Hatteras islanders packed the gymnasium at the Fessenden Center in Buxton on a particularly rainy, nasty, and foggy Thursday night to tell the tell County Board of Commissioners what is on their minds.
The official count is that 250 islanders attended, along with 30 or so county employees and department heads.
Six commissioners attended. Commissioner Margarette Umphlette was absent because of an illness in her family.
The commissioners listened attentively for almost two hours as 28 islanders came to the microphone to speak to them without time limits — including three who came back for a second round of comments. Then each board member made some brief comments. The meeting, which started at 6:30, did not break up until after 9 p.m.
The crowd was respectful, but enthusiastic and very eager to share their thoughts, concerns, and suggestions with their county leaders.
Almost all of those who spoke mentioned how much they appreciated the board members traveling to Hatteras Island for the meeting. And several made the point before the evening was over that they hoped the commissioners would come back — and more often.
The issue mentioned most often was the possibility of a “sand tax” — a special tax district to pay for beach nourishment in north Buxton. And almost every one of the islanders who spoke on the issue, opposed a tax increase.
The county has asked the National Park Service for a special use permit to nourish the beach in Buxton to protect Highway 12 from the encroaching Atlantic Ocean and frequent ocean overwash. Woodard said last night that the permit is expected to be issued, and the project is on track to begin in late spring or early summer.
The estimated cost is about $25 million, and most of it will be paid for with funds from a 2 percent occupancy tax that is earmarked for county beach nourishment projects, including those in four towns on the northern beaches.
Woodard emphasized last night that the board has made no decision on Buxton nourishment but is considering its options, which include a special tax district to help fund the project. For some, it’s an issue of fairness — property owners in the towns will be taxed to help pay for nourishment and Hatteras islanders should then have to contribute also.
And, while the sand tax was mentioned often, the comments were more broad and general than just beach nourishment and whether islanders should pay for it. Many speakers expressed a general concern for the island’s transportation corridor — including issues of erosion, hotspots, overwash, and bridges.
Although those issues dominated the discussion, islanders are also concerned about such issues as inlet dredging, mosquito-borne illnesses, public boat ramps, medical care, lot sizes, and either neglect or overstepping by the state and federal governments.
The first speaker of the evening was Judy Banks of Hatteras village.
“I’m here to talk about Highway 12,” she said. “I really don’t think there should be a special tax district to protect Highway 12.”
If islanders are going to have to pay for it, Banks said, the commissioners should consider asking others who will benefit to pitch in — such as Hyde County, which gets the benefit of using the highway and having tourists use it, or the Board of Education, which needs it to transport students to school.
“We are a unique area,” she said. “We are 90 percent undeveloped.”
She said there is no way the island’s villages can financially support a beach nourishment project.
However, she concluded, “Kudos to the Board of Commissioners for at least trying to address the problem.”
“It’s not the county’s job to protect the highway,” said Joe Farrow of Buxton, and most of last night’s speakers agreed with him.
Farrow was emphatic that protecting the highway is the job of the North Carolina Department of Transportation.
“We are already being taxed to pay for the roads,” he said. Furthermore, he said, $25 million will be “just a drop in the bucket.” So much sand will be needed to nourish the island’s beaches and keep them nourished that “there will never be enough to pay for it.”
Also speaking against the tax is the woman who has been battling the encroaching ocean the longest at her property, the Outer Banks Motel on the oceanfront in Buxton — 87-year-old Carol Dillon.
“This tax is so ridiculous that I’m not going to spend a lot of time talking about it,” she said.
She claimed that the “stupid dredging” in Oregon Inlet, according to well-known geologists, such as Dr. Stanley Riggs, is causing Hatteras Island to wash away. Dillon added that she wasn’t saying that Oregon Inlet shouldn’t be dredged, just that officials should do something to replenish the sand on Hatteras.
Dillon said she would urge property owners not to pay a special tax.
“We’re not going to pay for it,” she added. “We shouldn’t have to pay for it.”
Mary Jane Tutzauer of Avon said that a sand tax is “a really, really bad idea.”
“That is a state road — managed and maintained with our taxes,” she said.
Raymond Austin of Buxton said that beach nourishment was “throwing money away.” He said the sand would wash away in the next good northeaster.
Bob Davis agreed that “sand replenishment is too expensive.” He said the county needs to be willing to “force the federal government to repair the dunes, as they promised they would.”
Several people suggested that a tax on real property was not the way to pay for beach nourishment.
“The board has gone to the well a number of times on real estate taxes in the 4 1/2 years that I’ve lived here,” said Rick Anzolut of Avon. “I don’t know if the county can take more,” he said.
He suggested that the county needs to instead raise occupancy tax above the current 6 percent.
“Visitors would strongly support another occupancy tax,” said Lee Setkowsky of Avon, who owns a business in Hatteras village.
However, Beth Midgett of Hatteras village, property manager at Midgett Realty, disagreed. She said she is on the “front line,” talking to visitors making reservations and hears their current complaints about occupancy taxes.
“If we have to raise it more, we will get kickback,” she said.
Asa Gray is one of the speakers who is just generally worried about the island’s future.
“I’ve lived here my whole life, and our beaches are in terrible condition,” he said. “I’ve never seen them like this…. I look at it and I realize that maybe we are going to have to do something for Hatteras Island…The beaches are our future here, and nobody is helping us.”
Gray said the last thing he would want is a sand tax, but that “we’re going to have to start working together because nobody’s going to help us.”
Gray also was one of several people who mentioned that Dare County should buy its own dredge to clear out its sand-clogged inlets and put that sand on its eroding beaches. It’s an idea that has been mentioned several times by Commissioner Allen Burrus of Hatteras village.
