adding that he hoped that the project becomes a prototype for others.

“We have over 300 farmers now farming oysters for at least a secondary income. We’re hoping that it will eventually become primary income for them,” he said.

Rep. Celeste Cairns, R-Carteret and Craven, also spoke at the event Monday. She said the project was “a real collaboration among state folks, local folks, and great organizations like the Coastal Federation, and I know I speak for Senator Sanderson as well when I say, when everybody is moving and pulling in the same direction, it is a rare and beautiful thing.”

Cairns said she had been told the total number of leases and franchises was about 500.

“Each of those, whatever the number — it’s a lot and growing — and each of those folks represents a small business or family or an individual trying to make a livelihood on the water.”

The Rocky Mount-based Golden LEAF Foundation, created by the North Carolina General Assembly to award proceeds from the 1998 National Cigarette Manufacturer Settlement Agreement, uses that money to create economic opportunities in rural, tobacco-dependent and poorer counties.

Golden LEAF’s early support and $200,000 in backing in August 2022 helped build momentum for the project. Jason Rochelle evaluates funding proposals for the organization, works to implement Golden LEAF priorities, and oversees project monitoring and compliance.

“At the time, the project represented a strong vision, one rooted in supporting local aquaculture, strengthening coastal economies and creating new opportunities for shellfish growers in the region,” Rochelle said. “Today, it’s incredibly rewarding to see that vision move forward. The shellfish hub is a strategic investment in the future of Carteret County and addresses real needs identified by the shellfish farming community by providing shared infrastructure such as dock access, refrigeration, storage, grading and loading equipment and a central point for distribution. This facility will make a meaningful difference in the day-to-day operations of local growers.”

Rochelle said the hub would serve up to 15 operations and generate around $2 million annually.

“By locating the facilities near the fishing waters, growers will be able to spend more time harvesting, less time on logistics,” Rochelle said. “This increased efficiency will translate to higher production, increased income and the creation of high-quality jobs in this community.”

Assistant Carteret County Manager Matt Reynal said the project reflects “who we are as a county, from Harkers Island to Cedar Island and all across Down East, our connection to the water has always been central to how we live and work. Shellfish mariculture builds on that tradition.”

Reynal said that economic development “isn’t just about bringing in something new or shiny” to Carteret County.

“It’s about supporting the industries that are already here and ensuring that we have the infrastructure to grow,” he said. “That’s why the county was proud to provide this land. We see the long-term value and what this project supports working waterfronts local businesses and innovative opportunity that stays rooted in our communities, and that’s especially important for Down East.”

Chris Matteo, president of the North Carolina Shellfish Growers Association, said that when he was first told of the plan, he “immediately agreed to participate.” He said Coastal Federation founder Todd Miller and Looney had seen a similar model in Australia, and that infrastructure helped fuel a thriving shellfish aquaculture industry there.

“And today we are finally breaking ground on our shared vision. I’m very excited for our local shellfish farmers and for our industry. This is a special day, not just because we are breaking ground on a new building, but because we’re laying the foundation for the next stage of growth in our young industry,” said Matteo. “This project took years of persistence, collaboration and a shared belief that working waterfronts and shellfish mariculture are critically important to North Carolina’s coast.”

The fun part lies ahead, Matteo said.

“This shellfish hub will create job local jobs, support family businesses and keep waterfront communities working on the water. It will do so while helping grow one of the world’s most sustainable and healthy animal proteins, and as if that wasn’t enough, it will also improve our estuaries. Every oyster grown in our waters does more than feed someone. It is filtering water, creating habitat, rebuilding public trust stocks of marine species, and proving that economic growth and environmental stewardship can go hand in hand.”

Matteo said he was especially proud that shellfish farms in North Carolina filter more than 600 million gallons of estuarine water every day.

“This hub will help us grow that number further,” he said. “As a shellfish grower here in North Carolina, I can tell you firsthand, this hub isn’t just a nice to have. It solves real-world problems that growers across the state deal with daily. While shellfish farming has enormous potential, the reality is, starting and scaling a farm is not easy. For many growers, one of the biggest barriers has always been access to waterfront infrastructure.”

For small operations, the costs can be terminal.

“Shellfish farmers haven’t been limited by demand or ability,” Matteo said. “They’ve been limited by not having a place to work on the water, the equipment to process and refrigerate their product and an efficient way to get it to market.”

Stewards of North Carolina’s rivers and streams have created a manual designed to assist local governments in establishing land use rules that protect water quality and boost community flood resilience.

The new guide, “Gold Standard Development Practices for Watershed Protection,” was developed in response to river keepers’ documentation of irresponsible land use practices that have resulted in severe and devastating impacts across the state, said Neuse Riverkeeper and Sound Rivers Inc. Director of Advocacy Samantha Krop.

“We realized that how our cities approach land use practices is one of the most important indicators of water quality and flooding mitigation we have,” she said. “So, we’ve taken a very thoughtful pivot to focusing on land use policy because we see it as inextricably linked to our community health and safety in the future.”

The guide, created by Waterkeepers Carolina with support from the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, provides an array of options local governments may consider implementing in land use rules, developers can offer as proffers or in conditional rezoning applications, and concerned residents may use as an advocacy tool.

Counties, cities and towns throughout North Carolina establish key land use regulations through a single, consolidated document called a unified development ordinance, or UDO.

A UDO governs land use, zoning, and development standards aimed at guiding growth and protecting natural resources.

Local governments use these ordinances to govern land use in ways tailored to their communities.

Down-zoning ban limits local governments

In 2024, the North Carolina General Assembly banned local governments from being able to initiate a process called down-zoning, which is when property is rezoned to less dense or less intense use.

The ban effectively restricts those governments’ ability to enforce land use rules because the law requires that they must get written permission from all affected property owners before amending zoning text or maps.

The down-zoning ban in Senate Bill 382, a 2024 disaster relief bill, one vetoed by then-Gov. Roy Cooper, has prompted cities like New Bern and Durham to pump the brakes on updating their UDOs because the law lacks clarity, Krop said.

“I think that is presenting a lot of challenges, both in what the letter of the law says and also in what municipalities are sort of perceiving it to say, or sort of worried it’s created this boogeyman that I think is creating a lot of fear in municipal governments around can we do anything at all,” she said. “There are a lot of things that we can still do, both in passing changes to local UDOs and also in asking for more in some of these rezoning cases as proffers to protect waterways and communities from some of the harms that we’ve been documenting associated with development practices.”

Waterkeepers Carolina and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice last week in Durham hosted an event, “Designing Communities that Protect our Waters,” to discuss development and zoning practices aimed at protecting water and building community flood resilience.

Counsel for Environmental Justice James Huey at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice explained that one tool local governments have is something called conditional zoning.

Conditional zoning is a process in which a property owner and local government negotiate conditions in a rezoning request.

Local governments, “can impose conditions that address lots of various potential issues that might come up with any sort of development,” he said. “A lot of times with development, there isn’t really a one-size-fits-all and I think that’s why this document is important to show that there is a path forward, especially for those local governments that are concerned about their authority and also a little bit confused about if they should always be implementing a certain system or what systems to implement.”

Tree retention protects water quality

The guide also highlights how local governments can implement overlay districts that identify and bolster protections specific to sensitive and important areas such as drinking watersheds.

“With water quality, it really boils down to silver bullets, and that starts with leaving more trees in the ground,” Krop said. “The single, best thing that we can do when developing a landscape, a forested landscape, is leaving as many trees in the ground as possible. That looks like tree retention instead of removal and replacement with young saplings.”

Targeting tree retention around waterways, expanding riparian buffers, making sure wetlands are protected and buffered and increasing overall tree connectivity on the landscape are crucial in protecting water quality.

In areas where multiple acres of trees are being removed at one time, it is crucial that exposed soil is stabilized as soon as possible to prevent erosion, sedimentation and pollution in waterways. Local governments can regulate timeframes for which developers must establish ground cover to avert erosion.

Waterkeepers Carolina continues to push for a change in state law that would require developers to monitor all discharges coming from their sediment basins to prove they’re not pumping dirty water into creeks and streams.

“We would argue that this is something that needs to happen, at least in all sensitive watersheds where there’s evidence of construction practices polluting waterways,” Krop said.

She encourages communities to look at those that are implementing forward-thinking rules and protections for waterways.

“I think we can learn from each other and try to create more universal, more consistent protections across the whole state,” she said.

Emerald Isle commissioners are expected to consider at their meeting later this month raising tenfold the town-imposed penalty for violations involving damage to primary dunes.

The proposal, one that would increase the fine from $1,000 to $10,000, was unanimously approved last Tuesday by the town’s planning board and comes on the heels of Emerald Isle’s issuance of a cease-and-desist order for construction on an oceanfront lot.

Remarque Home Builders LLC was slapped with a notice of violation and ordered to stop working at 3405 Ocean Drive until the dune destroyed at the property, as well as a designated natural area on the lot, have been fully restored.

“I’ve been working as a beach town manager for most of my career, nearly three decades, and this is the most egregious violation I have ever seen,” Emerald Isle Town Manager Frank Rush said by telephone late Wednesday.

Carving more than 5,600 square feet of primary dune that buffered the lot from the oceanfront beach is a violation of the Coastal Area Management Act, or CAMA, minor permit the builder’s obtained May 1, 2024.

The developer also violated a town ordinance that requires 35% of a lot remain as undisturbed natural area.

The owners of the Cedar Point-based limited liability company did not respond to Coastal Review’s request for comment in time for publication, but in a statement to WCTI-TV, the owners said they were “cooperating fully” with the state and the town.

“We are working cooperatively with the regulators to finalize a remediation plan, to restore the dune in accordance with their directives, and to satisfy any lawful fines or penalties that may be assessed. We will continue to do what the Town and CAMA ask for us until this matter is fully resolved. Dune stewardship along the coast is a shared responsibility.”

It is unclear why the dune was leveled.

“The questions being examined at our property, such as how construction, landscaping and dune work interact with CAMA requirements, are not unique to 3405 Ocean Drive,” Remarque Home Builders said in the email. “We understand that similar work has been undertaken by other owners on Ocean Drive without triggering comparable regulatory action.”

“We raise this not to deflect responsibility, but to underscore that these are questions faced by many property owners along the coast, and by the regulators charged with applying the same standards to each of them,” the statement continues. “We welcome a regulatory process that produces clear, consistent guidance and even-handed enforcement across all similarly situated properties, and we are committed to helping that process succeed here.”

Rush said that sand from the dune was redistributed on the 0.43-acre lot and, in some cases, pushed onto adjacent properties.

“Essentially they have to put it back the way it was,” he said.

That entails restoring the dune to its original height of around 25 to 26 feet and planting it with vegetation commonly used for dune stabilization.

Under the terms of the notice of violation, the developer will also have to resubmit a new, separate pool permit so town staff “can judge that application on its own merits after this violation is completely resolved.”

The town’s notice of violation issued April 22 came with a $1,000 fine. The developer also faces an estimated $1,000 state-imposed fine, according to the town. If the limited liability company does not come into compliance within 60 days, the developer will be fined $1,000 a day until work is complete.

“They’ve indicated they intend to rectify it much sooner than that,” Rush said.

The town will not issue a certificate of occupancy for the 7,300-square-foot, 12-bedroom, 13 ½-bath house listed for $6 million until the repairs and restoration have been completed, he said.

Remarque, in its statement, reiterated that the property is privately owned and asked the media and public to stay off the lot where the conspicuously missing dune has drawn the ire of area residents and property owners who’ve taken to social media to express their outrage.

“If this is not escalated appropriately, it opens the door for others to push limits, take shortcuts, and deal with the consequences later. That is not a precedent we can afford to set in Emerald Isle,” Jamie Vogel, a former town commissioner, wrote in a social media post last month.

“The oceanfront dunes provide critical storm protection, aesthetic, and ecological value for Emerald Isle and the Town places the highest priority on a healthy beach strand and dune field,” Rush wrote in the May edition of the town’s newsletter Emerald Tidings. “Collectively, the community has invested tens of millions of dollars in beneficial beach nourishment projects over the past 23 years, and these sane placement efforts have resulted in the significant augmentation of existing dunes and the construction of new dunes to advance the Town’s goals. The Town’s existing dune protection regulation and State CAMA regulations are carefully crafted to balance dune protection, private property rights, and overall storm protection for the entire community and the violations at 3405 Ocean Drive were clear and obvious.”

The Emerald Isle Board of Commissioners will hold a public hearing during its May 12 meeting at 7500 Emerald Drive before considering amending an ordinance to increase the penalty for violations that involve primary dunes. That meeting will begin at 6 p.m.

New York Times bestselling author Kristy Woodson Harvey returns to the fictional, sleepy, seaside town of Cape Carolina in her newest novel “Summer State of Mind.”

Hitting shelves on Tuesday, the reader meets a burned-out neonatal intensive care unit nurse that crosses paths with an injured former baseball star who finds an abandoned newborn in their tight-knit community, Harvey explained.

A contemporary women’s fiction author, Harvey was on her way home from the Piedmont to Beaufort a few weeks ago when she carved out a few minutes of her day for a chat with Coastal Review.

She said that “Summer State of Mind” is a companion to her “Under the Southern Sky,” a 2021 novel about two childhood friends and neighbors, Parker and Amelia, raised in Cape Carolina, and the book in which she introduces secondary characters, aunt Tilley and Parker’s older brother, Mason.

In “Summer State of Mind,” the “very eccentric” Southern aunt and baseball player Mason are the primary characters along with Daisy, the NICU nurse who is new to the coastal setting, Harvey said.

The plot was inspired by a newspaper article written about an ICU nurse who adopted an abandoned baby, “and it just stuck with me for a long time,” Harvey explained. She mentioned the article to a friend who is an ICU nurse, and the friend shared with Harvey that she knew others with similar experiences. Then a book crossed her desk about nurses who had to make really difficult decisions, “and those kinds of gray areas where sometimes we find ourselves, and (then the novel) all came together.”

Harvey is getting ready to head out Friday to Charleston, South Carolina, to begin her “Summer State of Mind” launch tour. She will be back in eastern North Carolina on Sunday for brunch hosted by the Beaufort Historical Association in Atlantic Beach.

The rest of her tour takes her to Greensboro on Monday, and then on Tuesday, when the book is officially released, she has events in Greenville, South Carolina, and Salisbury, before heading May 6 to Chapel Hill and Raleigh.

Outside of the Carolinas, Harvey has events in Tampa, Florida, on May 7, followed by Franklin, Indiana, on May 8, then Webster Groves, Missouri, on May 9. She heads further west May 10 to Gig Harbor and May 11 to Seattle, both in Washington, and then on May 12 San Diego, California, for two events.

She will return to the east coast for events May 16 in Sneads Ferry and Ocean Isle Beach, and wraps up her tour in South Carolina May 17 for Pawleys Island and Columbia and then Camden on May 18. Tickets and more details are available on her website.

With this book being released in May and then “Falling for Peachtree Bluff,” the fifth installment of her “Peachtree Series” expected to come out in September, the second leg of her 2026 tour will be announced is this fall.

The road to Southern fiction

Harvey grew up in Salisbury, where she said she fell in love with writing when she was a senior year in high school. She was an intern at a “great, small-town daily newspaper.”

“I was actually going to medical school and decided to become a journalist instead, because I just absolutely fell in love with writing for newspapers,” she said.

As an intern at the Salisbury Post, “I just fell in love with writing for newspapers and interviewing people, and so I ended up going to journalism school at UNC and just ate it up. Just loved it,” she said. During that time, she worked on the university’s Blue & White magazine and served as its managing editor.

Harvey explained that when she earned her undergraduate degree in 2007, it was an unusual time in journalism because of increasingly adopted internet service, which “hadn’t really hit its stride yet, and the future of journalism was looking a little questionable.”

She decided to pursue her master’s in literature, with the thought that, if writing doesn’t work out, she can teach. But life sent her on a different path. After grad school, she started working in finance but continued to freelance as a writer.

She also began weaving together storylines. And though she took creative writing classes in college, she never really planned to write fiction.

“I think there was something really perfect about the way that it unfolded, because I started getting these ideas and then decided that I was going to write a book just to see if I could, just for myself,” Harvey said.

When she began writing, it wasn’t with the expectation of publishing or becoming an author, which she said was the right approach for her because there was no pressure in it at all. She wanted to see if this was something she could do.

“And I kept writing, and I kept writing,” and by the time she had her third manuscript, she decided to submit her work to literary agents.

She sold her debut novel “Dear Carolina” to a publishing house in 2014, and the book was out in 2015. Set in Kinston, the work follows the path of two women from different circles who bond over the adoption of a baby girl.

Her second book, “Lies and Other Acts of Love,” is set in her hometown of Salisbury, she said. This standalone 2016 novel delves into family secrets.

Harvey initially planned to set her next project, the Peachtree Bluff series, in Beaufort, but “then I realized how incredibly freeing it was to be able to just make up a town” and build the world to suit the story.

She draws inspiration from the beach communities on the East Coast like Beaufort, calling the fictional towns “loose interpretations” of places she knows, all with the goal to give the readers small southern towns.

“That’s what I know, and also because I think it resonates with readers,” she said, giving them a touchpoint that they can return to again and again.

The “Peachtree Series” launched in 2017, the same year she and her husband decided to try Beaufort out full time.

Harvey explained that they bought their house in Beaufort in 2012 and had spent about 18 months remodeling what they had planned to be their beach house. They had been driving to and from Carteret County, “And when our son was in preschool, we decided to move for one year, and now he’s in eighth grade and we still haven’t left,” she said about their move to Carteret County. By then she had published her third book.

The beauty of Carteret County, aka the “Crystal Coast” in marketing materials, and its residents are special to her.

Being from Salisbury, Harvey’s family was much closer to South Carolina beaches, and with her father being from Wilmington, “When we were going to the beach, we were either going to Wrightsville or Litchfield. And so, it was new for me, and I just fell in love with it right away.”

‘Friends & Fiction’ podcast

Harvey co-hosts “Friends & Fiction” with New York Times bestselling authors Mary Kay Andrews, Kristin Harmel and Patti Callahan Henry.

The podcast launched in 2020 when Andrews texted a handful of authors who had books scheduled to publish, but all their tours had been canceled because of COVID-19, and, “we were really worried about independent bookstores. There was no foot traffic, there was no events.”

While brainstorming about ways to reach their readers and help the small businesses, they decided to go live on Facebook and talk about their new books and remind people to support their independent bookstores.

“The first night we did it, we didn’t think anyone would show up,” she said, but a thousand people tuned in. The bestselling authors decided to go live every Wednesday night for seven weeks, when the hosts’ books would be out. And now, the show is coming up on its six-year anniversary, with 350,000 members.

“It’s just like a nice corner of the internet world where people can talk about books,” Harvey said. “We’re really good friends and we love what we’re doing, and we love supporting authors, and our mission is still to support independent bookstores, and as long as, as long as viewers keep showing up to watch, we’re going to keep going.”

One benefit of the podcast is that it pushes Harvey to read books outside of her preferred genres before interviewing the authors.  

“I’ve read so many things that I never would have read, but I did because the author was going to be a guest,” and through that process, she said she’s discovered new authors, genres and novels that broadened her view in some way. “I do think reading really widely can really help inform our own writing.”

She added that she loves to hear from the authors and the paths they took.

“It’s so cool to me how people just come to the page in such wildly different ways. And everybody has their own journey. Everybody has their own writing process.”

In addition to the two books released this year, “A Happier Life,” her 2024 work set in a historic Beaufort home, is in development for film by MGM/Amazon.

“The Summer of Songbirds,” the 2023 novel about lifelong friends who met as children at summer camp, is in development for television with Hulu, and a handful of other projects are in various stages of option or development for film and television, according to her provided bio. Her work has been Southern Living, Parade, Traditional Home, USA TODAY and other publications.

With more than a decade of full-time writing behind her, Harvey told Coastal Review that she loves watching the story unfold as she writes it.

“I’m so happy that I did it. I always look back and think, ‘What if I’d never done this?’ I never would have known,” she said.

Harvey remains unsure what life will look like in the next five years, but her plan is to focus on “writing my next best book and what’s the next best step.”

Though parts of North Carolina saw rainfall over the weekend, it didn’t touch the extreme drought conditions the state has been experiencing for at least six months.

State Climate Office of North Carolina Assistant State Climatologist Corey Davis told Coastal Review Monday that, while eastern North Carolina fared better than the rest of the state this weekend with the rainfall totals outperforming the forecasts — with A few spots like Lumberton and Goldsboro had around an inch, and parts of the Crystal Coast had 2 to 3 inches — “I don’t expect that will bring any improvements on the drought map this week.”

He is referring to the U.S. Drought Monitor’s weekly assessment of drought conditions. The North Carolina Drought Management Advisory Council, or DMAC, looks at data from Tuesday to Tuesday and submits its recommendations to the National Drought Mitigation Center. The center then publishes on that Thursday a map showing where conditions range from abnormally dry, or D1, to exceptional drought, or D4.

Often, Davis continued, the first rain event or two after a prolonged dry spell has little to no impact on things like soil moisture because the ground can hardened and then it becomes tough for water to infiltrate.

“Streamflow levels are also very low still, so it will take more rain to recharge those streams and their tributaries,” he said, calling the recent rain more of a “stop-the-bleeding kind of week.”

The state began moving toward these extreme drought conditions late last summer, the result of little rainfall overall, a quiet tropical storm season that did not contribute to the average precipitation numbers, and followed by a fairly dry fall and winter.

Since mid-March of this year, there has been a summer-like weather pattern with high pressure overhead, meaning unseasonably warm temperatures and little rainfall. That has helped drought intensify, and more than 40% of the state is now in extreme drought, which is considered the second most severe category in the U.S. Drought Monitor’s classification system, according to the climate office. Most of coastal North Carolina is in the severe drought category, the third category.

“The main hope is that this event is the start of a pattern change, and the forecast is promising for at least a couple more rain events through the end of the week,” Davis said Monday. “If we can pick up a few more inches of rain over the next week or two, then that could at least soften the edges of those Severe and Extreme Drought areas on the map and start bringing some gradual improvements.”

Davis made a similar point Thursday during a webinar “About Extreme Drought: What to know this spring and beyond.” He was joined by other members of DMAC, including its chair Klaus Albertin with the Division of Water Resources, N.C. Forest Service Forestry and Fire Environment Staff Forester Jamie Dunbar, and Senior Service Hydrologist Barrett Smith with the National Weather Service’s Raleigh office.

Davis said during the online presentation that the state had been experiencing a substantial drought for a while and will not be getting rid of the drought and its impacts with one event, or even in one month.

“Ideally, we would like to start seeing consistently at least 1 to 2 inches of rain per week,” Davis explained. “This time of the year, we tend to average between three-quarters of an inch to an inch of rain every week. We want at least to get that normal amount — an extra inch on top of that would be even better — and that would let us start chipping away at this drought and some of the ongoing impacts.”

In parts of northeastern North Carolina, “they are only, in quotes, in the moderate drought level, but that still means they are starting to see some crop stress and some low surface water levels,” Davis said.

The severe drought still prevalent across the coastal plain and central Piedmont means that it has been dry long enough that farmers are not going to see the yields that they expect if these conditions continue. And “at this point, that drought has been around long enough that it can start to take a toll on our water supplies.”

The final category, exceptional drought, “is reserved for the very rarest and the very driest events,” or “the most dire situation,” Davis said, which is “when water supplies are critically low, and you’ll see even more water restrictions implemented at even higher levels than what we’re seeing right now in extreme drought.”

Adding to the drought this winter was a La Niña pattern, which is where there tends to be cooler water out across the Pacific that weakens the jet stream, and ultimately shifting storms north, making it so places like the Great Lakes see more rain, while North Carolina usually experiences warmer and drier winter months.

The snowfall in late January and early February did not have much effect on the rain total deficits. “Even though we saw a foot of snow in some spots, that only amounted to about an inch of liquid, which is average per week at that time of the year,” he added.

Since the middle of March, there has been high pressure either just offshore or right over the Carolinas and has put the area in what Davis called a “heat dome” that is expected around June or July, not in April. “That’s why we’ve seen record high temperatures over the last few weeks and it has really blocked any sort of rai- making weather systems from moving through.” 

Impacts that most people are starting to notice as the drought lingers is that the soil moisture is extremely low right now.

“What that tells us is that the soil moisture is not in any shape for planting right now. There is just no moisture there, especially in the upper layers of the soil. And even if we were to get some decent rainfall over the next week, that does not necessarily mean it is time to start planting,” he said, because anything that’s planted will establish a very shallow root system.

“And if this drought continues, or if we get into some hot weather this summer, those shallow roots will dry out very easily, and that can kill the plant,” he said.

Davis mentioned Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network, or CoCoRaHs, a community science program that encourages people to make daily rainfall measurements and to submit condition monitoring reports that talk about the sort of dryness or impacts that they’re seeing around their home or in their neighborhood or in their community.

There was “a really interesting report from the northeastern part of the state,” Davis said about a submission from a farmer in Chowan County, which is in a moderate drought.

While farmers were able to get the corn in the fields, “the problem there is that a lot of those farmers will pull water directly from the Albemarle Sound, where it meets the Roanoke River, and use that to irrigate their farms,” Davis said. “Typically, in the upper levels of the sound there, you’re getting enough fresh water that’s being flushed down the river, then it’s not too much of a worry about saltiness.”

Because of the drought, water isn’t moving down the river, and salty water is pushing farther inland, which is too salty to use for irrigation. “That’s a very unique impact that we’ll see in that corner of the state during times of extreme drought like this one.”

Albertin with the Division of Water Resources explained that groundwater gives a good indication of the more extreme droughts.

“Surface water can fluctuate rapidly,” Albertin said. When there’s rainfall, groundwater is much more stable, but when there are low groundwater levels, widespread impacts to water resources across the state should be expected.

Another place drought presents itself is that the reservoirs are under more demand, and as the temperatures rise, evaporation is higher.

“When you have inflows that are below or well below the median,” he said, “it’s not surprising that we’ll start to see levels in the reservoirs drop fairly quickly.”

This has resulted in many areas implementing water restrictions, which may increase if conditions do not improve.

Common conservation guidelines are to limit outdoor watering to a couple of days a week and water by hand instead of using a sprinkler.

“It’s better to water heavier once a week versus lighter twice a week and try and water before 10 a.m. this results in less evaporation and reduces grass diseases,” Albertin said. Adding to avoid washing driveways and sidewalks, but repair leaking faucets and run full loads of dishwashers and washing machines.

Dunbar with the state Forest Service, said that as early as December, there have been abnormal load of wildfires.

The 10-year average for January was around 339 fires, but this year, there were more than 1,000 incidents that month across the state.

The coastal plain has a very pronounced spring fire season and if the drought gets worse, eastern North Carolina could very easily have a late spring and summer fire season, he added, and has an above-normal risk for significant wildfires next month.

When the burn ban was instituted on March 28 by the Commissioner of Agriculture, almost 18,000 online burn permits were canceled, noting that in the southeast, about 45% of wildfires are caused by debris burn escapes.

“Although the ban doesn’t prevent wildfire, it definitely reduces the number of new ignitions,” Smith said, allowing more local resources to be used to control complex fires, and allows firefighters to be able to move around more effectively around the state.

Smith with the National Weather Service said the next 30 days are critical for the state in terms of how much rainfall we get and how it impacts the drought.

The outlook for the coming weeks points to above-normal precipitation, and more rain through the summer months.

“As we head toward June, July and August, we come much more dependent on afternoon showers and thunderstorms,” which may help an individual community, farm, city, reservoir, but not always the entire state.

Forecasters are also keeping an eye on patterns in the pacific that could impact the 2026 tropical storm season.

Smith also plugged CoCoRaHS, which he said they are desperate for rainfall reports, “not just when it is raining, not just when it is flooding, but when we’re in these dry situations. We don’t have enough rainfall reports.” Adding that it does not take up much time. “We really need these reports, especially in these very dry situations.”

WILMINGTON – For more than two hours, residents in an area considered ground zero for PFAS contamination in North Carolina passionately, often angrily, chastised the Environmental Management Commission’s proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules.

Dozens of people who signed up to speak – 60 in all – at the public hearing Thursday in downtown Wilmington took turns at a podium unleashing what turned into a collective no-holds-barred rebuke of the proposed rules and, at times, the commissioners who pushed them forward for public comment.

Several of those who spoke in front of a crowd of about 230 people who filled a room in Wilmington’s Skyline Center shared stories about their own health issues, illnesses their loved ones have suffered, and family and friends they’ve lost to various forms of cancer.

Throughout the hearing, people snapped their fingers, signaling their agreement with those speaking at the podium. At the close of every short speech, the audience erupted in rousing applause and cheers.

The sheer number of people who signed up to speak prompted Environmental Management Commissioner Yvonne Bailey, the hearing officer that evening, to ask that residents limit their comments to two minutes.

“Those of us living here have advocated relentlessly at the local, state and federal level, and even at the U.N. for protection of our air and water,” said New Hanover County resident Priss Endo. The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality “has proposed new surface water standards, but in response, the Environmental Management Commission is proposing regulations that will still allow 500 industries across the state to release PFAS chemicals.”

The hearing last week was the third and final the commission scheduled this year on its proposed monitoring and minimization rules for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA; perfluorooctanesulfonic acid, or PFOS; and a branded compound called GenX developed by DuPont spinoff Chemours. The commission has also been hosting public hearings on similar proposed rules for the monitoring and minimization of 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent and likely human carcinogen that has also been found in downstream drinking water sources.

PFAS are a mixture of chemicals used in a host of consumer products from nonstick cookware and food packaging to stain-resistant carpets, water-repellant attire, and makeup.

These chemicals have been found in numerous drinking water sources in North Carolina and traced back to discharges from industrial manufacturers, landfills, firefighting facilities and publicly owned treatment works that accept industry effluent.

Ongoing research into human health effects of PFAS, of which there are more than 15,000 related compounds, have found that some of the substances, including PFOA and PFOS, have been linked to health issues such as weakened immune response, liver damage, low infant birth weights, and higher risk of certain cancers.

Nearly a decade has passed since residents in the Lower Cape Fear region first learned through a local newspaper article that Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility in Bladen County had for decades knowingly discharged PFAS directly into the Cape Fear River.

Since then, public drinking water utilities that pull raw water from the river have spent millions of dollars upgrading their facilities with filtration systems and methods to keep PFAS out of their final product.

Chemours, under a 2019 consent order, has had to test thousands of privately owned drinking water wells for contamination.

“The 2019 consent order was a start,” resident Jim Nesbit said. “It’s not enough. Your mission is to protect the health of the people of this state. Use the full authority you have to take on the pollution of corporations.”

The PFAS monitoring and minimization rules the commission agreed to put out for public comment have remained under a hail of verbal fire from residents, the public utilities that provide their drinking water, and environmental organizations throughout the Cape Fear region.

As written, the rules do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for PFAS dischargers found to be in violation of those rules.

“As a 33-year water professional and former EMC member, I am testifying that the voluntary minimization plans, as proposed, are ineffective,” Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Ken Waldroup said Thursday. “They’re essentially empty facades that do not solve the problem. These minimization plans do not remove PFAS from the Cape Fear River because all reductions are voluntary. Voluntary plans are simply ineffective. Upstream dischargers have had decades to disclose and minimize their PFAS discharges. Unfortunately, history has shown that dischargers only do so in response to effective regulation with specific mandatory limits or mitigation.”

Dr. LeShonda Wallace, who serves on the advisory board for the GenX Exposure Study, one that is measuring GenX and other PFAS exposure in area residents, said the proposed rules ignore science.

Instead, the proposed rules prioritize corporate convenience over public health, she said.

“The impacts are also economic as well as generational,” Wallace said. “PFAS contamination reduces property values, and it shifts the cost away from the polluters and on to the rate payers. Environmental protection and justice requires that those who cause the pollution pay to prevent it and that they pay to clean it up, and I urge the commission to reject these ineffective minimization rules and adopt enforceable, evidence-based standards that reduce pollution at the source.”

Lifelong New Hanover County resident Chip Jackson carried a doll baby with him to the podium.

“I came here tonight to tell this panel how ignorant I have been. I’ve been ignorant because nine years ago I trusted you people. I trusted you to do something,” he said. “I’ll give y’all a pro tip. When you see a baby float by in a stream, you look upstream to see who threw it in the stream.”

Resident Rosemary Schmitt said she simply wants to trust that the water coming out of her tap is not harmful.

“Drinking water should be safe, not something that comes with a list of side effects,” she said.

Just two weeks away from graduating with an undergraduate degree from the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Tyler Raines said he was in a conundrum.

“I don’t have much else to say that hasn’t already been said about the economic, environmental, and social impacts of PFAS on the health of all human beings,” he said. “As I think about where I’m planning to root myself post-graduation, I find myself at a loss. Do I stay here in Wilmington and get poisoned by PFAS or do I go back to my home in Fuquay-Varina and get poisoned by 1,4-dioxane?”

The Environmental Management Commission could decide as early as September to approve or reject the proposed rules. If adopted, those rules would go to the Rules Review Commission for final approval by early next year.

Written comments on the proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules are being accepted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject title “PFAS minimization” or by mail to Karen Preston, DEQ-DWR NPDES Permitting Section, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC  27699-1617.

Reprinted from the Outer Banks Voice

Debbie Swick has a way of spotting problems that most people barely notice — and then refusing to let them go.

On the Outer Banks, the Southern Shores resident is best known as the driving force behind the push to ban balloon releases, a grassroots effort that helped shift public awareness around a form of litter that can travel hundreds of miles before landing in waterways and harming wildlife.

This time, her focus is something less visible but just as persistent: discarded monofilament fishing line — the nearly invisible plastic filament that can linger in the environment for centuries, entangling and injuring marine life long after it’s been cast aside.

In partnership with the Outer Banks Anglers Club, Swick has helped launch a new monofilament recovery and recycling program — one that aims to intercept that line before it becomes a long-term hazard in the water by installing and maintaining collection vessels at sites across the Outer Banks.

“It is a strangling mechanism,” Swick said. “It becomes entangled in fish gills, sea turtles, seals, porpoise. It doesn’t break down. It will amputate and maim marine life.”

Discarded fishing gear — including monofilament line — is widely recognized by marine scientists as one of the most dangerous forms of ocean debris. Research has found that roughly 740,000 kilometers (about 460,000 miles) of fishing line enter the ocean each year — enough to circle the Earth more than 18 times.¹

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), at least 260 marine species are known to be harmed by entanglement in marine debris, including sea turtles, seabirds, and marine mammals.² Monofilament line is particularly dangerous because it is nearly invisible underwater and extremely durable, capable of persisting in the environment for hundreds of years.³

That is something David Masters Jr., vice president of the Outer Banks Anglers Club, sees regularly. “It’s usually tumbled up in seaweed or buried in the sand,” he said. “I pick it up all the time. I’ve seen birds with fishing line caught on the wings or legs and that’s very sad.”

Local conservation groups and park officials have long warned that sea turtles along the Outer Banks can become entangled in discarded fishing line, which can impair their ability to swim or feed — and in some documented cases, lead to death.⁴ Necropsies of stranded turtles in North Carolina have identified monofilament entanglement as a contributing factor, underscoring the long-term danger posed by fishing line that remains in the environment.⁵

Swick is a member of the Outer Banks Anglers Club and last year’s Member of the Year. That, combined with her reputation as an accomplished environmental advocate and volunteer — including recognition with a Governor’s Medallion Award — gave her the standing and credibility to introduce the idea of monofilament recovery to the
anglers. She brought the concept to the club’s board in January, and by February, they were building the collection vessels.

“I told the board, under no circumstances were we going to half-ass this,” she said.

This time, Swick wanted something different: accountability. Each location would be “adopted” by a member of the Outer Banks Anglers Club, responsible for monitoring, emptying, and maintaining the vessel.

“I have the list,” she said. “I know who is supposed to be picking it up, when and where.”

Recreational fishermen are often among the strongest stewards of the waters they fish — a point echoed by fisheries managers and conservation organizations who increasingly emphasize angler participation in sustainability efforts.⁶

The Outer Banks Anglers Club has its own track record, including helping spearhead the creation of artificial reef AR-165 off Oregon Inlet.

The program itself is simple by design. Collection vessels made from PVC pipe have been installed at fishing-heavy locations across the Outer Banks, including piers, marinas, and public access points. Among the initial sites are Kitty Hawk Pier, Avalon Pier, Jennette’s Pier, the Manteo waterfront, Wanchese Marina, and several others.

“We haven’t spoken to one entity that said no,” Masters said, noting support from local governments, property owners, and organizations.

Anglers deposit used monofilament line into the vessels. From there, club members assigned to each site collect the material, clean it, and bring it to monthly meetings. Swick then weighs the line and ships it to a recycling facility operated by Berkley Fishing in Iowa. There, it is processed through the company’s national recycling program, which
has collected millions of miles of monofilament since 1990 and repurposes it into products such as tackle boxes, other plastic goods, and components used in aquatic habitat structures.⁷

The program is still in its early stages, but initial results are encouraging. At one early collection site at Pirates Cove, volunteers gathered 4.5 pounds of monofilament in a single pickup. “That could have all ended up in the water,” said Swick.

As of now, about a dozen sites are in place, with a goal of reaching roughly 20 locations. Organizers are also working to expand the program through local tackle shops and a developing partnership with the North Carolina Beach Buggy Association, whose members could help collect discarded line from beach areas on Hatteras and further south.

Swick has set a clear benchmark for the program’s first year: 100 pounds of collected line. But success, she said, will be measured in other ways too. “When the community starts talking about how much less monofilament they are seeing in the water,” she said, “and when they start asking for us to put more vessels up — that’s a good sign.”

For Masters, the effort reflects something broader about the club itself. “It’s important people realize recreational fishermen really respect the natural resources we have here, because it is our love to fish here,” Masters said. “We want to keep it pristine.”

Sources

1. Global estimates on lost and discarded fishing gear and ghost gear impacts, based on peer-reviewed research (Richardson et al., 2022, Science Advances), including annual losses of fishing line and gear.
2. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — Marine Debris Program, documenting entanglement impacts affecting at least 260 marine species.
3. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission — monofilament fishing line persistence estimates (up to ~600 years in marine environments), widely cited in coastal management and debris mitigation guidance.
4. Outer Banks Forever — Cape Hatteras National Seashore conservation guidance on sea turtle entanglement risks from discarded fishing line.
5. Outer Banks Voice — regional reporting on North Carolina sea turtle necropsies identifying monofilament entanglement as a contributing cause of mortality.
6. NOAA Fisheries — Recreational Fishing Policy, emphasizing “proactive stewardship” and collaboration with the angling community as essential to sustainable fisheries management.
7. Berkley Fishing — Berkley Conservation Institute, “Dedicated to the Future of Fishing,” documenting the company’s national monofilament recycling program (established 1990) and reuse into products such as tackle boxes and habitat materials.

This story is provided courtesy of the Outer Banks Voice, a digital newspaper covering the Outer Banks. Coastal Review is partnering with the Voice to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast.

PEA ISLAND — Recently I had the pleasure of giving Johnnie Van Willis a tour of the historic Pea Island Cookhouse museum. Johnnie traveled to the museum from his home in Marshallberg, a historic fishing community situated on a peninsula in Carteret County and directly along the shores of the Core Sound.

Marshallberg has been characterized as a sleepy, close-knit village with a rich history of commercial fishing, boatbuilding and family heritage. Johnnie’s great-grandfather was Isaac Van Willis Sr. He’s the surfman sitting in the middle top row in the only known photograph of a “Checkerboard Crew.” This term was used in the U.S. Life-Saving Service, the predecessor to today’s U.S. Coast Guard, to identify racially mixed surfmen crews, crews with both Black and white surfmen, like a checkerboard.

In March 2023, a painting depicting this image was unveiled at the College of the Albemarle – Dare County Campus. Both the photograph and painting are on display at the “Cookhouse,” the shortened name for the museum housed in what once was a building in which surfmen cooked and ate their meals.

As background, Johnnie shares both his middle and last name with his great-grandfather and grandfather, Isaac Van Willis Sr. and Isaac Van Willis Jr. In spring 2018, Johnnie took a road trip with his wife and daughters in search of his great-grandfather’s grave. Through a friend, he had learned it was somewhere near the Marshall and Gussie Collins Trail, a trail named after my grandparents at the Collins homestead. They were part of a small and closely knit community of Black residents of Roanoke Island. It included those connected to the Freedmen’s Colony on Roanoke Island, as well as the rich Native American history here.

Like many Black people in their community, my grandparents were known for their hard work, family, friends, and record of service. They once owned a home and farmland near where the trail is now, including much of the property that surrounds the Dare County Governmental Center and not far from the Virginia Dare Memorial Bridge.

I had noticed when Johnnie and two of his daughters were walking on the trail and struck up a conversation with them. They told me they were searching for the gravesite but couldn’t find it, and they were super excited when I revealed that it was a just a few yards away. Leading them there, I sensed our special connection.

Johnnie did not know much about his great-grandfather, other than that he had worked several years in the Life-Saving Service.

I quickly realized the parallels and differences associated with our two families. My great-grandfather also worked in the service. We both had family members and friends who had lived in small, tightly knit communities and had grown up fishing, oystering, catching crabs, building boats, farming, hunting, and going to church together. Yet, we also shared the understanding that history shows the lives and experiences of our two families were very different, simply because of race. 

Born in January 1873, my great-grandfather, Joseph Hall Berry, began his career initially serving as a “substitute” surfman when the legendary Keeper Richard Etheridge commanded the historic Pea Island Life-Saving Station. He enlisted in February 1902, the same month that my father would do the same 37 years later. My great-grandfather Berry is also the only of several family members who served in both the Life-Saving Service and the Coast Guard. He retired in February 1917 after serving for 15 years.

The trail signage at Isaac Van Willis Sr.’s grave shows he served for 30 years. Given that Life-Saving Service stations that once stretched along coast were spaced about seven miles apart and that our great-grandparents worked at neighboring stations, in all likelihood they knew each other. They could have each lived on Roanoke Island, but I am uncertain where Isaac Van Willis Sr. may have lived. They also likely participated in joint rescues. Before motorized equipment was available, these rescues were especially difficult and dangerous, often requiring the manpower of several stations.

Today, Johnnie still chuckles when he recalls how we met. When I realized who he was, the first thing I told him was to wait a few minutes, that his visit was important and I needed to I grab a pen and piece of paper. Yet, as we stood talking, I realized that, other than knowing his great-grandfather spent several years in the service, Johnnie knew little about him. He died when Johnnie was just a small child.

Johnnie knew more about his grandfather, Isaac Van Willis Jr., had who worked in the U.S. Lighthouse Service at the Cape Lookout Lighthouse.

In 2018, I also knew little about Isaac Van Willis Sr., and the story of Checkerboard Crews. Yet, each time I looked at the gravesite, I sensed he was important. His prominent marker, which includes the Life-Saving Service emblem and information about his wife on the opposite side, has always intrigued me. I was delighted a few days ago to receive a call from one of Johnnie’s daughters telling me that she wanted to bring her father back to Roanoke Island and to visit the Cookhouse. The trip was quickly planned. Johnnie and his daughters were thrilled to see a framed copy of the 1910 photograph and the vibrant oil painting of the same, each showing Isaac Van Willis Sr. They had never seen either image before. The discovery even brought tears to one granddaughter’s eyes.

