COROLLA, N.C. — Nearly every seat was filled at the OBX Center for Wildlife Education Tuesday evening where Currituck County hosted a town hall meeting with neighbors and outlined the draft for the beach management plan for the first time.
"We're happy because they're finally listening to us," said Wayne Evans, a member of the Corolla Civic Association.
Evans and fellow CCA members have spoken to News 3 twice over the last six months about their erosion concerns in a stretch of northern Corolla. That stretch is now being recommended by Coastal Protection Engineering for beach nourishment in the county's beach management plan draft.
"What they showed so far is exactly what Corolla needs. We're pretty happy with the result of this study, and hopefully the county will do the beach nourishment on the northern end of the beach," said Evans.
CPE presented the draft for the beach management plan to neighbors Tuesday alongside Currituck County leaders.
"The main focus here today was that we've gotten to the point where we've now identified four specific areas that we believe warrant some sort of action," said Ken Willson, the senior program manager for CPE.
CPE identified the four most vulnerable sections that are most in need of action, including: the Central Reserve/Refuge Section (between the wild horse gate and Carova), the North Corolla Reach, the Spindrift Reach (included in the Corolla Section) and the South Pine Island Reach. CPE used the TELOS (technical, economic, legal, operational and schedule) method to identify the low, moderate and high possibilities for each stretch.
Each section includes options of what could work there, including: no action, buyouts and removals of oceanfront structures, beach nourishment, sand fencing and dune vegetation programs and beach nourishment alongside hardened structures (a proposed bill is currently in the General Assembly to overturn the state's ban on hardened structures).
In the compressed presentation, CPE included its recommendations for the four areas. For the Central Reserve/Refuge Section, the recommendation would be for the county to buy out and remove threatened oceanfront structures. For the North Corolla Reach, it would be beach nourishment. For the Spindrift Reach (included in the Corolla Section), there isn't a clear recommendation, though the buyout and removal of oceanfront structures scored high in three of five categories. For the South Pine Island Reach area, there was no clear recommendation at this time either. CPE included in its presentation that next steps would be to further analyze the two areas where current recommendations aren't clear.
"We're dealing with a lot of different variables. The land use is different north and south of the Horse Gate. There were multiple goals that the county had established, in terms of what the beach management plan was actually going to accomplish, where it would be warranted. There are different erosion rates, there's different vulnerability along those areas, it depends on which storm we use, so lots of different layers of vulnerability," said Willson.
Getting this information out in-person to neighbors in Corolla was important for county leaders like Commissioner Tony Angell.
"To me personally, it's important because the beach does provide a tremendous economic incentive to keep it running and keep it healthy. The other side is, I've grown to know these people, I've talked to them on numerous occasions, they see it daily, so to be able to help and address some of those concerns is the goal," said Angell.
But this is a draft, and ultimately county leaders will decide on the action taken once it is finalized. As far as beach nourishment being recommended for one specific stretch, Angell admits it is a costly project.
"The cost associated with beach nourishment is very high, the beach nourishment isn't a one-time thing. If you look at every project that's done, beach nourishment up and down the East Coast, everybody's had to continue to renourish a beach. Fighting Mother Nature is an expensive battle, so that's part of it," said Angell.
The other part that Angell mentioned is the current proposed legislation in Raleigh that would overturn North Carolina's ban on hardened structures.
"I think combined with working with the state to push that legislation forward, get that stuff kind of alleviated, it'll help local counties that are footing the bill for this to put a better plan in place," said Angell.
For neighbors like Evans, he feels time isn't on their side on this issue and hopes the county comes through for them.
"We've missed this year's window to do beach nourishment, so now we have to wait another year to apply, and then we have two years before the companies have time to come and do the beach nourishment, so it will be at least three years before they can even start the beach nourishment. Hopefully the commissioners take this very seriously, and they sit down with the people of Corolla and listen to us," said Evans.
The beach management plan draft is expected to be released this week and allow for a public feedback window before it is finalized.
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