Burrus has said for what all the dredging and beach nourishment is costing, the county could easily buy a dredge and lease it out to others if it wasn’t being used full-time on county projects.
Several speakers emphasized being more proactive on transportation issues.
“Highway 12 is the responsibility of NCDOT,” said Pat Weston of Avon. However, she added that “We need to keep Highway 12 healthy…We should be active, not reactive.”
Other topics that were brought to the commissioners included:
Public boat ramps. Joe Farrow of Buxton led with this issue, and several other speakers mentioned it. Farrow said his wife’s grandfather had “donated land at Buxton harbor for a public access and boat ramp.”
That was 25 years ago, he said, and still nothing has happened. The county, he said, continues to claim that titles to the properties in the area need to be cleared up before it can move forward.
“It’s mind-boggling,” Farrow said, “that this can’t be done in 25 years.”
Inlet dredging. Rom Whitaker, a charter boat captain, and Jeff Oden, a commercial fisherman, both mentioned this issue.
“Thank you for finally getting Hatteras Inlet dredged,” said Oden — even though he said six miles has been added to the trip in and out of the inlet for the watermen.
“There’s been some money spent here (on Hatteras Inlet),” said Whitaker, “and, in my opinion, the job’s not done.”
The inlet is only 6 feet deep in places, he said, which may be navigable for some of the local boats, but he said that’s not enough water for the bigger boats that come to Hatteras for tournaments and such.
There’s enough sand in Hatteras Inlet to fix all the problem we got,” Whitaker said to applause and laughter from the crowd.
The Zika virus, a mosquito borne virus that has spread rapidly across Latin America and the Caribbean, and poses the greatest threat to pregnant women and their unborn children. As of yesterday, 12 cases had been reported in Florida, all among travelers who had contracted it while traveling.
“Have you considered plans to address that?” asked both Buddy McDaniel and Wayne Mathis of Buxton.
Commissioner Beverly Boswell told them that the county was aware of the problem and prepared to address it if necessary.
Medical care. Frank Folb of Avon got some push-back from a comment he made on the county decision to spend $50,000 to help re-open the medical center in Hatteras in 2013. HealthEast Medical Care — now known as Vidant — closed the doors on the center it operated there in 2010. The building was owned by the county, and a group of villagers got the center re-opened as a private, non-profit in 2013. Vidant still operates a medical center with three physicians in Avon.
Folb mentioned briefly at the end of his comments about the sand tax and ocean overwash that the $50,000 “should not have been taken away from our major clinic.”
Rose Alice Mayo of Hatteras village took issue with that.
“The Hatteras Village Medical Center saved my life in November,” she said, adding that you cannot always get an appointment when you need one in Avon.
And Jeff Oden mentioned that his 95-year-old mother and other villagers “fought pretty hard for that medical center.”
National Park Service. There were some of the usual harsh words about the National Park Service, but not as many as might be expected in a roomful of Hatteras islanders. There were, especially, some complaints about the stormwater problems in the Cape Point area in Buxton.
However, about a half dozen speakers, had praise for the current superintendent, David Hallac, whose who has been on the job only about a year.
One of them was Frank Folb, who has been a frequent critic of the Park Service’s off-road vehicle plan.
“Since the 1970s, I’ve not seen the communication with the people that I se now…The Park Service has gotten rid of the old wood and got a lot of new wood.”
“I will echo your comments about the superintendent of the National Park Service,” Woodard added.
Carol Dillon, who has not often had kind words for the Park Service in the past, also approves of Hallac.
“I do believe our present Park Service man is helping us,” she said. “He’s a fine man.”
After the speakers concluded, the commissioners each spoke.
“We may not have done a good job of explaining where the 6 percent (occupancy tax) goes,” he said. “I want you folks to walk away with an understanding of where it goes.”
Woodard explained that 3 percent of the occupancy tax pays for such services as solid waste collection, police protection, and emergency medical services. Of that 3 percent, Dare County keeps a third and the towns split two-thirds based on a complicated formula.
Another 1 percent goes to the county Tourism Board.
And 2 percent is allocated to the beach nourishment fund.
He reiterated that “no one on this board has made a decision about taxing” and before the board does anything, he said, there would be a public hearing.
“I can assure you that there isn’t a commissioner up here who doesn’t have your best interest in mind,” he said.
Bowell noted that “government overreach is destroying our way of life” and that forcing the federal government to do anything in Dare County just wasn’t going to happen.
Judge explained much of the history of the county’s decision to nourish the Buxton beach.
“I agree Highway 12 is NCDOT’s responsibility,” he said. But, he added, when it became apparent that DOT was not going to declare a state of emergency in Buxton after Hurricanes Irene and Sandy in 2011 and 2012 — as it had done in north Rodanthe — the county decided to move ahead.
“I understand what you are saying,” he said, “but either you want it or you don’t.”
Allen Burrus of Hatteras village declared, “I am against it (a sand tax) and I’ve been against it since Day One.” He added that he might be able to live with an assessment on Buxton property owners who would get a direct benefit from nourishment.
Jack Shea promised that the commissioners would “take to heart what you have said.”
“I don’t want you to feel like stepchildren because you’re not,” he said.
Overman, who has been involved with the planning for nourishment, said a decision by the Park Service is waiting for just one more agency opinion and “the ball will get rolling.”
Woodard promised that the board would address each and every issue that came before it at the town hall and would report back.
He also said the board would consider more meetings on Hatteras Island, and reiterated what he has already said about making the board meetings more accessible to islanders, who now have to travel several hours round trip to go to Manteo for public comment.
He said the county’s public information department was working on live streaming of the meetings to the Fessenden Center with a two-way hookup, so islanders could come there to speak during the public comment period of each meeting.
“We’re trying to get it done in the next 60 days,” he said.