I also made Johnnie aware of a letter that I had discovered about Isaac Van Willis Sr. several years ago. I promised to search for it in the research material I have collected over the years. At the time he was Surfman No. 1 at the Oregon Inlet station, the position typically next in line to become Keeper. Although I haven’t looked at it for several years now, I still recall being surprised to find Keeper Richard Etheridge’s signature on it. He and several others had signed it in support of Isaac Van Willis Sr.’s desire to become Keeper. Before Johnnie left, I promised to search for it and send him a copy.

Likewise, although Johnnie did not have any pictures of his great-grandfather, he had brought along something very special for me to see. He showed me a cherished framed photograph of Isaac Van Willis Jr., a photograph showing him doing work inside the lantern at the Cape Lookout Lighthouse. He promised to send me a copy of the photo when he returned home.

After a day that began with a seafood lunch, then a long visit at the Cookhouse, and ended with a cherished joint return to the Isaac Van Willis Sr. gravesite, I have concluded that our chance encounter eight years ago was destiny, simply something meant to be.

The broader story of Checkerboard Crews is a planned topic for “Cookhouse Chats,” a new initiative for 2026 that started in February. These periodic chats are to provide information on lesser-known stories associated with the history that the Cookhouse represents. Our next planned chat will be announced soon. 

SURF CITY – Kerri Allen acknowledged early on what was also obvious to her audience.

“I do not need to tell anyone in here we have a really high density of leases,” the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s coastal management program director said. “In our public trust waters, when you have that many users, there are going to be conflicts.”

Several people sitting inside the Surf City Municipal Complex’s town council chambers that April 14 afternoon nodded in agreement, eager to share their thoughts on the subject.

With either temporary or permanent shellfish leasing moratoriums in North Carolina waters to its north and south, Topsail Island’s waters have become a hot commodity for oyster growers.

There are now nearly 190 shellfish leases in the waters behind the 26-mile-long barrier island from the New River and its adjacent estuarine waters south to Topsail Sound.

That’s a roughly 46% increase from the collective number of leases in 2018 in Onslow and Pender counties.

The squeeze put on the waters around Topsail Island has prompted ongoing calls for a temporary moratorium on new shellfish leases in the area.

The Topsail Island Shoreline Protection Commission, or TISPC, which is composed of elected officials from each of the island’s three towns – Topsail Beach, Surf City and North Topsail Beach – initiated a request for a temporary pause on leases more than a year ago. Commissioners in Onslow and Pender counties did the same.

Shellfish lease moratoriums in the state may be enacted only by the North Carolina General Assembly.

On April 10, 2025, Rep. Carson Smith, R-Pender, introduced legislation requiring a statewide study on shellfish leasing and the current lease moratorium.

House Bill 841 made it no further than the Senate’s Rules and Operations Committee.

“If there is a temporary moratorium, we don’t feel that’s unreasonable,” Allen said last week.

A pause would give the Coastal Federation and North Carolina Sea Grant more time to talk with those who live along and use the waters around the island and come up with suggestions to help shape future policy that would protect the industry, make it sustainable long term, and ease user conflicts, she said.

Additional focus groups, including one for shellfish growers, will be scheduled this fall.

Meanwhile, a temporary moratorium that has been repeatedly extended since it was first enacted in New Hanover County in 2019 is set to expire in July.

“It’s very reasonable to say if we were able to open up some of these other areas that could help alleviate the pressure that this area is seeing,” Allen said. “A lot of the oyster growers that we work with in this region live in New Hanover County and they would love not to have to drive up here to take care of their farms. We are actively trying to get New Hanover to not extend their moratorium. I do not have a good feel, one way or another, how that’s going to go yet, but we are having those conversations.”

Surf City Mayor Teresa Batts said officials on the island do not intend to wait for a decision before asking for a temporary moratorium.

“I know you’re going to go through the procedural steps, but the TISPC, we’re not going to sit back and wait,” she said. “If we see that New Hanover County is trying to extend their moratorium, then we’re going to try to slide in there on their session and piggyback on their moratorium.”

The Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, and North Carolina Sea Grant teamed up last year to launch a Geographic Information System, or GIS, database pinpointing areas where leases may or may not be suitable in the waterways behind Topsail Island. The GIS database is anticipated to be published next year.

Recommendations shared with the organizations will help shape the North Carolina Strategic Plan for Shellfish Mariculture, a plan commissioned by the General Assembly in 2017.

This document is effectively the state’s roadmap for a sustainable shellfish industry. It’s not meant to be a fixed document, rather one that evolves as the industry evolves and conditions change, Allen explained, adding, “which they very much have changed since 2017.”

In the years since, the state has seen a shift where shellfish farmers are using floating gear to grow oysters in the water column, a method that allows them to maximize the spaces in which they grow their product.

Unlike cages that are placed on the waterbed, those in water column leases poke up from the water’s surface.

And, as more water column leases have been granted, complaints have mounted about their impacts to the viewsheds of waterfront properties, boating and kayaking access, and infringement on popular fishing spots.

Fishing guide Capt. Ray Brittain offered to take Allen and N.C. Sea Grant Extension Director Frank López on his boat, and on his dime, to show them how the leases affect his business.

“There’s so many PVC pipes out there,” Brittain said. “You don’t need a thousand PVC pipes to mark,” a lease area. “We can’t fish in those. I mean, mark your outer edge to show people where it is, but a lot of it is just unnecessary stuff.”

Brittain was among nearly 30 attendees at the April 14 meeting, where participants were asked to break into two groups to discuss concerns and recommendations that will be documented and shared with local elected officials, legislators, and state agency officials.

Those at the meeting in Surf City last week touched on a host of issues, raising concerns related noise associated with shellfish farming activities, nighttime navigation around shellfish leases, the density of leases around Permuda Island Reserve, and linear placement of leases along estuary island shorelines blocking anglers from following fish.

Some asked for shellfish farmers to be required to carry liability insurance, while others suggested the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries create a more robust public notification system announcing lease applications that would include property owners whose land is within and adjacent to the viewshed of a proposed lease.

Other recommendations included an implementation of buffers by moving leases further from shorelines based on specific locations within a waterbody, potentially increasing lease fees, decreasing the length of time a lease is valid, and the possibility of commissioning studies on the impacts of floating cages on the ecosystem.

The Coastal Federation and Sea Grant are accepting comments online through the Stump Sound shellfish mariculture planning – stakeholder input form through Aug. 1.

Despite the utility poles connecting the network of overhead cables along the paved, two-lane road and other obvious signs of the 21^st century, Historic Halifax State Historic Site transported visitors to April 12, 1776, during “Halifax Resolves Days,” a weekend commemoration of North Carolina taking the first step toward freedom.

“Today is a huge day for North Carolina. Two hundred and fifty years ago today, the Fourth Provincial Congress of North Carolina met here in Halifax and adopted the Halifax Resolves, the first official action by any colony to declare independence from the king,” Gov. Josh Stein said Sunday afternoon to the more than 300 gathered for the Halifax Resolves Ceremony.

Held under a sizable party tent near the Colonial Courthouse Site, where the 1760s wooden building once stood, the 250^th anniversary ceremony wrapped up the April 10-12 event. Visitors were able to watch living history reenactments, colonial life demonstrations, musical performances, and a ceremony led by the state-recognized Haliwa-Saponi Indian Tribe based in Halifax and Warren counties.

North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources Secretary Pamela Brewington Cashwell introduced Stein before he took the podium.

During her brief comments, she explained that the department is responsible for organizing America 250 NC, the state’s celebration of the 250^th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, and Halifax Resolves Days is a signature event of that celebration.

“We will also have a major event at the capitol in Raleigh this Fourth of July titled ‘Capitol 250: North Carolina Freedom Fest.’ We hope that if you don’t have something going on in your local community, that you will join us in Raleigh for another massive event,” she said, then directed the audience to visit the A250 website that details 700 events taking place this year as part of the celebration, from dramatic presentations, festivals, murals that have been painted in various communities.

When Stein welcomed the audience, he encouraged them to see the Halifax Resolves document on display in the new visitor center that officially opened that week. The governor and other state officials made a trip to Halifax April 7 for a ceremonial ribbon-cutting and to view the document that will be on loan from the National Archives until October.

Stein explained that leading up to the delegates meeting in Halifax, there was tension in the colonies between those who wanted to reconcile with the crown and those who wanted to rebel.

Even after the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 9, 1775, a large portion of the colonial population wanted to make accommodation with England. When the Second Continental Congress met in Philadelphia in July of that year, they did not declare independence. Instead, they petitioned the king for more favorable terms. From 1775 to 1776, “the tide began to turn in favor of rebellion, but that path was by no means a certainty,” stein continued.

Then, Thomas Paine published “Common Sense” in January 1776, the pamphlet that Stein said made a “powerful argument for an independent, democratic nation founded on equality. Truly a radical notion.”

Then on Feb. 27, 1776, “a militia of patriots skirmished with loyalist troops at the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge,” located just west of Wilmington. “The Patriots soundly defeated the Loyalists, putting an end to English rule in North Carolina, blocking an English invasion of the south and lighting a flame of liberty within North Carolinians,” Stein continued.

As these events were taking place, North Carolina’s provincial delegates met with residents across the colony, and brought all those perspectives to Halifax in April 1776 when the fourth North Carolina provincial Congress gathered.

The delegates in the Halifax Resolves detailed their neighbors’ grievances, “or in their words, the ‘usurpations and violences’ committed by the king. They wrote that the ‘king and Parliament of Great Britain have usurped the power over the persons and property of the people, unlimited and uncontrolled and disregarding their humble petitions for peace, liberty, and safety. They made diverse legislative acts denouncing war, famine and every species of calamity daily employed in destroying the people and committing the most horrid devastations in the country.’”

By adopting these resolves, Stein said that these 83 delegates “did something radical, something revolutionary, something patriotic. They unanimously empowered North Carolina’s representatives at the Second Continental Congress up in Philadelphia to vote to declare our nation’s independence from the crown,” he said. “With these Halifax Resolves, North Carolina became the first colony to take any action declaring our nation’s independence.”

Though the document set the colonies on a path of expanding freedom in this nation, Stein acknowledged that the resolves were “far from perfect,” but still encouraged reading the text, even though parts will make the reader “feel very uncomfortable.”

“It’s easy, when you look back at history, to assume some sort of inevitability, like of course, it happened, but this historic action and the fact that it was unanimous was by no means a foregone conclusion,” Stein said, noting that rebuking the world’s greatest superpower “would have been considered treason, a crime punishable by death.”

The colonists depended on England for military protection and economic security. “Failure objectively was likely, and failure could have been fatal,” Stein said. “With these stakes and these odds, this vote for independence was brave and truly incredible.”

The British Empire could have easily subdued a “ragtag militia or a single colony, but a united force at least stood a chance.” With every single delegate voting in favor of the Halifax Resolves, “it was a precursor of the unity that the revolution would require.”

Less than three months later, at the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, “the 13 British colonies, so incredibly diverse and different from one another, declared that we were no longer 13 separate colonies. We are the United States of America,” Stein said.

And while “250 years ago, internal division was one of the greatest threats to our nation’s success. 250 years later, I would venture that that is still true,” Stein said. “There are so many forces seeking to divide us that profit from our distrust for one another. There are so many forces making the American Dream feel out of reach, telling us that our success requires others to fail, and too often, we hear crudeness, not civility and experience division, not decency. It does not have to be this way.”

Americans can chart a different course, lust like our forebears in Halifax, “After all, we are not red. We are not blue. We are red, white and blue,” Stein said.

“We have so much to gain from bridging our differences, not glossing over them, but having the confidence to find common ground and the patriotism to remember that we are all Americans, that we all love this place,” he concluded. “It is a revolutionary idea, and it is the North Carolina way.”

Rep. Don Davis, R-N.C., who represents the 1st District ecompassing 22 northeastern North Carolina counties, was among the handful of officials who spoke in addition to the governor.

Davis said that the day “shines a light on a true treasure from our great state and nation.”

“Right here in eastern North Carolina, 250 years ago, brave souls took courageous steps towards independence. Their actions remind us of our resilience and grit, illustrating what we can achieve together when we unite for common cause. The Halifax Resolves aren’t just a chapter in our history. They are evidence of hope for our future.”

FAYETTEVILLE — Proposed monitoring and minimization rules for industrial dischargers of 1,4-dioxane and the public sewage plants that accept those facilities’ waste fail to protect North Carolinians’ drinking water, speakers at a public hearing said Tuesday.

All but one of the 13 people who spoke at the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission’s hearing at Fayetteville Technical Community College criticized the proposed rules, arguing those rules fall short in reducing the amounts of 1,4-dioxane discharged into people’s drinking water sources and lack enforcement.

Those comments mirror ones articulated at the commission’s April 9 hearing on the proposed rules in Hickory. A third hearing is scheduled for May 12 in Jamestown.

“The so-called monitoring and minimization rule establishes certain monitoring requirements, but the term minimization is misleading,” Fayetteville resident Madison Williams said. “The way the rule is promulgated is in a way that does not require polluters to reduce PFAS or 1,4-dioxane emissions into North Carolina drinking water supplies, and it imposes no consequences, even if those discharges increase. This in effect is a polluter written rule.”

Related: Public hearings set on proposed wastewater discharge rules

The commission is hosting separate public hearings, the first of which was held in Asheville last week, on a similar rule for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS; perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA; perfluorooctanesulfonic acid, or PFOS; and GenX, a chemical specific to a manufacturing plant that sits near Cape Fear River in Bladen County.

Under the proposed rules, publicly owned treatment works that receive industrial wastewater, and their manufacturer customers, would be required to monitor for discharges of 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent, into rivers, creeks and streams.

Facilities would be required to conduct baseline monitoring every three months for one year. Based on those sampling results, dischargers may be required to conduct additional monitoring.

“If determined to need ongoing sampling the industrial direct discharger will be required to develop a minimization plan,” explained Bridget Shelton with the Division of Water Resources’ planning section. “A minimization plan is a strategy to reduce or eliminate pollutants at the source before they are discharged into the environment.”

Facilities that “meet certain criteria” may request exceptions from ongoing monitoring and minimization plan requirements, she said.

The proposed rules do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for violations.

That fact has drawn sharp criticism from residents, environmental groups and public drinking water providers who have been calling on the state to establish drinking water standards for PFAS and 1,4-dioxane and regulate direct dischargers of those chemicals.

“Over 1 million North Carolina residents consume water from the Cape Fear River, water that is contaminated with 1,4-dixoane, PFAS and other forever chemicals that will continue to proliferate without sufficient regulations at the federal and state levels,” said Jonelle Kimbrough, executive director of Fayetteville-based environmental nonprofit Sustainable Sandhills. “The proposed 1,4-dioxane minimization rules seem to be an attempt at regulation but, as written, they essentially do nothing to protect the natural resources or public health of our state and we need protection.”

Rob Clark, Cape Fear River Watch’s water quality programs manager, said the organization and its more than 1,000 members collectively opposed the proposed rules.

“These rules are completely inadequate when it comes to dealing with PFAS and 1,4-dioxane pollution in the Cape Fear River Basin,” he said. “The proposed minimization rules do not set enforceable limits on how much these toxic compounds can be discharged into our waterways. Instead, they rely on polluters to monitor their pollution and submit plans describing how they might reduce that over time. Do we really think that polluters are going to cut into their profits in order to do the right thing and stop discharging these chemicals into our waterways?”

Representatives of downstream public water suppliers said the proposed rules lack a clear objective to significantly decrease 1,4-dioxane levels in state surface waters.

Fayetteville Public Works Commission’s Environmental Programs Manager Rhonda Locklear pointed out that statewide monitoring has identified 1,4-dioxane primarily in the Cape Fear River Basin.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, “has sampled surface waters in 15 of North Carolina’s 17 river basins, confirming that most industrial 1,4-dioxane sources are in the Cape Fear River Basin, where 35% of these samples since 2017 were above non-detect thresholds, almost 10 times the rate in the Neuse River Basin, and nearly 200 times that of the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin,” she said. “The problem areas are well-defined, documented, and PWC expects DEQ to set meaningful regulations and reductions in the Cape Fear River Basin.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Deputy Executive Director Kevin Morris said that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which classifies 1,4-dioxane as a likely human carcinogen, warns that at even at concentrations of 0.35 parts per billion, long-term exposure to the chemical increases cancer risks to humans and may cause significant kidney and liver impacts.

“Downstream water systems continue to experience periodic spikes in 1,4-dioxane despite having no role in producing or discharging this chemical, which demonstrates the limitations of our current regulatory framework,” Morris said.

He highlighted how effluent from Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant has periodically tested for elevated levels of 1,4-dioxane, concentrations of which far exceeded levels associated with long-term health risks.

“These discharges flow into waterways like the Haw and Cape Fear rivers,” Morris said. “They’re relied upon by downstream drinking water systems, and they require additional monitoring, treatment, adjustments and customer communication. The downstream public ultimately bears the risk from and the cost of managing contamination that they had no part in creating. Voluntary reduction measures are insufficient to ensure consistent outcomes or to protect downstream communities. Utilities can manage only what arrives at their intake.”

As of Wednesday, DEQ had received more than 2,000 public comments and counting on the commission’s proposed rules for 1,4-dixoane and PFAS, according to Josh Kastrinksy, DEQ’s deputy communications director.

“The comments we’ve received in writing have by and large reflected the comments we’ve received in person,” he said.

Andrew Mlot, chair of the North Carolina Pretreatment Consortium Inc., a nonprofit that represents more than 180 pretreatment professionals in 64 state-approved pretreatment programs across North Carolina, was the only person Tuesday to speak in support of the proposed rules.

But that organization has “several specific concerns” with the rules as they are currently written, he said.

“The costs to treat 1,4-dioxane at the POTW (publicly owned treatment works) level is staggering. Capital costs alone range from $10 million to $1.3 billion, making source control the only practical path forward,” he said.

The proposed rules would require public treatment works in Greensboro, Burlington, Asheboro, High Point and Reidsville, which have been conducting monitoring and minimization activities going back to 2015, to start over, Mlot said.

“We ask for an explicit offramp for POTWs that have already completed successful programs. Replace any detection with a workable screening threshold. As currently written, any detection of 1,4-dioxane triggers ongoing monitoring requirements and a full minimization plan. NCPC members do not believe this is workable. We support an alternative screening threshold based on meaningful concentrations or loading levels,” he said.

DEQ is accepting written comments through June 15. Comments may be submitted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject heading “1,4-dioxane minimization, or by mail to Bridget Shelton, DEQ-DWR Planning Section, 1611 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1611.

Reprinted from the Ocracoke Observer

Waterfowl memories are woven throughout Ocracoke native Eddie O’Neal’s life.

He recalls redheads, pintails, teal and great flocks of geese on the Pamlico Sound and winter days in sink boxes with old-timers like Thurston Gaskill.

Because of that history and his skill of turning a block of wood into a work of art, he was named featured carver for this year’s Ocracoke Island Waterfowl Festival from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday, and from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday in the Ocracoke School gym.

O’Neal chose the Canada goose as his signature piece, honoring both the bird and the generations of island hunters and carvers who came before him.

“A Canada goose was a real trophy back then,” he said. “Something you showed off with pride and often shared with older neighbors who couldn’t get out to hunt themselves.”

O’Neal graduated from Ocracoke School in 1978 alongside classmates Vince O’Neal and the late John Simpson, two of the founders of the Ocracoke Decoy Carver’s Guild in 2018.

As a boy, O’Neal was constantly on the water.

Like many island youth, by age 12 he was already hunting and fishing around Springer’s Point and on his father’s nearby property.

He fished commercially with his father, Carson, who served in the Coast Guard, and brothers Andy and Albert, working pound nets and gigging flounder.

During his 23 years working for the state of North Carolina, he held a variety of positions: on a dredge crew, building spillways and working heavy equipment from Southport to Knotts Island.

Included in his working career, he also built golf courses, was a truck driver and worked on road paving crews for an asphalt company out of Norfolk, Virginia.

He and his wife Pam also ran the Island Galley restaurant on Ocracoke until damage from Hurricane Isabel (2003) forced them to close.

Although he appreciated decoys, he didn’t start carving as a hobby until around 2008 while living in Virginia Beach. Over time, that hobby “morphed into a full-time job.”

Among his fond memories are watching Wilbur and Clinton Gaskill, older Ocracoke carvers, who turned out small geese flyers and decoys at an astonishing pace. Wilbur could make 15 to 20 decoys a day and sell every one of them on a summer day when the island was far quieter than it is now.

His second cousin, Dave O’Neal, a retired Coast Guard man and renowned carver, has been an important influence offering tips on the techniques and tools of the craft.

Preferring to focus on his own carvings, O’Neal doesn’t collect or trade in other people’s decoys.

When he and Pam retired several years ago, they moved back to Ocracoke, and his carving became a daily practice.

Today, O’Neal does most of his carvings for the Island Ragpicker shop, run by his siblings Stephanie and Albert.

Not just decoys — he crafts shore birds, small flyers, fish, and a variety of decorative pieces that keep the shelves full and his hands busy.

Carving is his “therapy room” — something that keeps him grounded in retirement and balances time with his grandchildren Carter, Kyler, Amaya, Johnny and Angel.

He rarely sells pieces directly, except at some island events.

He prefers to stock the shop or donate carvings to local fundraisers like the Ocracoke Firemen’s Ball auction where his works have helped raise significant financial support over the years.

For materials, O’Neal favors northern white cedar, which he hauls back from a sawmill near Egg Harbor, New Jersey.

He also uses tupelo, sourced from a Mennonite mill near Pink Hill, and some pine.

Large decoys are almost always cedar, while smaller items, like flyers, often come from scrap wood he picks up from around the island, such as from the school that was torn down.

He appreciates cedar’s similarity to local juniper and its fine, aromatic grain. O’Neal shapes his birds with an angle grinder for the rough form, then refines them with a Dremel and extensive sanding, especially on the delicate heads and bills of shore birds.

He draws most of his own patterns by hand and also enjoys building furniture, having made tables and household pieces for family members from barn oak and other reclaimed woods.

This story is provided courtesy of the Ocracoke Observer, a newspaper covering Ocracoke Island. Coastal Review partners with the Ocracoke Observer to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest along our coast.

Microplastics and pharmaceuticals have made the Environmental Protection Agency’s newly published draft list of substances in public drinking water that warrant scientific scrutiny.

This marks a first for the EPA, which, along with U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., announced last week that microplastics and pharmaceuticals are two of four contaminant groups and dozens of chemicals included on the draft Sixth Contaminant Candidate List.

The April 2 announcement kick-started a 60-day public comment period.

The Trump administration hailed the additions to the list, also referred to as CCL 6, as “a landmark set of actions to safeguard the nation’s drinking water.”

“For too long, Americans have vocalized concerns about plastics and pharmaceuticals in their drinking water. That ends today,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin stated in a release. “By placing microplastics and pharmaceuticals on the Contaminant Candidate List for the first time ever, EPA is sending a clear message: we will follow the science, we will pursue answers, and we will hold ourselves to the highest standards to protect the health of every American family.”

The announcement comes as the Trump administration is actively pursuing rolling back drinking water standards for several per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, established under the previous administration.

PFAS, along with disinfection byproducts, once again made it onto a CCL, which singles out contaminants that are known or anticipated to be in public drinking water systems, but are not regulated under the Safe Water Drinking Act and may be considered for future regulatory action.

Also making it back on the list is 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent that, along with PFAS, is known to be in the drinking water sources for tens of thousands of North Carolinians, perhaps most notably in the Cape Fear Region.

Last year, the EPA announced that it would retain current National Primary Drinking Water Regulations for PFOA and PFOS but rescind regulations and reconsider regulatory determinations for other PFAS, including GenX.

GenX is specific to Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility that is situated near the banks of the Cape Fear River and more than 70 miles upstream of Wilmington. The Cape Fear River is the raw drinking water source for hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians.

The federal agency also said it was extending deadlines for public water treatment plants to come into compliance with the federally established limits for those PFAS.

Since the late 1990s, the EPA has been required by law to publish every five years a list of contaminants that are either unregulated or not proposed for regulation.

CCLs are considered the initial step in a process to better understand, through scientific research, potential human health risks of contaminants in drinking water.

And, while clean drinking water advocates say this is a good first step, they urge the public to call for regulations to limit the levels of or altogether halt the discharge of contaminants into public drinking water sources.

“I think it’s important to recognize what chemicals are in our drinking water and to study the risks associated with that,” Hannah Nelson, a staff attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center’s Chapel Hill office said. “But simply adding chemicals to this list isn’t going to protect our communities. They’re on the list because we know they’re in drinking water, so now we need to take the next step to control the source of that pollution at the source and get it out of our drinking water. I North Carolina, because we know these pollutants are already there, I think we really should be focusing on how do we keep them out in the first place, because that’s how we truly protect our communities.”

Residents in the Cape Fear region, the local governments that represent them, the public water utilities that serve them, and environmental organizations are embroiled in an ongoing fight pushing for state regulations to put the onus on dischargers of PFAS and 1,4-dioxane to reduce the amounts of chemicals they release into drinking water sources.

On Tuesday, the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission will host its first in a series of public hearings on proposed PFAS and 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules.

Three hearings will focus on proposed rules for discharges of PFOS, PFOA and GenX into North Carolina’s surface waters and three on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane in wastewater discharges from certain facilities into surface waters.

The proposed rules packages do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for discharge violations, which has become a sticking point for those who argue that the rules would do little in actually minimizing the amount of those contaminants in drinking water sources.

“We know our environmental rulemaking body is currently trying to pass rules on PFAS and 1,4-dioxane that don’t control chemicals at the source,” Nelson said. “Having drinking water standards would be a helpful too, but our real focus should be, how can we keep these out in the first place and how can we encourage our state and our federal leaders to protect the people from the pollution before it even reaches the point of coming out of our sink and pouring into our cups.”

Beyond Plastics, a Bennington College, Vermont-based organization dedicated to ending single-use plastic pollution, called for similar regulation for microplastics.

“The U.S. Environmental Agency has taken an important first step to regulate microplastics in drinking water,” Beyond Plastics President and former EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck stated in a release. “I applaud this decision by the EPA and urge the agency to move rapidly to not only regulate microplastics in drinking water but to also prevent microplastics from entering our water supplies.”

Cape Fear River Watch’s Water Quality Programs Manager Rob Clark agreed, saying that microplastics are ubiquitous – they’re in our environment and in our bodies.

“It’s a situation where it seems like we already have a lot of information on this,” he said. “What we need is ubiquitous monitoring across the country and we need regulation. The quicker that we get to setting a maximum contaminant level for microplastics, the quicker it’s not in our drinking water.”

In its April 2 release, the EPA noted that while human health benchmarks for pharmaceuticals are not regulations and not enforceable, “they are a vital resource, empowering local decision-makers to evaluate risks and protect their communities when pharmaceutical contamination is detected at concerning levels.”

The public comment period on draft CCL 6 will close June 5.

The EPA is expected to sign a final list by Nov. 17.

“I think public comment periods on action like this are really important because it’s a good time for folks to express concerns about the chemicals that are known to be present in their drinking water,” Nelson said. “Adding chemicals to the list is truly just an acknowledgement that they’re in the water. I don’t think we should read this list as a commitment to going above and beyond and advocating for folks. What we need to see is strong action to keep those chemicals out, whether it be from the federal administration or our state agencies.”

The Master Gardener Volunteer Association is hosting is annual native plant sale April 16-19 in Wilmington.

Now in its 39th year, the sale will feature more than 8,000 plant varieties, showcasing native plants that support wildlife populations in southeastern North Carolina and enhance the community’s botanical landscape.

Annuals, perennials, herbs and vegetables, azaleas, Japanese maples, and shrubs will be available for selection during the four-day sale, which will run 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. Thursday, April 16, through Saturday, April 18, and noon – 4 p.m. on Sunday, April 19.

The sale will be held at the New Hanover County Arboretum and N.C. Cooperative Extension, 6206 Oleander Drive.

The event will host a free seed exchange in the Cooperative Extension’s Plant Clinic. Houseplants will be made available through the Ability Garden, and an expert talk will be held on Japanese maple care and pruning.

Expert guidance will be offered from master gardener volunteers and extension staff on plant selections and they will help with safely and securely transferring plants to vehicles.

Parking and plant carts are limited, so participants are encouraged to carpool and bring their own carts to reduce wait time.

The arboretum will be closed April 13-15 in preparation for the sale.

Being able to watch a mother sperm whale give birth to her calf in the eastern Caribbean Sea a couple of summers ago “felt like an encounter with something both impossibly rare and profoundly ancient,” marine biologist David Gruber told Coastal Review.

Gruber, a National Geographic Explorer and City University of New York distinguished professor of biology, is president of Project CETI (Cetacean Translation Initiative). He founded the nonprofit based in the U.S. and Dominica in 2020. It’s made up of artificial intelligence and natural language processing specialists, cryptographers, linguists, marine biologists, roboticists and underwater acousticians from a network of universities and other partners, per the website.

He was aboard the organization’s sailing research vessel on July 8, 2023, off the coast of Dominica, where scientists have been observing whales for decades, when the team noticed that all 11 members of a known sperm whale unit had gathered at the water’s surface.

The team soon realized that they were witnessing the exceedingly rare 34-minutelong birth of a sperm whale in the wild and the coordinated care efforts for the newborn by the other adult females.

Project CETI published two reports detailing what the team observed, calling the work in a March 26 press release “the most comprehensive documentation of a sperm whale birth ever recorded and the first quantitative evidence of cooperative birth assistance among non-primates.”

The two studies analyze more than six hours of underwater audio and aerial drone footage recorded during the birth event.

Gruber, in the March 26 release, stated that these findings fundamentally reshape how we understand whale society. “What we’re seeing is deeply coordinated social care during one of the most vulnerable moments of life.”

Researchers said that understanding of labor, birth, postnatal and neonatal behavior is lacking for most cetaceans, with observations of these births in the wild recorded for less than 10% of species. Cetaceans are marine mammals such as whales, dolphins and porpoises.

“Of the described 93 species of cetaceans only nine species have reported birth observations collected in the wild,” the study states. “And reports of birth events of pelagic, deep-diving cetacean species, such as sperm whales, are exceptionally rare.”

Published in Nature’s Scientific Reports, “Description of a collaborative sperm whale birth and shifts in coda vocal styles during key events,” gives a chronological timeline of the birth framed within the context of known whale behavior, communication and evolution.

“Audio data revealed distinct shifts in vocal styles during key moments of the birth, including the presence of vowel-like structures, adding a new dimension to Project CETI’s ongoing work decoding sperm whale communication,” according to the nonprofit.

The journal Science published “Cooperation by non-kin during birth underpins sperm whale social complexity.” The organization explained that the study quantified the behavior of the 11-member unit by using high-resolution drone footage, computer vision, and multiscale network analysis using software developed for the work, combined with previously made scientific observations, including reports of whale births.

“The findings show that female sperm whales from two unrelated matrilines come together during a birth to assist the labouring mother, and both kin and non-kin taking turns assisting the newborn. This provides the first quantitative evidence of birth attendance outside of humans and a few other primates,” researchers state in the press release, adding that the birth attracted the attention of short-finned pilot whales and Fraser’s dolphins.

Gruber told Coastal Review what it was like to witness the live birth.

“To be on CETI’s sailing research vessel, in that moment, felt like an encounter with something both impossibly rare and profoundly ancient,” he noted.

“In marine biology, so much of a career is impacted by luck — being present when ocean life decides to reveal itself,” Gruber continued. “I’ve been fortunate enough to witness things like the first biofluorescent turtle seen to humans, but nothing compares to witnessing a sperm whale come into the world.”

Gruber went on to say that very few such births have been seen by humans, and the last scientifically recorded observation after the birth was decades ago.

“It makes you wonder what Herman Melville would have written had he glimpsed this: not the violence of whaling, but the circle of care and a society revealing itself through cooperation,” he explained about the author of the 1851 American novel, “Moby Dick,” that tells the tale of a whaling vessel’s captain and his quest for vengeance against the whale that took his leg.

“We witnessed culture in action,” when the 11 whales, across family lines, “coordinated to keep a newborn alive, communicating in ways we’re only beginning to understand.”

Gruber said it took more than 50 scientists 2.5 years “to begin to interpret even a fraction of that moment, because Project CETI sits at the intersection of marine biology, artificial intelligence, and network science — fields that must come together if we are to decode these lives,” he said. ”And, in some sense, this is why Project CETI exists: We are one of the few teams in the world continuously embedded with these whales, with the tools, the longitudinal data, and the interdisciplinary lens to not only witness something this rare, but to begin to understand it.” 

Shane Gero, National Geographic Explorer, Project CETI biology lead, and founder of The Dominica Sperm Whale Project, leads the research.

Researchers, who have been tracking since 2005, the mother that gave birth, observed her that day with both her mother and her daughter.

“This is the most detailed window we’ve ever had into one of the most important moments in a whale’s life,” Gero said in the release. “Because this family unit has been studied for decades, we could see what the grandmother was doing, how the new big sister acted, and how each helped mom and newborn, placing this rare birth within a deep social and behavioral context.”

The two studies point to cooperative caregiving during birth being ancient evolutionary behavior.

The behaviors documented in the research “suggest that cooperation during births functions to reinforce social bonds between sperm whales, which underpin their large-scale society. Helping unrelated companions drives them to help in return later. In this way, a foundation of trust and collective success builds their social world,” researchers said.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation has acquired 787 acres along the North River in Carteret County, expanding the North River Wetlands Preserve to close to 7,000 acres.

The property, purchased for just shy of $1.9 million, is expected to further the nonprofit organization’s mission to protect water quality, while supporting military operations. The new land is also going to provide a new official portion of North Carolina’s Mountains-to-Sea Trail, the environmental group said Monday.

The North River Wetlands Preserve was once mostly ditched and drained farm land but has been restored over the past two decades into one of the largest rehabilitated wetland systems in state.

The new property was purchased through a partnership of state, federal and nonprofit funding, including $590,000 from the U.S. Department of Defense, $449,000 from the Complete the Trails Program for the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, and $964,691 from the N.C. Land and Water Fund for acquisition and transaction costs. 

With the property acquisition April 2, the preserve includes the headwaters of the North River, Wards Creek, and Jarrett Bay, “forming a connected natural system that filters runoff, improves water quality, and sustains productive fisheries downstream,” according to the organization.

“The newly protected tract includes forested wetlands, upland areas, and approximately 6,900 linear feet of tributaries flowing into the North River—a designated Primary Nursery Area and contributor to the Outstanding Resource Waters of Core and Back Sounds,” the organization added.

The Coastal Federation said it plans to begin restoring the site’s natural hydrology by reconnecting wetlands, improving drainage patterns, and enhancing long-term resilience to sea level rise. 

Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis explained in a release that the acquisition reflects the kind of forward-looking investment North Carolina needs.

“One that protects water quality, strengthens coastal ecosystems, supports military readiness, and creates meaningful public access. Expanding the North River Wetlands Preserve to nearly 7,000 acres ensures this landscape will provide lasting benefits for communities, fisheries, and future generations,” he said.

The land will be a new official section of North Carolina’s Mountains-to-Sea Trail, which is a 1,400-mile route connecting the Great Smoky Mountains to the Outer Banks, and is managed by North Carolina State Parks. 

“The acquisition of this property represents a transformational moment for the Mountains-to-Sea Trail in this area,” Brent Laurenz, executive director of Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, said in a release. “We’re so appreciative of the partnership with the Federation to acquire this property for both the significant addition it will make to the MST and for its long-term conservation value.” 

The Department of Navy used funding from the Defense Department’s Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration, or REPI, Program, to secure a permanent restrictive use easement over the property where low-altitude helicopter training routes associated with Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point operations are held.

“This project represents years of work bringing together the right partners and funding to protect a truly special place,” Todd Miller, senior adviser to the Coastal Federation and project manager for the acquisition, said in a statement.

“By securing this property, we are safeguarding the headwaters of the North River, expanding one of the most important coastal preserves in the state, and creating a permanent route for the Mountains-to-Sea Trail. It’s a powerful example of how conservation can deliver clean water, public access, and support for our military at the same time,” he added.

This project is part of the organization’s “Lands for a Healthy Coast” initiative, which focuses on conserving strategic coastal landscapes that protect water quality, sustain fisheries, and build resilience to climate change. The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Additional partners on the project include the North Carolina General Assembly, and Morehead City attorney John Harris.

North Carolina’s Flood Resiliency Blueprint Tool now includes enhanced flood mapping and risk information for five river basins in Eastern North Carolina.

The online tool designed to help local governments, agencies and nongovernmental partners develop, evaluate and prioritize resilience actions has been updated with new nonregulatory or “advisory” flood maps for the Cape Fear, Lumber, Neuse, Tar-Pamlico, and White Oak river basins.

The need for new maps and modeling efforts were identified in the draft blueprint, which was created by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality at the direction of the General Assembly.

The updates were made through extensive coordination with local leaders, other state agencies, nongovernmental organizations, university researchers and evaluating programs in other states like Texas and Louisiana for guidance, according to an NCDEQ release.

NCDEQ Secretary Reid Wilson, in the release, stated that research from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill found that more than 90,000 buildings in Eastern North Carolina flooded at least once from 1996 until 2020, and 43% of those buildings were outside the mapped Federal Emergency Management Agency floodplain. “The General Assembly’s investment in updated modeling and mapping means that North Carolinians in five river basins now have a more accurate picture of their actual flooding risk, Wilson said.”   

The improved mapping was done in partnership with the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program, one overseen by the North Carolina Emergency Management.

“NC Emergency Management is proud to provide flood mapping support to DEQ which will produce additional flood mapping products to build resilient communities across the state,” N.C. Emergency Management Director Will Ray stated. “As part of a multi-year advisory flood data web application development project, which began in 2022, the NCEM Floodplain Management Program was able to provide data and resources to assist in this project, once again showing the whole-of-community approach to disaster preparedness In North Carolina.” 

The mapping includes numerical models that simulate surface runoff and routing on a landscape, and are available for previously unmapped or undermapped basins too small to be included on regulatory maps and extend beyond what is normally included in traditional regulatory floodplain mapping.

The maps also include areas that flood despite being many miles from the nearest stream and allow communities to explore their future risk associated with projected growth patterns and the changing climate fueling more frequent and severe storms and sea level rise.

“These new maps, available through our Flood Resiliency Blueprint Tool, mean that Eastern North Carolinians can make more informed decisions and better investments to build their resilience in the face of more frequent and severe flooding,” Flood Resiliency Blueprint Manager Stuart Brown said in a release.

River Basin Action Strategies for the five river basins are expected to be available this summer, and new maps for the French Broad River Basin available this fall, according to DEQ.

Notorious for its bloated and rigid regulatory structure, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Civil Works program is looking to slim down and speed up, all while redirecting resources and prioritizing programs.

As detailed in 12 memorandums released in March, the agency’s new initiative, “Building Infrastructure, Not Paperwork,” seeks “to deliver critical projects and programs for the nation more efficiently, sooner, and at less cost than the current ways of doing business,” Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works Adam R. Telle stated in a February press release.

“This will eliminate bureaucratic delays and provide fast, clear decisions needed to save lives and empower our economy,” he added.

According to the release, the plan’s 27 initiatives are grouped under five categories: maximizing ability to deliver national infrastructure, cutting red tape, and focusing on efficiency, transparency and accountability and prioritization. The plan would not affect the Corps’ execution of its emergency response support to natural and human-made disasters.

Even by federal government standards, the Corps’ Civil Works is massive, managing about $259 billion in water resource assets and employing an estimated 37,000 full-time-equivalent employees, 98% of whom are civilians, according to a 2025 congressional report.

Through the initiatives, there are assurances that all projects are reviewed for the best path forward, said Eugene Pawlik with the Corps’ public affairs in an email, responding to questions from Coastal Review. “(The Corps) will be focused on strategically allocating available resources to prioritize the most pressing infrastructure needs across the country.”

The slow pace of the permit approval process will be addressed with new technology and geospatial tools that will expedite jurisdictional and permitting decision-making as well as reduce subjectivity in identification and elimination of Clean Water Act areas, Pawlik said.

Additional permitting goals, he wrote, include reissue and expand the existing Nationwide Permit program, eliminate barriers that prevent establishment of new mitigation banks, leverage private capital to modernize and expand generating capacity at Corps facilities, provide long-term leases with rights to additional revenues to entities willing to pay for capital improvements, and reform how the Corps conducts Section 408 reviews and engineering oversight.

The Section 408 program allows people or entities to make changes to a civil works project following reviews that are to verify that the changes do not have negative effects on the public interest or the project itself.

No additional funds nor dedicated budget item is being requested to implement the program.

“We believe the transformation initiatives will be a more effective use of annual appropriations,” Pawlik said.

But a closer look at just two interconnected and increasingly important tasks that the Corps is charged with in North Carolina and numerous other states — that is, dredging clogged inlets and nourishing eroding beaches by pumping in sand — may seem logical and sensible. But it’s not that simple.

With both activities being done more frequently, while sand supplies are becoming more sparse, the Corps is more often being asked to put the dredged sand from navigation channels on the beach. And more often, and to the enormous frustration of the permit applicant, it’s not permitted.

“In the Wilmington District, maintenance dredging often serves a dual purpose through the Beneficial Use of Dredged Material,” the Corps press release said, referring to a program created under the Water Resources Development Act of 2016. “The district uses beach-quality sand removed from navigation channels and inlets to provide for North Carolina’s coastal communities.”

On the Outer Banks, for instance, dredged material from Oregon Inlet in past years had been pumped onto an adjacent beach on the north end of Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge.

“Maintenance dredging is about more than just keeping the channels clear and ships moving; in North Carolina, it’s also a critical tool for coastal resiliency,” said Col. Brad A. Morgan, commander of the Corps’ Wilmington District. “By placing dredged sand back onto our beaches, we aren’t just maintaining a channel—we are protecting coastal infrastructure, supporting the local tourism economy, and restoring vital habitats.”

But the state Division of Environmental Quality has to permit sediment placed on state beaches, and it requires that sand to meet standards. On federal lands, such as the Pea Island refuge and Cape Hatteras National Seashore, the U.S. Department of Interior also must permit the sand placement. Even when sand is removed from a nearby location, it’s not necessarily transferable to the beach where it’s needed.  Dredged sand may be the wrong color or size, or testing has revealed pollutants or toxins. It might be mucky and unsuitable for bird habitat. It might be too fine for the targeted location, meaning it would soon blow away. Or as happened in 2015 at North Topsail Beach, it could be too rocky.

Still, the Corps would continue to ensure that dredged material used as beach fill meets required standards, Pawlik said.

“The Flood and Coastal Storm Risk Reduction programs reduce risk for millions of Americans and billions of dollars of infrastructure,” he wrote. “(The initiative) will ensure USACE pursues cost efficiency through better use and scheduling of dredging assets nationally and increased use of dredged materials for beneficial use.”

Pawlik said that the Corps’ district commanders would review all projects and be “key players” in forward motion of projects and allocation of resources “to prioritize the most pressing infrastructure needs across the country.”

Each of the 12 memorandums provides details of different aspects of implementation of the “Building Infrastructure, Not Paperwork” program, addressing what many people have frequently noted about the agency.

As one excerpt from the memo, “Prioritization of Efforts Within the Army Civil Works Program” reveals, there’s room for improvement: “In recent years, the Corps has prioritized every effort all at once, which of course means there are no priorities and that we can mask lack of delivery with progress on paper.”

Coastal Review will not publish Friday as our offices will be closed in observance of Good Friday.

Presales for commercial and for-hire fishing licenses and permits for the new license year will begin April 15.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries is encouraging fishers to schedule appointments to obtain licenses and permits in April and May, when presales traffic is typically lighter.

Walk-in only service will be available in June.

Under new rules this year, all license sales offices will stop taking customers at 4 p.m. during the last two weeks of June and the first week of July. Service may be slower at license offices during lunch between 12- p.m., according to a division release.

The new license years starts July 1.

Applicants are asked to bring any one of the following current/valid photo identifications:

• State Issued Driver’s License.
• State Issued Identification Card (issued by Department of Motor Vehicles).
• Military ID.
• Passport.
• Resident Alien Card (green card).
• Individuals applying for another license under the authority of Power of Attorney must submit a photocopy of the power of attorney and a current/valid photo ID.

Current/valid state vessel registration or U.S. Coast Guard vessel documentation is also required. Anyone applying for a transfer of ownership with pending U.S. Coast Guard vessel documentation may bring a notarized bill of sale.

Those applying as a business are required to provide the following documents to renew:

• A copy of the original business documents from the Secretary of State in which the business was created.
• A copy of the annual report from the Secretary of State in which the business was created.
• A copy of the written agreement partnership.
• A copy of the assumed name statement from the register of deeds in the county in which the business was created.

You might not have noticed, but the pine trees seem to have been in overdrive the last few years, throwing out pollen like they’re dishing out revenge for every one of their brethren that’s been cut down. Ever.

We all know pollen season is coming when the loblolly pines (Pinus taeda) turn vibrantly green, standing out like the Jolly Green Giant outlined against a cerulean sky. Then they get the yellow candles on the ends of their branches, which some people say look like crosses. Personally, I think they look more like a vampire-warding motion.

“Back! Back,” I say! “Get thee gone, thou foul spawn of Satan!”

One day, you’ll be standing at your kitchen window, washing dishes and minding your own business, enjoying seeing things beginning to green up. Maybe a few early flowers have popped here and there, the cheery yellow of daffodils, or the pinks and purples and blues of hyacinths. A splash of purple where some grape hyacinths are poking their stack of miniature-cannonball-looking, pyramidal heads out. A bit of fragrant jasmine draped over the myrkle bushes.

Then comes the squint and head tilt. “Wow. It’s really hazy out today!” Haze isn’t that unusual around here. Maybe it’s a fog bank moving in off the ocean. Again, not that unusual.

Another squint, and a head tilt in the other direction. A grimace.

“Maybe my windows are just really, really dirty.”

Again, nothing unusual. The way the never-ending wind blows around here, dust is almost as much a factor as during the Dust Bowl. Add in some heavy dews and a fuzz of mildew … and how does that stuff stick to something as slick and impenetrable as glass?

A gust of wind, another cloud of sulfur yellow, and you realize … it’s not haze. It’s not dust. It’s not even merely windows severely in need of some Windex and elbow grease. Nope, this year’s Pollen-palooza has descended.

Like marauding army ants — those in the jungle that swarm over everything in their path, leaving nothing but destruction and desolation in their wake — the pollen drifts and blows.

Your newly applied windshield tint wouldn’t pass inspection, not even if you slipped the mechanic a hefty tip and paid the fine. Activating the windshield-washer fluid and the windshield wipers results in yellow sludge drooling down the sides of your windshield like somebody christened your car with a bottle of Karo syrup.

Whatever color vehicle you have, it’s either become snot green or looks like the primer gray and rust have been awaiting paint so long they’ve faded to a noncolor.

Congratulations on your spring decorating skills! Your porch, sidewalk, and steps have been painted yellow. Walking across the yard means your shoes and the cuffs of your jeans match the trim on your porch rail. Dust puffs with every step, like videos of men walking on the moon. The airborne menace sticks to your face worse than pancake makeup on a rodeo clown.

Better hope you have stock in Kleenex and Benadryl, because you’re fixing to need copious quantities of both! Sniffles and sneezes and wheezes, oh my! And Visine. Can’t forget the red, itchy eyes.

Pollen is necessary. We all know that. Without it, things can’t get pollenated. Although do we really need any more pine trees? Flowers and vegetables get pollenated without all the over-the-top, absolutely outrageous hoopla associated with pines. We’ve all seen cute little bee’s knees all decked out in puffy orange pantaloons as they visit various flowers. The bees and the flowers both seem well satisfied, so what gives?

Why do pines go crazy? Other trees need to be pollenated as well! It’s discrimination, I tell ya! Pine pollen particles are larger than those of hardwoods and theoretically don’t affect allergy sufferers as much as hardwoods. More visibility means pines get blamed. Yeah, right! Sure!

Pine trees are pollenated by the wind, as if we humans weren’t already aware. All you have to do is watch the dense clouds of pollen blowing across fields and roads, obscuring the sky like a haboob of epic proportions. Because they are wind pollenated instead of being pollenated by insects, pines rely on quantity and chance. Less pollen means fewer pines, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, unless you’re a pine tree.

Short winters and warmer weather earlier in the spring make pollen season worse, as does less rainfall. So we’ve had a short winter and an early spring combined with very little rain this year, therefore … pollen-palooza.

But wait! Maybe we should be bottling this stuff instead of battling it.

Pine pollen is supposedly a super food, nutrient-dense and high in vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Used in China for thousands of years for whole-body wellness and to boost energy levels (among many other things) pine pollen can be consumed in several different forms, powders, capsules and tinctures.

Pass. Hard pass.

If pine pollen was really that good for humans then everyone in eastern North Carolina should be able to cancel their health insurance straightaway. Maybe China has different pines than we do. Who knows?

Native to the Southeastern coastal plains and once the dominant species of pine, longleaf pines (Pinus palustris) made many North Carolina naval suppliers wealthy. Consisting of exports like whole tree trunks for masts and various other much-needed products for wooden ships such as pitch, rosin, turpentine and lumber for shipbuilding, harvesting the slow-growing, fire-resistant trees was a booming operation. Because of this, it’s not unusual to find the remains of tar kilns, or tarkle beds, throughout eastern North Carolina.

The pine is also the state tree, and the Order of the Longleaf Pine is the highest awarded civilian honor. Some famous recipients include Maya Angelou, Billy Graham, Charlie Daniels, and Dale Earnhardt.

Meanwhile, for those of us affected by pollen-palooza , it seems there’s little we can do except grin and bear it. Wash our cars. Spray the porch and the steps off.

Rinse and repeat.

Cheer up! Pollen season can’t last forever.

Before accepting the Trump administration’s $1 billion taxpayer buyout, TotalEnergies fostered a campaign that its wind energy project off the coast of Brunswick County would eventually generate enough electricity to power 300,000 homes in the Carolinas.

“Our team is passionate about creating a clean energy economy and the new opportunities it brings to our local communities,” reads an excerpt from TotalEnergies Carolina Long Bay website. “Our partnerships in the Carolinas are making renewable energy a regional priority, building a stronger future for us all.”

TotalEnergies Carolina Long Bay, a wholly owned subsidiary of the France-based global energy company, “will harness the power of offshore wind to generate abundant energy and significant economic growth for the communities of the Southeast.”

The Interior Department’s announcement Monday that TotalEnergies had accepted a federal buyout of its wind energy leases off the New York and North Carolina coasts is a sharp pivot from the company’s previous narrative on offshore wind in the United States.

TotalEnergies’ chief executive officer and chair of the company’s board of directors said in a Department of Interior release that the decision to relinquish offshore wind development in the United States was made because such projects are “not in the country’s interest.”

Instead, TotalEnergies will invest the refunded money in a liquefied natural gas export terminal in Texas and other fossil fuel projects.

The Trump administration lauded it as an “innovative agreement,” one that is a major win for President Donald Trump, who has made offshore wind the biggest bullseye in his target to dismantle renewable energy projects and replace them with fossil fuel and nuclear power.

“Offshore wind is one of the most expensive, unreliable, environmentally disruptive, and subsidy-dependent schemes ever forced on American ratepayers and taxpayers,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a release. “We welcome TotalEnergies’ commitment to developing projects that produce dependable, affordable power to lower Americans’ monthly bills while providing secure U.S. baseload power today – and in the future.”

Shortly after taking office in January 2025, Trump issued an executive order barring new offshore wind leases and requiring reviews of existing and permitted wind projects.

Last December, the Trump administration, citing risks to national security, ordered work to stop in five offshore wind energy areas on the East Coast, including Dominion Energy’s 2.6-gigawatt project based in Hampton Roads, Virginia.

Courts have since allowed all five of the projects to operate for the time being until final judgments are rendered in those cases.

Monday’s announcement drew immediate rebuke from opponents who argue the deal sets a dangerous precedent and limits alternative energy production as Americans face rising electricity bills and concerns mount about the amount of power artificial intelligence data centers use.

“Donald Trump truly can’t leave a good thing alone,” BlueGreen Alliance Vice President of Federal Affairs Katie Harris said in a release. “His never-ending vendetta against offshore wind shows that he either doesn’t understand the affordable energy crisis or that he just doesn’t care. Either way, it’s clear he’s never paid his own electricity bill, and he’s determined to raise bills for working people.”

Southeastern Wind Coalition Senior Program Manager Karly Brownfield said that the agreement “feels really counterproductive” at a time when people are closely watching their energy costs at home and at the pump.

“The whole thing is unprecedented and it’s also completely unprecedented to take a lease payment and then refund it in exchange for investment in the natural gas industry. That has never happened before,” she said in a telephone interview earlier this week. “Whether you’re investing in offshore wind or you’re investing in solar or whatever it might be, it’s not a great feeling to know that just because you have a project that’s permitted or a project that’s received all the stamps of approval that it still runs the risk of the plug being pulled halfway down the line. Certainty is what drives business and the more uncertain we make our energy market the more complicated this is all going to become in the long term.”

North Carolina is investing in natural gas, but the gas turbine industry is facing years-out backlogs on turbine orders. Nuclear power, from permitting to production, can take upwards of 15 years to build.

“And the leg up we had with offshore wind was that these projects were leased. Permitting had started. The sites were secured. There was some sort of headway that was made on those projects,” Brownfield said.

The Carolina Long Bay wind energy area spans a little more than 110,000 acres roughly 22 miles offshore, south of Bald Head Island.

The area is split into two leases.

In May 2022, Duke Energy paid $155 million for what equates to a little more than half of the total wind energy area.

In June of that same year, TotalEnergies Renewable USA paid more than $133 million for the adjacent lease.

Projects in the Carolina Long Bay area were anticipated to generate up to 3 gigawatts of electricity, enough to power about 675,000 homes, and estimated to provide more than $4 billion in net economic impacts.

According to information on its website, Duke Energy was collaborating with TotalEnergies on “early development activities.”

When asked for comment, Duke Energy spokesperson Bill Norton responded to Coastal Review by email, writing in part, “Large offshore wind projects involve substantial capital investments and extensive development timelines. It’s reasonable that policy makers question cost-exposure of such projects to customers. We continue to evaluate next steps as it relates to the Carolina Long Bay lease, which is currently maintained by Duke Energy’s nonregulated subsidiary, Cinergy.”

Duke Energy prioritizes energy sources “proven to be the most cost-effective while meeting the growing needs of our customers,” he wrote. “A diversified energy mix is essential to meeting the moment of high demand under all conditions.”

Offshore wind, Brownfield said, offers just that.

“What offshore wind is really, really good at is providing that really stable and predictable energy during extreme weather, and especially at nighttime, when solar is not really working, or when either gas is really constrained or you’re looking at scarcity pricing,” she said. “And, with wind being a free resource, yes, it’s an upfront investment, but it’s a very predictable cost of the project.”

There are still active leases for a wind project off Kitty Hawk that’s owned by Avangrid Renewables and Dominion Energy.

“As far as I know, Avangrid is still very much firm on engaging in North Carolina and they’re still looking at a longer-term future for their lease,” Brownfield said.

As she sees it, the Interior Department’s agreement with TotalEnergies is perhaps less of a setback to offshore wind energy production in the U.S. but rather increases the need for other energy resources.

“Not saying that we don’t need natural gas. SEWC is a very technology-neutral organization,” Brownfield said. “We don’t want to shoot down other resources by any means. But your grid is a lot more balanced when you’ve got a little bit of everything on it. And, right now, we’re on track for our grid to be about 50% gas by 2034, and that’s a lot of gas.”

Second and final in a series

As the North Carolina Coastal Resources Commission’s Science Panel studies the effects of permanent beach erosion control structures such as seawalls and jetties, a critical aspect of the analysis will be looking at the lessons learned.

The commission banned hardened structures on the ocean shoreline in 1985 because of the down-shore erosive effects on the beach. Still, there are numerous examples of such structures in place along different parts of the coast, with varied degrees of effectiveness.

Erosion is not only more severe and longstanding on the Outer Banks, which are more exposed to the power of the open ocean and coastal storms than other parts of the North Carolina coast, it is the most dramatic and unforgiving, especially on Hatteras and Ocracoke islands. But coastal erosion is a statewide issue. To that point, federal beach nourishment projects in North Carolina began in 1965 at Wrightsville Beach and at Carolina Beach, and nourishment at both locations has been done in recent years.

When development and tourism took off on the Outer Banks in the 1980s, it didn’t take long before beach cottages began lining ocean shorelines.

Still, the forces of erosion had no mercy, and Kitty Hawk began losing beachfront properties. After the commission issued a variance to the hardened structures ban in 2003, permitting sheet-piling along N.C. Highway 12 in the beach community, then-Sen. Marc Basnight strongarmed the state’s ban into legislation.

Then in 2011, the North Carolina General Assembly passed a law that permitted four “test” terminal groins and has since expanded the permissible number of groins to seven. To date, four communities submitted permit applications: Figure Eight Island, Ocean Isle Beach, Bald Head Island and Holden Beach. Holden Beach has since withdrawn its application.

Long before the ban, numerous attempts were made to shore up the beach oceanward of the 1870 Cape Hatteras Lighthouse in Buxton. By 1930, the nation’s tallest brick lighthouse was a mere 98 feet from the ocean.

According to National Park Service records, interlocking steel sheet-pile groins were installed in the 1930s on the beach near the lighthouse and reinforced a few years later. Over the years, dunes were built, grasses were planted, the beach was nourished, revetment and sandbag walls were installed.

In 1969, the U.S. Navy installed three reinforced concrete groins to protect its base, which was adjacent to the lighthouse at the time. But the erosion continued. More sandbags were put in place; more beach nourishment was done. The Navy left in the 1980s. While the National Park Service officially gave up its beach nourishment and dune stabilization efforts in 1973, it continued trying in ensuing years to protect the lighthouse from the sea with rip-rap, artificial seagrass, sandbags and a scour-mat apron.

Finally, after much study and public debate, with the ocean lapping at its foundation, in 1999 the lighthouse was relocated about a half mile from the beach.

Fast-forward a quarter-century and, since September 2025, 19 unoccupied beach houses near that same beach in Buxton have collapsed into the ocean.

Escalating beach erosion along the state’s entire coast, but especially in Buxton, has put difficult discussions about lifting the hardened shorelines ban back on the table. The few existing permanent erosion-control structures built over the years on North Carolina beaches have yielded mixed results.

Oregon Inlet

One of the most successful examples of a terminal groin doing what it was intended to do, and with relatively minimal harm, is the 3,125-foot terminal groin and 625-foot revetment built in 1991 to protect the N.C. Highway 12 tie-in at the Herbert C. Bonner Bridge, which has since been replaced and renamed the Marc Basnight Bridge. The $13.4 million groin is substantial — ranging from 110 to 170 feet wide at its base and 25 feet wide at its landward end, and 39 feet wide at its seaward end — and was built to withstand waves as high as 15 feet, according to an analysis done by the state Division of Coastal Management, “North Carolina’s Terminal Groins at Oregon Inlet and Fort Macon,  Descriptions and Discussions.”

Located on the south side of Oregon Inlet at the north edge of Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge land, the groin placement encouraged sand buildup, or accretion, landward, resulting in a wide expansion of 50 acres of sandy property on the inlet side of the historic state-owned Oregon Inlet Life-Saving Station. The building is vacant, but has been weatherized to preserve it for future use.

The groin site and surrounding beach have been regularly monitored by state and federal coastal scientists. Studies have shown that the structure has likely increased shoaling of a spit on the Bodie island side and deepening of the channel. Yet, the groin has cause little if any destructive downstream erosion while adequately protecting the highway and bridge infrastructure.

But the report warned that within the next 20 years or so, the continued southward migration of the Bodie Island spit could push the inlet’s main navigational channel up against the terminal groin structure itself.

“If this were to occur, the result would be severe scour and an increase in the maintenance necessary to preserve the threatened integrity of the structure itself,” according to the document.

Beaufort Inlet/Fort Macon

Since Fort Macon was constructed in 1834, about 25 erosion-control structures adjacent to Beaufort Inlet have been built, including groins, breakwaters, timber cribbing, sand-fencing and seawalls, as well as multiple beach nourishment projects, according to the terminal groin report.  The first phase of the terminal groin project began in 1961 and included a 530-foot seawall, a 250-foot revetment and 720-foot long, 6-foot-high terminal groin. Phase II, beginning in 1965, extended the groin 410 feet oceanward, and another groin was built west of the revetment to address extensive soundside erosion, while 93,000 cubic yards of sand was placed on the ocean beach.

The third phase, started in 1970, extended the terminal groin another 400 feet, to a total of 1,530 feet long. A 480-foot-long stone groin was built to stabilize the beach fill, and another 100,000 cubic yards of sand was placed on the ocean beach. Total costs for the three-phase project was $1.35 million.

Effects of the project include increased wave energy along the Fort Macon State Park and Bogue Banks area, and continued increases in wave energy were predicted. A sediment deficit has created erosion on the inlet’s western shoreline. Meanwhile, the sand spit at Fort Macon has migrated into the western bank of the navigation channel, indicating that the terminal groin has become inefficient at trapping sediment.

“Without constant beach nourishment, the terminal groin would no longer perform as observed historically and potentially fail altogether,” the report concluded.

Buxton

Dare County is planning a nourishment project in Buxton, as well as restoration of one of the Navy’s three abandoned reinforced sheet-pile groins that had been installed in 1969. According to the recent application to repair the southernmost groin, which is 50% or more intact, that groin had been lengthened in 1982 on the landward side by 300 feet, and armor stone was added two years later. New sheet piles and additional scour protection were added to the structures in 1994. The other two groins in the original groin field are too damaged to qualify under the Coastal Resources Commission’s “50% rule” that permits repairs.

Dare County Manager Bobby Outten has said publicly that the county is under no illusions that the project planned for this summer will solve the erosion issue for good. But the hope is that it will serve as a Band-Aid long enough to find a more permanent solution to erosion that is now so severe it is threatening the livelihoods of community residents and the island’s tourism economy, as well as N.C Highway 12.

Retired East Carolina University professor and veteran coastal geologist Dr. Stanley Riggs, who has studied the Outer Banks since the 1970s, agreed that the fact that the lighthouse had to be relocated to save it illustrates why Buxton’s erosion is not going to be easy to tame for long, with or without groins. When the first coastal survey from Virginia to Ocracoke was done in 1852, the original 1802 Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, which was destroyed, had been 1,000 feet from the shoreline, Riggs recently told Coastal Review. All told, the shoreline has receded 3,000 feet, or about two-thirds of a mile, at the cape, he said.

“And it’s been constant,” Riggs said. “It oscillates a little bit, but the main direction has been constant.”

As Riggs explained, offshore just north of the motel area in Buxton, there is an underwater rock structure that is set at an oblique angle relative to the barrier island. Similar “old capes” are also off Avon and Rodanthe, he said. The rocks are under as much as 50 feet of water, and they dictate how the waves refract there.

“And so, if you fly over it, and you get the right angle down there, what you see is a series of cusps, and one side of that cusp will be stable, the other side will be highly erosional,” he said. Groins will only make the eroding side erode faster. And when there are permanent or semipermanent structures along the beach, the shore face — the part that is under water — starts to erode and gets steeper and steeper, he said. And the steeper it gets, the more severe the overwash and the more difficult it is to hold the sand in place. That’s a big reason why beach nourishment is having to be done more frequently.

Not only does the Outer Banks stick out farther into the Atlantic, there is also a narrower continental shelf, which allows the bigger waves to come ashore from the open ocean without the wider “speed bump” needed to dissipate the power.

There’s no negotiating with the ocean, Riggs said. Considering the combination of coastal dynamics at play in Buxton, efforts to control erosion will continue to fail.

“It’s that land-sea-air interface that is really the highest energy place that we’ve got on our planet,” Riggs said. “And there’s some things you can do there. There’s some things you shouldn’t do there, you can’t do there, and it’s a matter of understanding how that system works.”

Ocracoke Island

A persistent erosion hot spot on the north end of the island along N.C. Highway 12, the only road between the Hatteras Ferry Docks and Ocracoke Village, has been patched on and off for decades by increasing numbers of ever larger numbers and size of sandbags.

But even the type of large, new, trapezoidal bags permitted at Ocracoke, Pea Island and Mirlo Beach have not held up as expected, according to a presentation provided by Paul Williams of the North Carolina Department of Transportation at the February Coastal Resources Commission meeting.

Williams presented details at the meeting of NCDOT’s revised request to increase the base of the sandbags from 20 to 30 feet and the height from 6 feet to 10 feet, to better protect them from being undermined by waves.

The newer bags have open ends at the top, which proved to be a problem at Pea Island, Williams told the commission. The Pea Island Refuge at the Visitor Center, he added, faces similar risks now to that seen at Mirlo Beach in Rodanthe in the years before the hotspot was bypassed with completion of the Rodanthe “Jug-Handle” Bridge.

“The performance has not been what we anticipated,” he said, describing how they were flooded at the top, which caused the sandbags to deflate. “This product, there may be some modifications that can be made to make them more resilient.”

Some of the new bags were also installed along with traditional sandbags at Ocracoke, and they’re still covered, Williams said, but roughly 1 mile of sandbags along N.C. 12 are at risk of being undermined during the next big storm.

“So it’s basically to give us more latitude on different products, to try to protect the roadway out there better than traditional sandbags have,” Willams told Coastal Review after the meeting. “We’ve used them for decades out there, and especially Mirlo, they really got tossed around during storms. We were looking to find a more resilient product, and we’re working on evaluating other options out there.”

The new sandbags with an opening at the top are quicker to fill, he said. They’ve worked at other areas, but conditions elsewhere are not as fierce.

“When you’re on the Outer Banks, you’re under constant pressure during some of these storm events, because we’ll have a storm set up on the coast and grind for days at a time,” Williams said. “And every tide cycle is just steadily pulling sand out of the bags, and we need to have some way to stop that.”

Even though many of the traditional sandbags without the troublesome opening are still in place at Ocracoke, Williams said that about half of them, or about 1,000, have been exposed and need to be replaced. Another issue on the island is the limited amount of sand available to cover.

Sandbags, which are considered temporary erosion-control structures that are permitted parallel to shore to protect imminently threatened roads or structures, have rules about color and size, but those rules have been notoriously abused with regard to the “temporary” part, with extensions often adding up to decades at a site, making them “hardened structures” in everything but name.

Before Nags Head in 2011 started nourishing its eroded beaches in South Nags Head, for instance, even battered and torn sandbags weren’t removed for years, and property owners often successfully sued the state to keep longstanding stacked rows of protective bags in place in front of their oceanfront homes on the eroded beach.

As sea levels continue to rise, storms intensify and erosion accelerates, even sandbags as fallbacks in the absence of other impermissible erosion-control structures are becoming less effective, as evidenced by photographs of huge piles of sandbags lined up against undermined houses at North Topsail Beach.

Ocean Isle Beach

Responding to the state legislature’s repeal of the ban on hardened erosion-control structures on the coast, Ocean Isle Beach in 2011 began the planning process to pursue permits to install a terminal groin at Shallotte Inlet to stem erosion that for decades had chewed away at the island’s east end. Five years later, state and federal approval was in hand to build a 750-foot-long terminal groin, but environmental groups in 2017 filed a lawsuit to stop the project. A ruling in March 2021 in the 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s ruling that the project alternatives were properly considered. By April 2022, the $11 million terminal groin was completed.

Today, a diminished beach remains in front of multi-million-dollar homes that were built after the groin was in place. Rows of sandbags block the surf from reaching some of the oceanfront homes, and several lots remain vacant because there is no longer enough property left to meet setback requirements.

In November, the Coastal Resources Commission allowed the owners of eroding vacant oceanfront lots to use larger sandbags to protect their properties.

Interest in future terminal groins

The Village of Bald Head Island, the first community to build a terminal groin after the “test groin” law passed, was issued a permit in October 2014 to build the erosion-control structure, which was completed in 2015.

North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality monitoring of the project after its completion did not turn up significant issues requiring corrective measures, according to its January 2024 report.

“While ongoing post-construction monitoring performed by the permittee has not identified any significant issues that would require corrective or mitigative measures, the Village performed a maintenance beach nourishment event, received nourishment from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ regularly scheduled Wilmington Harbor maintenance project, and is currently seeking permit authorization for a second Village-sponsored maintenance nourishment event,” according to the document.

Six other communities have expressed “varying degrees” of interest in building a terminal groin project, including North Topsail Beach and Figure Eight Island, as noted in the report.

First in a series

Something potentially and significantly consequential is underway now in North Carolina that could alter management of the state’s increasingly battered Atlantic coastline.

The state Coastal Resources Commission’s Science Panel is in the process of finalizing an analysis of beach erosion-control structures, a report that is expected to be submitted to the commission in June. Although the 10-member advisory panel’s study is meant to inform policymakers of their options, some fear – or hope – that it’s the first step toward repealing the state’s longstanding ban on hardened shoreline structures.

“Alarms are sounding in nearly all of our oceanfront counties,” state Division of Coastal Management Director Tancred Miller said at the commission’s meeting in November at Atlantic Beach, referring to threats from accelerating beach erosion. “Nourishment costs continue to rise and the lifespan of many of these projects is painfully short. Infrastructure is increasingly vulnerable, and some communities are very concerned.”

Since September 2025, the Hatteras Island village of Buxton, home of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse and the massive corner of wild beach known as Cape Point, has seen 19 unoccupied oceanfront homes collapse into the surf. In addition to a beach nourishment project, Dare County this summer is planning to restore the only salvageable groin of a 57-year-old groin field in an attempt to prolong the project’s lifespan.

In response to calls from Dare and Hyde counties, among others, to allow more options to address erosion, the division last winter asked the Coastal Resources Commission to review the structures.

“We must approach these challenges with open minds, innovation, and balanced pragmatism,” Miller urged. “We must take a critical view of our past and current practices, embrace what continues to succeed, and replace practices that are no longer working.”

But even the draft outline that the Science Panel submitted at the commission’s February meeting,  titled “Report on The Effects of Hard Structures on Sandy, Open-ocean Coastlines,” revealed the complexity involved in redirecting, blocking, deflecting, buffering, or absorbing the power of an open ocean energized by high winds, with forceful longshore and cross-shore currents feeding beaches with sand here, starving them of sand there.

“We’ve broken this into two categories according to how these erosion-management measures function; essentially all erosion-management approaches fall into two categories,” CRC Science Panel Chair Laura Moore told the commission. “One is structures or approaches that trap sand, and the second is structures that that really harden the shoreline.”

While the report will provide details about protective barriers and techniques, she said, it is less about offering remedies than providing information about effects of each option. It will also include comparisons to beach-restoration methods such as nourishment and living shorelines.

Erosion has been a fact of life along North Carolina’s 320-mile-long ocean shoreline for centuries, but before coastal development and tourism went into overdrive, the Coastal Resources Commission, the 13-member body that sets coastal policy in the state, took steps to preserve beaches.

In 1985, after studying the down-shore erosive effects of seawalls, bulkheads, groins, jetties and sandbags, the commission established a policy banning permanent hardened structures on the ocean coast. Sandbags were permitted as temporary structures.

Upheld in court in 2000, the ban was codified as law three years later by the North Carolina General Assembly. Then in 2011, a law was passed that permitted a limited number of terminal groins — sand-trapping barriers built near inlets or at the end of an island. Much of the ban, however, remains the law of the land. Environmentalists and countless coastal scientists have credited the limits on hard structures for preserving the state’s coastal wildlife and beautiful natural beaches, which attract millions of tourists every year. But critics blame the ban for limiting the ability to protect shorelines, as well as private and public property and infrastructure.

No magic, one-size-fits-all formula exists to address erosion, Moore said, and many factors will need to be weighed.

“There are approaches and strategies that can either shift the erosion problem to another adjacent location, or in some cases, we can slow the problem down,” said Moore, who is professor of coastal geomorphology at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. “We can create more time to make perhaps bigger adjustments that are likely to be needed going forward.”

With seas rising and Atlantic storms intensifying over recent decades as a result of climate change, erosion on the state’s barrier island beaches has been happening faster and more dramatically, especially along the high-energy Outer Banks coastline, where erosion rates at some locations – as severe as an annual average of 14 feet – are among the highest on the East Coast. Dozens of oceanfront houses on eroded beaches, pounded and undermined by surging surf, have fallen into the sea. At the same time, more Outer Banks inlets and waterways are filling with sand, clogging channels that until the recent past had always been navigable.

But the entire coast has been experiencing its own degree of changing and increasingly destructive conditions, and the pressure has been building to find ways to prevent or mitigate damages at different locations, each with different conditions.

“I would say most of the North Carolina coastline is either barrier or behaves like barrier,” Moore told Coastal Review. “Certainly, subsidence in the north is a factor that’s going to make the relative rate of sea level rise a little higher. But there’s also the shape and the orientation of the shoreline and the wave approach angles and the wave energy and how those drive longshore sediment transport gradients, and how much sand is coming into a stretch of coast versus how much is leaving. Also, a really big factor is how frequently in the past the coast has been nourished.”

The final report is to be centered on sand-trapping and shoreline-hardening structures, Moore said. But it will also look at other widely used erosion management tactics, ranging from avoidance with setbacks or relocation, sand trapping with fences or beach plants, and building the beach with sand nourishment and dunes.

The two-category design of the document is focused on function of the structures, she said, “because there are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of coastal erosion management approaches out there, and they all essentially fall into two buckets.” What the panel of volunteer scientists cannot do, she added, is analyze each approach.

“What we are trying to do is provide a better, clearer explanation of how structures function and what their effects are,” Moore said.

Moore emphasized that the science panel’s task is to provide an assessment of structures on the coastline. But she understands the urgency people feel for finding a “solution” rather than a range of options.

“And although we’re not providing recommendations, I do want to highlight that we will be discussing tradeoffs, and I think that’s really important, because whether an approach has benefits or negative effects depends on the perspective and goals of the beholder,” she said. “We certainly know that there are efforts afoot to repeal the ban. And again, it’s not our job to say whether that should or should not happen. It’s our job to lay out in a clear way what the tradeoffs are, given how these different approaches to mitigating erosion function.”

Next in the series: How have hardened structures currently installed on North Carolina beaches performed?

Part of an ongoing series on coastal North Carolina’s observance of America’s 250th.

Tensions began to brew between the colonists and Britain in the early 1760s after the Seven Years War, also called the French and Indian War, in North America. The British decided to impose new taxes on the colonies to recoup the funds that went to the war, but instead incited widespread protest.

Britain passed the Stamp Act March 22, 1765, and then in June 1767, the Townshend Act imposed duties on paint, paper, tea and other commodities. British troops attempted to enforce the Townshend duties in Boston October 1768, ultimately leading in March 1770 to the Boston Massacre that left five dead.

The British, to help the struggling United East India Co., passed the Tea Act in May 1773, allowing the company to import and sell tea to the colonies duty-free, undercutting the Dutch who had been smuggling tea in, and creating a monopoly.

Then, on Nov. 28, 1773, the Dartmouth sails into Boston Harbor, and three more ships were expected to arrive, all carrying chests of tea.

Over the next few weeks, colonists met to figure out a way to fight back. On the night of Dec. 16, 1773, around four dozen men impersonating Native Americans boarded the ships and dumped 342 chests of tea into the harbor.

Almost a year later, 51 women in Edenton took a more peaceful approach to protesting the tea tax by drafting a document explaining their boycott. The women committed to no longer drinking tea or wearing British cloth because of taxation without representation and sent the final copy to England.

“This action forms one of the earliest-known political actions written and organized by women in the American colonies,”  the Edenton Historical Commission explains. “The events of the ‘Edenton Tea Party’ today form an iconic moment in our nation’s history, when a community of women used their own voices to stand by their loved ones and risk the wrath of the Crown by protesting injustice.”

The women of Wilmington responded to British taxation with a similar protest in the spring of 1775, though little is known about the gathering to publicly burn tea.

Burgwin-Wright House and Gardens Assistant Museum Director Hunter Ingram told Coastal Review that the Wilmington Tea Party is an oft-overlooked event in the final days before the start of the American Revolution.

In the port city of Wilmington, the import of tea had ground to a halt by the spring of 1775.

The Continental Congress had forbidden tea from coming through the colonies’ ports, so it had become a scarce commodity, he said. That is why events like the Boston Tea Party and the Edenton Tea Party were so crucial to the cause of resistance.

“Tea was hard to come by and sacrificing it sent a message to those who were already hurting from the disruption of its trade,” Ingram continued.

The Wilmington Tea Party happened in the spring of 1775 and is only documented in one place: the writings of Janet Schaw, a Scottish woman who was traveling through Wilmington to visit her brother.

“She wrote a single line about her observations of the tea resistance in Wilmington, which she did not support. ‘The Ladies have burnt their tea in a solemn procession, but they had delayed however ’til the sacrifice was not very considerable, as I do not think anyone offered above a quarter of a pound,’” Ingram said. 

While the simple description doesn’t give many specifics, Schaw was clear in what the protestors did, Ingram said. “Burning the tea was unique, and it meant the women of Wilmington, even in the eleventh hour before the outbreak of war, were willing to set a precious privilege blaze in the name of revolution.”

The Burgwin-Wright House is the oldest and largest historic site in Wilmington, comprised of four of the eight remaining colonial structures in town, Ingram said of the house’s importance during the Revolution.

“We have three buildings from the city’s first jail, circa 1744, and the mansion home built in 1770 on top of the main jail building after the prisoners were relocated. It has sat at the corner of Third and Market streets for 256 years, and it has watched Wilmington grow from small-but-mighty port city into a thriving town that was, for a time, the most populous area in the state,” Ingram explained.

“The colonial era in Wilmington doesn’t always get its due, but the surviving home built for merchant and politician John Burgwin can tell that story –– and has been for generations,” said Ingram.

Ingram explained that that the Burgwin-Wright House had partnered with the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution’s Wilmington Ladies Tea Walk Chapter to commemorate the 251st anniversary of the protest with the “Wilmington Ladies Tea Walk.”

The Wilmington Ladies Tea Walk event begins at 10 a.m. Thursday, March 26, at 224 Market St. the program will include remarks from a few historic organizations and officials and samples of a brand-new tea blend by Cape Fear Spice Merchants.

“Guests can walk through the gardens, enjoy a presentation about Janet Schaw and then join members of the Daughters of the American Revolution and the Sons of the American Revolution as they walk, in a solemn procession, to river to burn tea in commemoration of this act of resistance on the eve of revolution,” he said.

The historic home is a good fit for the Wilmington Ladies Tea Walk because the site likely would have been “witness to that solemn procession into history, and the act of resistance that helped give Wilmington a reputation for rebellion even before the war.”

Schaw was also a Loyalist, as was Burgwin, and it’s “likely she would have visited the house during her time in Wilmington. This was a home built for a wealthy guest list, and Janet would have qualified,” he said.

Though the program is offered at no charge, registration is required. Call 910-762-0570 to register.

“If you can’t get in this year, we hope to make it a recurring event through multiyear A250 celebration,” Ingram said, referring to the state’s official celebration of 250 years of independence, America 250 NC, a program under the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Elected officials in Leland seek to tighten language related to the town’s purchasing guidelines following a highly contentious, well-publicized investigation into one of their own.

The Leland Town Council voted Wednesday night to direct the town attorney to consult with the North Carolina Local Government Commission about the town’s procurement policies and ask for suggestions on amending those policies with respect to the role of elected officials.

The unanimous vote was cast in a special-called meeting to discuss a legal advisory opinion the town’s attorney released following his investigation into Councilman Frank Pendleton, a relative newcomer to the town board.

Attorney Steve Coggins determined in his 175-page report that Pendleton’s effort earlier this year to expedite the delivery of a laptop the town signed off on buying him did not break any laws.

But Pendleton’s attempt did violate the town’s policies, Coggins concluded, telling council members Wednesday night that the matter was a “learning lesson.”

After he highlighted his findings to the council, Coggins thanked Pendleton for taking the time, one-on-one, to explain his side of the story.

“I appreciate it very much his willingness to do that and his candor with that,” Coggins said. “It certainly made this most unpleasant task more palatable and for which I extend my gratitude for that, as well as to staff who spent time in educating me.”

Pendleton, who asked for an opportunity to speak when the mayor asked for a motion to adjourn the meeting, did not reciprocate, instead rebuking Coggins and Town Manager David Hollis.

“When you look at this entire situation, if it weren’t for the fact that this process has needlessly wasted a huge amount of time and, more importantly, a great deal of taxpayer monies, it would be laughable,” he began. “This entire situation speaks volumes to the professionalism on the part of this council, the council attorney and especially the town manager.”

Pendleton refuted various points Coggins identified as undisputed facts in his report, disputing he called the laptop vendor on Jan. 21 to try and expedite the time in which the laptop would be delivered. When he made that call, he was under the impression that the delivery time would be up to 13 weeks.

“I called simply to verify the lead time from the vendor and to see if the town manager had lied to me,” Pendleton said. “As it turned out, someone was lying because the vendor told me that the computer would be delivered between January 30 and February 4, which would have been two weeks from the delivery date or from the order date. So, someone was indeed lying. Either the town manager was lying to me, or the vendor was lying to the staff.”

“What actually happened, but was conveniently left out,” of the report, he continued, “was that the vendor called me back two days later on January 23 to tell me that the delivery would actually be pushed back two additional weeks. This would put it at four weeks from the original date, not 13-plus weeks.”

Pendleton said he did not ask or attempt to authorize canceling the town’s laptop order.

“The question that should have been asked when the town manager was made aware of the conversations between myself and the vendor, why didn’t he handle this situation like the CEO he claims to be?” he continued. “Why didn’t he act like a man and pick up the phone and call me? He could have said, ‘Mr. Pendleton, you shouldn’t be speaking with the vendor and, going forward, please director those questions to me.’ Why didn’t he tell me about the procurement policy that applies to town employees regarding purchases when he provided me the name of the vendor and the specs on the computer? No, he chose to attempt to discredit me by implying that I did something that I didn’t do. It certainly appears that this was a case built on entrapment, political meddling, violations of employee code of ethics and insubordination on the part of the town manager.”

Meeting attendees sitting in the council’s chambers broke out in applause when Pendleton, who was sworn in last December to serve his first term on the council, finished speaking.

They jeered when his fellow Councilman Bob Campbell fired back, “I absolutely agree somebody was lying. And, in my opinion, just from what I read, sounds more like you.”

Mayor Brenda Bozeman repeatedly hammered her gavel to quiet the audience as other council members questioned Pendleton about his actions.

“I was hoping this was going to be put to bed tonight,” Bozeman said. “I’m tired of it. It’s an issue we need to get rid of.”

Councilwoman Veronica Carter reminded the board of a previous discussion it had about how, in the town’s 37-year history, nothing like this issue had occurred until now.

“I think we all want it to end, but we don’t want it to come back to bite us later,” Carter said. “We haven’t put it to bed if we haven’t come up with any change.”

AHOSKIE — Between 35 and 40 protestors gathered on a downtown street corner Saturday to call attention to the proposed reopening of the Rivers Correctional Facility in Winton as a federal immigrant detention center.

While the number protesting was modest, they were buoyed by the overwhelmingly supportive response from passing drivers.

The 257-acre, 1,450-bed facility shuttered in 2021 is being considered as a facility to house people seized by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and suspected of not being in compliance with U.S. immigration law. The facility is owned by international private prison company GEO Group, “the largest detention services provider to ICE, with nearly 40 years of operational experience under ICE contracts,” according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

The ACLU on Jan. 29 released the information it had obtained via a Freedom of Information Act process, and within three weeks, during the Hertford County Board of Commissioners Feb. 16 meeting, at least 10 people spoke out against the prison plan.

One individual, while not expressing support, noted that the decision about the fate of the Riverside prison was in the federal government’s hands, leaving county officials little, if any, recourse.

County commissioners, as of this publication, had declined to take a position on the property. Soon after the Feb. 16 commissioners meeting, Coastal Review asked County Manager Bill Shanahan whether he had been contacted about reopening the facility.

“I can tell you that the county manager has not been contacted,” he said, indicating that he had no more to add.

In an email following Saturday’s protest, Shanahan said nothing had changed.

Caroline Stephenson, who helped organize the protest, told Coastal Review that while she opposed ICE moving in, she had also been thinking about the “implications for citizens and residents,” she said. “I think the implications are not great.”

She said the facility would overwhelm the sheriff’s office, emergency medical services and hospital. “We’re a really small, rural county in terms of the amount of capacity that we have,” she explained.

Hertford County had fewer than 22,000 people when the last census was taken, and the official estimate was fewer than 20,000 as of 2024. Its population is roughly 58.4% Black, 36% white, 6.7% Hispanic or Latino, 1.9% Native American and 1.2% Asian. Nearly 23% of residents live in poverty and the per capita income is less than $29,000.

Walking along the protest line, Bobby Riddick used his cellphone to record the protest, planning, he said, to use it on his Facebook page. As cars passed by honking in support, he talked about the challenges of organizing a protest in Hertford County.

“It’s a very small area. A lot of people here have been here all their life,” he said. “They’re not used to protesting. They’re not used to fighting for their rights.”

Stephenson agreed, telling Coastal Review, “A lot of people, I think, are unsure or afraid of using their First Amendment rights and any of their rights that are provided under the Constitution. I think it’s important to educate people about their rights, but also about the dangers of not speaking.”

Standing with two friends behind a sign reading “ICE Out,” C.S. Brown High School senior Bird Lashbrook spoke clearly about her feelings.

“I have a voice that should be put to use, and I’m happy to give my support,” she said.

In 2021, President Biden, citing Justice Department reports that found private prisons were often less safe and had lower safety standards, as compared to publicly managed facilities, ordered the Justice Department to no longer renew contracts with private prison companies.

Construction and other projects expected to affect waters or wetlands will now be vetted through a newly implemented state process.

Depending on a its impacts to streams and wetlands, some projects will get to bypass a 30-day notice as part of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources Clean Water Act 401 general certifications updates that took effect March 15.

The new certificate of coverage process is anticipated to apply to “many project” currently requiring individual Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certifications, according to a DEQ release.

Applicants must still apply to the division through the new process, but those that meet thresholds and conditions under the general certification will receive a letter of concurrence, which will allow the project to proceed without a 30-day notice.

Project located in sensitive areas, those with a significant quantity of impacts to waters or wetlands, or those that cannot meet the general certification conditions must still go through the process of a 30-day public notice and project-specific decision letter to obtain individual 401 water quality certification.

The state’s update reflects corresponding U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 404 Nationwide Permits, which have been modified following a 2023 Supreme Court ruling that changed the definition of “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS.

That same year, the North Carolina General Assembly passed session law directing the state Environmental Management Commission to adopt a rule that aligns the state’s definition of wetlands to those of the federal definition.

The latest definition excludes noncontiguous wetlands, or those that are not connected to navigable waters.

The Corps has extended a one-year grace period to projects it has approved for permitting to complete impacts to waters outlined under their existing federal permit. New certifications will not be required for those projects.

DEQ advises permittees to check with their Corps representative to confirm whether the grace period is applicable to their projects.

The division has included a list of frequently asked questions online for general information.

Whether its a nature hike, a stormwater tour at North Carolina’s premiere coastal university, or helping a town’s staff permanently mark storm drains, there’s something for nearly everyone during Cape Fear Creek Week.

Creek Week kicks off on Sunday and goes through March 21, offering opportunities to connect with, celebrate, and care for local waterways of the Cape Fear Region.

Throughout the week, participants are invited to play Cape Fear Creek Week virtual bingo by completing activities for a chance to win a swag bag.

The events lineup starts Sunday with a birding walk from 10-11 a.m. in Leland, where participants will be given tips on how to identify local and migrating birds. Registration for this event is through the town of Leland.

On Monday, gather beneath cypress trees in Wallace Park at 2110 Market St. in Wilmington for a scavenger hunt from 10 a.m. until 11 a.m. The Alliance for Cape Fear Trees will have resources on hand to share tips on how to properly plant and care for trees.

The University of North Carolina Wilmington is hosting that afternoon a behind-the-scenes tour of its stormwater-control measures, including rain gardens, permeable pavement systems and other sustainable features that reduce runoff and support healthier waterways. This event will be held 2-3 p.m. Monday at 4935 Riegel Road. Registration is required.

On Monday evening, discover ways to diagnose and restore wetland habitats through Habitat Fixer Uppers with Fort Fisher Aquarium, a program scheduled for 6-7:30 p.m. at 1212 Magnolia Village Way in Leland. You may register here.

Tuesday, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority will host a tour of its Southside Water Reclamation Facility, 3436 River Road in Wilmington. Registered participants must be age 5 or older.

Events for Wednesday include a bird hike at Burnt Mill Creek 8-9:30 a.m., an opportunity to work alongside employees of Leland’s engineering department 4-5:30 p.m. to permanently mark the town’s storm drains, a children’s scavenger hunt 5-6 p.m. at Cypress Cover Park in Leland, and resilient coastal communities program public meeting drop in between 5p.m. and 7 p.m. at the Skyline Center in downtown Wilmington.

Events later in the week include a golden hour guided tour by paddleboat in Greenfield Lake Park, a walking tour at Pages Creek, a sustainability brewery tour at Mad Mole Brewing (for those 21 and older), a Brunswick Nature Park tour in Winnabow, and a cleanup at Greenfield Lake Park.

Details, including all dates, times and locations, are available on the N.C. Cooperative Extension website.

Cape Fear Creek Week is a collaboration between the N.C. Cooperative Extension, Wilmington’s Heal our Waterways, Leland, Cape Fear River Watch, New Hanover County Soil and Water Conservation District, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, Coastal Land Trust, Cape Fear Birding Observatory, Plastic Ocean Project, Mad Mole Brewery, UNCW Sustainability, and Alliance for Cape Fear Trees.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission has scheduled a series of public hearings in select cities beginning next month on proposed PFAS and 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules.

In all, six hearings have been set, three of which will focus on proposed rules for discharges of three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances through wastewater into North Carolina’s surface waters and three on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane in wastewater discharges from certain facilities into surface waters.

A public comment period for each set of proposed rules will kick off on March 16 and continue until June 15.

Under the proposed PFAS rules, all major and minor industrial direct dischargers, and significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works, would be required to monitor and implement “minimization activities required to eliminate or significantly reduce” discharges of PFOS, PFOA, and GenX within a period of anywhere between three and five years.

Discharge limits for those specific PFAS have yet to be determined.

PFAS exposure has been linked to a number of adverse health impacts to people, including thyroid disease, increased cholesterol, liver damage, and different types of cancers.

More than 3 million North Carolinians are estimated to drink tap water containing PFAS levels above the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency health-based standard scheduled to go into effect in the coming years, according to the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.

Public hearings on the proposed rules for the three PFAS are scheduled as follows:

• April 7 at 6 p.m. in Ferguson Auditorium, AB-Tech Community College, 19 Tech Drive, Asheville.
• April 20 at 6 p.m. in the Archdale Building, ground floor hearing room, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh. Public parking will be available after 5 p.m. at parking deck 64 across North Salisbury Street from the Archdale Building.
• April 23 at 6 p.m. in Wilmington City Hall at Skyline Center, first floor conference center, 929 North Front St., Wilmington. Parking is available in the south lot using the Brunswick Street entrance. Attendees requiring American with Disabilities Act access should park in the visitor lot.

Written comments are being accepted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject title “PFAS minimization” or by mail to Karen Preston, DEQ-DWR NPDES Permitting Section, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1617.

Comments will be accepted on the proposed rule adoptions and associated regulatory impact analysis. The commission is also accepting comments on specific questions including:

• Whether it would be scientifically defensible and advisable to establish a screening threshold above the lowest reporting concentration for PFOS, PFOA and GenX that could serve as a trigger for ongoing monitoring and minimization requirements.
• Whether the applicability of the PFAS monitoring and minimization rule should be limited to industrial dischargers associated with a standard industry classification (SIC) or North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes known to be linked to PFAS use or discharge.

Hearings on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane, a federally deemed likely human carcinogen, in wastewater discharges into surface waters from certain facilities have been scheduled for the following dates:

• April 9 at 6 p.m. in the Catawba County St. Stephens Branch Library, 3225 Springs Road, Hickory.
• April 14 at 6 p.m. at Fayetteville Technology Community College, Tony Rand Student Center multipurpose room, 2220 Hull Road, Fayetteville.
• May 12 at 6 p.m. in the Percy H. Sears Applied Technologies Building Auditorium, Guilford Technical Community College, 1201 Bonner Drive, Jamestown.

Written comments on the proposed rules for 1,4-dixoane may be submitted via email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject heading “1,4-dioxane minimization,” or by mail to Bridget Shelton, DEQ-DWR Planning Section, 1611 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, N.C., 27699-1611.

The EMC will also be accepting specific comments on the proposed 1,4-dixoane minimization rules to include:

• Whether a screening threshold above the lowest reported concentration (currently 1 microgram per liter) for 1,4-dioxane would be appropriate as a trigger for ongoing monitoring and minimization planning.
• whether the applicability of the 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules should be expanded beyond the currently proposed scope of dischargers with certain standard industry classification or North American Industry Classification System codes to include all industrial dischargers.

Sign-in and speaker registration will begin at 5 p.m. at each of the hearings.

Based on attendance, speaking time may be limited to allow everyone an opportunity to be heard. The commission will accept written comments and copies of prepared remarks at each hearing.

HERTFORD — Even as the proposed Mid-Currituck bridge project has been uncharacteristically zipping along in the planning process, a new analysis of two revenue options has cast doubts on the project’s future, with serious concerns raised about the latest estimated construction costs that hover around $1.2 billion.

The North Carolina Department of Transportation presented a report Feb. 18 to the Albemarle Regional Planning Organization comparing a traditional toll project and a “P3” toll project, as required by federal law, to determine “value for money.” With a traditional toll project, the state is responsible for financial, operational and construction-related risks. A “P3” toll project is where a private sector/single developer has responsibility for revenue, financial, operational and construction-related risks.

“The base case financial results from the comparative analysis reveal that neither the Traditional Toll Delivery nor the P3 Toll Delivery are currently financially feasible,” the report said. “The analysis highlights funding gaps of $1,005 million for the Traditional Toll Delivery and $875 million for the P3 Toll Delivery, both of which exceed the $173 million of committed STIP (State Transportation Improvement Plan) funding.”

And it doesn’t appear that sunny prospects are around the corner. “Project costs have continued to increase above inflation and any schedule delays would likely increase costs further,” the report adds.

NCDOT has scheduled another presentation to the Albemarle Regional Planning Organization of the Mid-Currituck bridge comparative analysis for 11 a.m. Wednesday at the Albemarle Commission headquarters, 512 South Church St., Hertford.

A decision on the next step must be made by the organization’s board by its April meeting.

Although the transportation department and the North Carolina Turnpike Authority, the state agency responsible for tolling, are not advocating for any particular decision, the report said, it did cite several potential options.

One option is to adjust the STIP schedule and submitting it again to compete for funding, or removing the project from the schedule all together, which would free up the $173 million bridge allocation to be used for other Division 1 projects. Other options are to continue applying for federal grants, looking for other funding sources, consider local sales or occupancy taxes, and/or request an annual state appropriation.

Despite the challenging budgetary situation, the bridge agencies are still in the fight, with both NCDOT and the Turnpike Authority continuing to advance the project toward construction, Logen Hodges, the authority’s marketing and communications director, said in an email responding to questions from Coastal Review.

So far, he said, three permits have been issued for the project, including those issued by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s divisions of Water Resources and Coastal Management on Sept. 19, 2025, and one issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Oct. 28, 2025. While geotechnical investigations are being completed, another permit application to the Coast Guard is pending.

First identified as a need in 1975, the proposed bridge would connect the Currituck mainland at Aydlett to Corolla, on the Currituck Outer Banks. The 4.66-mile-long bridge would cross Currituck Sound and a 1.5-mile-long bridge would cross Maple Swamp on the mainland side about 25 miles south of the Virginia state line.

But the project, which has a timeline of five years for design and construction, has been rife with conflict, budget shortfalls, waning and waxing political support and repeated legal challenges. Dare and Currituck counties, and most of their respective towns and villages, have been pushing for the bridge for decades as a necessity to decrease traffic volume and improve hurricane evacuation.

At the same time, vocal opponents, many of them residents from both sides of the proposed bridge, have maintained that the bridge would be a costly boondoggle that would damage the environment and increase traffic.

Legal challenges were filed by the Southern Environmental Law Center, which challenged the permit issued by DEQ on different fronts.

“The timeline for resolution of this legal challenge is uncertain,” Hodges wrote. “Due to the pending legal challenge of an environmental permit and additional project funding needs, the project schedule will remain uncertain. To reflect this, the project construction let date has been extended by one year and may continue to be adjusted until a project schedule is determined.” 

On behalf of No Mid-Currituck Bridge, a citizens’ group opposed to the bridge, and the Sierra Club, an environmental nonprofit group, the SELC submitted a Petition for a Contested Case Hearing to the state in November that challenged the DEQ’s Coastal Area Management Act, or CAMA, permit. 

The petition argues, among others, that the bridge will bring adverse effects and disrupt communities on both sides.

“The permit for the construction of the Bridge Alternative would induce dramatic increases in traffic and development on both the mainland and Outer Banks, strain already overburdened coastal wastewater and drinking water infrastructure, permanently harm estuarine waters, wetlands, and other surface waters,” the document states.

In a separate action, the law center submitted a petition for judicial review to the state in December, also challenging the issuance of the permit by Coastal Resources Commission and DEQ.

To the community on the northern Outer Banks and the southern end of mainland Currituck County, as well as for visiting property owners and tourists, the summer traffic crossing the Wright Memorial Bridge back and forth from Currituck to Dare counties is an annual headache, with bumper-to-bumper traffic clogging roads to and from Corolla every weekend and holiday.

According to a September 2025 traffic and revenue report, more than 1 million vehicles crossed the Wright Memorial Bridge in July 2023, the highest count to date. 

“The proposed (Currituck bridge) is expected to provide significant distance and time savings to residents and visitors, particularly to those that travel to the most northern portion of Dare County and the Currituck County portion of the Outer Banks,” the report said. “The (bridge) will reduce peak season congestion for trips to the south, facilitate planned growth north of the (Wright bridge), and improve emergency evacuation for those residing on all parts of the Outer Banks.”

Tolls would be charged starting in 2032, according to the report. Minimum tolls in 2023 dollars for cars would be $6 each direction, with discounts for tolls paid by transponders and future increases reflecting the inflation rate. Trucks and other heavy vehicles will pay proportionally higher tolls.

The report also states that the optimal toll rate of $15 would generate 90% of the maximum forecasted toll revenue. In the numerous models, calculated rates were as high as $40. 

But Hodges cautioned that the models are not just that.

 “While estimated toll rates were used for the purpose of the analysis, all toll rates are set by the North Carolina Turnpike Authority Board of Directors,” he wrote in the email. “Formal toll rates for the Mid-Currituck Bridge would not be established until closer to the facility’s opening.”

The $173 million in committed division funds represents about 20% of the total STIP funding for Division 1, Hodges said. Depending on the outcome of the project schedule, the DEQ permits would not expire on their own, he said. The Corps’ permit, however, is set to expire iis set to expire on Dec. 31,2030, unless an extension is granted.

But if the Albemarle Regional Planning Organization decides to move the project to the last five years of the STIP, he said, it could potentially be eligible for funding at statewide, regional impact funding and division needs tiers.

“Ultimately whether the project is funded and programmed for construction would be dependent on available funding at each tier and how the project scores relative to other projects submitted for prioritization,” he wrote.

Whatever its fate, it’s taken a lot of resources for the Mid-Currituck Bridge proposal to finally reach the runway, only to be stalled indefinitely — or eliminated. 

“Since the early 1990s when the project was first conceived,” Hodges wrote, “approximately $60 million has been spent on early project work, including preliminary engineering, environmental analysis and initial right-of-way acquisition.”

As North Carolina’s population grows, local and state governments, elected officials, educators and nonprofit groups are bracing for the demands more residents will put on the state’s already taxed and aging water infrastructure.

The 2026 Emerging Issues Forum: Future Forward Water held Feb. 25 brought together these decision-makers and advocates to forums in Morehead City, Winston-Salem and Asheville, where they could share their challenges, ideas and solutions regarding the often-unnoticed necessity.

The forum featured several speakers, including Gov. Josh Stein, and group discussions that focused on four main challenges: aging infrastructure, resiliency, the water workforce crisis, and maintaining safe and reliable water systems.  

In a video message, Stein said that North Carolina’s water infrastructure faces serious challenges. The American Society of Civil Engineers recently graded the state, giving it a C-plus on drinking water, C-minus on stormwater, and a D-minus on dams and on wastewater.

“Storms like Hurricane Helene, Hurricane Matthew, Hurricane Florence and tropical Storm Chantal damaged wells and water systems across the state, leaving many communities without clean water,” he continued. “At the same time, continued population growth in some of our areas require expanded service and new infrastructure. Life sciences, companies, data centers coming to North Carolina also require large amounts of water to operate, further straining our infrastructure. Many rural communities struggle in aging systems and limited financial capacity. Contaminants such as PFAS further poison our water supply. We must take all of these challenges on as a clarion call.” 

Usually held in Raleigh, this year’s forum was hosted in the three locations to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Emerging Issues Forum, the idea of the late Gov. Jim Hunt, who died in December. Institute for Emerging Issues, established in 2002 at North Carolina State University, hosts the forum. The institute “is a nonpartisan connector, bringing North Carolinians together across sectors, regions and perspectives to address the state’s most significant challenges while advancing its economic competitiveness.”

Sandra Merkel DeJames, who is a member of the Institute for Emerging Issues National Advisory Board, explained to the more than 100 attending the Morehead City forum that the challenge being addressed that day is how to keep up with the unprecedented population growth facing the state. Population growth is the topic of the three-year Emerging Issues Forum series that kicked off in 2025, and focused on energy infrastructure. Next year the event will address housing.

“Last year, the state added an average of 400 new residents every day. That’s over 145,000 people by 2050. Some 14 million residents will call our state home, compared to the 11.2 million today,” said DeJames, who is president and CEO of Harmonize Strategy Group.

“People are moving to North Carolina for work, education, our climate and a host of other reasons,” she continued. All of these “new residents will need access to housing, energy and water that’s safe and affordable. They’ll need transportation and broadband and all of the other critical infrastructure needed to support a thriving economy, like childcare, healthcare, public safety and education.”

Companies are moving to the state as well, she continued.

“We’ve been named the best state for business in three of the past four years by CNBC. Once here, they too need infrastructure to support their operations,” DeJames said. “As to those businesses already here, this population and business growth will not be even across the state, or even within this region, but all areas have infrastructure needs, and we must now meet them.”

DeJames continued that forum organizers spent the last year learning more about the state’s water issues, “and we’ve learned the following: Water is a truly hidden infrastructure.” But, it is also the “most local form of infrastructure.”

The state is one of 10 with more than 5,000 public water systems – it is closer to 6,000 — and that number does not include the more than 2 million people who use privately owned wells and septic systems.

While water issues vary by region, there are common themes.

“First, our water infrastructure is aging,” DeJames said, despite some of the largest increases in water infrastructure spending in recent years.

“One conservative estimate is that we need $20 billion in new investments for drinking water and $21 billion in new investments for wastewater treatment and sanitary sewers in the coming decades, left unaddressed, our state’s economic vitality and public health are at risk.”

Next is the need to treat water for new contaminants.

“The emergence of new contaminants that can impact our health, such as PFAS, and the additional billions of dollars in cost to treat them will further compound financial pressures on our water systems and our customers,” DeJames said. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, are long-lasting chemicals found in water, air and soil that are linked to harmful health effects.

Third, the state’s water infrastructure is too vulnerable.

“The damage done to wells and water systems from Hurricane Helene, Tropical Storm Chantal and other storms add to longer-term challenges to water and wastewater systems across the state. We need to increase our infrastructure’s resiliency,” she said.

“And finally, we need more workers in the water sector. There is significant shortage of qualified workers as the current workforce ages out, and not enough new workers to enter these fields.”

N.C. State’s Peter A. Pappas Real Estate Development Program Director Chuck Flink expressed similar points in a message delivered to all three forum locations via video.

The state’s population is expected to grow by between 3 and 3.5 million people in the next 25 years, and the growth is not going to hit North Carolina in a uniform manner. “A lot of it’s going to congregate in our two metro areas, which we expect to grow by more than a million people each in this 25-year period,” Flink said.

Wake County currently is the third fastest growing county in the country, averaging around 65 to 75 people moving there each day. It is the most populated county in the state. Charlotte is currently the sixth fastest growing city in America, averaging around 65 residents a day, and it’s the 15th most populated city in the country today, Flink continued.

By the year 2050, 75% of all residents will live in cities, and that’s a new phenomenon for the state, and at the same time, while we have this population growing, the state is experiencing population loss, with 41% of North Carolina’s municipalities in decline.

“We have vast swaths of our eastern part of our state and some portions of our western counties that are losing population,” Flink said. “In fact, we have a band of counties that stretches from the Virginia border to the South Carolina border, where we need more population, we need more economic opportunity. So it’s not a real simple picture there.”

He paused to say that he loves that the state is a collection of small communities, “and yet some of these small communities, especially in the eastern part of the state, are literally being abandoned due to population loss.”

“In North Carolina, 50% of us derive our drinking water from underground reservoirs, aquifers, and when we look at other elements of our water infrastructure, our water and wastewater systems are antiquated and they’re failing,” he said.

In some cases, there has been an overall decline in water quality across the state because of drought, overconsumption, and pollution, including forever chemicals.

The people that manage water infrastructure are aging as well. More education and training is needed for a new workforce to manage the infrastructure going forward.

However, Flink said he’s optimistic about where the state can go.

“It really begins with planning. Planning for growth. How do we want to grow? I think that’s the ace of spades that we control,” Flink said, adding that growth can be controlled and that’s how these challenges will be met.

There were four panel discussions throughout the day. The panels each had participants represented different sectors who shared the hurdles they’re facing, their frustrations and ways they’re navigating these challenges.

Martin Doyle, professor of River Systems Science and Policy at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Energy, explained that water systems are not supported by general tax revenue, but are covered by the funds generated by billing its customers.

The UNC School of Government surveyed water systems around the state, and found that less than a quarter of those water systems actually collected sufficient revenue to be considered economically viable.

“They’re not collecting sufficient revenue to cover their costs as well as to cover the cost of preventative maintenance,” Doyle said. “The challenge for this is that we have a large number of water systems that are operating right at the financial threshold. They’re just getting by” and unable to keep up with preventative maintenance.

East Carolina University Water Resources Center Associate Director Samantha Mosier said that there are a number of ways to solve some of the state’s problems. She encouraged raising awareness about infrastructure needs, but the “real solution” is to help municipalities establish or join a regional authority.

“Most small local governments in North Carolina have their own water and wastewater system because that was part of becoming a town, years and years ago when we had lots of population,” Mosier said. “But in the eastern part of the state, we’re seeing that loss of the population.”

With the population dwindling, utilities are losing their customer base, making it no longer feasible for every small town to maintain a water system. Encouraging regionalization brings folks together to have those conversations. 

“To me is that next critical strategy we’ve got to embrace as a local, regional and state level,” she said.

Belhaven Town Manager Lynn Davis said that Beaufort County town’s obstacles are many, including a limited budget. “How do we not just look at the day to day, not just look at the infrastructure that we have, but how do we plan for if something breaks and that’s a challenge that faces us.”

She said staffing is another challenge. Half of the town’s staff could retire right now, and it won’t be easy to replace those workers. “You just don’t find people that have the knowledge and the skills.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Security and Emergency Manager Craig Malone said when it comes to tackling these issues, “it’s not the plan itself that we need to focus on, it’s the process of planning. It helps us look at these contingencies, look at these risks, and our options to address these emergencies.”

He incorporates resiliency planning into his capital improvement plan. “Now you don’t have to stop and plan for emergency. Now you don’t have to stop and plan for that resiliency action or that upgrade to your facility.”

Nags Head Mayor Ben Cahoon said the town has 3,000 year-round residents, and around 45,000 in the summer time, and 80% of the properties have on-site septic systems. On a summer day, millions of gallons of water goes through the houses and into the septic systems.

“At the same time we have sea level rise, which is bringing the water table up under those wastewater systems, causing them to perhaps function less effectively. And then we get a storm, and you get a lot of water in those ditches and in the ground, and you can imagine the dynamics of what’s happening in the ground.”

Cahoon said the town has to plan for these issues.

“We do integrate drinking water, wastewater, stormwater, capacity into our zoning, development/redevelopment decisions. We do that by tying our infrastructure capacity directly to our long-range planning and adopted master plans and our resilience strategies, rather than treating any of these separately. So in Nags Head, our land use and development decisions are guided by the town’s comp plan.”

To address the retiring workforce that most local governments seem to be facing, some town leaders are changing how they recruit. For example, Maysville Town Manager Shcumata Brown said they’re looking for employees who have the aptitude to learn and not focus on certain certifications.

Perry Harker, vice president of Workforce Continuing Education at Carteret Community College, said that students aren’t hearing about this type of career, and the college is trying to introduce students to water and wastewater industry opportunities.

Compounding these issues is water quality.

Ben Farmer, planning and development services director for Upper Coastal Plain Council of Government, said raw water is pumped to a treatment plant, and that water has to fall within certain threshold or maximum containment levels. The systems, regardless of the town or city’s size, have to make sure that drinking water is up to that very extreme standard to keep the water safe.

Cape Fear Riverkeeper Kemp Burdette told the attendees that many residents get their drinking water from rivers — the Cape Fear River basin provides about one in five residents with the drinking water – and “protecting rivers is the single most effective way of protecting drinking water supply and reducing infrastructure costs for communities, period.”

Jacksonville Stormwater Manager Pat Donovan-Brandenburg said that we all need to be part of the solution.

“Each one of us impact stormwater. Meaning we have a home, we have a car, we have a road to get to and from work. I challenge all of us to look at our individual yards, our individual businesses,” she said.

“What can we do to disconnect our stormwater runoff from ever making it out to the storm drain in the road and out to a stream? Can we get it to infiltrate instead of making it to our surface waters? Making it to our surface waters does not recharge our aquifers, and we need to recharge aquifers in order to have the drinking water,” she said. “There’s the connection. So can you disconnect your storm drains or your gutters and put it into your landscape beds? Can you put in an infiltration trench? Can you put in a rain garden or rain barrel? Everybody’s yard, everybody’s business counts toward stormwater runoff, so we can all be part of the solution,” she reiterated.

There’s so much technology out there, so ask your engineer to think outside of the box. “Yes, it may cost a little bit more, but if you’re building there for the rest of your life, invest in your community. Because that’s what it is. We’ve got to invest in our neighborhoods, invest in our communities. So my message is very simple, reduce the storm water that you’re creating individually off your own property, and collectively, we will make a difference.”

We all like vibrant colors and new show-offs in our gardens, and with a mailbox full of gardening catalogs this time of year that advertise all sorts of gorgeous goodies, what’s a gardener to do? Ignore all the pretties?

Though it is tempting to collect plant specimens from faraway lands — a part of human history that is many, many centuries old and not likely to fizzle out any time soon — there’s a risk to introducing non-native species to your garden.

So, what’s so bad about trying out new plants? Sometimes plants from far off make it, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they thrive, and sometimes they really thrive, to the point of becoming dangerously invasive. Sadly, the only way to find out is to try it, often with disastrous results.

While natives have evolved over centuries to survive in certain soil and temperature conditions, and native pollinators have thrived along with them, non-natives often throw off the delicate balance.

Some pollinators, such as monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus), have specific plants for feeding or laying their eggs on. Monarchs love milkweed, both to nosh on and for their nurseries. The plants and butterflies have developed a symbiotic relationship.

Milkweed (Asclepias spp.) is the sole host plant for monarchs. Momma monarchs lay their eggs on milkweed plants. When the eggs hatch, the caterpillars feed on the leaves of the milkweed.

While poisonous to most critters, including humans, the monarchs use the toxins as their first line of defense. Because the milkweeds are toxic to many critters, the monarchs store the toxins in their bodies, thus making them unpalatable to many predators. The butterfly’s bright orange coloring serves as an added warning.

Adult monarchs feed on brightly colored flowers such as zinnias, sunflower, golden rod, asters, and lantana. Since milkweeds are, well, weedy looking, and because people fear them as a poisonous plant, many people rid their yards and woods of the plants.

But wait … can’t you just go to a nursery and buy milkweed plants? Again, native versus non-native.

Native milkweeds die back in winter, encouraging monarchs to migrate. Tropical milkweeds such as Asclepias curassavica, do not die back, confusing the monarchs and tricking them into staying.

Because the tropical variety overwinters, a harmful protozoan parasite (Ophryocystis elektroscirrha) also overwinters on the plant. The spores of this parasite accumulate on the plant and infect monarch caterpillars, causing infection and deforming wings, leading to death. 

Natives versus non-natives are kind of like name brand groceries versus store brand. Some things you can’t substitute. Like peanut butter, for instance. Team Jif all the way. Cream cheese has to be Philadelphia brand or nothing.

It may be cheaper and it may look the same, but the qualities you prize are muted or nonexistent and it won’t do what you want.

Growing up, we all took weedy lots and meadows for granted. They were just there, something waiting to be mowed and maintained to human standards.

Somewhere in the last few decades, or centuries, we’ve lost our appreciation for lush cottage garden-type landscapes and replaced them with sterile, manicured expanses of monoculture.

Monocultures, such as grass lawns, while orderly and green, feed pretty much nothing. In past times, there would still be enough wild places around to offset lawns and support plants and insects and critters. With more and more pavement, more and more houses and stores and buildings sprouting up every day, it’s becoming harder and harder for wildlife to survive.

We are fortunate enough to live in a place with vast tracts of woodlands and fields to support biodiversity. Anybody local ever hike the Patsy Pond loop on N.C. Highway 24 in Newport? Or any of our local trails, really?

At first glance, it looks, well, weedy. Take your time and really look. Because it is so “weedy,” there is a plethora of pollinators and critters.

A patch of purple blazing star (liatris) and honeybees here. Some native grasses and a lizard or toad there. Wild native blueberries and other berries scattered around. Toadstools on a rotting log. Lichens and fungi growing on trees. Beetles. Flies. Gnats. Mosquitoes.

While the insects bother us, they provide an all-you-can-eat buffet for birds and toads and turtles and frogs. Because the plants are all natives, they’re well adapted to the poor, sandy soil, humidity, wind, salt, and heat prevalent in our coastal area.

Walking our trails, in addition to lots of natives, you may also notice invasive plants.

Centipede grass (Eremochloa ophiuroides) tracked in on someone’s shoes and thriving because it found a perfect spot for itself, and because it isn’t being mowed. Did you know it was once an on the books law that it was illegal to plant Centipede within a certain distance of crops?

One of the worst invasives is Elaeagnus, or Russian tea olive. With its distinctive speckled foliage, tannish on the bottom and green on the top, this one is easy to spot. Originating in China and Japan, spreading invasively here by the bird/berry method, this fugitive from Sleeping Beauty’s protective wall was planted as hedges and soil conservation for decades.

Did I mention it has thorns? Nasty thorns. And it’s almost impossible to kill.

So if you don’t want to plant non-native invasives, what can you plant? Kind of depends on where you are, your soil, what your objectives are. Do you want color? Trees? Butterflies? Wildlife? Some combination of all of the above?

What if you love a certain non-native but don’t like its downside? With a bit of research, you can probably find a native with similar qualities.

To that end, check out these resources:

• go.ncsu.edu/CoastalLandscapes
• https://ncwildflower.org/native-plant-nurseries/
• https://homegrownnationalpark.org/keystone-plants/
• https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/
• https://ncseagrant.ncsu.edu/plant-this-instead/
• https://auth1.dpr.ncparks.gov/nbnc/a/accounts.php

These are just a few of the many resources designed to help you help the environment while beautifying your yard. With a little research, planting can be much more than just seeing a really cool plant and sticking it in your yard only to regret it later.

Registration is open for the 2026 North Carolina Aquaculture Development Conference, a three-day event that focuses on the future of aquaculture in state.

The event, which will be held March 25-27 at they Crystal Coast Civic Center on the Carteret Community College campus in Morehead City, is to include keynote sessions, technical workshops, and interactive discussions on a range of aquaculture species and production systems relevant to the state.

The program is a time for the public, current and aspiring fish farmers, scientists, educators, researchers, students, and agency and regulatory professionals to come together to share ideas, advance best practices, and strengthen connections across the aquaculture community, organizers said.

The Got to Be NC Seafood Expo, which celebrates the state’s seafood industry, will take place during the event, and innovative equipment, technologies, and products will be showcased

There will be a career fair March 25 and attendees may join in at 6 p.m. for trivia night at Tight Lines Pub and Brewing Co. in downtown Morehead City.

Agendas for each day of the conference are available online. To register for the conference and the expo visit https://ncaquaculture.com/registration/.

Though it snakes 50 miles through Onslow County from start to finish, the New River is, in a practical sense, two distinct parts.

The upper river begins northwest of Richlands, a small but increasingly developing town that’s roughly 10 miles from the Duplin County line. From there, the river cuts a narrow path through largely rural agricultural land southeast to Jacksonville, where it widens, its fresh water transitioning to salt water.

The lower river then forms into a tidal estuarine 2 miles wide before ultimately opening into Onslow Bay in the Atlantic Ocean.

Plans have been in the works some two years now to ensure the river’s distinguishing parts get the attention they need. This year, Coastal Carolina Riverwatch, with the support of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, is finalizing the Lower New River Watershed Restoration Plan,  one that focuses on areas where saltwater creeks drain into shellfish-harvesting waters and tributaries including bays and creeks.

One river, two plans.

Plans are being designed through a wide-reaching collaborative effort to work in unison to restore and protect the river’s water quality.

“We felt that, even though this a river that begins and ends in Onslow County, that it would be a great opportunity for us to separate it into two different plans so that we are spending as much time as we can in those two sections and really delve into the issues and the concerns and things that are affecting water quality and things that could potentially improve water quality through the watershed restoration plan,” Coastal Carolina Riverwatch Executive Director Lisa Rider told Coastal Review in an interview earlier this month.

Next year, the upper New River plan is expected to be complete. That plan addresses inland freshwater systems that flow through neighborhoods, farms, and paddle trails, she added.

At their cores, the plans espouse the connections shared by water, land and people. Essential to both missions is bridging people, whether it be those who live along it, recreate on it, or fish in it for sustenance, with organizations and agencies “needed to respond at the scale the river demands” to improve and protect it, Rider explained.

“It’s definitely a collaborative effort and I think that’s what makes this process a little bit unique for the watershed water management planning,” she said. “We’ve been really spending a lot of time connecting with community members, leadership in the community, folks that really have a unique grasp of what’s going on in the area.”

Riverwatch has worked through the New River Roundtable, a collaborative group of scientists, regulators, academics, government representatives and stakeholders, Rider explained. The organization has also worked closely with the county and with state partners.

The organization took a boots-on-the-ground approach, setting up at local festivals and other public events and speaking at various homeowners’ associations and community meetings.

The watershed restoration plans are a first for Coastal Carolina Riverwatch, an organization that has for years been monitoring the New River to try and determine sources of bacteria detected in the river.

The plans are rooted in the idea that, by creating one set of watershed restoration plans for the river, “we may get some really great projects out of that” to fill in gaps in areas of the river where water quality improvements and protections are needed, Rider said.

“That sort of initiated us into starting to work with the North Carolina Land and Water Fund to start funding the lower part of the New River plan, and we talked to them quite a bit about the reasoning for separating those plans out, knowing that eventually we would be working in unison,” she said.

The North Carolina Division of Water Resources has been key in helping the organization make the lower river plan sustainable through continued use and updates.

The plans in the agency’s watershed improvement projects, or WIPS, tool, which maps water quality improvement projects reported by residents, organizations and local governments.

“Even after the plan is complete it’s not really complete because we’re going to be continually using the watershed improvement tool to gauge what the public sees, what’s being requested in terms of projects by stakeholders and community members, and then looking to help connect funders with the projects that are being prioritized,” Rider said.

Severe pollution closed the New River to the public in the 1980s.

Things were so dire in the river that when 25 million gallons of waste flowed from a breached hog lagoon into its waters, no fish kills were recorded.

Three years after that spill, Jacksonville closed its downtown wastewater treatment plant to cut off the predominant source of pollution that had been sickening the lower river, where the riverbed between Wilson Bay and Stones Bay was covered by soft organics like ammonia and phosphates that, when in excessive amounts, choke out aquatic life.

City officials urged those at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune to stop its wastewater facility from discharging into the river.

The river was reopened in 2001.

Since then, both the city and Onslow County have been taking further steps to improve and protect the New River.

Jacksonville took on a multiyear project installing artificial reefs on either side of the river between Wilson Bay and Stones Bay to grow millions of oysters. The final phase of the $1.6 million Oyster Highway Project, which has helped usher marine life back into the river, wrapped a couple of years ago.

In 2024, the city’s elected leaders signed off on a grant awarded to Jacksonville’s stormwater department to develop a New River Nutrient Management Plan.

That plan focuses on nutrient loading from nonpoint sources — stormwater that flows from streets, subdivisions, commercial and industrial areas — into the city’s drainage system.

Last December, the Onslow County Board of Commissioners adopted a resolution that supports using low-impact development strategies in all new or significantly renovated county-funded facilities “when they are fiscally responsible and practical,” according to a county notice.

The resolution also encourages the county school system and Coastal Carolina Community College in Jacksonville to adopt similar strategies, such as bioretention areas, swales, pocket wetlands, impervious surface removal, cisterns, green roofs, and permeable pavement, for new and renovated projects.

“As Onslow County continues to grow it will be increasingly important to meet the needs of future development through sustainable means,” according to a county release.

Onslow County residents who would like to help Coastal Carolina Riverwatch identify flood-prone areas, streams in need of restoration or stabilization, areas where stormwater runoff causes erosion or water quality problems, and flood mitigation projects may contact the organization by email at waterkeeper@coastalcarolina.org.

Community-based organizations, including homeowner associations, civic and church groups, environmental and conservation clubs, paddling and fishing organizations, business associations and school groups may request a presentation by Coastal Carolina Riverwatch – or offer a project idea, or talk about an area where there are problems with flooding, at one of the group’s regular meetings.

“The collaboration, I think, really reflects how the river itself works,” Rider said. “Water doesn’t recognize those jurisdictional lines so the solutions themselves are more effective when the planning reflects that reality. This approach, we fell like, helps ensure that the investments are targeted, the support is local, and that it’s designed to deliver real benefits for both water quality and the quality of life across the watershed.”                                                                                                               

The North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort welcomed visitors Saturday for the first time in over a year after closing to the public in late 2024 for a major overhaul of the heating and cooling system.

During the yearlong closure, staff worked to revamp existing displays and installed two new exhibits, Museum Site Manager Jamie McCargo explained during a ribbon-cutting last week.

“We have two brand-new exhibits. We are very proud to say one is called ‘North Carolina’s Road to Revolution,’” McCargo said, which celebrates America’s 250th anniversary, and “is wonderfully aligned with our division-wide initiative to celebrate the anniversary.”

The other new exhibit is “Swell Times,” which highlights coastal recreation, such surfing, fishing and boating, she said.

The maritime museums are under the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, which is leading America 250 NC, the state’s yearlong commemoration of the 250^th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Programs, experiences, exhibits and more are scheduled throughout the year at sites across the state.

McCargo highlighted one panel from the “Road to Revolution” exhibit. During the winter of 1777-78, Gen. Washington’s army was camped Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, and desperately in need of supplies.

“They were cut off and just really were in dire need, and North Carolina rose to the occasion. North Carolina was able to provide food and clothing. They came from Ocracoke Inlet and traveled up our rivers and sounds and were able to deliver items to both South Key, Virginia, and on up to Valley Forge,” McCargo said.

McCargo added that the extensive upgrades inside the facility required moving all of the artifacts, around 10,000, to a controlled-climate room, while the rest of the facility’s HVAC was replaced.

During the site closure, staff continued to work by planning new and updating existing exhibits, including adding new artifacts to the Queen Anne’s Revenge exhibit. The museum is the official repository for the ship, which Blackbeard the Pirate was captaining when it ran aground in Beaufort Inlet 1718, and are expecting more from the Queen Anne’s Revenge conservation laboratory in Greenville.

McCargo also thanked the Friends of the N.C. Maritime Museum, for the $80,000 gift the nonprofit made toward the updates before welcoming the president of the group that supports the museum, Tom Kies.

“The museum is important on many different levels. First and foremost, it safeguards our history. The stories preserved within these walls of boatbuilders, sailors, fishermen, families and communities — and pirates — are not just relics of the past. They are living reminders of who we are and how this region was shaped by the sea. The educational programs offered here ensure that these stories are not last or lost, but passed on to a new generation who will carry them forward. But this Museum’s impact extends far beyond education and preservation,” Kies said.

He added that places like the Maritime Museum are where visitors can connect with the state’s maritime heritage, experience something authentic and meaningful, and understand why this part of North Carolina is so special.

“When they do, they don’t just visit the museum, they support local businesses, stay in our hotels, dine in our restaurants, and leave with a deeper appreciation of our community. In that way, the Maritime Museum is both a cultural anchor and an economic engine, strengthening the region in ways that are sometimes unseen but always felt,” Kies said.

Division of Cultural and Natural Resources Secretary Pamela Brewington Cashwell opened her remarks by telling the room that, for the past year, she had been asking when the facility would reopen. 

“How long does it take to put in a new HVAC system?” she said, with a hint of humor. “To which my staff says, ‘It’s not a window unit, secretary, it’s different,’” and the museum underwent a facelift, which she said many state sites need.

She thanked legislators for help with the $1.8 million project and the supporters, who are “critical to allowing us to do what we do across all of our over 100 sites in North Carolina.” The total includes other sites in the nearby area, like Fort Macon State Park and the N.C. Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores.

The museum was initially scheduled to reopen Jan. 31 but the event was rescheduled for Feb. 21 because of inclement weather.

‘America 250 NC,’ ‘Swell Times’

The museum’s Information and Communications Specialist Cyndi Brown told Coastal Review that the “America 250 NC” exhibit is the first of three phases looking at North Carolina’s role in the American War for Independence.

“This first phase, which will remain on exhibit for about three years, looks at Revolutionary War commerce. The exhibit explores the state’s imports and exports, shares stories about some of its interesting figures and details the importance of the maritime routes in supplying war efforts to the north,” Brown said. “Phase 2 will focus on North Carolina’s privateers and the state’s navy. The final exhibit will look at the end of the war, focusing on coastal raids and the battle of Beaufort.”

Brown explained that creating these exhibits, as with all exhibits in the museum, starts with the history curator and collections staff.

“The historian will come up with a potential theme or concept and research it to be sure there are enough primary sources accessible to tell the history. He’ll then work with collections to be sure we can support those histories with artifacts that are either already in our collection or available for purchase or via loan from another institution,” she continued.

The other new exhibit, “Swell Times,” explores the history of recreation along the coast, specifically on the water.

“There’s info on surfing and sailing, boating, spearfishing, hunting and more. There’s a fun interactive with various historic postcards, front and back, to show some personal perspectives of being on the coast,” Brown said.

It has been almost two weeks since the Environmental Protection Agency announced plans to ax Obama-era carbon emission regulations for new motor vehicles and engines, arguing that the agency didn’t have the authority to impose the science-based standards on the greenhouse gas emissions that the current administration says have only a negligible effect on climate change.

While Republican lawmakers and leaders in the fossil fuel and automotive industries support the move, Democratic Party leaders, health care industry and environmental groups are saying the decision goes against decades of peer-reviewed research that the heat-trapping gases will amplify climate change, and are taking legal action.

President Donald Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced Feb. 12 that the administration was rescinding its own findings, and, consequently, eliminating the greenhouse gas emission standards, or the legal limits on the amount of pollutants a vehicle can emit, that have been in place for more than 15 years.

“We are officially terminating the so-called Endangerment Finding, a disastrous Obama-era policy that severely damaged the American auto industry and massively drove up prices for American consumers,” Trump said during a press conference Feb. 12 at the White House. “Effective immediately, we’re repealing the ridiculous endangerment finding and terminating all additional green emission standards imposed unnecessarily on vehicle models and engines between 2012 and 2027 and beyond.”

The agency stated in a release that week that the Obama-era EPA, via section 202 of the Clean Air Act, exceeded its “authority to combat ‘air pollution’ that harms public health and welfare.” The EPA said that a policy decision of this magnitude should be up to Congress, and “even if the U.S. were to eliminate all GHG emissions from all vehicles, there would be no material impact on global climate indicators through 2100. Therefore, maintaining GHG emission standards is not necessary for EPA to fulfill its core mission of protecting human health and the environment, but regardless, is not within the authority Congress entrusted to EPA.”

When the action was announced, there was a torrent of criticism.

“Today, the Trump administration repealed the endangerment finding: the ruling that served as the basis for limits on tailpipe emissions and power plant rules. Without it, we’ll be less safe, less healthy and less able to fight climate change — all so the fossil fuel industry can make even more money,” former President Barack Obama said on social media Feb. 12.

Dr. Georges C. Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, said that the EPA’s action to repeal the endangerment finding that greenhouse gases threaten the health of all communities undermines decades of science and rulings by federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

“Instead of protecting the public’s health from the dangerous and deadly effects of air pollution, including greenhouse gases emitted by new cars and trucks, this action will exacerbate the health threats we are already seeing from climate change, including increased heat waves, more air pollution and deadly wildfires,” Benjamin said in a statement.

Dr. Gretchen Goldman, president and CEO of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said in a statement that Zeldin “took a chainsaw to the Endangerment Finding, undoing this long-standing, science-based finding on bogus grounds at the expense of our health. Ramming through this unlawful, destructive action at the behest of polluters is an obvious example of what happens when a corrupt administration and fossil fuel interests are allowed to run amok.”

Goldman continued that the science establishing harm to human health and the environment from heat-trapping emissions was clear in 2009.

“More than fifteen years later, the evidence has only mounted as have human suffering and economic damages. Meanwhile, the continued burning of fossil fuels is causing global warming emissions to rise. The science, the facts and the law are unassailable: EPA has the obligation and the authority to regulate this pollution under the Clean Air Act, an act of Congress it’s now blatantly violating,” she said. “The transportation sector is the single largest source of U.S. global heat-trapping emissions. By scrapping vehicle global warming pollution standards today, the Trump administration has co-signed the release of more than 7 billion tons of planet-warming emissions nationally in the decades ahead.”

The “Rescission of the Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding and Motor Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emission Standards Under the Clean Air Act” was published Feb. 18 in the Federal Register.

The same day more than a dozen groups filed a lawsuit in the D.C. circuit against the EPA, “over its illegal determination that it is not responsible for protecting us from climate pollution and its elimination of rules to cut the tailpipe pollution fueling the climate crisis and harming people’s health,” the Environmental Defense Fund announced last week.

“The finding supported commonsense safeguards to cut that pollution, including from cars and trucks. In addition, the agency eliminated the clean vehicle standards, which were set to deliver the single biggest cut to U.S. carbon pollution in history, save lives, and save Americans hard-earned money on gas,” continued the Environmental Defense Fund.

Clean Air Act

The Clean Air Act has given the EPA comprehensive authority to set standards for and regulate motor vehicle pollution since it was signed by President Richard Nixon Dec. 31, 1970.

Section 202(a), states that the administrator “shall by regulation prescribe (and from time to time revise) in accordance with the provisions of this section, standards applicable to the emission of any air pollutant from any class or classes of new motor vehicles or new motor vehicle engines, which in his judgment cause, or contribute to, air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.”

The act was amended in 1977 and 1990, expanding EPA authority.

In 2004, the agency initiated efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Then in 2007, in Massachusetts v. EPA, the Supreme Court found that greenhouse gases are air pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act.

By December 2009, the EPA had established the backbone for greenhouse gas emission rules with the final “Endangerment and Cause or Contribute Findings for Greenhouse Gases Under Section 202(a) of the Clean Air Act,” or the “endangerment finding.”

The EPA administrator had two conclusions: the “endangerment finding,” and the “cause or contribute finding.”

The endangerment finding that determined the current and projected concentrations of the six key well-mixed greenhouse gases — carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride — “in the atmosphere threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.”

The cause or contribute finding is that “the combined emissions of the six “well-mixed greenhouse gases from new motor vehicles and new motor vehicle engines contribute to the greenhouse gas pollution that threatens public health and welfare under CAA section 202(a).”

Rescission background

Rescinding the endangerment finding has been in the works for a year. Zeldin said in March 2025, that the agency was going to formally reconsider the 2009 endangerment finding and resulting regulations.

A fact sheet from the EPA explains that the agency was directed to review the legality and applicability of the endangerment finding.

“EPA carefully considered and reevaluated the legal foundation of the 2009 Endangerment Finding, the text of the CAA, and the Endangerment Finding’s legality in light of subsequent legal developments and court decisions,” the agency states. “The agency concludes that Section 202(a) of the CAA does not provide EPA statutory authority to prescribe motor vehicle emission standards for the purpose of addressing global climate change concerns. In the absence of such authority, the Endangerment Finding is not valid, and EPA cannot retain the regulations that resulted from it.”

Zeldin reiterated the argument during the Feb. 12 press conference, saying that Congress never voted for the climate mandates in section 202 of the Clean Air Act.

“If Congress wants EPA to regulate the heck out of greenhouse gasses emitted from motor vehicles, then Congress can clearly make that the law, which they haven’t done, for good reason,” Zeldin said at the press conference. “We have now realigned EPA rulemaking to reflect the Clean Air Act exactly as it is written and as Congress intended, not as others might wish it to be, where our predecessors focused on trying to make and please a few fear mongering climate alarmists.”

‘Exhaustive Precedent’

Around the time a public comment period opened on the findings, Dena Adler, senior attorney at the Institute for Policy Integrity out of the New York University School of Law, and legal fellow Kate Welty, issued a 19-page brief, “Exhaustive Precedent: EPA’s Requirement to Regulate Motor Vehicle Emissions that Contribute to Dangerous Air Pollution” in July 2025.

They explain that the current administration’s reasons for repealing the emission standards, stating that the “EPA’s suggestion that motor vehicle greenhouse gas emissions may not legally ‘contribute’ to climate change because they comprise a small share of global emissions rests on a flawed understanding of Section 202.”

They write that the Clean Air Act controls pollution from both stationary sources such as power plants and factories and mobile sources such as cars and trucks. Section 202 requires EPA to regulate emissions from new motor vehicles “if the Administrator finds that they ‘cause, or contribute to, air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.’”

The provision “authorizes EPA to regulate a variety of air emissions from new ‘motor vehicles,’ which encompasses cars, light-duty trucks (pick-up trucks and SUVs), heavy-duty trucks, buses, and motorcycles. Under this authority, EPA has been regulating air pollution from motor vehicles since the 1970s,” they continue.

With the 1977 revisions to the Clean Air Act, “Congress wanted EPA to consider how each source of emissions contributed to public health dangers, not limit the agency to regulating only source categories that emitted enough pollution to independently cause health harms,” Adler and Welty explain. “Any effort by EPA to now require that greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles independently endanger public health and welfare would contradict the express Congressional intention described in the legislative history.”

Adler and Welty note that, in 2009, when the EPA concluded that greenhouse gas emissions endanger public health and welfare and that the greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles contribute to climate change, “the agency found that new motor vehicles were responsible for over 23 percent of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and approximately 4 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide and concluded that either comparison was sufficient to meet the contribution standard of Section 202(a).”

In the time since, nothing has meaningfully changed to disturb this finding, as motor vehicles remain responsible for more than 23% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, and greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles “still make a meaningful contribution to climate change and unquestionably cause substantial damages in and of themselves. They also far surpass the levels of contribution that EPA has consistently recognized as sufficient to justify regulation in the past,” they wrote.

“The scale of greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles, EPA’s regulatory precedents under Section 202, and its reasoning under analogous Clean Air Act provisions all demonstrate that emissions from motor vehicles contribute to dangerous air pollution.”

Coastal effects

Southern Environmental Law Center Climate Analyst Jenny Brennan told Coastal Review last week that the lift of the endangerment finding “will almost certainly result in the worsening of climate change impacts that North Carolina communities are already struggling with — meaning sea level rise at faster rates, more rainstorms that drop massive amounts of water in just a few hours, and heatwaves that make it difficult for people to stay safe and healthy.”

Brennan continued that all these impacts will add stress to the already taxed infrastructure, such as roads, drainage systems and housing.

“Extreme heatwaves with even more air pollution, which is likely in the absence of the air regulation policies based on the endangerment finding, pose an even greater health hazard; heat plus air pollution makes it harder for even healthy people to breathe and is especially dangerous to people with asthma, heart conditions, or other medical conditions,” Brennan said.

First of two parts

A highway sign installed last September in Camden County calls attention to Moses Grandy, born there an enslaved person, and the story of his life told in “Narrative of the Life of Moses Grandy; Late a Slave in the United States of America.”

The book was published in London, England, in 1843. When the book was printed, he was, Grandy guessed, 56 years old, although as he notes in his book, “Slaves seldom know exactly how old they are: neither they nor their masters set down the time of a birth; the slaves, because they are not allowed to write or read; and the masters, because they only care to know what slaves belong to them.”

The book was published the following year in the United States.

There are no kindly “Old Black Joes,” elderly enslaved people treasured for their wisdom by caring masters in Moses Grandy’s autobiography. Rather, early in the book, there is a description of his mother, “blind and very old … living in a little hut, in the woods, after the usual manner of old worn-out slaves.”

Grandy observed late in his narrative that, “As far as the owner is concerned, they live or die as it happens; it is just the same thing as turning out an old horse.”

The book is filled with Simon Legree-like characters, capricious in their cruelty, and chilling descriptions of the horrors of the American institution of slavery. Legree is a harsh slaveowner in Harriet Beacher Stowe’s fictional, antislavery novel, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”

Yet the book is more than that. Grandy’s eye for detail and his memory are remarkable. What emerges from the pages is an exceptional and complex description of the institution of slavery.

It is Grandy’s penchant for remembering names that may provide the most damning indictment of slavery.

The title page of the book carries the warning, “It is not improbable that some of the proper names in the following pages are incorrectly spelled. M. G., owing to the laws of the slave states, being perfectly illiterate, his pronunciation is the only guide.” Yet, if some names are muddled in pronunciation and untraceable, there is still plenty to go on.

He describes his first master, Billy Grandy, as “a hard-drinking man” who “sold away many slaves.”

The Camden County 1790 census lists 18 slaves in the William Grandy household, but its apparent there had been more.

“I remember four sisters and four brothers; my mother had more children, but they were dead or sold away before I can remember. I was the youngest,” Moses Grandy recalled. 

His master died when he was probably 9 and the Grandy will bequeathed Moses to James Grandy, the son of William Grandy. James and Moses were the same age and there was a stipulation in the will that Moses would be hired out until “my master and myself were twenty-one years old.”

When he was old enough “to be taken away from my mother and put to field-work, I was hired out for the year, by auction, at the Court House, every January; this is the common practice with respect to slaves belonging to persons who are under age.”

The first person to buy his services, a Mr. Kemp, “used me pretty well; he gave me plenty to eat and sufficient clothing,” he then went to Jemmy Coates, “a severe man”

“Because I could not learn his way of hilling corn, he flogged me naked with a severe whip made of a very tough sapling…The point of it at last entered my belly and broke off; leaving an inch and a-half outside…On looking down I saw it sticking, out of my body: I pulled it out and the blood spouted after it. The wound festered, and discharged very much at the time, and hurt me for years after,” he said.

“I was next with Mr. Enoch Sawyer of Camden county,” Grandy recalled.

A prominent North Carolina politician immediately after the Revolution, Sawyer was deeply involved in developing the Great Dismal Swamp Canal. If the gravestone the Elizabeth City Economist found in November, 1897 is to be believed, Sawyer was a good man.

“Sacred to the memory of Enoch Sawyer, who was born on the 10th of March, 1758. and departed this life on the 16th of March, 1827, age 68 and six days. He was universally beloved and respected, and a faithful servant of the Lord Jesus. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints,” the Economist reported.

If Sawyer was a good man to his neighbors and peers, to Grandy, “It was cruel living.”

“We had not near enough of either victuals or clothes … I have often ground the husks of Indian corn over again in a hand-mill, for the chance of getting something to eat out of it,” Grandy reported. “In severe frosts, I was compelled to go into the fields and woods to work, with my naked feet cracked and bleeding from extreme cold.”

If the living was cruel in working for Sawyer, Grandy learned a skill that gave him a degree of freedom very few enslaved people enjoyed.

“The young Moses Grandy tended the ferry across the Narrows on the Pasquotank River,” historian David Cecelski wrote in his 1994 article “Moses Grandy: A Slave Waterman’s Life,” written for the Institute for Southern Studies.

The Black watermen were, Cecelski wrote, “an elite fraternity … both irreplaceable to the plantation economy, and subversive of the racial bondage that fueled it.”

That skill served Grandy well, raising his importance as a commodity, and the value that was placed on his skill as a waterman underscores how complex the institution of American slavery was.

After three years working for Sawyer his services were acquired by “Mr. George Furley (probably George Ferebee, early postmaster of South Mills) … he employed me as a car-boy in the Dismal swamp; I had to drive lumber, &. I had plenty to eat and plenty of clothes. I was so overjoyed… that I then thought I would not have left the place to go to heaven.”

Although no longer working under Sawyer, the “cruel living” touched him once again.

“I married a slave belonging to Mr. Enoch Sawyer,” he said. After eight months of marriage, he was returning home on a Friday, when he “heard a noise behind me, on the road which ran by the side of the canal … When they came up to me, one of them cried out, ‘Moses, my dear!’… It was my wife. She cried out to me, ‘I am gone.’

His wife had been sold.

He was able to walk with her for a short distance “and bid her farewell. I have never seen or heard of her from that day to this. I loved her as I loved my life.”

Next in the series: To purchase his freedom

Reprinted from the Outer Banks Voice

On Tuesday, Feb. 17, the North Carolina Supreme Court heard arguments in the long-running legal battle between Currituck County and the Corolla Civic Association (CCA) over how the county spends occupancy tax money.

The CCA plaintiffs contend that the county has improperly used those funds to pay for police, fire protection, emergency services and equipment for public safety rather than earmarking them for tourism-related expenses. The Currituck County Commissioners, citing the extra needs placed on public safety in the summer tourist season in Corolla, have contended that state law allows public safety spending with those funds.

The state legislature passes a law for any county that wishes to charge an occupancy tax, with a provision outlining how the tax can be used. The Currituck County occupancy tax law was first passed in 1987 and amended in 2004. The Outer Banks Voice – NC Supreme Court to hear Currituck County occupancy tax case

In March 2024, the NC Court of Appeals Court ruled in favor of the CCA and members of the organization. Currituck County then appealed that ruling to the State Supreme Court.  During the Feb. 17 arguments, it seemed clear that key elements of the case are whether public safety expenses are related to tourism and how much discretion the commissioners have in allocating occupancy tax dollars.

In speaking first for the defendants, attorney Chris Geis of the Womble Bond Dickinson firm argued that under the statute, the “[Currituck] Commissioners were given the broad authority to use their judgment to determine what is a tourism-related expenditure” that brings tourism to the county.

As an example, Geis cited occupancy tax spending on the county’s Veterans’ Memorial Park, which he said a “leaves people with a good feeling about [this] place. That is a tourism related expenditure.” He noted that the plaintiffs opposed spending occupancy tax dollars on the Park.

“We have reasonable disagreement here, we understand that,” Geis said, in addressing the Supreme Court Justices. “But this is not an area where the county has stepped outside that line” of violating state law.

Making the case for the plaintiffs, attorney Troy Shelton of the Dowling PLLC firm, stated that “the Court of Appeals saw exactly what happened for what it was,” in ruling for the plaintiffs. “The County’s been breaking the law, and it has to stop.”

In response to one Justice’s question, Shelton said that “I don’t think that paying for police or firefighters attracts tourists.”

“There is nothing stopping the County from going back to the [North Carolina] legislature and trying a new round of lobbying” to change the statute. “That’s what they need to be doing instead of fighting this case,” he stated.

Asked by Chief Justice Paul Newby what remedies the plaintiffs are seeking if they prevail, Shelton indicated that among things, they want the restoration of the occupancy tax funds they say were improperly spent.

You can see the Supreme Court arguments here. Supreme Court of North Carolina: 101PA24 Costanzo, et al. v Currituck County, et al.

This story first appeared in the Outer Banks Voice, Coastal Review Online partners with the Voice to provide readers with more environmental and lifestyle stories of interest about our coast.

This story has been updated to include a corrected description of land ownership. Information initially provided to Coastal Review had incorrectly identified the owner.

More people moved to North Carolina last year from different parts of the country than any other state in the nation.

North Carolina’s population grew by almost 150,000 people, trailing behind only Texas and Florida, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released last month.

As political leaders grapple with the demands that growth is placing on essential services like water and sewer, public safety and education, pressure is mounting on conservation groups to acquire, conserve and preserve land.

This month, more than 2,000 acres in coastal counties have been secured for permanent protection from development.

These newly protected areas are filled with natural landscape features that reduce flood risk, improve water quality, and provide habitat for plants and animals that are increasingly getting squeezed out by encroaching development.

In Brunswick County, one of the fastest growing in the state, North Carolina-based conservation nonprofit Unique Places to Save acquired land that serves as a corridor between two protected natural areas, bridging what amounts to nearly 10,000 acres of conserved landscape.

“We really want to be able to maintain large, connected natural areas for habitat for species and to maintain biodiversity of our natural areas,” Unique Places to Save Executive Director Christine Pickens told Coastal Review in a recent telephone interview. “And, particularly, in the southeast of North Carolina, we have some really cool endemic species and really wonderful habitats that you don’t find anywhere else.”

Within the 1,040-acre tract nestled between the towns of St. James and Boiling Spring Lakes are forested wetlands, Carolina bays, sandy pine and wet sandy pine savanna.

The tract, referred to as Boiling Springs Wilderness, specifically connects thousands of acres of privately conserved land including Orton with the North Carolina Boiling Spring Lakes Plant Conservation Preserve.

“When you connect these large areas, you’re connecting a mosaic across the landscape and there’s tiny variations of habitat availability,” Pickens explained. “What that does is allow species that use that area for habitat or refuge or migration to use those slight variations of habitat. When we experience extremes in weather, precipitation or drought or big storms, having just a little bit of wiggle room in terms of available habitat goes a long way to allowing species to be resilient to some of these extremes and some of these changes.”

Habitat that is free from being sliced up by ditches or roads is valuable to species that rely on that habitat, she said.

Take the red cockaded woodpecker, for example. These birds, which were reclassified in late 2024 from endangered to threatened, live in groups, or clusters, helping each other raise their young.

They depend on large, connected natural areas – typically anywhere from 125 to 200 acres – where living pine trees, preferably mature, longleaf pine forests, grow.

Boiling Springs Wilderness includes varying types of soils that support different sets of plants, trees, shrubs and forbs, more commonly referred to as herbs.

A good deal of pond pine and a “little bit” of young longleaf pine grace its landscape, Pickens said.

The headwaters of Orton Creek are within the project area, as are wetlands that blanket the Castle Hayne aquifer, a drinking water source for thousands of Brunswick County residents and tens of thousands in other coastal North Carolina areas.

“That’s a long-term way to protect water quality,” Pickens said. “The areas around streams act as buffers to absorb nutrients, runoff, excess components in surface water that soak in, and they get absorbed by the plants and the roots and the soils around streams. That prevents excess nutrients getting into waterways.”

Then there are the wetlands, which function like nature’s sponges, absorbing stormwater that might otherwise flood developed properties.

“Every chance we get to conserve wetlands is really important right now,” Pickens said.

That’s because state lawmakers decided to align North Carolina’s definition of wetlands with that of the federal government, which is in the process of changing the interpretation of waters of the United States that may omit protections for millions of acres of wetlands in the state.

“It may result in more wetlands being nonjurisdictional, therefore a lot more likely to be converted to uplands through ditching and draining. These conservation easements are perpetual. Once we protect it, that’s it,” Pickens said.

The Boiling Springs Wilderness project was funded through a $3.68 million North Carolina Land and Water Fund grant.

Unique Places to Save will own and manage the tract, while the state will hold the conservation easement. The Coastal Land Trust will steward that easement.

Last year, Unique Places to Save applied for another state Land and Water Fund grant to protect about 500 acres of predominately wetlands between the town of St. James and N.C. Highway 211.

“We’ve got a provisional award from the Land and Water Fund so if they have enough funding we may get funded this year for that effort,” Pickens said.

She touted efforts among other groups that work to conserve land throughout the state, including the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, The Nature Conservancy, North Carolina Plant Conservation Program, North Carolina Coastal Land Trust, and Cape Fear Arch to name a few.

Tyrrell County parcel transferred

Last week, national nonprofit The Conservation Fund finalized the transfer of ownership of about 1,550 acres of coastal wetlands and forestland in Tyrrell County to the Coastal Federation.

“This partnership reflects years of careful conservation planning and cooperation,” Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis stated in a release. “This acquisition protects important coastal wetlands that help filter water, support fish and wildlife habitat, and provide natural flood buffering in on the of the state’s most ecologically significant regions.”

Portions of the Tyrrell County property, which is valued at an estimated $1.7 million, are in the Land and Water Fund’s Stewardship Program, one designed to establish, monitor and enforce perpetual conservation agreements.

The property will be included as part of the Coastal Federation’s Land for a Healthy Coast program, which focuses on protecting estuaries, reducing polluted runoff, buffering floods, and boosting long-term coastal resilience.

“Some lands are simply too important to risk losing,” Coastal Federation founder and senior adviser Todd Miller said in the release. “When a property protects water quality, supports fisheries, and strengthens the natural defenses of the coast, we believe it’s our responsibility to step forward and ensure it is permanently conserved and well managed.”

This report has been updated for clarification.

Dominion Energy’s 2.6-gigawatt offshore wind project based in Hampton Roads, Virginia, which was ordered by the Trump administration to stop work right before Christmas, has resumed the project and is now on track for completion by early 2027.

But the 26-day shutdown of Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, also known as CVOW, came at considerable cost to the company, its customers and the nation’s energy needs. 

According to its Jan. 30 project update, Dominion tallied the current total project cost at $11.5 billion, reflecting $228 million for increases associated with the suspension, as well as $580 million related to actual/estimated tariffs. Dominion’s update in May 2025 had the project cost at $10.8 billion.

“It’s a terrible time to be restricting any source of new energy and especially sources of new clean energy that can be constructed in places that otherwise have limited ability to add new generation, whether that might be a new gas plant or a new coal plant,” Katharine Kollins, president of the Southeastern Wind Coalition, told Coastal Review.

When fully operational, CVOW’s 176 wind turbines will generate enough energy to power up to 660,000 homes, making it the largest offshore wind farm in the U.S and one of the largest wind energy production facilities in the world. Dominion, which provides electricity to 3.6 million homes and businesses in Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina and natural gas service to 500,000 customers in South Carolina, said the wind project is critical to its “diverse energy supply strategy” to meet growing regional demand.

“I think from the wind industry’s perspective, this is an industry that has been operating for over 20 years and has shown that there’s an ability to put a significant amount of new clean energy on the grid every year — when the free market is at play and when they are able to construct in areas where it makes sense to have wind,” Kollins said.

Citing risks to national security, the U.S. Department of Interior issued the suspension order on Dec. 22 to CVOW and four other offshore wind projects in varied stages of development on the East Coast. The following day, Dominion sued the federal government.

In the action, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Dominion argued, in part, that it had worked extensively with military interests while developing the project to ensure that any concerns about radar, training or operational readiness were addressed. Not only did the agency director lack the “generalized authority” under the lease regulations to order the suspension “at whim,” the lawsuit said, the government did not cite an “applicable trigger” to halt construction.

“Our nation is governed by laws, and a stable legal and regulatory environment is essential to allow regulated public utilities like (Dominion)  as well as other businesses, contractors, suppliers, and workers, to invest and support our nation’s energy needs and associated jobs,” according to the lawsuit.

“Sudden and baseless withdrawal of regulatory approvals by government officials cannot be reconciled with the predictability needed to support the exceptionally large capital investments required for large-scale energy development projects like CVOW critical to domestic energy security, continues the legal document. “That is true regardless of the source of energy.”

Based on a 2022 agreement with regulators on cost-sharing, for project costs beyond $10.3 billion up to $11.3 billion, the company and the customers each pay 50%, and from $11.3 billion to $13.7 billion, the company pays 100%, according to Dominion’s Jan. 30 project update.

Customers in Virginia, but not North Carolina, currently pay about $11 a month to cover CVOW costs, said Jeremy Slayton with Dominion media relations in a Feb. 10 email response to Coastal Review. Cost recovery, which influences rates, is updated annually, he added, and the October 2025 filing is still before the Virginia State Corporation Commission.

On Jan. 16, the court granted Dominion’s request for a preliminary injunction that allowed construction at CVOW to resume while the lawsuit is resolved. Courts have now allowed all five stalled offshore projects to operate for the time being.

“While our legal challenge proceeds, we will continue seeking a durable resolution of this matter through cooperation with the federal government”, Dominion Energy said in a press release.

The company didn’t waste time getting back to work. According to information provided by Slayton, project construction was by late January about 70% complete, with the facility expected to deliver its first power to the grid by the end of the first quarter of this year.

“Our U.S-flagged wind turbine installation vessel Charybdis completed the first turbine installation today,” Slayton wrote in the Jan 27 email. 

So far, he added, all 176 monopole foundations have been installed, and 119 of the 176 transition pieces — the yellow parts that connect the foundations to the turbine towers — are in place.

Also, two of the three offshore substations have been installed, the deepwater offshore export cables installation has been completed and the nearshore export cables installation is about 60% completed. And about 67 miles of an estimated 231 miles of inter-array cables, which carry energy created by the wind turbines to the offshore substations, has been installed.

Onshore electric transmission construction is expected to be completed in early 2026. Before the abrupt stop-work order, CVOW, which started construction in 2024, had expected to flip the power switch on by that date, and be fully operational by the end of 2026.

In addition to the obvious benefit of clean, plentiful energy, the project has brought millions in economic value to the region, including many jobs and dollars while under construction.

“Offshore wind, in particular, provides the United States with a generational opportunity to supply large amounts of affordable, reliable power while spurring investment and creating U.S. jobs,” Dominion argued in its filing.

According to Dominion, the completed project will create 1,100 direct and indirect jobs annually in Hampton Roads, equaling about $82 million in pay and benefits, $210 million in economic output, $6 million in revenues for local governments and $5 million in state tax revenue.

Since Donald Trump’s reelection, the president has focused on dismantling renewable energy-related projects — solar, wind, battery storage, even grid modernization —  in the U.S, and replacing it with fossil fuel and nuclear power. But he has reserved his strongest animus for offshore wind, apparently based on his objection to 11 wind turbines in the water off his Aberdeenshire, Scotland golf course.

Shortly after he purchased an estate there in 2006, according to a July 29, 2025, article published online by the BBC,  Trump “soon became infuriated at plans to construct an offshore wind farm nearby, arguing that the ‘windmills’ — as he prefers to call the structures — would ruin the view.”

He also insisted that the turbine blades killed “all” the birds, but surveys at the site have to date not found a single bird strike. In addition to calling wind energy “a scam,” as quoted in the article, the president regards wind power as “very expensive, very ugly energy”.

Despite Trump fighting the plans through the Scottish courts and ultimately the UK’s Supreme Court, construction of the “monsters” went ahead in 2018.

“It clearly left him smarting and he’s not had a good word to say about wind power since,” the article said.

According to an Audubon study, most bird deaths are caused by striking buildings, especially tall ones with large windows, and cats eating them. On land, building collisions alone are estimated to kill over a billion birds each year in the U.S., the report said.

“On the open ocean, birds can be killed or injured when they collide with ships or offshore oil platforms,” the report stated. “Similarly, offshore wind infrastructure — including turbine blades, towers, electrical platforms, and construction equipment on boats — all pose potential threats.”

The report goes into much detail, but best practices were summed up as “Avoid, Minimize, Offset and Monitor.”

Dominion states on its website that it uses the latest technologies to protect birds and other wildlife, such as time-of-year restrictions, installation of anti-perching devices and acoustic monitoring.

Typically, offshore wind production is generated by three-bladed rotors attached to a ocean-worthy structure that houses a generator insider turbines attached to elevated platforms. Cables from the generator deliver the energy to the bottom of the tower to the underwater transmission cables to onshore power stations. 

But technology has evolved considerably since the first offshore turbine was built in Denmark in 1991.

“As turbine technology continues its rapid evolution — with units now reaching 26 (megawatts) — and floating wind advances toward commercial scale, the industry finds itself at a critical juncture that will shape its trajectory for years to come,” Power magazine reported in a Feb. 9, 2026, article published online.

Global offshore wind capacity reached 83 gigawatts at the end of 2024, the article said, and it appears that the 2025 report will show it was another banner year for the industry, with new construction “positioning the sector for accelerated growth through the decade.”

Significant projects have been constructed or are planned in European and Asia-Pacific regions, the magazine said. Meanwhile, the U.S. offshore wind industry is sputtering, resulting in a severe impact to the market. The International Energy Agency, according to the article, forecasts a 60% downward revision from 2025-2030 for U.S. wind energy, equaling 57 GW of both onshore and offshore capacity “that is now unlikely to be built.”

It appears the U.S, for now, may be left in the dust.

“Offshore wind technology continues its relentless march toward larger, more powerful machines,” according to the article. “The average capacity of turbines installed offshore in 2024 reached 10 MW, according to (the Global Wind Energy Council), a figure that would have seemed implausible a decade ago. Yet, the frontier has already moved well beyond that threshold.”

Still, in the long run, the realities of market forces and the limitations of dirty or destructive energy resources can make an unlimited, clean energy such as wind an unavoidable choice. Offshore projects may be a younger industry in the U.S., but it is considered a powerful renewable resource to tap. While land-based wind projects are less costly, wind speeds are generally higher and more constant offshore, allowing turbines to generate more electricity for longer periods.

In the U.S., solar and wind have often been the most affordable energy resource, but they are also compatible grid partners, Kollins said, with wind at its peak when the sun is not.

“Generally, wind turbines have higher generation factors in the winter and in evenings, and those are two times when solar has less output,” she said, “So if you have a lot of solar on the grid, you can add a lot of wind before you really need storage.”

Once all five of the offshore projects are operating at full capacity, she said, that’s when people will see the benefits of having more electricity produced, when they need it — such as the recent weekend deep freezes along the East Coast.

“These things are going to be generating their full output all weekend when everybody’s got their heat turned on and is using max electricity load,” Kollins said, adding: “Offshore wind is highly correlated with winter storms.”

There is an increasing demand overall for electricity, Kollins noted. And construction of gas turbines and nuclear power is many years down the road.

“These electrons are needed so badly,” she said.  “We are in a period of rapid economic growth, and in order to continue fueling that growth, we need every resource available.

“And offshore wind provides one of the only ways to build a significant amount of new energy generation in the near term.”

A North Carolina court has ruled that the state’s lead environmental agency has the authority to set 1,4-dioxane discharge limits for public wastewater utilities.

The ruling reverses a 2024 administrative law judge’s determination that the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality did not follow the proper process when it established discharge limits for a handful of municipal wastewater treatment plants in the piedmont.

DEQ followed state Environmental Management Commission and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “protocols in creating the 1,4-dioxane limits and created the criteria for the purpose of protecting the health and wellbeing of North Carolinians,” Wake County Superior Court Judge A. Graham Shirley wrote in his Feb. 5 decision. “Compliance with regulations and a desire to maintain or improve public health cannot be said to be a ‘patently in bad faith’ decision.”

Shirley wrote that the agency “did not err” in considering 1,4-dioxane, a substance used primarily as a solvent in chemical manufacturing, as a carcinogen.

“Because 1,4-dioxane is a pollutant likely to cause cancer in humans, permit limits are necessary to protect North Carolinians’ drinking water and their health,” DEQ Secretary Reid Wilson stated in a release the agency published Thursday. “The court vindicates DEQ’s decision to impose limits to protect downstream communities from this harmful carcinogen.”

Discharges of the chemical substance into North Carolinians’ drinking water sources has gained attention in recent years, with downstream public water suppliers and communities calling for tighter regulations and that pollution be controlled at the source.

DEQ’s Division of Water Resources attempted to do that when, in August 2023, it issued Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit that capped its releases of 1,4-dixoane.

Asheboro sued, challenging the state’s authority to include a water quality standard for 1,4-dioxane in the permit and arguing the new limits created an excessive financial burden.

The cities of Greensboro and Reidsville joined the lawsuit. Both had been ordered to include limits in their draft NPDES permits after they received notices of violation for 1,4-dioxane discharges in November 2019.

Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant discharges into Cape Fear River basin, where some 900,000 North Carolinians receive their drinking water downstream of the plant.

Brunswick County, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority and Fayetteville Public Works Commission intervened in the case, asserting that upstream 1,4-dioxane dischargers placed an undue financial burden on them to sample drinking water sources for the chemical and try and reduce the level of consumption of it to their customers.

In a September 2024 ruling, then-Chief Administrative Law Judge Dr. Donald van der Vaart sided with the upstream municipalities and revoked the permit limits set by DEQ.

“The Superior Court was right to uphold DEQ’s ability to limit chemicals in our water, and my office will continue working with DEQ to make sure people have clean drinking water,” North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson stated in a release.

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Kenneth Waldroup said in a statement to Coastal Review Thursday afternoon that the utility is pleased with Shirley’s decision.

“CFPUA’s raw water intake is the last on the Cape Fear River. We rely on State regulators to set and enforce reasonable discharge standards upstream of our intake to protect our region’s raw water supply,” he explained. “While CFPUA’s Sweeney Water Treatment Plant is able to treat drinking water for 1,4-dioxane, that treatment process carries an expense and our ability to treat this pollution has its limits. Reducing the amounts of 1,4-dioxane and other emerging contaminants being released upstream also reduces the financial burden on downstream customers and communities.”

Last October, Waldroup joined representatives of other public water utilities and residents in asking the EPA to uphold its earlier objection to the proposed NPDES permit excluding Asheboro’s discharge limit for 1,4-dioxane.

As of this report, the EPA had not made its final determination.

Emily Donovan, co-founder of Clean Cape Fear, said in an email that the Superior Court ruling, “is a win for public health and every downstream community threatened by Asheboro’s irresponsible leadership.”

“It’s a shame cities like Asheboro prefer squandering tax dollars defending industrial polluters rather than protecting the public’s drinking water supplies,” she said. “It’s also a devastating reminder that until North Carolina creates strong source control measures for toxic chemicals, we will always be one discharge away from the next preventable crisis.”

Earlier this year, the state Environmental Management Commission voted to push proposed monitoring and minimization rules for 1,4-dioxane and three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, to the public this month.

Critics of the proposed rules argue they lack any real enforceability because they do not include water quality standards, specify what best management practices dischargers must follow, or how facilities must minimize their discharges.

The public comment period had yet to be announced as of this report.

In June of last year, the Southern Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch and Haw River Assembly against Asheboro and the city’s industrial customer StarPet Inc., to stop their discharges of 1,4-dioxane into the Cape Fear River basin.

“Asheboro, Greensboro, and Reidsville have spent years arguing for downstream communities to shoulder the health and monetary costs of the cities’ pollution,” Jean Zhuang, a senior attorney with the center’s Chapel Hill office, stated in a release. “The Wake County Superior Court saw through the cities’ arguments and restored a key tool that can be used to protect families, communities, and drinking water utilities downstream.”

According to that release, the cities have filed a motion to suspend the court’s decision and an appeal is pending.

Ocean Isle Beach hopes to pump tens of thousands of cubic yards of sand onto the beach at the easternmost tip of the island by this spring as an erosion stopgap.

The Brunswick County town has asked the Army Corps of Engineers Wilmington District for authorization to have up to 70,000 cubic yards of sand placed east of its terminal groin where erosion has been chipping away at the shoreline in front of a luxury neighborhood.

The Corps announced late last week that it is accepting public comments through March 8 on the town’s application to modify the federal permit it received in 2016 to build the terminal groin at Shallotte Inlet. 

As it stands, that permit does not allow sand to be placed east of the terminal groin.

A terminal groin is a wall-like structure built perpendicular to the shore at inlets to contain sand in areas with high rates of erosion.

Proposed modifications to the permit include placing sand along an 1,875-foot stretch of shoreline at The Pointe, a gated community whose oceanfront property owners have been desperately trying to hold back an encroaching sea.

Under the terms of the proposed permit changes, this would be a one-time beach nourishment project.

The town is also asking for its permitted sand borrow source in Shallotte Inlet to be expanded from about 83 acres to a little more than 117 acres, to add a new borrow area within the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway and be allowed to work outside of the environmental window for dredging from April 30 to June 15.

Ocean Isle Beach Town Manager Justin Whiteside said on Tuesday that the town wants to get the modified permit as quickly as possible in hopes that the sand placement project would coincide with a federal dredging project.

The Corps announced last September it had awarded a nearly $8.5 million contract to maintenance dredge several areas along the Intracoastal, including at the Shallotte Inlet crossing.

Whiteside explained that Ocean Isle Beach anticipates receiving 25,000 cubic yards of sand “that the town is paying for” from the Corps through the inlet crossing project.

“The hope is to get this permit modified within the timeframe that the Corps’ contractor is here on site and then we could contract with them possibly to dredge more in that federal channel or go into that inlet borrow area to put that additional sand there,” he said.

Whiteside said the town does not yet have an approximate cost of its proposal to nourish the beach east of the terminal groin.

Ocean Isle’s east end had for decades been losing ground to chronic erosion, the worst of which occurred along about a mile of ocean shoreline beginning near the inlet.

An encroaching ocean claimed homes, damaged and destroyed public utilities and prompted the North Carolina Department of Transportation to abandon state-maintained streets there.

To stave off further erosion, the town in 2005 was permitted to install a wall of sandbags to protect public roads and infrastructure from getting swallowed up by the sea.

In 2011, Ocean Isle Beach was, along with a handful of other beach communities, allowed to pursue the option of installing a terminal groin at an inlet area after the North Carolina General Assembly repealed a law that banned hardened erosion control structures on the state’s ocean shorelines.

Five years later, the town received state and federal approval to build a 750-foot terminal groin.

But before construction could begin, the Southern Environmental Law Center in August 2017 filed a lawsuit on behalf of the National Audubon Society challenging the Corps’ approval of the project.

More than three years passed before the lawsuit, which later included the town, concluded after an appellate court affirmed a lower court’s decision that the Corps fairly considered the alternatives included in an environmental impact statement examining the proposed project.

Construction of the $11 million project was completed in the spring of 2022, the same year the final plan for The Pointe, a 44-lot subdivision, was approved for development.

By fall 2025, The Pointe’s oceanfront properties were suffering significant erosion.

Last November, the North Carolina Coastal Resources Commission unanimously agreed to grant permission to the owners of eight lots in that neighborhood to install larger than typically allowed sandbag structures waterward of their land.

Whiteside said Tuesday that those sandbags had not been installed.

Sand in the area east of the terminal groin, he said, appears to be “recovering a little bit.”

“We think over the past month and a half or so that we’ve gained, just looking at aerial photographs, approximately 5,000 cubic yards of sand that’s deposited east of the groin, so some of the beach is building back up in that area,” Whiteside said.

He explained that in 2022 the town’s federal beach nourishment project took place in conjunction with the construction of the terminal groin.

“The dredger came through and we had a huge spit on the east end of the island and that contractor came through and just dredged right through that spit and took it down to a negative 15-foot elevation,” Whitesaid said. “It’s kind of filled back in now and we’re thinking that’s why we’re seeing the growth back east of the groin. We’re hoping this shows that that’s some of what contributed to it, that it was maybe our own nourishment project through the Corps.”

“But, in the meantime, we know this is a short-term solution that we’ve got to figure out some type of long-term solution to, so our engineer firm is going to be doing some modeling to see what kind of modifications, if any, need to take place to the existing groin,” he continued.

Comments on the proposed project should refer the permit application number (SAW-2011-01241) and may be submitted to the Corps electronically through the Regulatory Request System at https://rrs.usace.army.mil/rrs or by email to Tyler Crumbley at tyler.a.crumbley2@usace.army.mil. 

Written comments may be mailed to Commander, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Wilmington District, Attention: Tyler Crumbley, 69 Darlington Ave., Wilmington, NC  28403.

The Corps will consider written requests for a public hearing to be held to consider the proposed application modifications.

The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission has opened for public comment a proposed temporary rule amendment to close recreational harvesting of spotted seatrout in the state’s inland and joint fishing waters from April 6 until June 30.

The proposed rule aligns with the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries’ recently announced seatrout harvest closure for all commercial and recreational coastal and joint fishing waters.

The closure was enacted because of recent cold stun events in multiple areas of the state.

“The Wildlife Resources Commission initiated the temporary rulemaking process as quickly as possible to provide regulatory consistency following the Marine Fisheries proclamation,” Inland Fisheries Division Chief Corey Oakley stated in a release. “Temporarily closing the spotting seatrout harvest season will follow recommendations set out by the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission’s Spotted Seatrout Management Plan to allow the population to recover from cold stun events.”

A virtual hearing on the proposed temporary rule amendment has been scheduled for noon, Feb. 25. Pre-registration is required.

An in-person public hearing is scheduled for 6 p.m. March 10 at the N.C. Cooperative Extension’s Lenoir County Center, 1791 NC-11 in Kinston.

Public comments may be submitted through March 13 online, by email to regulations@ncwildlife.gov, or by mail to Rulemaking Coordinator, 1701 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1701. Mailed comments must be postmarked by March 13.

State Wildlife Resource Commission commissioners will review comments and vote on the temporary rule during their March business meeting.

If the proposed rule passes, spotted seatrout harvest season in inland and joint fishing waters will reopen July 1.

NEWPORT — State Rep. Celeste C. Cairns, R-Carteret and Craven, members of the Carteret County Board of Commissioners, county staff, area town officials and project partners broke ground Friday for a new public boat launch in the growing western part of Carteret County.

The ceremonial groundbreaking for the Western Carteret County Boat Launch Facility at 4411 N.C. Highway 24, Newport, has been in the making for a long time, said Commissioner Mark Mansfield, the county board’s vice chairman, at the event. “As you can see, the western part of the county has been deficient in access to the water for quite some time, and this will hopefully enable us, with all the growth that’s going into the western end of the county, provide access to the waterways, which actually helps with the tax base and the property values in this area”

Former Commissioner Robin Comer, who was in office years ago when the project was conceived, was also on hand for the ceremony. He said the launch site is on one of the last available parcels that would facilitate the kind of facility needed in this part of the county where residential development has been rapid.

“This project became so popular — and when I say popular everywhere — everywhere we went to try to round up money for this thing, everybody was on board,” said Comer during his remarks.

Comer said the state provided money, as did the federal government using funding from a Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point program to buffer its nearby auxiliary airfield from residential encroachment. “And everybody wound up, everybody we asked, wound up putting money, time and effort in this thing.”

He said that Emerald Isle businessman Ronnie Watson represented the site’s then-landowner, Steven Stroud.

“If anybody knows Steve, he’s a tough businessman, so a lot of appreciation goes there to (Watson),” said Comer.

Cairns, in her remarks, credited her predecessor, former Rep. Pat McElraft, who served eight consecutive terms ending Jan. 1, 2023, for providing the initial momentum that made the project possible.

“I’m here to celebrate this occasion, that it has finally come to fruition with all the hard work that your county commissioners and my predecessor and others have put into it,” Cairns said. “It’s a wonderful opportunity for folks on the western end of the county to be able to get access to the water. A wonderful collaboration with the Coastal Federation conservation folks. It’s just beautiful all the way around this great project. And I’m just honored, as I can be, to be a part of it today.”

The North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, is developing an abutting parcel for its new Center for Coastal Protection and Restoration being built on Bogue Sound. Construction on that project began in late 2024 and is anticipated to wrap up later this year. The center will share access with the county facility through a common driveway.

County Commissioner David Quinn, who represents the Newport area, expressed how meaningful the boating access is to residents here.

“If you’ve lived in Carteret County, you know that the water isn’t just scenery, it’s part of our daily life. It’s how we relax, it’s how we work, it’s how we make memories with our families,” Quinn said. “Bogue Sound has always been central to who we are, and having safe, dependable access to it matters. That’s exactly what this facility is going to provide for folks who live here year-round and for visitors who come to enjoy the coast. This gives people a safe, convenient place to get on the water. It also helps take pressure off of other boat ramps that have been overcrowded for years.”

Quinn said that with six launch ramps and a transient floating dock, boaters will be able to get in and out more efficiently with less waiting and less congestion, especially during peak season.

“That makes a real difference for families, makes a real difference for fishermen, makes a real difference for anyone that’s trying to enjoy a day out on Bogue Sound without frustration,” he said. “But in Carteret County, access alone isn’t enough. We also understand, if we don’t take care of the waters, then the waters will not take care of us. This project was built with that in mind.”

He explained that the 159-space trailer and vehicle parking lot will help keep vehicles out of sensitive areas. A channel connecting to the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway was designed to minimize the environmental impact while still proving easy for navigators.

“One of the most important features is the living shoreline,” Quinn noted. “Instead of concrete walls, we’re using natural systems that protect marshes, reduce erosion and preserve submerged vegetation that helps improve water quality and it keeps it healthy for a long time for fishing, for boating and, more importantly, for future generations. This site isn’t just about boats, the nature trails connecting Bogue Sound to the Croatan National Forest will give people another way to experience our outdoors, whether that’s a quiet walk, learning about the marsh, or just slowing down and enjoying where we live.”

He said the partnership with the Coastal Federation was important.

“It shows what can happen when public access and environmental stewardship work together instead of against each other. That kind of cooperation reflects Carteret County values: It’s practical, responsible and rooted in long-term thinking,” Quinn said.

Quinn said that in addition to the expected economic benefits of the facility, the project strengthens our connection to the water and to each other.

“It’s a place where kids learn to fish, neighbors cross paths, families spend time together, making memories together, the same way generations did before us,” said Quinn. “Found here in this body of water is the mind-clearing quiet of nature, and the small sounds of its islands are stark and healing, the squeaky flap of a cormorant’s wings overhead, the sizzle of salt foam over broken shells in a backwashing wave, the clicking of sandfiddler claws as they scuffle in the mud, and the splash of a jumping mullet breaking that flat water.

“My granddaddy was a commercial fisherman on these waters. My daddy was born here. I was raised on Bogue Sound. It isn’t just a place that I love, it’s who I am. I want to see my sons and future generations of Carteret County citizens to enjoy, to protect and to appreciate this beautiful place we call home.”

The North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher invites you to cast your vote on names for some of its newest, cutest residents.

Two months have passed since the aquarium welcomed an all-male trio of Asian small-clawed otters born during a full moon on Dec. 5, 2025.

As these adorable pups grow, physical differences are beginning to show and they’re starting to develop their own personalities.

The boys share what aquarium officials are calling “very special genetics,” making them “promising additions” to the Association of Zoos and Aquariums Species Survival Plan program.

Their grandparents, Si and Fun, as well as mom, Milli, are all from Hong Kong.

Si and Fun were confiscated in 2018 by the Hong Kong Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department and moved to Ocean Park Hong Kong where they were placed under the professional care of animal experts.

Later that year, Milli was born. She was sent to the Fort Fisher aquarium in January 2024, where she was paired with mate Binx later that year.

Aquarium staff focus on names that highlight an important connection, such as historical or cultural significance, a species’ history or scientific name, and an attribute, adaptation, or behavior of the animal.

Voters may choose one of the following three groups of name options:

1. Koshi, Bheri, and Seti.
2. Bo, Eddy, and Reed.
3. Nyx, Baloo, and Bodhi.

Meanings of each name, information about each pup, and how to vote are on the aquarium’s website.

The voting deadline is noon Feb. 19.

This report first appeared Feb. 3 in NC Newsline.

North Carolina Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey says even as snow from last weekend’s storm begins to melt, his office has received a flurry of calls from business owners and lifetime Outer Banks residents upset to see more homes falling into the Atlantic Ocean.

The powerful storm, packing winds of 60 mph, brought down four more unoccupied structures in Buxton.

“There’s some angry people out there,” Causey told members of the Council of State on Tuesday. “That makes a total of 31 homes that have collapsed since 2020.”

Related: Winter storm takes 4 Buxton houses, leaves inches of snow

Causey said while his office doesn’t have a solution to deal with the continually eroding shoreline, the state should listen to the locals.

“The complaint that I hear is there’s been too much finger-pointing with the multiple agencies involved, the federal government, the parks system, environmental groups, on down the list,” said Causey. “But what they’re telling me is that we need emergency help to stop the bleeding, because we can’t let these houses keep collapsing.”

Buxton typically loses six feet to eight feet of shoreline each year, but rising sea levels and an active storm season can accelerate that erosion. And a collapsed home can leave a debris field that stretches for miles.

“It is an economic nightmare and it’s an environmental nightmare when that happens,” said Causey.

Property owners are responsible for removing debris when a home collapses, but currents can spread the wreckage far down the coast, so responsibility has increasingly fallen on park officials to protect the shoreline.

Last year the Cape Hatteras National Seashore hauled out over 400 truckloads of debris from fallen houses.

Causey said the residents he’s spoken to this week want to see manmade reefs or hardened structures, which are currently banned, reconsidered. Beach renourishment, which has been used in other coastal communities, is an expensive and temporary solution.

This is not the first time Causey has pressed for help for Outer Banks homeowners.

Last November, Causey and Gov. Josh Stein urged Congress to pass the Preventing Environmental Hazards Act of 2025. The bipartisan bill would allow National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) payments to be made before an imminent collapse caused by erosion.

Standard homeowners’ insurance doesn’t cover shoreline erosion damage, so property owners can’t collect on it, even if the property is condemned, until the house collapses. The proposed legislation would give homeowners financial help to demolish or relocate a condemned structure before it falls into the surf.

“Federal NFIP pre-collapse authority would reduce hazards, protect visitors and wildlife, and save taxpayer dollars on emergency response and cleanup,” Causey and Stein wrote in their Nov. 2025 letter.

But the bill, co-sponsored by U.S. Rep. Greg Murphy (R-NC3), has not moved since last May, when it was referred to the House Committee on Financial Services.

“I think those people deserve to be heard,” said Causey.

While Causey was focused on the coast at Tuesday’s Council of State, Stein turned his attention to disaster recovery out west.

The governor’s office continues to push for Congress to authorize $13.5 billion requested for Hurricane Helene relief, Stein told the council. While North Carolina’s congressional delegation is supportive, the wheels of the federal government move very slowly, tied up in red tape due to new FEMA review requirements.

North Carolina has only received about 12% of the federal aid it has requested for Helene recovery, Stein said.

“I’m so glad I’m not in Congress because I can only imagine trying to get anything constructive done in that body,” said Stein. “But we need their help, Western North Carolina needs their help, and we’re going to keep asking for their help.”

For now, Stein said he’s incredibly grateful for the state employees who helped North Carolinians weather back-to-back winter storms in January.

Transportation crews pre-treated state roads with over 10 million gallons of brine, Stein said. Over 100,000 tons of salt was spread across North Carolina’s 100 counties, with another 20,000 tons expected to be needed in the next day or two with more wintry weather in the forecast.

“They’re just working nonstop to try to minimize the impact on our lives,” said Stein.

NC Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. NC Newsline maintains editorial independence.

A beach nourishment project expected to begin this summer on Buxton’s ocean shoreline will be the topic of a public meeting scheduled for Feb. 11.

Officials with Dare County, which is hosting the meeting at 6 p.m. in Buxton, will be joined by several representatives from the National Park Service – Outer Banks Group to provide general information and answer questions from the community about the upcoming project.

The meeting will kick off with a brief discussion about the nourishment project, including its expected timeline and duration, after which time the public may ask questions.

The meeting will be held in person at the Fessenden Center, 46830 N.C. Highway 12 and will also be livestreamed on the Dare County YouTube channel.

Those who are unable to attend the meeting may submit comments or questions via email to DareCountyPR@DareNC.gov no later than Sunday.

Additional information about nourishment projects in the county is available at MoreBeachToLove.com.

MANTEO — Shoaling in a Roanoke Sound channel just outside Shallowbag Bay has once again prevented the state attraction Elizabeth II from leaving its moorings at Roanoke Island Festival Park for maintenance.

And once again, Dare County has agreed to help manage another dredging project for the state so the ship can motor to the Wanchese state shipyard for its overdue haul-out.

“We’re still essentially in the planning stages,” Dare County Waterways Commission administrator Barton Grover said in a recent interview. “We’re not exactly sure what path we’re going to take moving forward.”

The 43-year-old wooden-hulled vessel, built to represent a 16th-century English sailing ship that participated in Sir Walter Raleigh’s 1584-1587 Roanoke Voyages, was last hauled out for dry-dock maintenance in 2021, after sitting in brackish water for four years.

Grover said that the proposed project would be addressing the same clogged area near where the channel intersects at Roanoke Sound and Shallowbag Bay that had earlier blocked the ship from moving.

In November 2020, the county had approved a contract and a grant application to conduct maintenance dredging in the channel to allow larger vessels, including the Elizabeth II, to access Manteo harbor. The vessel, which has an 8-foot draft, was able to safely leave its dock in Dough’s Creek about a week earlier than completion of the project in late February 2021, according to the county website.

Although the Roanoke Channel is officially a federally authorized channel, Grover explained that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers pipeline dredge does not do work north of Wanchese. Ultimately, a bucket-and-barge method was used for the 90-day project, which increased the depth of about 2.2 miles of channel from as little as 1 to 5 feet to 9 feet. Another 290 feet in a connector channel to the ship’s berth was also dredged. Costs for the $1.9 million project were appropriated by the North Carolina General Assembly, with an additional $170,000 provided by the state’s Shallow Draft Navigation Channel Dredging and Aquatic Weed Fund and the town of Manteo.

Some of the factors that come into play with the proposed dredge project, Grover said, include higher costs to dispose of the dredged material, as well as the lack of an obvious disposal area.

In the earlier projects, the material — scooped from the channel, piled onto a barge and then transported to land — was hauled off in a truck to the be placed on top of the county’s Manns Harbor landfill. But the increased expense may have made that option less attractive, he said. Other possibilities could include placement in a permitted area of water, or beneficial re-use along a shoreline or other area, he said.

Another consideration under review is whether the local hopper dredge Miss Katie would be capable of doing the necessary work instead of again using a bucket-and-barge method, Grover said. But the choice of an appropriate disposal site could also come into play in determining costs for that dredge to reach the site.

Typically planning and permitting for a similar dredge project takes at least “six-plus” months, he said. Also, the state has yet to secure the funding. Ideally, he said, a project would be ready to go during the upcoming winter of 2026-2027.

By then, the 69-foot-long ship will have been sitting in the brackish water alongside its dock in Dough’s Creek for about six years.

Michele Walker, assistant communications director at the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, said in an email responding to questions from Coastal Review that the last condition report was done by surveyor Paul C. Haley with Capt. G. W. Full & Associates Marine Surveyors in 2016, when numerous issues, including signs of rot and deterioration of the exterior and interior, were detailed.

When the vessel was hauled out in 2021, she added, Haley did not travel to the Outer Banks because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but he verified with the firm’s staff on site that the earlier repair recommendations had been completed.

“In addition, the ship is inspected annually by the U.S. Coast Guard,” Walker wrote. “This provides us approval to operate as an attraction vessel, which allows us to have passengers on board while moored.”

Walker added that the ship is maintained above the waterline throughout the year, with more extensive maintenance done while Roanoke Island Festival Park, a state museum that memorializes regional English precolonial and Native American history, and the adjacent Elizabeth II State Historic Site are closed January through mid-March.

Haley’s 2021 report, while emphasizing his familiarity with the vessel from doing the surveys in 2004, 2011 and 2016, also lauds the park for always following through on the surveyors’ recommendations.

Notably, when compromised planking documented in the earlier survey had been replaced, he said, the frames exposed during the work were observed to be in good condition. Also, all the critical repairs and plank replacements had been completed, he said.

“The vessel has a good maintenance program by the park and they haul out the vessel on a regular basis for repainting of the bottom and doing any maintenance work that requires the vessel being out of water,” he wrote.

Except for a few months in the winter, the Elizabeth II welcomes visitors aboard to experience a sailor’s view of ship life and duties, guided by interpreters in period costumes who regale them with stories.

As a representative vessel, the Elizabeth II was built based on knowledge of the tools, materials and basic designs used in Elizabethan-era shipbuilding, but there are no original design sketches of the actual merchant ships that sailed during the late 1500s to Roanoke Island from England. Still, the three-masted, square-rigged ship with dashing blue-and-white markings contrasting with its wooden hull — even while rarely moving from its dock across from the Manteo waterfront — has reliably served its mission as an ambassador for the state, the Outer Banks and Manteo’s heritage as the site of the first English colony in America.

But since the flashy ship’s 1984 launch during the town’s 400th anniversary celebration of the Roanoke Voyages, which culminated in the ill-fated “Lost Colony” that was never seen again after its governor left for supplies in 1587, once-routine day trips to visit coastal ports or join in community festivals fell by the wayside due to lack of funds, scheduling difficulties and other challenges. And gradually, even annual haul-outs started being delayed for multiple years, despite that prolonged time in the water for wooden hulls can lead to damage from shipworms and rot.

The ship’s current dockside stranding was not anticipated during the last review five years ago.

“It is the plan of this office to be present and to conduct a full survey at the haul out at the beginning of 2022,” Haley wrote in the report. “With this in mind, it is our opinion that the vessel is suitable for her present use.”

On Dec. 18, the nonprofit Friends of Elizabeth II indicated no intent to give up the ship, so to speak, posting a notice seeking to hire a new captain for the vessel. Applications were due Jan. 29. In addition to overseeing the maintenance of the ship and leading the crew and interpreters, the job’s responsibilities include training staff and volunteers in rigging, sailmaking and marine woodworking.

The required duties also illustrate that the Elizabeth II isn’t just a pretty ship decorating a small historic North Carolina town’s harbor. The captain must not only understand Coast Guard regulations associated with “moving watercraft” through waterways, the captain must be capable of “sailing the Elizabeth II as needed.”

While North Carolina residents are dealing with the inches of snowfall in the aftermath of this weekend’s winter storm, National Park Service officials on the Outer Banks are also dealing with the debris left behind by four more houses collapsing on Cape Hatteras National Seashore’s beaches.

National Park Service Public Affairs Specialist Mike Barber told Coastal Review Monday that Cape Hatteras National Seashore officials were notified that a house in Buxton collapsed earlier in the day, around 9 a.m. It was the fourth unoccupied house to collapse since Sunday morning.

The first house at 46201 Tower Circle Road collapsed early Sunday morning. Overnight, two more unoccupied houses at 46215 and 46219 Tower Circle Road fell, then the fourth house, which was at 46285 Old Lighthouse Road, Buxton. These four bring to 31 the total number of houses to collapse on the seashore’s beaches since 2020.

“Cape Hatteras National Seashore advises everyone to stay away from the collapse sites and the surrounding beach area, due to potentially hazardous debris. The beach is closed in front of the entire village of Buxton,” Barber said.

The Outer Banks, like much of the coast, continued to experience compromised roadways Monday and people were advised to stay off the roads unless necessary.

State transportation officials closed N.C. Highway 12 Saturday evening between the Basnight Bridge and Rodanthe, as well as on the north end of Ocracoke. They said Monday that the road would remain closed, “as we continue to see ocean overwash from this weekend’s nor’easter. Overwash also occurring at Buxton corner and on Rodanthe secondaries. Crews will be out working to clear today.”

N.C. 12 experienced ocean overwash and dune breaches on Pea Island Sunday morning, as well in Buxton and in Hatteras.

Additionally, all ferry routes were suspended Friday and remain suspended until conditions are deemed safe for operation, according to the North Carolina Department of Transportation.

NCDOT crews said they were making progress Monday clearing interstates and highways, but dangerous icy spots may remain because temperatures remained low. Gov. Josh Stein’s office and transportation officials urged people to stay off snow- and ice-covered roads and warned people to beware of black ice, which forms when ice and snow melt and then refreeze overnight into hard-to-see slippery patches.

As of late Monday, there were 2,500 NCDOT employees and contractors working to plow snow and spread salt on the highways and secondary routes. Since the storm began affecting the coast Saturday, crews have spread more than 23,000 tons of salt and plowed thousands of miles of roads.

Stein said that the state was “working around the clock to clear roads and get people back to their daily lives as quickly and safely as possible, but because temperatures will remain low overnight, this process takes time. We ask for your patience, and if you need to be on the roads this week, I urge you to slow down, give extra distance, and use caution while traveling.”

His office reported that the sunshine Monday, with temperatures reaching the upper 30s to lower 40s, allowed for snow that fell over the weekend to melt. However, that water will likely refreeze after sunset Monday evening because temperatures are forecast to fall into the teens and 20s.

Temperatures will warm into the low to mid 40s Tuesday before a cold front approaches the region.

The National Weather Service said Monday that for parts of eastern North Carolina, a light wintry mix of snow and freezing rain was possible Wednesday night.

“Please continue to remain vigilant as we are still experiencing extremely cold temperatures across the state,” NC Emergency Management Director Will Ray said in a statement. “As a reminder, several hazards remain, such as the risk of freezing pipes in homes. There are many people in our communities that are especially vulnerable to prolonged cold temperatures, so please check on your friends, family, and neighbors.”

Currituck County Emergency Management, in a social media post around lunchtime Monday, said that NCDOT crews were actively out working on the primary roadways throughout the county.

“While some roads are improving, many side roads remain covered with snow and ice, and freezing temperatures are keeping conditions slick. As temperatures drop and the sun goes down tonight, please be alert for black ice: a thin, nearly invisible layer of ice that forms when moisture refreezes on road surfaces. Black ice is especially common on bridges, shaded areas, overpasses, and low-lying roads, and can cause vehicles to lose traction with little warning,” they warned. “If you must travel, slow down, increase your following distance, and use extra caution. If you can stay home, that remains the safest option.”

Carteret County sent out a similar message Monday.

“Some roadways still have several inches of snow coverage, and partially melted snow and ice are expected to refreeze overnight, creating dangerous travel conditions. Residents are urged to stay off the roads if possible. If travel is necessary, exercise extreme caution, as icy conditions may make driving at posted speeds extremely dangerous and cause vehicles to lose traction with little warning,” according to Carteret County government officials. “Secondary and less-traveled roads are more likely to remain untreated and pose additional risks. Remaining off the roads also allows first responders and emergency management staff to continue their work safely.

Largely because of travel concerns, most county government offices were closed Monday because of the weather, and several had announced plans to close Tuesday as well, including Beaufort, Carteret, Gates, Pamlico, Dare and Hyde counties.

Record snowfall in coastal counties

Assistant State Climatologist Corey Davis, in a blog on this weekend’s snow storm, called the accumulated snow that fell all across North Carolina, “our most widespread wintry event in more than a dozen years, and the biggest snow for some areas in several decades.”

For parts of eastern North Carolina, this was the snowstorm of a lifetime, he continued.

“More than a foot fell over the central Coastal Plain, surpassing every other wintry event so far this century. The 12.5 inches in New Bern and 15 inches in Newport made this the first foot of snow for both areas since December 1989. The highest totals in the state came along the Crystal Coast, including 19.5 inches in Peletier and 17 inches in Swansboro,” he wrote.

In Cape Carteret, near whiteout conditions were observed on Saturday, Davis continues, bordering on blizzard criteria. Beaufort reported three consecutive hours with visibility of a quarter-mile or less, wind gusts of 35 mph or greater, and heavy snow falling or blowing.

Northeast North Carolina from Friday to Sunday experienced between 6 and 10.5 inches of snow, according to the National Weather Service Wakefield, Virginia, office, which provides the forecast for the region that includes Ahoskie, Elizabeth City and Currituck County.

Mainland Hyde County experienced a widespread swath of 8 to 12 inches, with localized snowfall totals in some townships exceeding 12 to 16 inches. For Ocracoke Island, “reliable totals” range from 4 to 6 inches, and that accumulation was coupled with “significant coastal flooding and inundation,” county officials announced Monday.

Heading south, centrally located counties including Beaufort, Carteret, Craven, Dare, Pamlico, Onslow and Tyrrell saw between 2 and 19 inches. Dare experienced the least amount with 2 to 11 inches and Carteret, Craven and Pamlico had areas getting hit with more than 18 inches, according to the Weather Service office in Newport.

“Most remarkably, along the Pamlico River in Beaufort County, this was the first foot of snow in more than 67 years, since December 1958. In that region, reported totals included 17 inches in Bath, 15 inches in Bayview, and 13 inches in Belhaven,” Davis explains in the blog.

“Along with having a strong, moisture-laden low pressure system just offshore, a key factor in ramping up the snowfall amounts was the cold air that created unusually high snow-to-liquid ratios for this part of the country. While Wilmington only measured 0.32 inches of liquid precipitation, that yielded 5.8 inches of fluffy snow – the heaviest snow there since 1989 – at an impressive 18-to-1 ratio,” Davis wrote.

In a Monday morning announcement, Holden Beach officials in Brunswick County warned residents that, although the bridge to the island had reopened, roads on the island were “treacherous.”

Holden Beach’s neighboring island to the west, Ocean Isle Beach, was covered in a whopping 15 inches of snow, according to estimated totals based on National Weather Service reports and local observations.

Farther north in Brunswick County, Leland, Bolivia and Southport all received a reported 9 inches of snow.

Brunswick County announced its offices and facilities will reopen at 10 a.m. Tuesday. The Brunswick County Commissioners meeting postponed Monday had not been rescheduled as of this report.

In New Hanover County, a reported 9 inches of snow accumulated in Carolina Beach. Wilmington saw less with a little under 6 inches of snow.

And, in Pender County, Hampstead received 10 inches of snow, while farther north, areas of Onslow County got upwards from 13 inches accumulation.

From a science perspective

Davis explained to Coastal Review that the coast was hit so hard because, “to put it simply, this was a strong nor’easter setup that happened to be cold enough for snow.”

He said that anytime the state gets these low-pressure systems right off the coast, whether they’re tropical storms or winter storms, “we know they’re capable of some major impacts. And we saw a lot of those typical impacts in this event, including the gusty winds and high surf that has already claimed a couple more houses along the Outer Banks.”

Davis compared this system and the nor’easter that moved up the coast October 2025.

The main low-pressure center started to deepen at pretty much the same location just south of Cape Fear, and the minimum pressure observed at Hatteras was nearly identical: 998.8 millibars in October, and 998.4 millibars during this storm. A millibar is a metric measurement of atmospheric pressure.

“If this had happened at any other time of year, we would have been talking about similar impacts, but with rain instead of snow. Having such cold temperatures in place so far south meant that it fell as all snow, and the snow-to-liquid ratios were off the charts compared to what we’re accustomed to. That let a lot of snow add up very quickly, and with the wind added in, that snow covered everything, and deep,” Davis continued.

When it comes to climate change and storms like these, Davis noted that a “common, or at least vocal, misconception about climate change is that it can and will make cold and snow impossible.”

He explained that while warming temperatures do make some wintry events — like the one from this previous weekend — more marginal for anything frozen, cold and snow are still a part of the winter climate, and big events like this can and do still occur.

“Of course, we’ve also seen the flip side of that, with a nearly three-year stretch with no measurable snowfall across much of the state, the average annual snowfall nearly cut in half in places like Charlotte and Raleigh, and steady warming in our wintertime low temperatures at the rate of about a degree per decade. All of those things — warming with snow events becoming rarer, along with seeing an occasional big snowfall — can still be true,” Davis explained.

“As a scientist, I think it’s important to acknowledge our certainty about climate changes and future projections. We’re very confident that the overall warming trend, especially in our nighttime low temperatures, will continue into the future, and that will continue to reduce our overall snow totals and snow event frequency. We’re less certain about how coastal winter storms like this one may change in the future,” he continued. “We often think about these climate trends as clearly pointing in one direction, but that’s really not true for projections of coastal storms like this, and there are competing forces that may affect how they evolve.”

He said that on one hand, these systems originate in tropical areas and strengthen over the warm ocean, which we know is warming at an even faster rate than the atmosphere, letting these coastal lows strengthen faster and pull in more moisture. But, on the other hand, it’s getting tougher to get temperatures cold enough over land to see all-snow events. These lows tend to bring in warm air in the mid-levels that causes precipitation to transition from snow to sleet, freezing rain, or regular rain, like we saw a couple of weekends ago.

“You might say that this storm offered up the best — or worst, depending on your perspective — of our past and future climates. We had that deep layer of cold air like we saw during our big storms back in the 1970s and 80s, but also a rapidly intensifying coastal low in a very warm and moist ocean environment that was able to drop extreme snowfall amounts,” he said. “That doesn’t mean this sort of event will get any more common in the future. It is now, and always will be, a rare collision of circumstances to bring such a major winter storm over such a large part of the state.”

Though there’s piles of snow out there, Davis said to keep in mind that, in terms of the liquid precipitation totals, most areas saw less than an inch of total liquid during this event, which he said is “a surprisingly low amount, given how much snow we received.”

That matters because it may mean the state sees less drought recovery than expected.

“Most of eastern North Carolina is still in moderate to severe drought, and even after the storm, places like Wilmington, Greenville, and Fayetteville are more than 10 inches below their normal precipitation over the past six months,” Davis said. “We may see some small improvements this week based on that precipitation, and the gradual snow melt may bring a slow recharge in streamflow and soil moisture levels over the next few weeks. But this winter is still tracking as a dry one overall, and we could use some more precipitation in any form before the end of the season to keep from entering the spring and the growing season with a bad drought still going on.”

Annie Harshbarger had been interested in animal behavior ever since she was young. Now, as a doctoral candidate at Duke University’s Marine Lab, she is currently building her thesis on decision-making in pilot whale social groups.

“I sort of knew when I started college that I wanted to study the behavior of whales and dolphins,” Harshbarger said. “The way that they navigate this really challenging environment that they’ve evolved to live in is very interesting.”

Harshbarger spoke about the way we can see this in the behaviors of whales off the coast of Cape Hatteras. She said in a talk at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences that the behavior of pilot whales in that area demonstrates this flexibility. “They’re generalist foragers, so they can eat a lot of different things, so that means they can live in a lot of different habitats, and their behavior varies with what they live and what they’re eating.”

Pilot whales’ flexibility is tempered by the needs of their social groups, however. Unlike other whale species, they stay with the same group of whales for their entire lives (with occasional exceptions of males who join other groups to mate). When pilot whales dive for food, they do so together. Harshbarger is studying how those groups make decisions at different points throughout this process — a question without a lot of known answers, as of now.

New technology brings new information

One of the tools Harshbarger is using for her thesis is data gathered from digital acoustic recording tags, or DTAGs. These tracking tags can capture whale movement in three dimensions, painting a much more holistic picture of their behavior, and as the name implies, they record sound as well as movement. The technology was initially developed in 2003 by Mark Johnson and Peter Tyack in order to better understand the ways in which human-made noise pollution potentially affects the behavior of whales and dolphins.

“They were designed to study the effects of anthropogenic noise. We didn’t have the tools to understand the ways that noise pollution affects marine life. Peter and Mark came up with the tags to tackle that,” said Dr. Andy Read, director of the Duke Marine Lab and Harshbarger’s academic adviser.

Now this technology is being used to paint a fuller picture of what pilot whales are doing beneath the ocean’s surface. Harshbarger explained that the acoustic tags not only captured sound, but depth and movement in three dimensions. This allows researchers to study specific details about the whales’ diving behavior. Harshbarger is particularly interested in this data because of her focus on how pilot whales decide as a group when and where to look for food.

The information shows that pilot whales usually stick together throughout the entirety of their dives. It was originally hypothesized that while hunting, pilot whales would stay far enough apart from one another so as to avoid competition while also staying close enough that they could still hear each other.

To test this, researchers used information gathered from the acoustic tags. Because the tags have special hydrophones attached, they are able to record the sounds in such a way that they can gain an approximation of each whale’s position relative to the others.

“We can really understand how the group is foraging separately and together like we never have before,” Harshbarger said.

Tackling the big questions

One of the great unknowns with pilot whale behavior has to do with their decision-making processes. They are flexible animals who eat a wide variety of food found in many different environments. So how do they decide when and where to eat? Because pilot whale populations around the world are so large and varied, it can be difficult to track any one group consistently enough to determine the specifics of their behavior.

This is the question that Harshbarger is trying to help answer. “I found that decision-making process really interesting. So I’m studying how groups of pilot whales make decisions at different points in the dive cycle,” she said. Harshbarger compared it to a large family or group of friends trying to decide where to go for dinner. There are a number of options, and it can be difficult to make a decision for a big group of people. The same rule applies to pilot whales.

Harshbarger hopes that her research will begin to tackle these questions. Data gathered from the tagging of the Gibraltar whales has already answered some of them. By examining the audio and movement information gathered from the acoustic tags, researchers have learned that pilot whales not only dive together, but they usually forage for food at the same depths as well, even though there isn’t currently any evidence of them sharing prey.

The question of how pilot whales make decisions as a group remains mostly unanswered. Large populations and limited technology makes tracking them difficult in the long term. Acoustic tags stay on the whales’ bodies for around 24 hours maximum, so information is still limited.

“I think Annie’s work is probably going to leave us with a lot more questions. The potential conflicts between animals in groups is a really interesting idea. But Annie’s going to address the first, fundamental questions,” Read said.

Harshbarger said she believes in the value of studying and understanding these whales’ habits and behaviors, even if they are not currently endangered. There have been instances where local populations have suffered declines due to disease, and those populations’ behaviors changed as a result. Researchers were only able to notice that change because they had been observing the population beforehand.

“I think that’s kind of why I’m really interested in this, even for pilot whales, which are not necessarily something that people think of as the species with the most pressing conservation needs,” Harshbarger said. “That’s why I think it’s valuable to understand social behavior in any species, because you know that could change for them at any time.”

Part of a series about the effects federal budget and staff cuts and the cancellations of programs and services are having in coastal North Carolina.

The call from the North Carolina Attorney General’s office late last year relayed news of a victory.

A federal judge in Boston on Dec. 11, 2025, sided with Jeff Jackson and 19 other state attorneys general in their case against the Federal Emergency Management Agency, informed the caller.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard G. Stearns ruled that FEMA unlawfully terminated a federal grant program under which roughly $200 million had been awarded to North Carolina communities, including Pollocksville, to tailor projects to reduce and prevent storm damage.

Stearns issued an immediate, permanent injunction restoring the Building Resilient Infrastructures and Communities, or BRIC, program.

“And, that’s all we’ve heard,” Pollocksville Mayor Jay Bender said. “We’ve never heard anything official from FEMA saying yay or nay. We have not heard anything from North Carolina Emergency Management saying yay or nay.”

FEMA funnels BRIC grants to state emergency management offices, which are responsible for managing and passing funds on to grant recipients.

N.C. Division of Emergency Management’s Justin Graney, chief of external affairs and communications, said in an email that the agency had not been notified by FEMA as to when funding would be released.

“NCEM continues to work closely with FEMA to determine the next steps and looks forward to a resolution,” Graney said.

But any such resolution could be, at a minimum, months away.

The federal government still has time to appeal Stearns’ decision. The 60-day window to challenge his ruling closes before the middle of next month.

The N.C. Department of Justice’s communications office confirmed in an Jan. 26 email that FEMA had, at that time, not filed an appeal in the case.

“We are closely monitoring FEMA’s compliance with the court order,” the email states.

FEMA’s news desk at its regional office in Atlanta did not respond to requests for comment. 

The agency announced without any forewarning last April it was canceling the BRIC program, one created under President Donald Trump’s first term in office.

But just three months or so into Trump’s second term, an unnamed FEMA spokesperson stated in the announcement that the agency considered BRIC to be “wasteful” and “political.”

FEMA later clarified only projects that had been completed would be fully funded, erasing congressionally appropriated funding for more than 60 infrastructure projects in North Carolina.

Jackson joined a lawsuit filed last July by a coalition of state attorneys general who argued FEMA’s termination of the program was unlawful.

The court agreed, concluding that FEMA did not have the authority to end BRIC because Congress, not the federal agency, appropriated funds for that program.

“The BRIC program is designed to protect against natural disasters and save lives,” Stearns wrote.

“Our towns spent years doing everything FEMA asked them to do to qualify for this funding, and they were in the middle of building real protections against storms when FEMA suddenly broke its word,” Jackson said in a release following the court ruling. “Keeping water systems working and keeping homes out of floodwater isn’t politics – it’s basic safety.”

Pollocksville and Leland were selected to each receive about $1.1 million through the BRIC program.

Leland plans to relocate the town’s sewer system away from Sturgeon Creek from which floodwaters rise often after storms and natural disasters.

Jessica Jewell, Leland’s communications manager, said in an email that the town is exploring other grant opportunities to help fund their project.

At the time of FEMA’s announcement last April, Pollocksville had already paid out about $18,000 in legal, advertising and procurement fees ahead of the project the Jones County town had secured to raise six commercial buildings in its downtown next to the Trent River.

“I mean, this is a project that we thought was done,” Bender said. “We had a contractor. That was probably one of the most frustrating things. We were already under contract.”

Before the state attorneys general filed their lawsuit, town officials were contacted by the state and encouraged to submit their project proposal through the Hazard Mitigation Grant program. The HMGP is federally funded, but managed by the state Division of Emergency Management.

“Having to file all the same paperwork over – I don’t know that I can convey to you the complexity of the paperwork,” Bender said. “The positive thing about this, going through HMGP as opposed to going through FEMA, is that HMGP will be at no cost to the town. There’s no match and so that will obviously make it a more financially attractive proposal than FEMA.”

He went on to say that the town will take “the best deal that comes the quickest.”

“I will feel much more confident when there is an actual piece of paper to sign and when I see people on the street preparing elevate a building,” he said.

The National Park Service has approved a project to stabilize about a mile of rapidly eroding shoreline at Fort Raleigh National Historic Site.

The 513-acre site located on the northern end of Roanoke Island in the Albemarle Sound was established in 1941 to preserve where Sir Walter Raleigh established colonial settlements between 1581 and 1591.

National Park Service leadership signed on Jan. 14 a finding of no significant impact to install a combination of rock revetment and rock berm to sections of the shoreline. A finding of no significant impact confirms that a proposed action won’t significantly affect the environment.

When the National Park Service announced the project’s approval Jan. 15, officials also released the mandatory floodplain statement of findings, which explains why the project must take place in a floodplain, along with any associated risk, and flood mitigation strategies.

The announcement opened up a two-week comment period that ends Friday on the findings. Instructions on how to comment are on National Park Service’s website.

The floodplain statement of findings concludes that the proposed rock revetment and berm to prevent ongoing and future shoreline erosion at Fort Raleigh National Historic Site “is necessary and consistent” with federal rules on activities in floodplains.

On the same day, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management announced and opened up a public comment period for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration-requested federal consistency determination for the proposed rock berm and revetment combination project.

The determination is to “ensure compliance” with the Coastal Zone Management Act, a national policy for managing coastal resources.

“Specifically, the National Park Service proposes installing rock berms and rock revetments along approximately 1,100 linear feet of shoreline on the western end of Roanoke Island to reduce erosion, protect infrastructure, and enhance long-term shoreline stability,” per the state. “The State’s review of the submitted federal consistency determination request will determine if the proposed project in Dare County is consistent with the enforceable policies of North Carolina’s Coastal Management Program.”

To read the shoreline stabilization federal consistency determination request and comment, visit NCDEQ’s website.

Since becoming a national historic site, erosion along the property’s shoreline has been a management challenge. The shoreline is estimated to have eroded a quarter-mile or more since the late 16th century, according to the National Park Service.

Previous efforts have been made to slow shoreline loss but erosion has continued at an estimated 1 to 5 feet per year, impacting both cultural and natural resources at the site as well as the adjacent, privately owned Elizabethan Gardens, documents explain.

Michael Flynn is the physical scientist and certified floodplain manager for the Outer Banks Group of National Parks, which consists of Fort Raleigh, Cape Hatteras National Seashore and Wright Brothers National Memorial.

Flynn told Coastal Review that wind, wave action and currents have eroded the shoreline over time and threaten facilities, infrastructure and cultural resources such as the Waterside Theater, where the “Lost Colony” out door drama is performed every summer, and a family cemetery on the property.

“This has caused loss of archeological resources and upland forested areas,” Flynn said. “In the 1980s, the park installed stabilization measures including rock berm and rock revetment. Erosion is especially prevalent at the edges of these stabilization measures in an effect known as flanking.”

In recent years, park staff have been developing the stabilization and erosion control plan approved earlier this month and the associated environmental assessment, which identifies any potential effects of the proposed project.

The plan and environmental assessment released in July 2025 detailed three possible projects: a rock revetment, a rock berm or a combination of the two. The environmental assessment that was out for public review July 21, 2025, to Aug. 20, 2025, identified as the preferred action the combination of the two.

“After evaluating the potential impacts of three action alternatives, NPS selected the preferred alternative: a combination of rock revetment and rock berm in areas of the shoreline that are the best fit due to existing topography, land use and constructability,” according to the press release.

Flynn said the combination was chosen because of the variable topography along the shoreline. The approach also offers flexibility for engineered designs for different environmental conditions.

For example, the rock revetment alternative will be placed in locations where existing steep and high embankments range from 5 to 15 feet or higher, he said.

“For areas with rock revetment, the application of appropriately sized rock will prevent the bluff from sloughing. The rock berm alternative will be placed in areas with no or minimal embankment heights. For areas with rock berm, the application of appropriately sized rock will protect the low-elevation sand beach areas from erosion caused by wave action,” he explained.

Flynn said that the environmental assessment for the proposed project was prepared in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act, NEPA, and Department of Interior NEPA regulations.

Because the National Park Service issuing earlier this month the finding of no significant impact, often referred to as a FONSI, officials determined that the preferred alternative identified in the environmental assessment, or EA, will not have a significant effect on the human environment. If the environmental assessment does not support a finding of no significant impact, then the park service must prepare an environmental impact statement and issue a Record of Decision before taking action on the proposed activity.

“In short, Fort Raleigh may now proceed with implementing the preferred alternative described within the EA. The park will stabilize the shoreline for erosion control once NPS officials finalize the accompanying Floodplain Statement of Findings,” Flynn said.

The floodplain statement of findings is necessary because of two executive orders that require the National Park Service to evaluate the likely impacts of actions in floodplains.

It is park service policy to preserve floodplain functions and values, minimize potentially hazardous conditions associated with flooding, including threats to human health and safety, risks to National Park Service capital investment, and impacts on natural and beneficial floodplain values, he said.

That means a floodplain statement of findings “is prepared when a proposed action is found to be in, or affecting a floodplain, and relocating the action to a non-floodplain site is considered not to be a viable alternative. This is the case with implementing shoreline stabilization measures for erosion control,” Flynn continued.

Flynn noted that the floodplain findings factor in climate change effects. When data are available, the climate-informed science approach detailed in one of the executive orders is the preferred way to develop the floodplain statement of findings.

The climate-informed science approach incorporates the use of best-available data on water movement and methods that integrate current and future changes in flooding due to the increasing severity and frequency of precipitation, sea level rise, tidal cycles, land use change, yielding the most accurate elevation and flood hazard area, Flynn said.

Once the public review and comment period closes Friday, park staff are to revise the document accordingly and send it to the National Park Service’s Water Resources Division for review and signature. After that, the plan goes to the regional office for review, signature and approval to move forward, he explained.

Nature-based coastal shoreline erosion control structures that successfully attract and grow oysters can better defend shores from waves, according to a study led by East Carolina University researchers.

The study, published late last year in the journal Scientific Reports, found that the more oyster-dense a breakwater designed to recruit and grow those shellfish is, the better that structure is at dissipating waves.

“We actually found that wave attenuation increased or improved as the structures recruited oysters,” said Georgette Tso, a doctoral candidate in ECU’s Integrated Coastal Sciences Program and co-author of the study.

As more and more oysters grow on a surface, their shells building layer by layer, those shells alter that structure’s surface, making that surface rougher and less permeable.

After documenting two seasons of oyster recruitment, researchers found that living shorelines constructed with living oyster breakwaters absorbed wave activity by an increase of 10-15%.

Their findings are based on observations of living shorelines at two private properties along Bogue Sound in Newport in Carteret County.

The structures were installed between May and June 2022 by Native Shorelines, the coastal resiliency division of Davey Resources Group, using concrete-based breakwater systems called QuickReef.

QuickReef is built from materials primarily of natural calcium carbonate formed into concrete slabs. Those slabs are installed to allow water flow and attract oyster larval, which attach to and grow on the structures.

Living shorelines are becoming increasingly attractive for coastal waterfront property owners seeking ways to curb erosion of their land.

“I think there’s been a lot more awareness within coastal North Carolina about living shoreline options as an alternative to a hardened shoreline, like bulkheads or some other vertical structure, which oftentimes actually costs more over time to repair. And, they’re not as resistant to hurricane damage because of that vertical profile,” Tso said.

The benefits of living shorelines, including their resiliency against the effects of rising sea levels, have been documented through research spanning back more than a decade.

But Tso said that there is little data how smaller-scale living shoreline projects like the ones she and her fellow scientists observed for this study actually change the way waves interact with shorelines.

Their observations proved to be “an exciting finding,” Tso said, because they prove what researchers have suspected for some time.

“Oysters grow vertically and they increase the roughness on the surfaces that they grow on. They also can grow within interstitial spaces and reduce porosity in that way. So, we hypothesized that the amount of wave attenuation a structure could provide would increase with the recruitment of live and healthy oyster populations,” she said. “This additional factor that’s not been explored, of it actually improving the wave attenuation potential and reducing the wave energy that hits the back of your shoreline over time, is something that we should communicate more to homeowners because they’ve actually bought into a solution that has increased benefits over time that they may not have anticipated when they first put in the structure.”

And while it’s fair to say the longer these structures recruit oysters the more protection they may offer to a shoreline, Tso said there is one important caveat.

“This is just a two-year study so we’re not capturing the point in time where the oyster population will eventually plateau. The size of the structure and the amount of food available to the oysters in the water is limited, obviously, so the oyster population will eventually plateau. So, though we’ve observed increases in wave attenuation potential, probably it’s going to cap off at some point,” she said.

It is also important to note that oyster recruitment and growth will not be the same at every shoreline.

Shorelines bend and curve, leaving pockets where water does not circulate to deliver oyster larvae.

“What we found is only relevant if your structure can actually recruit oysters, and that’s not true on all North Carolina shorelines,” Tso said. “If you don’t have baby oysters being delivered to your shoreline, you’re not going to be able to recruit oysters. If you’re in a site where that’s not possible then the wave attenuation potential that you have at construction is what you’re going to have. It’s not going to improve because you’re not recruiting oysters.”

Successful oyster larval recruitment and growth also depends on things like water temperature, salinity, and tidal variation.

Tso is in the process of analyzing data researchers collected last summer at more than a dozen QuickReef living shoreline sites. Scientists during that time also revisited their two original study sites, which continued to recruit oysters, Tso said.

The other researchers on this study include Dr. Siddharth Narayan, assistant professor in ECU’s Integrated Coastal Programs, Megan Geesin, a doctoral candidate at ECU, Dr. Matthew Reidenbach, professor and chair of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, Dr. Jens Figlus with Texas A&M’s Ocean Engineering Department, and Dr. Rachel Gittman, assistant professor with ECU’s Department of Biology.

A powerhouse in the marine science and coastal management community, Dr. B.J. Copeland, 89, died Wednesday, Jan. 14.

Copeland left a lasting impact on the state as the director of North Carolina Sea Grant, a N.C. State University professor, and through his work with the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership. He served on the Marine Fisheries Commission, and was on the committee that drafted what is now the Fisheries Reform Act of 1997.

Copeland spent his childhood, along with his three siblings, on the family farm in rural Oklahoma. He earned his master’s and doctorate at Oklahoma State University, where he met his wife of more than 60 years, Jean Van Nortwick. They married Jan. 26, 1963.

He relocated to Texas in 1962 where he was a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at the University of Texas Marine Science Laboratory at Port Aransas.

In a 2016 interview for the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center’s Coastal Voices Project, Copeland said his “Ph.D. degree is in Limnology, the study of fresh water. So, I went to the University of Texas to see if salt water was the same as fresh water and indeed it is, except for a little bit of salt!”

He moved to Raleigh in 1970 for an associate professor position at N.C. State. Copeland said in the Q&A that he moved to North Carolina mainly because of the beginning of a marine science program jointly between N.C. State, the universities of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Wilmington, and Duke University.

“We were trying to start a graduate program in Marine Science and so I was a researcher and a professor in the Zoology Department, Botany Department, and the new Marine Sciences program,” he said, adding that the new marine sciences program eventually became the Department of Marine, Earth, and Atmospheric Sciences at N.C. State. 

In 1973, he took on a new role as the director for what was then the North Carolina Sea Grant institutional program, explains an article on the 25^th anniversary of the program in the October 2001 issue of N.C. Sea Grant’s Coastwatch magazine.

Congress established the program in 1966, and began awarding grants in 1968. Sea Grant then became part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, that was formed in 1970. UNC Chapel Hill administered the Sea Grant institutional program from 1970 to when Copeland took over and relocated the program to Raleigh.

“In truth, if Sea Grant wasn’t invented in 1966, someone would invent it today. People depend on Sea Grant for good information and to help them survive,” Copeland said in the 2001 article. “You can’t argue with priorities when they are to improve the quality of life and enhance economic opportunities. That’s what Sea Grant is all about.”

Copeland said that in the early days of trying to gather input on research and extensions needs, he talked with a man who working his eel pots and crab pots. Copeland said he asked the waterman what the program could do for him and the man responded, “’Sounds like you guys are just looking for something to do.’”

Copeland got the message, though. For Sea Grant to be accepted, the program would need to be relevant and deliver good information, he said in the article.

He began hiring staff who brought in their own experiences, leading the program to marine advisory work, promoting shellfish culture, addressing seafood processing issues, developing seafood recipes, outreach efforts, and research.

When Copeland took over the program in 1973, his goal was to elevate N.C. Sea Grant from an institutional program to be designated a Sea Grant College Program, which happened in July 1976. The program also got a budget of $1 million.

The federal-state partnership was supported with $2 in federal funds for each $1 in state funding, but in 1980, Sea Grant was zeroed out of the federal budget, leading to Copeland spending many days in Washington getting the Sea Grant message out, according to the 2001 article.

He said at the time that it wasn’t a stretch to show that Sea Grant was worth something and worth keeping.

“The direct impact was evident in the growth of the extension program. Initial work in fisheries and marine education were soon joined by aquaculture and mariculture. Coastal processes work increased, as did coastal law and policy efforts,” the article explains.

Copeland left Sea Grant in 1996 and began serving as graduate administrator for the Zoology Department at N.C. State. He retired from the university in 2002.

Current N.C. Sea Grant Executive Director Susan White told Coastal Review that she was fortunate have had Copeland as an early and regular mentor when she joined the North Carolina Sea Grant program as director in 2012.

“We had great lunches together, sometimes here in Raleigh sometimes closer to his home, and his knowledge of the intricacies of a statewide program that evolves regularly with the pressing needs of the times was relevant and timely as I was still learning the many paths for NC Sea Grant,” White said.

“B.J. always had great stories to tell about his time with NC Sea Grant, the challenges of federal funding support ebbing and flowing, the great characters of each of the team members, and his enjoyment of his time with the program. B.J. joined us for retirement parties and program reviews throughout the past decade, keeping his finger on the pulse. His practical advice, and huge laughs, were wonderful to be on the receiving end of,” she continued.

Copeland’s work with what is now Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuarine Program predates his time with Sea Grant and, once he began directing Sea Grant, his partnership with APNEP grew.

Copeland said in a Q&A with the program that he “was involved with APNEP before it was APNEP – before it even existed, in fact.” APNEP is an effort to understand, protect, and restore natural resources of the Albemarle-Pamlico estuarine system in North Carolina and Virginia, its website explains.

The only National Estuary Program in the 1960s was the Chesapeake Bay. In the late 1960s, “somebody got the happy idea that Congress ought to have an annual or biannual report on the status of the nation’s estuaries, so they commissioned one,” Copeland explained.

He went to Chapel Hill in 1968 to work on a report on the nation’s estuaries. He and the late Dr. Howard Odom wrote “Coastal Ecological Systems of the United States.”

“To do research for it, we went to every state and gathered material that had been written up or stuck in a drawer, and we took that data on coastal systems and turned it into a book. It was the first work on the status of the nation’s estuaries,” Copeland said.

A handful of Congressmen in the 1970s, including Walter Jones from North Carolina, who was chair of the House Merchant Marine and Fisheries Committee, pointed out that there’s an estuary in North Carolina.

Copeland continued that the whole setup of the National Estuary Program was changed to include not only Chesapeake Bay, but also other estuarine systems. The Albemarle-Pamlico system “includes a lot of water and a lot of territory – we were known as the second-largest ecosystem on the East Coast.”

In the early 1980s, work began on establishing the Albemarle-Pamlico as a National Estuary Program, and he helped form the first technical committee. “In 1987, we got the first grant for the program – for the Albemarle-Pamlico Estuarine Study (APES). We were a part of the National Estuary Program, authorized by Congress earlier that same year,” he said.

At the time, there were water quality problems that he described as “astronomical,” with algal blooms in the Chowan River, Albemarle Sound and Pamlico River. The Neuse River had fish kills.

“We had a crisis. You couldn’t sell seafood for a year, so we had to solve this problem. You’ve got to turn this thing around or the seafood industry is going to go down the tubes – that’s the reason for the program. But what people sometimes forget is that you can’t do all this at once. You’ve got to prioritize, you’ve get something understood and you find out it’s really connected to something else over here – it’s not easy,” Copeland told APNEP. “And so, we began to work. We had technical committees and proposals for projects and for priority research, and things began to trickle into state policies and state government.”

After the technical committee completed the Albemarle-Pamlico Estuarine Study and produced the Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan for the region in 1994, the project was renamed as the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuarine Program. In 2012, program was changed to partnership.

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Derb S. Carter Jr. told Coastal Review that Copeland was leading the state’s Sea Grant program when the Coastal Area Management Act was enacted in 1974 and when the Albemarle Pamlico Estuarine Program launched. 

“Effective environmental and natural resource programs must be based on sound science.  We are all fortunate that B.J. was passionate about ensuring programs to manage our coastal resources incorporate the best science,” Carter said.

It was also in the 1980s when Copeland was appointed the first time to the Marine Fisheries Commission, and eventually helped draft the Marine Fisheries Reform Act in the 1990s.

In the 2016 Q&A for Carolina Coastal Voices project, Copeland said he became involved with fisheries management because Sea Grant has programs on commercial fishery, recreational fishing, interactions, management of fisheries, how things worked, and could translate research into management.

“And I got into fisheries management for real when I was appointed to the Marine Fisheries Commission in the 1980s, under the so-called, ah, Egghead Commission,” he explained, adding he served on the commission for four or five years before it dissolved.

“I mean, the state government decided that commissions weren’t really the way to go, so the Marine Fisheries Commission was actually dissolved and they started over again. And so there was legislative action to create a new commission, which kept getting things added to, and added to, and added to until we have a 19-member Marine Fisheries Commission,” he explained. This was in the mid-1980s.

“And that was also a disaster, because 19 people can’t make any kind of decision,” Copeland said.

The committee argued a lot and “what happened with the Fisheries Moratorium Act, I mean–that was one of the factors, that we had an unwieldy commission — no way to get there — we had regulations right and left, none of which were related to others. People were kind of fed up with the whole idea,” Copeland said. The fisheries moratorium “came because they wanted to stop, look, consider, and really come up with something. And so, we had a three-year moratorium on anything; on any regulation, on any activity, any new activity. And that resulted in the Fisheries Reform Act.”

The North Carolina General Assembly approved in 1994 the moratorium on selling any new commercial fishing licenses and established the 19-member Fisheries Moratorium Steering Committee to study the state’s coastal fisheries management process and recommend improvements.

The committee issued a draft report in late summer 1996, held 19 public meetings statewide, and adopted a final report in October 1996 that formed the basis for the Fisheries Reform Act, which was signed into law Aug. 14, 1997, according to the oral history project, calling it the “most significant fisheries legislation in NC history.”

Copeland was on the moratorium steering committee and as director of Sea Grant, he said he represented the research and information side.

As part of the moratorium, Copeland said, funds were appropriated for research that was administered through N.C. Sea Grant college program, and “I think I knew about all of the players. So, communication and interaction amongst the players was also important, and Sea Grant played a role in that, as well.”

Another part of Sea Grant’s role was to get the information out broadly and quickly, Copeland said they did that through a network “and we traded on two very important elements: one of them was the truth. If you’re a bearer of the truth, you usually get along pretty well. And so we had a reputation for doing that. And secondly, we thought that information was a necessary ingredient for anything we did. And so, we were doing that, too. It was kind of a natural fit.”

The committee was tasked with creating parameters for a Marine Fisheries Commission that “could actually function,” Copeland said, trimming it down from 19 to nine. The commission has three people from the commercial interests, three people from recreational interests, and three at large, all appointed by the governor. He served on the newly structured commission for 12 years.

Copeland said in the Q&A that “we were purveyors of the truth. We had a reputation of, you know, you can come and ask Sea Grant a question, you were going to get an honest answer. And so we could be a player without taking a side. And that was really important, because most people take sides somewhere, sometime. And so we worked very hard at not taking a side.”

He lamented that fisheries is going to take a hit because of misinformation, in the 2016 interview.

“Some of these environmental issues, which are going to get scuttled because of some misinformed position, somebody who’s more powerful than somebody else will get their way and so on. I mean, they practice the Golden Rule, you know: them what’s got the gold, rules. So, you know, I think things are going to get worse before they get better. I keep thinking that, one of these days the general public’s going to wake up and say, ‘We need to get rid of this bunch!’ but that’s not happening,” he said.

After the Fisheries Reform Act, Copeland said in an interview that he went back to the academic department at N.C. State and taught a couple of courses, retiring in 2002.

North Carolina Coastal Federation founder Todd Miller told Coastal Review that Copeland influenced the direction of coastal science and management in North Carolina for more than half a century.

“After ‘retirement,’ he continued to shape coastal policy and practice as a member of the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission, an active participant in the Albemarle–Pamlico Estuarine Partnership, the Coastal Habitat Protection Plan process, and numerous other civic efforts,” Miller continued. “He built a Sea Grant program in North Carolina that earned international respect and, importantly, translated coastal research into practical solutions for real-world management challenges. Through his leadership and service, he profoundly influenced efforts to protect and restore the North Carolina coast and left it stronger for future generations.”

He and his wife owned a farm near Apex from 1978 until 2002 and later a farm near Pittsboro, according to his obituary, and he found joy in gardening and farming.

“For many who knew and loved him, B.J.’s deep voice and his loud belly laugh will always be remembered. His excellent memory and quick wit made him an entertaining teller of stories and jokes. We can only hope that some of us can tell them as well as he did. B.J. will long be remembered with gratitude, admiration, love and a big smile,” his obituary states.

His memorial is at 2 p.m. Friday at Pleasant Hill United Methodist Church in Siler City.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in memory of B.J. Copeland to: Boys & Girls Homes of North Carolina, P.O. Box 127, Lake Waccamaw, NC 28450, or Pleasant Hill United Methodist Church at P.O. Box 1322, Pittsboro, NC 27312. Arrangements are by Donaldson Funeral Home and Crematory.

The Army Corps of Engineers wants more time to mull over concerns that have been brought up on the proposed project to deepen and widen portions of the Wilmington Harbor channel.

The North Carolina Division of Coastal Management announced late Tuesday afternoon it had granted the Corps’ request, indefinitely pausing the division’s review of whether the proposed project is consistent with state coastal management program laws, regulations and policies.

“The decision to pause allows time for the Corps to review and consider issues raised by DCM and the public before DCM completes its review,” according to a release. “A timeline has not been established for when the pause may be lifted.”

The pause follows a series of deadline extensions that have been made in recent weeks on the proposed project, one that is being highly scrutinized for its potential effects to the environment, shorelines and treasure of historic and culturally significant areas along the shores of the lower Cape Fear River.

The N.C. State Ports Authority says the project designed to accommodate larger ships would attract more import and export business to the port, ease shipping congestion on the East Coast, and keep the state’s ports competitive. The proposal calls for deepening the harbor channel by 5 feet and widening portions of it from the mouth of the Cape Fear River to the Wilmington port.

In late December, the division announced that the Corps’ Wilmington District was giving the division more time to complete its review of the federal determination, pushing its deadline from Jan. 5 to Jan. 19.

The Corps requested the pause on Jan. 16, just days after state fisheries and wildlife resources officials sent the division memorandums saying those agencies continue to have concerns about impacts to fish and wildlife resources within the proposed project area.

A Corps spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment by deadline for this report.

In its Jan. 14 memorandum to the Division of Coastal Management, the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries reiterated its concerns about the proposed project’s effects on habitat essential to fish in the river, wetlands connected to the river, and the overall water quality in the river.

Deepening and widening the harbor as planned “will have significant adverse impacts to fisheries resources due to the permanent loss of state-designated nursery and anadromous fish spawning areas along the Cape Fear River estuary and its tributaries,” the memorandum states.

“There is also potential for significant adverse impacts to wetlands, (submerged aquatic vegetation), shellfish resources, and water column habitat due to insufficient mitigation plans and uncertain impacts associated with the proposed actions that are not adequately discussed,” in the federal letter report and draft environmental impact statement of the Wilmington Harbor 403 navigation project released in September. The figure 403 refers to the relevant section of the Water Resources Development Act.

N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission officials raised similar worries, stating in a Jan. 15 memorandum to DCM that while it had been involved throughout the project’s development process, “our agency still has concerns regarding impacts the proposal will have on wildlife resources in the project area.”

“These comments include concerns regarding the proposal’s direct impacts to wildlife habitats, whether impacts to these habitats have been adequately assessed, inadequacies of mitigation proposals, the need to consult appropriate agencies prior to moving forward with the proposal, and the subsequent impacts to wildlife and their habitats (particularly nesting waterbirds and shorelines) from larger and increased vessel use.”

A number of towns in Brunswick and New Hanover counties have adopted resolutions urging state and federal agencies to protect a series of islands within the lower Cape Fear River that support 30% of the state’s coastal shorebird population.

Those towns are also calling for the creation of a comprehensive, long-term, and fully funded environmental and adaptive management plan to cover costs related to monitoring and mitigation to prevent and repair environmental harm.

A Corps official earlier this month confirmed to Coastal Review that the agency was implementing a programmatic agreement with the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office, the General Services Administration, the state Ports Authority, “and possibly the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation” to review historic and culturally significant areas along the river that may be impacted by the proposed project.

The agreement must be signed before the agency finalizes project plans, which would occur after the Corps releases its final environmental impact statement.

The final environmental impact statement is expected to be released sometime this summer, according to a tentative timeline released by the Corps. It is unclear how the Corps’ request of the state to pause its review may affect that projected timeline.

Once the review process resumes, DCM must decide whether to concur with or object the Corps’ determination.

“If DCM objects, it can offer alternatives or conditions that, if agreed to by the Corps, would allow the project to proceed,” according to the division.

Construction on the proposed project would begin no earlier than 2030 and take about six years to complete, a schedule Corps officials have said is optimistic.

The nonprofit organization that aims to preserve Bath’s history has asked the corporation selling an about 1,768-acre tract of riverfront property to consider separating out what it considers historically significant section of the land, Washington Daily News reported Jan. 19.

Currently owned by Nutrien, a global fertilizer company formerly operating as PCS Phosphate or PotashCorp, the multiparcel property known as Archbell Point is listed for $17.5 million.

The Historic Bath Foundation believes remnants of both Native American villages and early colonial plantations are among the important pieces of the area’s history that are within the property located across the Pamlico River from Nutrien Aurora’s phosphate mine.

The foundation feels that the property has the potential to be eligible for the National Register of Historic Places, and wants Nutrien to consider separating out a historically significant part of the parcel that’s currently up for sale, Washington Daily News reported.

The land for sale has more than 3.4 miles of shoreline along the Pamlico River, Bath Creek and Duck Creek. Structures on the property include three houses, a workshop, around 180 tillable acres, 1,500 acres of timberland and freshwater ponds, the listing states.

The foundation sent a letter to Nutrien late last summer after learning the property was going to be sold asking the company to consider excluding the historic area from the sale, but has not received a response, Washington Daily News reported.

Foundation President Seth Effron told Washington Daily News that the group wants all parties to be aware of the “documented historic and archeological significance of portions of the site and have an opportunity to discuss ways to assure there is a full understanding on how to move ahead before these places are sold.”

The listing notes that the property “offers a variety of development possibilities — all subject to approval by Nutrien,” the current owners.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation has received funding to remove a dozen abandoned and derelict vessels from waters in Carteret, Chowan, Hyde, New Hanover and Onslow counties.

BoatUS Foundation announced last week that the Coastal Federation, along with nine other organizations spanning five states, one reservation and two territories, has been selected for the funding.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program funds this program administered by BoatUS Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes safe, clean and responsible boating. The Coastal Federation is a nonprofit member organization that works to protect and restore the state’s coast.

“This award provides critical support for removing vessels from working harbors,” Coastal Federation Marine Debris Program Director Ted Wilgis said in a release. “These communities, already facing tight budgets and rising expenses, do not have enough resources or funding to remove and dispose of these vessels. This award will enable the North Carolina Coastal Federation to continue its partnership with the NC Wildlife Resources Commission and local governments to remove and dispose of ADVs affecting the livelihood and environment of our coastal communities.”

The award for $550,000 is to go to the removal and disposal of vessels ranging in size from 24-foot recreational boats to commercial fishing trawlers up to 75 feet long out of waters in Edenton, Engelhard, Swan Quarter, Morehead City, Beaufort, Marshallberg, Sneads Ferry, Holly Ridge and Carolina Beach, according to the nonprofit.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation, publisher of Coastal Review, is launching a leadership and professional development program focused on coastal issues.

The cohort-based Coastal Leadership Institute is designed for individuals who play leadership roles in coastal North Carolina communities, as well as leaders from across the state whose work influences the coast.

The institute is designed as a six-month program with two full-day sessions per month beginning in March. The cohort size is limited to about 20–25 participants. Registration is now open for the inaugural class.

“The Coastal Federation has established a strong reputation as a convener of people and organizations interested in protecting and restoring the coast,” said Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis, “so the launch of this new Institute is a natural fit for us and will be important to advancing our mission.”

Through facilitated discussions, expert-led sessions, and site-based learning, participants will gain a deeper understanding of the forces shaping coastal communities, examined through economic, environmental, natural, and cultural history lenses, while building strong professional relationships that support effective leadership in complex coastal settings, institute organizers said.

“Coastal issues rarely have simple solutions,” said Coastal Federation Chief Community Engagement Officer Amanda Lyle. “By bringing together leaders from different communities and sectors, the Institute creates space for shared learning and helps build the capacity for informed decision-making.”

The tuition of $1,000 per participant covers program materials, meals, transportation for site visits, lodging, and alumni programming access. Scholarships are available.

The six sessions will convene in March, April, May, September, October, and November, with a summer break.

An orientation is set for March 9-10 in Beaufort. This session will also explore how the cultural, historical, and ecological context of coastal North Carolina factor into the region’s identity, challenges, and leadership needs.

Subsequent sessions will cover coastal and marine sciences, growth and economic development, coastal policy and management issues, and natural resource conservation and restoration. This year, sessions will primarily take place in Carteret County and the Wilmington area.

The program is intended to become an annual offering that brings together emerging and established leaders from a wide range of professional backgrounds, including business, local and regional government, military, education, nonprofit, and industry.

The Institute is geared to create a space for thoughtful dialogue, practical learning, and a trusted peer network that continues well beyond the program.

 “We really couldn’t do this without our partners and supporters – the many individuals and organizations who have committed to sharing their expertise, insights, resources and time with the participants and to helping create new professional connections for the betterment of our coast,” Davis added.

The inaugural Coastal Leadership Institute cohort is partially subsidized through the support of the Duke Energy Foundation, the Carlyle Adams Foundation, and the RBC Foundation.

More details and the application are online.

From shortly after the Civil War until the mid-2000s, when the last menhaden plant was shuttered, the town of Beaufort would “smell of money.”

“The menhaden industry made Beaufort prosperous. Local menhaden companies once provided hundreds of jobs in the local community and surrounding areas with numerous factories and vessels working this lucrative fishery,” according to information from the North Carolina Maritime Museum, which has held several programs on the industry.

“The fishery itself, processing plants ashore, and support infrastructure provided steady employment opportunities, especially for African-Americans. While many visitors remember the smell of the fish, locals call it the ‘smell of money,’” It was their livelihood. Local merchants all benefited from the influx of people and money during menhaden’s fishing season. Menhaden fishing was recognized throughout Carteret County as an important part of this county’s commercial fishing industry.”

In the early days of catching menhaden, the mother boat would deploy smaller purse boats to maneuver a large net around a school of fish. Once the string draws the net shut around the hundreds of pounds of menhaden, the fishermen would haul the net by hand.

To perform this physically demanding, dangerous work, the fishermen would sing work songs, or chanteys, to help rhythmically synchronize their movements.

Barbara Garrity-Blake, fisheries social scientist and adjunct at Duke University Marine Lab in Beaufort, told Coastal Review that the menhaden fishermen used to sing these songs before hydraulic net-lifting technology was introduced in the early 1960s.

“Each vessel carried a crew of about two-dozen men, mostly African Americans, who worked shoulder to shoulder in purse boats to pull in a giant seine net heavy with menhaden — sometimes a 100,000 or more fish. The men would coordinate their pulling by singing in a call-and-response style where the leader would sing out a line and the crew would answer in harmony,” she continued.

Their songs were a seafaring tradition known as chanteys.

After the menhaden industry became mechanized in the 1960s and 1970s, and the songs were no longer sung, some of the former and retired fishermen began to perform these traditional work songs for audiences, eventually becoming formally known as the Menhaden Chanteymen in 1988.

After the group began performing publicly, they sang for the North Carolina General Assembly, National Council on the Arts, at New York City’s Carnegie Hall and on national television, including for a segment on “CBS Sunday Morning” with Charles Kuralt. The group recorded the album “Won’t You Help Me to Raise ‘Em: Authentic Net Hauling Songs from an African-American Fishery,” for Global Village Music in 1990.

The remaining members made special appearances at events throughout the county, including a handful at Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center on Harkers Island.

Beaufort Mayor Sharon Harker awarded in 2022 the two surviving Chanteymen, Ernest Davis and the Rev. Leroy Cox, the key to the city. Cox died in 2023, leaving Davis as the “last legacy-bearer of the Menhaden Chanteyman” until the final member, Davis, 86, died Jan. 3. His service and burial was Jan. 8 Mt. Tabor Missionary Baptist Church of North River. Noe Funeral Services of Beaufort handled the arrangements.

Garrity-Blake noted that Davis was the youngest of the Chanteymen and had “explained that singing generated a special power or strength, used for nets otherwise too heavy for human strength alone. So the chantey songs were used as a tool.”

In a recording, Davis explains that the fishermen would sing a chantey when they needed to raise up a net full of fish.

“If we couldn’t sing, we couldn’t get them raised up,” Davis said. The singing “would give you more spirit, and more power” and you could raise your fish better.

“At night you couldn’t sleep because you’d be hurting and cold so you just make up songs,” Davis said. And most of the captains would be singing right along with the crew. “Music could be heard all over the ocean … like music was on the water.”

Garrity-Blake said in an interview that she worked for many years with Davis and other menhaden workers on a project called “Raising the Story of Menhaden Fishing.”

The 2005 closure of Beaufort Fisheries, the last menhaden plant in the state, inspired North Carolina Humanities Council-funded project that Garrity-Blake helped launch in 2009 and 2010 with the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center on Harkers Island.

Davis was among a group of menhaden workers, including captains, crewmen, cookhouse and factory workers, who met several times at the Beaufort train depot to plan the project, “which was hilarious because ‘planning’ took a backseat to telling tales,” Garrity-Blake said, adding that the meetings always turned into a big storytelling session and nobody wanted to leave when the meeting was over.

“I realized that the menhaden folks had a hunger for getting together to talk about fishing. They feared their experiences and the industry’s legacy as the economic backbone of Carteret County would be forgotten. So we decided to call it ‘Raising the Story’ — just as the men worked together to raise fish, we’d work together to raise the story of menhaden fishing,” Garrity-Blake continued.

Garrity-Blake conducted about a dozen oral history recordings of people representing different skills in the fishery, from ring-setter in the fishing process to factory owner, the late Jule Wheatly in December 2009. He died in October 2011.

Fine art photographer and Beaufort resident Scott Taylor took portraits of all the folks who were interviewed, and developed an exhibit for the waterfowl museum. The oral history interviews and photos are part of the Core Sound museum’s online collection, on a Facebook page also called “Raising the Story of Menhaden Fishing,” and on Carolina Coastal Voices YouTube channel.

As part of “Raising the Story,” the group wanted to involve young people who didn’t know anything about the industry, so they collaborated with Josie Boyette’s seventh grade class at Beaufort Middle School.

“Three of the men, including Ernest Davis, were invited into the classroom to share stories, and the kids asked questions and recorded them,” Garrity-Blake said. “Davis talked about his role as first mate, although he’d also served as fish boat captain on occasion. He was proud to have made a good living, putting his kids through college, menhaden fishing. He said, ‘A lot of people think fishing is a disgrace. But I made a good living. Didn’t look to get rich or nothing.’”

She added that Davis’ grandson Trevor was in the classroom. “It was wonderful to see the pride on that little boy’s face when his grandad shared a story about fending off a shark that had swum in the net.”

The project culminated in what Garrity-Blake called a “jam-packed event” at Core Sound, where the middle school students showcased their work, captains and crewmen told stories to the audience, and the Menhaden Chanteymen performed their songs.

“When they performed, it was powerful and otherworldly; everyone was mesmerized,” Garrity-Blake said.

Historian and author David Cecelski has written extensively about coastal North Carolina’s fisheries, including that of menhaden, many of which can be found on his personal website such as “Menhaden Fishing Days” and “It Was Like a Ballet’: Menhaden Fishermen at Work, 1947,” which he describes the process of hauling a net based on a photo from the North Carolina State Archives.

He was invited to speak at the “Raising the Story of Menhaden Fishing” event held in the fall of 2010. In 2017, Cecelski reflected on the “Raising the Story” project and shared his comments from that event in an essay he titled, “Music All Over the Ocean.”

In the essay, he calls the project a “commemoration of the central role that the menhaden industry played in Carteret County for generations.”

Cecelski, who grew up near Beaufort, writes that anybody listening to the oral histories Garrity-Blake recorded for the project would be impressed with what the menhaden fishery meant to Carteret County, particularly the stink that permeated the town when the fish were being processed.

“When the wind was right, the aroma of the fish covered those towns like a blanket. Coastal visitors sometimes complained, but my cousins in the industry used to call it ‘the smell of money,’” he wrote in 2021.

Cecelski explains in his 2017 piece that Davis’s story was typical of what the industry’s wages meant to local fishermen and fish factory workers.

Davis, who left school when he was 15 and went to work menhaden fishing at Beaufort Fisheries, said in his interview that it was hard work but it was what he had to do. He fished for 41 years and became one of the most respected first mates on the East Coast, sending all five of his own children to college and helping raise and educate nine younger brothers and sisters.

The oral histories also show how the men and women watched the menhaden industry change over their lifetimes, like motorizing the process to haul in the fish, business became more corporate, unions made headway and state and federal governments enacted environmental regulations, just to name a few.

“But through it all, I could hear two things in the men’s voices: a love for menhaden fishing — master net mender Lee Crumbacker said it well: ‘it grows on you like a barnacle on a pole’— and a fierce pride in their craftsmanship,” Cecelski writes.

Cecelski writes that as a child, the first thing he ever heard about the menhaden industry was his mother’s stories about those chanteys. His mother grew up in Harlowe in the 1920s and 1930s, when Highway 101 was still a dirt road.

“Many of Beaufort’s African American fishermen lived in Harlowe, particularly in a reclusive community just across the county line called Craven Corner. As they drove oxen and carts down the road on their way to Beaufort, the menhaden fishermen sang the same songs that they sung as they hoisted the nets onto their boats,” he writes.

“Early Monday mornings, long before first light, my mother would wake up in her bed at the sound of those beautiful, haunting songs and listen to them as the fishermen moved through the darkness and toward the sea.”

Cecelski observes that the fishermen in the interviews talk about the chanteys the same way his mother did.

Davis said in his “Rising the Story” interview they “would sing all night long just to keep their minds off the cold and hurt. It ‘just seemed like music was all over the ocean’,” Cecelski writes.

“The fishermen mostly stopped singing their legendary chanteys with the introduction of power blocks and hardening rigs in the late 1950s and early 1960s, but those songs have remained a powerful memory for all who ever heard them.”

And while the chanteys have not been heard on a menhaden boat in a long time, but older people from around Carteret County still remember them, and tell Cecelski “how, on cool autumn days, you could sometimes stand on shore and hear the songs coming across the water. They filled the air and stirred the heart and got deep inside your bones,” Cecelski describes.

“And if you heard those songs, like my mother did when she was a little girl, you never forgot them or the way that they made you feel. It is hard to put into words, but it was not just the beauty of the melodies or the men’s fine voices, but the appearance that the music was rising right out of the sea.”

Note: This story has been updated to correct the misspelling of Louis Bacon’s first name.

Restoring land as close to how it was more than two centuries ago is by no means a cheap venture.

Just ask Louis Moore Bacon.

Since 2012, Bacon has invested more than $100 million in the property on which his ancestor, Roger Moore, founded Orton Plantation in 1725 off the lower Cape Fear River’s western bank in Brunswick County.

Nearly a third of that cost has gone toward restoring an expansive, historic rice field system and an earthen dike enslaved Africans built some 250 years ago to protect the fields they planted, grew, and harvested Carolina Gold rice from the river.

If the state green lights a proposed project to deepen and widen portions of the shipping channel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Port of Wilmington, all of it – the dike, 350 acres of historic rice fields and hundreds of acres of freshwater wetlands – will face threat of “irreversible damage,” according to Bacon.

In a 22-page letter he submitted to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management late last year, Bacon detailed how the proposed Wilmington Harbor 403 navigation project “threatens the failure” of the earthen dike.

“The structural integrity of the dike is Orton’s number one concern,” Bacon wrote. “The Project poses a real and unacceptable risk of catastrophic failure of the dike system. Failure of the dike will result in a cascading series of events including saltwater intrusion into the historic rice fields, rendering them incapable of growing rice and destroying the freshwater ecological water system at the Orton Property. Failure of the dike would flood the rice fields and freshwater ponds with saltwater, erasing what stands today as a preserved monument to enslaved African Americans dating back centuries.”

He closed the Nov. 24, 2025, letter with an ardent request of the division: Object to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ determination that the proposed project aligns with the state’s coastal policies and rules.

The Corps, Bacon wrote, failed to analyze how the proposed project to deepen and widen the harbor channel might affect historic and cultural resources along the river.

His objections echo those of other individuals and groups voicing concerns about how the project the N.C. State Ports Authority says is needed to keep the Wilmington Port competitive might impact those sites along the river.

Deepening the river channel from 42 feet to 47 feet and widening it along areas throughout the river will allow larger vessels to travel to and from the port, attracting more business, according to the authority.

But opponents of the proposed project say that, in addition to threatening historic and cultural resources along the river, it will accelerate erosion and exacerbate flooding, destroy habitat, disperse contaminants in the riverbed’s sediment into marshes and onto public beaches, and is not economically justified.

Like Bacon, their hope is that the Division of Coastal Management rejects the Corps’ determination.

The determination

Two days before the New Year, NCDEQ announced that the Corps was giving the Division of Coastal Management more time to complete its review of the federal determination, pushing the division’s deadline from Jan. 5 to Jan. 19.

Division officials have until then to determine whether the proposed project is consistent with the state’s coastal rules, including those under the Coastal Area Management Act, or CAMA.

The division must decide whether to concur with Corps’ determination, concur with conditions, or object.

Related: Wilmington residents see no good in proposed harbor project

If the division decides the latter, that could shutter the proposed project altogether.

“An objection generally prevents the federal permit or approval from being issued unless DCM and the project proponent negotiate a resolution that would allow the project to go forward,” according to the division’s Dec. 30 release notifying the public about the extension.

The Corps “may be entitled to certain mediation/appeal privileges” with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Office for Coastal Management, which heads programs including the National Coastal Zone Management Program and Estuarine Research Reserves and works with coastal states, territories and partners to manage resources and address impacts from climate change.

The division has to render its decision months before the Corps wraps what it says will be a detailed examination to identify all historic and cultural properties within the project study area.

“To ensure historical and cultural sites are identified and evaluated properly, the Corps is executing a study specific Programmatic Agreement (PA) with the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office, the General Services Administration, the North Carolina State Ports Authority, and possibly the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation,” Jed Cayton, public affairs specialist with the Corps’ Wilmington District, said in an email responding to questions.

The programmatic agreement, he wrote, is a “commonly applied strategy to protect cultural and historical resources.”

“It facilitates more informed decision-making by allowing time for additional data collection and formal coordination efforts to extend beyond the feasibility study phase,” Cayton said.

The agreement, which is currently being reviewed, must be signed before the agency finalizes project plans, which would occur some time after the Corps releases its final environmental impact statement on the proposed project.

Under a tentative timeline the Corps has shared with the public, the federal agency is expected to release the final EIS sometime this summer.

Construction on the project would not begin until 2030 and take about six years to complete, a schedule Corps officials have said is optimistic.

‘Necessary analysis’

Today, the Orton property spans about 14,000 acres. More than 830 acres of that land, including 6,800 feet of restored and repaired earthen dike and coinciding system of canals, roads, dams, and ditches, around the rice fields is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

In his letter to the division last year, Bacon argued that CAMA protects the historic resources on his land “from irreversible damage and it protects the Property’s significant ecological resources from adverse impacts.”

The draft environmental impact statement, or EIS, the Corps released last September, “does not disclose these obvious impacts,” Bacon wrote.

“There is no analysis in the Draft EIS about the effects of the Project on the Orton Property or the CAMA-protected resources at Orton. None. This analysis cannot be deferred. The Corps’ consistency determination must be supported by ‘comprehensive data and information.’”

“The Corps’ failure to undertake the necessary analysis is the simplest reason that Division should object to the consistency determination,” he continued.

His land is among nearly 30 historic sites and properties the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources’ State Historic Preservation Office lists as being within the proposed projects area of potential effects.

Last October, that office penned a letter to the Corps requesting the programmatic agreement, “so as to address effects on known and potentially National Register-eligible historic properties to be adversely affected by the proposed undertaking and the regularly scheduled maintenance dredging, spoil placement, and environmental mitigation measures following the proposed undertaking.”

While Corps studies of historic properties that may be affected by the proposed project “appear to have focused solely on the physical impacts of dredging the river-bottom, placement of dredged materials, and locations of mitigation measures, we believe from nearly two decades of observation and monitoring erosion at historic properties along the channel that we can expect other effects will result from the proposed project,” the letter states.

Dark Branch

Among the list of 28 sites and properties identified in that letter is Dark Branch, a community in unincorporated Brunswick County where land remains largely owned by the descendants of emancipated slaves.

Dark Branch, also known as Kendall Chapel, was founded in the early 1870s by a handful of formerly enslaved people, including Robert “Hooper” Clark, who’d been forced to work the rice fields of Orton, Lilliput, and Kendal plantations.

The land they purchased between those plantations became “a thriving hub of Black farming, entrepreneurship, and civil rights activism,” according to the Historic Wilmington Foundation.

Dr. Charles Chavis Jr., Clark’s fourth-great-grandson and executive director of the Dark Branch Descendants Association, explained in a telephone interview that there is a direct connection between the cultural resources that have been restored at Orton and those members of the Dark Branch community have taken upon themselves to preserve.

“Everything that Mr. Moore Bacon has sought to preserve is the work of our ancestors and those who were enslaved on the various plantations,” Chavis said. “For us, this is not only about protecting our cultural resources, but also about protecting our community.”

Chavis, an assistant professor at George Mason University and founding director of the university’s John Mitchell Jr. Program for History, Justice, and Race, started the association about three years ago to preserve the community’s history.

There are about 20 historical structures in Dark Branch, including homes, a store, and sharecropping and slave cabins.

Some of those structures, as well as the community cemetery, one Chavis calls one of Dark Branch’s most sacred sites, are under threat of riverine flooding.

“We just can’t afford for it to get worse and we’re working with local organizations to try and get resources around historic resource preservation,” he said. “We’re concerned that any potential harm or more work done to the river is going to make our job as an organization harder to protect the cultural resources that we have. Based on the assessments and our conversations with those we’ve consulted with, it’s not going to get better. It’s going to get worse.”

Dark Branch is a member of the National Park Service’s Reconstruction Era National Historic Network.

According to the Division of State Historic Sites, the Dark Branch Community Historic District was added to the National Historic Preservation Study List in 2024.

Sites that make that list are good potential candidates for the National Register.

The association continues to pursue a nomination for the National Register of Historic Places.

The Dark Branch community lies within the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor, which encompasses 12,000 square miles of coastal area that runs up the southern Atlantic Coast from St. John’s County, Florida, to Pender County.

The corridor links places of historic significance to the Gullah Geechee, West Africans torn from their native land and enslaved on plantations along the southern Atlantic Coast, and tells stories of their lives on the plantations and in the coastal plains after abolition.

Efforts are underway to build the North Carolina Gullah Geechee Greenway Blueway Heritage Trail that will run from Navassa to Southport.

Last summer, the North Carolina General Assembly authorized the trail’s construction.

Veronica Carter, chairwoman of the heritage trail and member of the Leland Town Council, also raised concerns about how the proposed project might affect land within the trail. Carter is also board member with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review.

“Deepening the Cape Fear River will negatively impact our culturally significant, state-established North Carolina Gullah Geechee Blueway portion of our trail by increasing saltwater intrusion, worsening erosion, and degrading water quality, thereby threatening sensitive habitats,” she wrote Col. Brad Morgan, the Corps’ Wilmington District commander.

The Corps acknowledges that “more surveys are needed to determine the presence of additional historic and cultural properties within the study area,” Cayton said by email. “We have already included conservative cost estimates for this work, based on known resources identified within Wilmington Harbor and experiences at other similar projects, to ensure these resources are properly managed and respected.”

The University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship is accepting applications for its newest program aimed at helping business owners grow and strengthen their businesses.

The center’s new Thrive Lab will offer a series of sessions that focus on finance, funding, sales, product strategy and leadership beginning in March.

“Entrepreneurs will also build a strong peer network and receive hands-on support to develop the mindset and capabilities of CEOs, CFOs and CPOs, all while preserving the unique strengths that make their businesses thrive,” according to a university release.

The lab will run through May and is open to qualified business owners across all industries. The deadline to apply is Feb. 27. Space is limited. Additional details are available on the lab’s website.

Wells Fargo’s contribution to the program covers half of the original cost to attend the lab, lowering the total fee to $750.

According to a study by the North Carolina Department of the Secretary of State in collaboration with Fayetteville State University released in 2024, adopting policies and initiatives to help 5% of “aspirational” businesses become self-sufficient will create more than 24,000 jobs annually and $980 million in new wages.

Thrive Lab was created in response to those findings as targeted effort to help strengthen businesses and support long-term entrepreneurial growth in coastal North Carolina, according to the release.

“It’s relatively easy to start a business, but many fail within a year and only half make it to five years,” UNCW CIE Director Heather McWhorter stated in the release. “Even more striking are the entrepreneurs who don’t pay themselves and who are stuck year after year. CIE’s Thrive Lab will give entrepreneurs and small business owners the tools and connections they need to succeed and to scale, leading to direct impact for our students and community.”

Proposed rules that would require hundreds of industrial manufacturers and public sewer plants across the state to test the wastewater they discharge into rivers, creeks and streams for three types of PFAS and 1,4-dioxane will go out for public comment next month.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission last Thursday voted to push proposed monitoring and minimization rules for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances PFOA, PFOS and GenX, and for 1,4-dixoane, an industrial solvent, to the public in February.

Commission Chair JD Solomon indicated that more than one public hearing will be scheduled during the comment period, which is to be held through April. As of publication, neither specific dates for the comment period, nor dates and locations for hearings, had been announced.

Solomon told fellow commissioners he anticipates the state will receive thousands of comments on the proposed rules packages, which do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for violations.

Those omissions from the proposed rules were the basis of lengthy, at times contentious, discussion among members of the commission.

A majority of commissioners ultimately rejected Commissioner Robin Smith’s motion to inject federally enforceable limits on a half-dozen individual chemical compounds and a mixture of those compounds into the proposed rules package for PFAS.

Amending the rules to include the Environmental Protection Agency’s enforceable levels of PFAS, including PFOA, PFOS and GenX, Solomon said, would substantially change the proposed rule, triggering the need for a new regulatory impact analysis to examine projected costs associated with the rule.

PFAS are a mixture of chemicals used in a host of consumer products from nonstick cookware and food packaging to stain-resistant carpets, water-repellant attire, and makeup.

These chemicals have been found in a number of drinking water sources in North Carolina through discharges from industrial manufacturers, landfills, firefighting facilities and publicly owned treatment works, or POTWs, that accept industry effluent.

Ongoing research into human health effects of PFAS, of which there are upwards of 15,000 related compounds, continues. Some of the more well-studied substances, including PFOA and PFOS, have been linked to health issues including weakened immune response, liver damage, increased cholesterol, high blood pressure, lower infant birth weights, and higher risks of certain cancers.

The Trump administration’s EPA announced last year that it would retain current National Primary Drinking Water Regulations for PFOA and PFOS and extend deadlines for public water treatment plants to come into compliance with the federally established limits for those PFAS.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin also announced plans to rescind regulations and reconsider regulatory determinations for the other PFAS, including GenX.

Solomon said the commission will start talking about legally enforceable limits, also known as numeric standards, for PFAS at its March meeting.

“That is the intention and that will continue to be the intention,” he said, later adding, “Everybody on this panel wants a numeric standard. The question is more, what level are those numeric standards and for what compounds. That’s what we’re going to talk about when we get to the numeric standard part.”

The Environmental Management Commission voted 10-3 to move the proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules package to public comment and hearing.

60-day deadline

Under the proposed rules, industrial manufacturers and publicly owned treatment works, which officials call POTWs, will be contacted by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources and given 60 days to conduct baseline sampling for the three PFAS from the time the rules become effective.

Testing would be done quarterly for one year, with results reported to the division. Division officials would then determine whether ongoing sampling is needed based on practical quantitation limits, which are considered the base line in testing laboratories.

The division would decide whether a business or POTW has to develop a minimization plan, one that would take about 2.5 years to be implemented.

When asked how minimization would be measured, Division of Water Resources Deputy Director Julie Grzyb said, “There is nothing in the rule that defines a set level or set goal in the particular case. So, there is some left up to who is reviewing it.”

Minimization, she said, is determined by a number of things, including training and education equipment and seeing whether one product could be substituted for another.

“However, usually we have a water quality standard that we are shooting to meet and that defines the minimization much more clearly. I’ll leave it at that,” Grzyb said.

The proposed rule also does not specify what best management practices a facility must follow or how that facility must reach minimization.

Smith, who voted against moving the proposed rule to public comment, warned the rule may not pass the Rules Review Commission because, among other things, it lacks such standards.

“I think that one of the concerns is this could be an ongoing perpetual monitoring machine that doesn’t result in significant reductions,” she said, adding that a rule should not be sent out for public comment that “has basic drafting problems and gaps in essential decisions.”

“I cannot vote for this motion to be sent to public notice and comment the rule as it currently stands because I think there are too many issues that need to be resolved,” Smith said.

Commissioner Michael Ellison, who seconded the motion to move the rules to public comment, argued that the rules “help us as a state, statewide, reduce our uncertainty as to where the problems are and how bad they are while science continues to advance, while EPA continues whatever research they’re going to do and whatever standards they’re going to promulgate.”

After the vote to move the proposed rules on PFAS to public comment, the commission also agreed to ask for comments on whether industrial businesses and sewage plants should report to the division all 40 PFAS they are required to test for under federal requirements.

Smith made similar arguments against the proposed 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rule that the commission voted 7-6 to move to public comment.

She said that while the proposed rule pertaining to 1,4-dioxane is a “pretty good monitoring rule,” it is “not a good minimization rule.”

“What I don’t want to do is create an impression out there that we have a serious minimization program if we don’t have any teeth in it. I think we need to be honest with the public about what this rule does. I’m not for something that calls itself a minimization rule that doesn’t have any enforceable attachment to it,” she said.

Early in what turned out to be a more than two-hour discussion leading up to their vote on the proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules, Solomon reminded commissioners that the votes they cast Thursday would not be their final, saying that getting the rules out for public comment is an incremental step in a process aimed at ultimately reducing PFAS discharges.

Why do sheepshead have a mouthful of human-like teeth? Fisheries ecologist Dr. Jim Morley will explain that and more during this month’s “Science on the Sound” Lecture Series.

Morley, an assistant professor in the biology department at East Carolina University, will present, “Investigating the Life History of Sheepshead, North Carolina’s Toothiest Fish,” starting at 6 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 15, at the Coastal Studies Institute on the ECU Outer Banks Campus in Wanchese.

The public is encouraged to attend the program being offered at no charge. The talk will be livestreamed on the CSI YouTube Channel and archived for later viewing.

Though sheepshead are a popular species among anglers throughout the state, their life history is one of the most poorly understood, according to the university. “Recently, researchers have uncovered important aspects of sheepshead biology relating to reproduction, movement patterns, and habitat use. However, as with all good science, new questions emerge.”

Morley has been investigating the life history of marine and estuarine species in North Carolina for more than 20 years. He is interested in how human-caused disturbances and climate change interact with the life cycles of aquatic species.

Science on the Sound is a monthly, in-person lecture series with the Coastal Studies Institute that brings perspectives from all over the state and highlights coastal topics in northeastern North Carolina.

North Carolina Department of Transportation’s Ferry Division has scheduled four career events along the coast to recruit temporary and seasonal employees to staff its ferries, terminals and shipyard.

Officials said that the seasonal employees are a key part of the ferry system’s service, and they are often the first considered for permanent roles.

“In fact, a majority of last year’s temporary hires transitioned into permanent roles,” Ferry Division Director Jed Dixon said in a statement.

The career events are all from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. on the following dates:

• Jan. 14 at NC Works Career Center, 3813 Arendell St., Morehead City.
• Jan. 21 at Hatteras Ferry Operations Center, 59063 N.C. 12, Hatteras.
• Jan. 28 at Southport Ferry Operations Center, 1650 Ferry Road, Southport.
• Feb. 4 at Pamlico River Ferry Operations Center, 229 N.C. 306 North, Bath.

At the events, applications will be accepted for temporary, seasonal employment at all experience levels, from general utility worker to experienced boat captains.

Those looking for permanent employment can learn more about open positions and how to obtain a Transportation Worker Identification Card or a Merchant Mariner Credential for the application process. 

Benefits of year-round, full-time permanent employment with the division include competitive salaries, health insurance, retirement benefits, and paid vacation, holiday and sick leave.

For a list of the Ferry Division’s current job openings, visit the state jobs website​ to create a profile and apply for permanent positions. For more information, call 252-370-5573.

A North Carolina native and long-serving law enforcement officer with the N.C. Marine Patrol was formally pinned Tuesday as the agency’s top cop.

Chris Lee, who most recently served as captain of the agency’s Marine Patrol District 1, took the helm as colonel of the Marine Patrol on Jan. 1, replacing Col. Carter Witten, who retired Dec. 31.

Lee, a native of Colerain, has served with the patrol for 18 years. He was pinned by his father, Vernon Lee, a former deputy sheriff, during the ceremony, which was held at the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries headquarters in Morehead City. A pinning ceremony is a long-held tradition that marks a a law enforcement officer’s promotion.

Lee helped form the Marine Patrol’s Swiftwater Rescue Team, building and training its members in late 2019. In 2021, the team became North Carolina’s first state law enforcement-certified swiftwater rescue team.

“That’s been one of the most rewarding things of my career,” Lee said in a release. “The relationships we have made across the state have done wonders for us as an agency, and we are providing a better service to the citizens of North Carolina.”

Lee, who trained alongside fellow team members, added, “We were all learning together and trying to make it happen to better serve in times of need.”

The team, which has deployed numerous times across the state, was one of 71 swiftwater rescue teams deployed to Western North Carolina to assist with rescuing people from floodwaters of Hurricane Helene in the fall of 2024.

The Marine Patrol enforces coastal recreational and commercial fishing regulations of the state. The patrol has helped transport food to flooded communities, provided security in business districts hit by tornadoes, and its officers have flown Department of Environmental Quality staff to survey shoreline erosion and flooded animal waste operations after hurricanes.

As colonel, one of Lee’s goals is to “make the Marine Patrol even more of an asset to the people of North Carolina through training and working with North Carolina Emergency Management, while continuing to serve as the fisheries law enforcement agency,” the release states.

As colonel, Lee manages more than 50 officers and directs law enforcement efforts over 2.7 million acres of ocean and coastal fishing waters in 21 eastern counties.

“The N.C. Marine Patrol plays a vital role by enforcing fishing regulations and providing water, air and ground support to other DEQ divisions, including during emergencies,” N.C. DEQ Secretary Reid Wilson said in the release. “Colonel Lee will do an outstanding job because of his tremendous experience, vision, and commitment to the Marine Patrol’s mission.”

Lee is an Operation Iraqi Freedom veteran, where he served in 2003 as a member of the N.C. Army National Guard.

He began Basic Law Enforcement Training at Beaufort Community College upon his return from overseas and later worked for the Edenton Police Department before joining the Marine Patrol in March 2008.

He earned a degree in criminal justice after joining the Marine Patrol. In 2012, he received the N.C. Marine Fisheries Enforcement Officer of the Year award from the Governor’s Conservation Achievement Awards Program.

Lee was joined in his pinning by his wife Melissa, who pinned his badge; sons, Sonny and Banks; parents, Vernon and Tammy Lee; brother, Bryan Lee; and mother-in-law Kathy Rea.

The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit Monday against the National Marine Fisheries Service for what it calls “failing to make a preliminary decision on whether to protect American horseshoe crabs under the Endangered Species Act.”

The nonprofit is among the more than two-dozen organizations that petitioned the federal agency in February 2024 to protect the ancient species found along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. When a petition is filed, the service is required to publish within 90 days their initial findings if the species warrants protection. The petition was due May 2024.

Though the Endangered Species Act allows the service some leeway in publishing its initial finding “within 90-days of receipt of the petition ‘“’to the maximum extent practicable,’ but in no case longer than one year,” according to the lawsuit filed Monday.

Nearly twice as old as dinosaurs, horseshoe crabs date back to than 450 million years. The animal is a brown, body-armored arthropod with 10 eyes and a long, spiked tail. Each spring horseshoe crabs lay their eggs on beaches in massive spawning events.

In recent decades, according to the center, horseshoe crab populations have declined by more than 70% because of overharvesting and habitat loss.

“Biomedical companies drain the blood of horseshoe crabs for drug safety testing even though synthetic alternatives are available, approved and used widely in Europe and Asia. Biomedical harvests have doubled in the past seven years, with more than 1 million horseshoe crabs harvested in 2024,” the center explains in a press release.

Additionally, horseshoe crabs are harvested for use as bait by the commercial whelk and eel fisheries, fishing regulators have increased the amount of horseshoe crabs that can be harvested, and development and sea level rise are threatening horseshoe crabs and their spawning beaches across their entire range from Maine to Louisiana, the center said.

“Horseshoe crabs have saved so many people, and now it’s up to us to pay back that debt and save them,” said Will Harlan, a senior scientist at the center, said in a release. “We could lose these living fossils forever if they don’t get Endangered Species Act protections soon. It’s reckless to delay their obvious need for protection, so we’re going to court to force the government to do its job.”

As horseshoe crab numbers have declined, so have other species like endangered sea turtles, fish and birds. The rufa red knot, a shorebird species that feeds on horseshoe crab eggs during its 19,000-mile migration from South America to the Arctic, was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 2015. The listing decision cited horseshoe crab overharvesting as one of the contributing factors to the red knot’s decline, per the center.

The two agencies that enforce the Clean Water Act have proposed changes to the waterbodies considered jurisdictional, or under federal protection, and the deadline for the public to comment is here.

The Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers published on Nov. 20 in the Federal Register the “Updated Definition of ‘Waters of the United States,’” opening the public comment period that ends 11:59 p.m. Monday, Jan. 5. Information on how to submit comments is on the EPA website.

The agencies said the proposed rule revises “the regulations defining the scope of waters federally covered under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, as amended, also known as the Clean Water Act, in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency.”

The agencies argue that their proposed amendments to the “waters of the United States” definition when finalized, will provide clarity and align with the Supreme Court’s opinion in the Sackett case that the “Clean Water Act extends to relatively permanent bodies of water connected to traditional navigable waters and wetlands with a continuous surface connection to those waters ‘so that there is no clear demarcation between “waters” and wetlands.’”

Environmental organizations argue that the proposed changes will gut basic water quality protections, which were already compromised by the 2023 Supreme Court decision on Sackett v. EPA that essentially left nontidal wetlands without protection. Nontidal wetlands are usually in floodplains along rivers and streams, in isolated depressions surrounded by dry land, along the margins of lakes and ponds, and in other low-lying areas where the groundwater intercepts the soil surface or where precipitation sufficiently saturates the soil, according to the EPA.

“When it comes to the definition of ‘waters of the United States,’ EPA has an important responsibility to protect water resources while setting clear and practical rules of the road that accelerate economic growth and opportunity,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a Nov. 17 press release. “EPA is delivering on President Trump’s promise to finalize a revised definition for WOTUS that protects the nation’s navigable waters from pollution, advances cooperative federalism by empowering states, and will result in economic growth across the country.”

Environmental Defense Fund Coasts and Watersheds Science Senior Manager Dr. Adam Gold told Coastal Review that the “proposed rule could increase the pace of wetlands loss and lead to more flooding impacts for communities. Wetlands loss increases downstream flooding impacts, and at the same time, any new infrastructure built in former wetlands is also at increased flood risk.”

Under the agencies’ proposed rule, the term “waters of the United States” would include “(1) traditional navigable waters and the territorial seas; (2) most impoundments of “waters of the United States;” (3) relatively permanent tributaries of traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, and impoundments; (4) wetlands adjacent (i.e., having a continuous surface connection) to traditional navigable waters, impoundments, and tributaries; and (5) lakes and ponds that are relatively permanent and have a continuous surface connection to a traditional navigable water, the territorial seas, or a tributary.”

The difference between the existing rule and proposed is that the existing rule includes an interstate waters category and the word “interstate” is in front of the lakes and ponds category. The agencies propose deleting both.

The agencies also recommend revising the existing exclusions from the Clean Water Act permitting process for waste treatment systems, prior converted cropland and ditches, and adding an exclusion for groundwater, as well as definitions for “continuous surface connection,” “ditch,” “prior converted cropland,” “relatively permanent,” “tributary,” “and waste treatment system.”

Carolina Wetlands Association Executive Director Rick Savage also has concerns about the flooding that could be unleashed on communities if these proposed changes go through, and the damage to water quality.

He said communities are going to see developers take wetlands without a permit.

“These wetlands are often buffers against flood waters. if they are developed then guess what happens? The flood waters just go inland to the community,” Savage said, adding that water quality could suffer as well, because of the potential for more pollution to pass into streams.”

North Carolina Sierra Club Deputy Director Erin Carey told Coastal Review that ultimately, “the American public should be very concerned that the federal agency tasked with ensuring clean water, clean air, and the protection of our natural environment seems determined to undermine that responsibility. With this proposed change, the EPA claims to seek clarity in regulation, but this rule would serve only to allow industry to profit from environmental destruction, and the ruination of our natural resources.”

Gold said that according to the fund’s analysis published September 2024 in Science that modeled different interpretations of the Sackett decision, the modeled scenario that best aligns with the proposed rule open for public comment now would result in 82 million acres, or 91%, of nontidal wetlands in the contiguous United States estimated to be without Clean Water Act protections. 

About WOTUS, Sackett decision

The Clean Water Act is the revised and restructured Federal Water Pollution Control Act, enacted in 1948 to protect waterways that are used for or could be used for commerce.

“The 1972 amendments to the Clean Water Act established federal jurisdiction over ‘navigable waters,’ defined in the Act as the ‘waters of the United States,’” according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

But that’s as far as the definition goes, leaving the two agencies that jointly enforce the regulations to define the term under statute, and have had to determine what geographical features such as wetlands, streams and rivers fall under “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS, and, therefore, under federal protection under the Clean Water Act.    

In the decades since, that definition has undergone several amendments, most recently in 2023 to conform to the Supreme Court’s Sackett decision.

The Sacketts are an Idaho couple who were fined by the EPA for backfilling wetlands on their property near Priest Lake. The Sacketts filed a lawsuit asserting that the wetlands were not directly connected to the lake, a navigable body of water protected by the Clean Water Act. Justices ruled in favor of the couple and put parameters on “waters of the United States.”

Justices state in the May 2023 majority opinion that the Clean Water Act’s use of “waters” only refers to geographical features described in everyday language streams, oceans, rivers, and lakes “and to adjacent wetlands that are ‘indistinguishable’ from those bodies of water due to a continuous surface connection.”

The ruling narrowed the definition of “waters of the United States, stripping away protection under the Clean Water Act for isolated wetlands, or those without an obvious connection to navigable waters.

The two federal agencies, under the Biden administration at the time, had published a revised definition in January 2023 that was then amended that September to conform to Sackett.

Shortly after the second Trump administration took office, the agencies began a campaign to change the amended 2023 WOTUS that it called “overly broad” in a news release Monday and “failing to fully implement the Supreme Court’s decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency.”

Savage explained that the Clean Water Act, passed in 1972, was based on relationships with navigable waters. Then in 1977, the Corps of Engineers came up with the wetlands definition manual, which set the process for how wetlands were defined, based on hydrology, hydrophilic vegetation and hydric soils.

“During that time, almost any wetland was protected because you could find some relationship to​ a navigable water, even if it’s over land, but now you know that’s all changing,” he said, and the reason it started changing was because the Supreme Court got involved.

“That was in 2006 and ever since then, it is going around and around and up and down and through. You know, nobody knows what the rules are half the time. I mean, there’s been a couple of times where half the states were under one set of rules and the other half are under another set of rules because of litigation,” Savage said.

On the state level

Savage said regarding the proposed rule change that there’s two ways to look at it: the federal level and the state level.

“Right now, as far as North Carolina is concerned, it’s not looking good, period,” he said, because of the Farm Bill that made state and federal regulations to protect wetlands the same.

During summer 2023, the General Assembly approved language in Senate Bill 582, often called the Farm Bill, to align the state’s definition of wetlands with the federal. The definition reads: “Wetlands are classified as waters of the State are restricted to waters of the United States as defined by” the Army Corps and EPA.

Savage said he’d heard that a few legislators were starting to reconsider the move, and he said part of it is because the state government is funneling millions of dollars to use nature-based solutions, like wetlands, to mitigate flooding issues. “However, what the heck is this about, not wanting to protect the very resources we need to use to protect our communities? And I think that might be having a little bit of an effect.”

Savage said they’re working with the Southern Environmental Law Center and other groups to make changes, but there’s not a lot that can be done at the state level in North Carolina because of Dillon’s rule, which means that local governments only have as much power as the state specifically allows.

“Anything a locality may want to do to protect wetlands, the state legislature can immediately overturn it” via legislation, Savage said. “So, it’s not a lot that can be done there.”

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Mark Sabath told Coastal Review in an earlier interview that, while this proposed rule reduces federal protections, states and tribes still have authority to protect waters, and can fill the void in protecting these resources that the federal government is leaving behind.

Sabath said in some situations, it’s not a possibility because of not having the resources, “and there are examples occasionally of states that do their best to try to fill that gap. But much more often, we see the opposite, like in North Carolina.”

Savage clarified his point in noting that, just because the wetland is not considered protected by the Clean Water Act, it is still a wetland.

“Some people think if it’s not jurisdiction​al, then it’s not a wetland. No, it’s just not a jurisdictional wetland. It’s still a wetland. It meets the Army Corps of Engineers’ definition of a wetland, which is heavily based on science,” Savage said. “I think it’s important to make that distinction. We have jurisdictional wetlands that are protected, and the definition of jurisdictional wetlands is getting tighter and tighter and tighter, so that most of our wetlands are no longer jurisdictional, right? Therefore, they’re not protected, but they’re still wetlands, right? And that’s why we still have to be concerned about them.”

The EPA and Corps committed in a Dec. 22 press release to consider the public input received in developing a final rule.

The management and operation of Beaufort Town Docks will officially transition to what the town calls an “experienced marina management company” at 12:01 a.m. Thursday.

The company, F3 Marina, specializes in the operation of public and private waterfront facilities along the East Coast, officials said Wednesday in a press release.

“On behalf of the Board of Commissioners and the citizens of Beaufort, I’m excited to welcome F3 Marina Management as the selected company to manage the Beaufort Town Docks beginning January 1,” Mayor Sharon Harker said in a release. “With their experience and proven track record, we’re looking forward to this new chapter and to working together to ensure the docks continue to operate safely, smoothly, and as a welcoming place for boaters and residents alike.”

As part of the transition, the new website, www.beauforttowndocks.org, has launched, to serve as the primary source for details on dockage, rates, policies, amenities, events, and contact information.

“The transition marks a new chapter for the Beaufort Town Docks, with an emphasis on enhancing services for residents, visiting boaters, and the maritime community while preserving the character and heritage of Beaufort’s historic waterfront,” the town said.

More than a dozen species of trees are expected to be available at this year’s annual TreeFest in Wilmington.

The event, now in its 28th year, will be held 11 a.m. – 4 p.m. Jan. 16-17, or until inventory runs out, at JCPenney’s atrium, Independence Mall, 3500 Oleander Drive.

Households may select up to five bare-root tree seedlings or native bunch grass plugs.

A $5 donation per household is encouraged and will be used to fund the return of TreeFest in 2027.

Experts will be available to assist with plant selection and provide care advice based on individual site conditions, space, and utility lines.

Visitors are encouraged to bring their own bags or buckets to reduce plastic waste.

The TreeFest committee expects to receive from the North Carolina Forest Service’s Claridge Forestry Nursery near Goldsboro a variety of species, including longlead pine, bald cypress, chickasaw plum, buttonbush, red maple, river birch, flowering dogwood, silky dogwood, southern wax myrtle, sugarberry, eastern redbud, crabapple, and coastal white oak.

More than 180,000 trees and grasses have been funded through donations since TreeFest’s inception in 1997 to restore tree populations after hurricanes Bertha and Fran.

The event is held in an effort to rebuild tree canopy in New Hanover County and neighboring counties.

For residents of other counties or to get additional plants, seedlings may also be purchased directly from the Forest Service nursery by calling 1-888-NCTREES (628-7337) or from the online forestry store. They may also be ordered through any Forest Service office.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality has suffered the highest percentage of staff cuts of any state, with nearly one-third of its workforce eliminated between 2010 and 2024, according to an environmental watchdog group.

A whopping 32%, or 386 DEQ staff positions, were wiped out during that 14-year period, according to an Environmental Integrity Project report released earlier this month.

Those staff cuts, the report concludes, leave the state agency responsible for administering regulations to protect water, air quality and the public’s health “ill-positioned to confront” pollution from the state’s growing factory farming industry, climate-driven storms and flooding in coastal communities.

The report notes how the agency was downsized when former Gov. Pat McCrory signed the 2015-16 state budget into law, triggering a shift of several divisions from what was then the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

The Republican governor, who also renamed the agency the Department of Environmental Quality, said the move aligned with his vision for government efficiency.

Josh Kastrinsky, DEQ’s deputy communications director, said in an email last week that it is “difficult” to directly compare present staffing levels to those in 2010 because of the changes that were made to the department in 2015.

“However, for several regulatory divisions that existed in 2010 and 2025, staffing levels declined by at least 25%,” he wrote, adding that, “The EIP report focuses on regulatory work and does not include DEQ’s non-regulatory work, which affects the total numbers of staff shown.”

As of the week that began Dec. 8, the departments vacancy rate was 8%, Kastrinsky said.

“This includes an engineer vacancy rate of 14% and an environmental specialist vacancy rate of 9%,” he said. “Several DEQ programs have larger workloads and several programs have less staff than they did in 2010.”

North Carolina’s population has increased by more than 11.5% since 2010, according to USAFacts, a nonprofit organization that gathers data from federal, state and local governments.

The state’s population growth corresponds to an increase in environmental permit applications filed with the department.

Since 2010, the department’s Division of Mitigation Services has seen a 200% increase in projects.

During that same time period, the number of erosion and sediment control project applicants filed with the Division of Energy, Mineral, and Land Resources has jumped by nearly 60%, and the Division of Waste Management has received a 62% increase in underground storage tank applications.

“The 2010-2025 period also includes several destructive hurricanes, and DEQ staff have been heavily involved in recovery and long-term resilience in impacted communities,” Kastrinsky said. “DEQ’s ability to hire and retain sufficient staff levels has a direct effect on its ability to provide permit oversight, technical assistance to businesses and customer service to North Carolinians.”

The department’s “roughly 1,700 staff members remain dedicated to providing science-based efforts to ensure clean air, water and lands by managing applications, conducting inspections and permit oversight, investigating complaints and taking enforcement measures as appropriate under law,” he continued. “DEQ also continues to focus on a variety of funding and assistance programs to maintain critical infrastructure and make communities’ aging systems more resilient to increasingly severe natural disasters.”

The Environmental Integrity Program analyzed the budgets, annual expenditures and staffing levels from 2010 through to 2024 of the environmental agencies of all 50 states.

North Carolina topped the list of 31 states found to have cut jobs at their environmental agencies from 2010 to 2024. Connecticut experienced a 26% cut during that same time, followed closely by Arizona, which saw a 25% reduction in its environmental agency’s staff.

Seven states, including Texas, Mississippi, South Dakota, and Connecticut, reduced their pollution control funding by at least a third, the report concludes.

The impacts of such cuts will likely only be exacerbated by the Trump Administration’s plans to downsize the Environmental Protection Agency, the program warns.

“The Trump Administration is attempting to dismantle EPA and rollback commonsense federal pollution rules, claiming that the states can pick up the slack and protect our communities – but that’s not the case,” Jen Duggan, Environmental Integrity Project executive director, stated in a release. “The implementation of our environmental laws depend on both a strong EPA and state agencies that have the resources they need to do their jobs. But our research found that many states have already cut their pollution control agencies and so more cuts at the federal level will only put more Americans at risk.”

The report highlights North Carolina’s factory farming industry, which includes the production of nearly 1 billion chickens annually for sale as meat. And, as of March, there were 8.1 million hogs in concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, in the state.

Poultry waste at these CAFOs is sometimes dumped in open-air heaps and, when it rains, washes into nearby streams, discharging harmful nutrients into waters downstream, including those in the Cape Fear River Basin, which has the highest density of CAFOs in the world, according to Cape Fear River Watch.

“The unchecked expansion of hog and poultry farms has left the state environmental agency unable to even evaluate the cumulative impacts,” Drew Ball, director of Natural Resources Defense Council’s Southeast Campaigns team, states in the report. “At this point, policy experts and advocates can’t even get the information they need to protect the public. You can’t respond if you don’t know what’s coming online. We need to think a lot harder about keeping track of potential pollution and what it could mean for downstream communities.”

Coastal Review will not publish Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in observance of the Christmas holiday.

Post has been updated.

WANCHESE — Genetic testing of purportedly wild-caught shrimp served earlier this month at dozens of Outer Banks restaurants found that 64% of the shrimp was actually imported.

On behalf of the Southern Shrimp Alliance, SeaD Consulting collected and analyzed shrimp samples from randomly selected seafood restaurants in Duck, Southern Shores, Kitty Hawk, Kill Devil Hills, Manteo, Rodanthe, Salvo, Avon, Buxton, Frisco, Nags Head and Hatteras, according to a Dec. 17 press release from SeaD.

Of the 44 restaurants tested, 43 had verbally claimed to serve local American wild-caught shrimp, but only 16 — 36% — were found to be serving local shrimp in the tested dishes. The remaining 28 restaurants had served imported farm-raised shrimp, but only one of them admitted it. All 44 of the eateries had used imagery to imply that they served local shrimp. 

“The findings raise concerns about seafood transparency in an iconic coastal region known for its local fishing heritage,” the release said.

Despite the Outer Banks’ poor showing, it was noted that Wilmington did even worse, with an “inauthenticity rate” of 77% in previous testing. 

SeaD (Seafood Development) Consulting, in partnership with Florida State University, holds the patent for the Rapid ID Genetic High-Accuracy Test, or RIGHTTest, that was used in the survey conducted Dec. 2-6. The Southern Shrimp Alliance, an advocacy trade group, has funded the genetic testing of shrimp throughout the region.

Shrimp, the most popular seafood in the U.S., was an $8 billion market in 2025, with Americans consuming 5 pounds per capita of shrimp a year. But it’s not local shrimpers who are raking in big profits.

According to the U.S. International Trade Commission, 93% of the shrimp consumed in the United States comes from overseas, with 1.7 billion pounds of shrimp products imported in 2024, valued at $6 billion. Meanwhile, commercial shrimp harvests in the Gulf of Mexico and the South Atlantic declined from $522 million in 2021 to $269 million in 2023; $25 million to $14 million, respectively, in North Carolina. 

The demand for shrimp is only increasing, along with the creativity in how to serve it.

“We don’t need to undersell our industry and our product,” David Williams, a commercial fishery scientist and co-founder of SeaD, told Coastal Review in a recent interview. A generation ago, shrimp cocktail was the extent of its use in most American cuisine; now there’s a dozen different shrimp dishes on menus, he said. “It should be a proud part of our industry”

As the Alliance detailed, imports, depending on the country, can be “dumped” at lower prices because they use cheap labor, and sometimes even forced, trafficked or child labor. Some countries use a lot of antibiotics, or grow shrimp in polluted ponds. A few countries impose tariffs ranging from 13% to 45% on U.S. wild-caught and farmed shrimp.

While most restaurant prices for shrimp dinners are on the higher end of the menu, they’re not reflecting the dock prices, which have remained low. But more recognition for the quality of wild shrimp as a food source would increase its value.

“The only real way of doing that is that people in restaurants appreciate wild caught shrimp,” Williams said. And diners who choose to eat wild seafood should be able to trust that they’re getting what they’re paying for, otherwise, it’s misrepresentation.

“You charge a premium for a product that’s not a premium,” he said.

North Carolina does not have a law that requires restaurants to disclose the origin of shrimp on menus. Certain retail seafood products fall under federal country-of-origin requirements, but they do not apply to restaurants. North Carolina U.S. Rep. David Rouzer, R-7th District, has recently met with the Alliance and others in the industry and is looking into the legislative remedies and other shrimp industry issues.

“Tackling mislabeling is crucial to ensure that consumers receive the shrimp they are sold,” Blake Price, deputy director of the Southern Shrimp Alliance said in the release. “This testing shows American fishermen are regularly losing sales of their own product to shrimp farmed in countries with safety, labor, and environmental abuses.”

Mark Vrablic, general manager of Willie R. Etheridge Seafood in Wanchese, said that he’s not directly aware of Outer Banks restaurants misrepresenting imported shrimp as local. Still, he has had people tell him that they were told the seafood they were served had come from Etheridge’s, when he knew it didn’t.

“I would love for it not to be this way, but I wouldn’t dare sell a farm-raised shrimp and call it domestic,” he told Coastal Review in an interview. People have a right to know what they’re eating, he added. “I’m not going to sell something marked one thing and it’s something else.”

Vrablic, 66, agrees that the biggest problem with imported shrimp is that the dock price shrimpers are paid is almost too low to make it worth the costs and work involved. 

Probably 25 countries send shrimp here, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Ecuador, Peru, Mexico and Venezuela, he said.

“When fuels went up real high two years back, (local shrimpers) were going to have to either raise prices or just get out of it, because they were going to go broke,” Vrablic said. Even with gas lower now, he said, the “homeboys” should still be getting prices 30% to 40% higher.

“But because of the millions of pounds of farm-raised that’s available daily, it’s just overwhelming,” he said. “The market is staying down because of the supply.”

Vrablic, who is a member of the Etheridge family, once one of the most powerful fishing clans on the Outer Banks, began fishing when he was 14 years old, and later joined the family restaurant business for a few years before taking over commercial management and sales.

Until about 20 years ago, shrimping was a short summer fishery in North Carolina, he said. But as the climate changed, the waters warmed to the shrimp’s liking. Now the season stretches from July Fourth until December or later.

“I don’t like imports, Vrablic said. “They’ve crushed us like cockroaches. They’ve taken our markets away, and our fishermen can’t get the fair share what they should be getting. When I fished, I made a lot of money. We didn’t have imports.”

But the fact is, he said, the increased demand for shrimp on the Outer Banks, and elsewhere, exceeds what local shrimpers can catch. And almost all farm-raised shrimp is from overseas.

“We produce shrimp in this country, but we do not produce enough,” Vrablic said, and referred to the 1.7 billion pounds that were imported last year. “Where would we find something like that?”

To his point, he explained, Etheridge Seafood doesn’t have the capacity or bargaining power to meet the volume of the demand.

“We keep a heavy inventory of shrimp, and it’s just the whole world dumps on us,” Vrablic said.

Bottom line, Vrablic says that something has to be done about the unfair competition from imported shrimp. Ideally, restaurants and fish markets should prioritize serving local catch, but when they can’t, they need to be honest about the origin of the shrimp they’re selling. And it would help if consumers remember that wild-caught shrimp also is a seasonal product.

“When restaurants say ’Mark, what will we do if we went three or four months without shrimp?’ I said, ‘If I got no shrimp … we could treat it like we do soft crabs or scallops or oysters when it comes in season.’ People come buy them just like they do watermelons. When it comes out of season, guess what? You come up short.

“Then they’ll just buy more fish from me,” he said, “because they can’t compete with me with fresh fish.”

The following eateries on the Outer Banks found to be serving authentic, American, wild-caught shrimp in the random sample of 44 restaurants:

1. 1587 Restaurant & Lounge, 405 Queen Elizabeth Ave, Manteo.
2. Barefoot Bernie’s Tropical Grill & Bar, 3730 N. Croatan Highway, Kitty Hawk.
3. Basnight’s Lone Cedar Café, 7623 S Virginia Dare Trail, Nags Head.
4. Coastal Cravings, 1209 Duck Road, Duck.
5. Goombays Grille & Raw Bar, 1608 N. Virginia Dare Trail, Kill Devil Hills.
6. Greentail’s Seafood Market and Kitchen, 3022 S. Croatan Highway Unit 34, Nags Head.
7. I Got Your Crabs Shellfish Market and Oyster Bar, 3809 N. Croatan Highway, Kitty Hawk.
8. Lucky 12 Tavern, 3308 S. Virginia Dare Trail, Nags Head.
9. O’Neal’s Sea Harvest, 618 Harbor Road, Wanchese.
10. Outer Banks Brewing Station, 600 S. Croatan Highway, Kill Devil Hills.
11. Red Sky Casual Dining & Cocktails,1197 Duck Road, Duck.
12. Roadside Bar & Grill, 1193 Duck Road, Duck,.
13. Sea Chef Dockside Kitchen, 8770 Oregon Inlet Road, Nags Head.
14. The Paper Canoe, 1564 Duck Road, Duck.
15. Village Table & Tavern, 1314 Duck Road, Duck.
16. Vicki B’s Restaurant & Market, 301 Budleigh St., Manteo.

BUXTON – Faced with devastating destruction across a significant segment of its beachfront, this small Outer Banks village is seeking help for coastal solutions, including measures that could require potentially controversial legislative action by the state and federal governments.

Since September, 15 houses have collapsed on a stretch of beach in Buxton just north of Cape Hatteras, the distinctive point of land midway along the East Coast that juts far into the Atlantic. Adaptation to storms and natural forces have fortified the community since its establishment in the late 1800s, but now stunningly rapid erosion is endangering its future.

“Today, small areas of our oceanfront have deteriorated to the point where we can no longer shoulder these challenges alone,” Dare County Board of Commissioners Chairman Bob Woodard wrote to members of the North Carolina General Assembly in November. “With your support, we can preserve our coastline, protect public infrastructure, and sustain the economic engine that benefits all of North Carolina.”

The county is one of the few “donor counties” in North Carolina, with more than 3 million people annually visiting Dare’s beaches and national parks and generating significant state tax revenue, he said. So far, he added, the county has spent about $275 million for beach nourishment as well as additional millions to maintain inlets, with little state or federal assistance.

In addition to a beach nourishment project in 2026 for Buxton, the county is planning to repair a purportedly half-intact groin, one of three installed in 1969 to protect the former Navy base constructed in 1956 near the original location of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse.

Dare and Hyde counties also have asked the state Division of Coastal Management to lift the 1985 state ban against hardened structures so the remnants of the two deteriorated groins at the site can be replaced.

But beach stabilization of any sort on the Outer Banks, with its extraordinarily high-energy coastal conditions, is becoming more challenging in a changing climate with quickly evolving and often unpredictable consequences: Sea levels are increasing faster than projected, storms are intensifying, rainfall is heavier.

In recent years, Hatteras and Ocracoke islands on the barrier islands’ southern end have been suffering dramatically increased shoaling in its inlets and far worse erosion at numerous hot spots along N.C. 12, the island’s only highway. Over wash, loss of dunes and road damage is becoming more frequent and difficult to mitigate, sometimes resulting in loss of vehicular access for hours or days. 

People say things feel different. Residents — from old timers to long-time transplants — have noticed places flooding where they never did before, shoaling in waterways that had never clogged before, and erosion consuming an entire shoreline that had been wide and stable just a few years before. And this fall and winter, even seasonal nor’easters have switched to overdrive, with the storms coming in one after another and more often than some ole salts say they’ve ever seen. 

“When we really developed these islands in the ’70s and ’80s, it was a different system, and we need to recognize that, acknowledge it, and plan accordingly,” Reide Corbett, executive director of the Coastal Studies Institute and Dean of the Integrated Coastal Program at East Carolina University, said in a recent interview. “We can’t let self-interest lead the way. We need to understand what this looks like, and we need to get behind better policy. And it starts with how we develop.”

Responding to increasing numbers of house collapses in Buxton and Rodanthe, the Hatteras Island’s northernmost village, state leaders are urging Congress to pass legislation introduced by Rep. Greg Murphy, a Republican from North Carolina’s 3rd District, that would authorize proactive Federal Emergency Management Agency flood insurance payments to remove threatened oceanfront houses before they fall.

While the proposal has garnered bipartisan support, FEMA is currently understaffed and targeted for downsizing, reorganization or even elimination, and its flood insurance program is woefully underfunded.

A delegation representing local, state and federal officials toured the damaged area in Buxton on Nov. 24, where dozens of additional oceanfront houses are scattered willy-nilly, awaiting near-certain demise. Numerous members of the group expressed shock at the disarray and destruction at the scene.

Meanwhile, North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Reid Wilson has directed the Coastal Resources Commission’s Science Panel to analyze shoreline stabilization options, including the potential effectiveness or negative impacts of groins.

Erosion on Buxton’s oceanfront has been a persistent problem for many decades, at least to the infrastructure on the beach, such as the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse.

“It was quite obvious to everybody that in the course of time the lighthouse would topple into the Atlantic Ocean and the thousand acres of park land, upon which no tree and scarcely any blade of grass grew, would be swallowed up by the warring ocean currents that swirl around the point of Cape Hatteras,” author Ben Dixon MacNeill wrote in an article published on July 30, 1948, in the Coastland Times. At that point, he noted, in just the lifetime of a middle-aged man, erosion had already whittled away 1,500 feet of beach. 

Despite the 1937 congressional directive to the National Park Service to preserve what would later become Cape Hatteras National Seashore as a “primitive wilderness,” until the early 1970s, according to park documents, the agency spent more than $20 million to stop the “natural process” of barrier island movement. Projects included installing in 1930 steel sheet pile groins along the beach by Cape Hatteras Lighthouse; installing in 1933 additional sheet pile groins at the lighthouse; nourishment of the beach in 1966 near the Buxton motel area with sand dredged from Pamlico Sound; and in 1967 placement of revetment of large nylon sandbags in front of the lighthouse.

In addition, the U.S. Navy built three reinforced concrete groins in 1969 to protect its facility near the lighthouse; the beach near the Buxton motels was nourished again in 1971 with material dredged from Cape Point; and the beach near the Navy operation was nourished in 1973 with Cape Point sand. 

Those actions were in addition to construction and repeated reconstruction of sand dunes, as well as beach fences and planting grasses, shrubs and trees to hold the dunes. 

Finally, in 1973, the National Park Service acknowledged the futility and unsustainable costs of stabilization, and abandoned its efforts. The agency, however, did continue various attempts to protect the lighthouse with riprap, offshore artificial grass, sandbags and a scour-mat apron. With the sea by then lapping at its base, the lighthouse in 1999 was relocated a half-mile inland.

In a letter dated Jan. 9, 1974, from the U.S. Department of Interior to a Buxton resident, the agency promised that all available data would be analyzed before determining future beach stabilization management decisions in the Seashore, including relative to the groins.

“The most reliable scientific data we have obtained thus far offer no evidence that the existing jetties or groins at Buxton provide acceptable protection from ocean forces,” the department added. “While some stabilizing effect may be gained in the immediate area, the jetties actually cause more erosion in adjacent locations.”

A report the year earlier published by University of Virginia coastal scientist Robert Dolan, et. al, to analyze the effects of beach nourishment in Buxton, in fact, said that the groins — short jetties extending from a shoreline — rapidly increased erosion by the motel area, causing dune destruction and ocean over wash into private property.

“The groins, somewhat unexpectedly, are trapping sediment at the expense of the beaches to either side and as a result of their success, the reach protected by the groins has become stable,” the report said, adding that the localized erosion problem at Buxton had followed construction of the groins.

Barely more than four years after they were built, the groins were damaged by storms and required repairs with new sheet piling. Patches and reinforcements continued until the Navy in 1982 abandoned the base, apparently leaving the groins to the elements.

By the time heated discussions kicked in about whether the lighthouse should be saved in place or moved, the community tried to persuade the federal government to not only maintain the by-then-deteriorating existing groins, but also to add a fourth groin. The petition was soundly rejected, and the Navy, the Park Service and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers appeared to want nothing to do with the groins.

Today, the county sees the sand trapping barriers — even a single groin — as a way to prolong the effectiveness of a $50 million beach nourishment project, and importantly, as a way to buy time while consultants determine a long-term strategy for Buxton.

Dare County Manager Bobby Outten reported in March that, according to Coastal Science & Engineering, the firm hired to do the beach nourishment and groin work, the southern-most groin would meet the state’s 50% rule that allows repair of an existing structure that has 50% or less in damages. The county is currently awaiting approval from the state, as well as acknowledgement that the application meets the exemption criteria for an exemption from the hardened structures statute, he said.

If the groin work is approved, contractors estimate the $2 to $4 million project would take up to two months to complete this summer and involve about 640 feet of repairs, using steel sheet pile and riprap scour protection within the original footprint.

As Outten summed up the current dilemma facing Dare and other North Carolina coastal communities: There are two extremes, either hold the coast in place as it is, and build sea walls. Or let nature take its course, let the houses fall and see the economy crumble.

“And neither one of those extremes is acceptable,” he told Coastal Review. “To anybody.”