Chimney Sweep in Sullivan’s Island, SC

SULLIVAN’S ISLAND, S.C. (WCSC) - Potential changes are underway for Sullivan’s Island erosion control structure ordinance.

Erosion control structures are not allowed to be constructed in RC-1 and RC-2 Recreation and Conservation Area Districts without town and agency approvals, according to.

Town leaders say the ordinance prohibits structures such as fill, bulkheads, seawalls targets areas along the back portions of the beach as well as marsh areas.

Town Planning and Zoning Director Charles Drayton says the idea to amend the ordinance was first brought up in May 2024.

“We’ve had some concerns brought to us from some of the residents back there who are experiencing tidal inundation in their properties currently, and we’re looking for ways to address that in an environmentally friendly fashion,” Drayton says.

The idea falls in line with the town’s progress towards a Sea Level Adaptation and Resilience Plan. The plan is meant to create community-wide recommendations to protect the island from future flood events.

Some recommendations included creating natural buffer areas that will give rising tides space before any impacts to property.

Drayton says the plan also considers an amendment to the town ordinance that only allows one foot of fill to be added on properties. Drayton says seven feet and four inches is the height predicted to protect homes from sea-level impacts in about 50 years.

“Consideration for allowing greater fill on some of these low-lying lots that are more susceptible to tidal flooding so that they would be able to build their building pad at seven and a half feet.”

Resident Eric Dodson says he appreciates the town’s steps towards a protective plan. He shared concerns that the plan will only allow homeowners to adapt to sea-level rise.

“What we need to do is defend against it. That adaptation that’s recommended takes years to basically start to take hold when we’re under constant attack right now. And we need to do this today, and it needs to be effective today. Not 10 years from now or five years from now.”

He hopes officials understand how storm events impact homeowners on a frequent basis.

“Inundates the downstairs, the garage level and creates thousands of dollars of damage. The storm we had in December, about a year and a half ago, was a significant budget impact. Because it basically took everything out and that wasn’t even a named storm.”

Dodson says he denied approval for a bulkhead to defend against sea-level rise impacts to his property over a year ago. He wishes to see a change that follows regulations under the South Carolina Department of Environmental Services instead of restrictive town regulations.

“We’re trying to do is replace our revetment with a bulkhead because it’s stronger, more resilient, and the revetment is currently not working in maintaining the ability for our property not to continue to wash into the marsh.”

The resilience plan will go to town council leaders for preliminary review on Tuesday at 6 p.m.

If any changes are made to the plan, it will go to the council again for a final reading in September.

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SULLIVAN’S ISLAND, S.C. (WCBD) –Sullivan’s Island Town Council is working to solidify their plan for sea level rise adaptation and resilience over the next 50 years.

The Sullivan’s Island ‘Sea Level Rise Adaptation and Resilience Plan’ aims to engage the community, protect natural resources, restore natural systems and adapt.

“The nature of barrier islands is they are low-lying and prone to flooding and inundation from storm events,” said Land, Water and Wildlife Project Manager Brooke Blosser, with the Coastal Conservation League.

The goal of the flood plan is to use natural resources to protect the island from flooding to protect the island from erosion and high tides.

“The premise of this type of infrastructure is to leverage your natural resources. We have sandy soils in certain parts of the island that can drain waters fast, in lower lying areas with high ground water tables, tree landings could pump that water back up into the sky, said Director of Resilience and Natural Resource Management Rebecca Fanning for the Town of Sullivan’s Island. “Nature based solutions have a number of benefits including boosting the biodiversity of the island, mitigating heat island effects as well as water quality impacts from stormwater runoff.”

One part of the plan suggests raising the elevation of the Ben Sawyer Causeway. The suggestion was made based on an interview with the South Carolina Department of Transportation. It would not raise the elevation of the drawbridge but would raise the approaches on either side and potentially widen them.

“It was determined we should look at that major lifeline that tethers the island to shore. It’s an evacuation route, it’s most people’s primary point of entry route on and off the island, and recognizing it is a low elevation,” said Fanning.

The Coastal Conservation Leagues says there are ways you can protect your home on your own through rain gardens and living shorelines. This is also a part of the town’s recommended strategy to engage the Sullivan’s Island community through a recognition program.

“Rain gardens do a really good job of observing stormwater and redirecting the stormwater into the ground. Homeowners who are right on the marsh, on the back end of the island could install living shorelines on their private property and those living shorelines can help restore the marsh help, help filter the water and act as an erosion control device on properties,” said Blosser.

The final plan will be presented to Sullivan’s Island town council on August 19th for council adoption.

SULLIVAN’S ISLAND — A former National Park Service employee spent four decades at Fort Moultrie, transforming how the national historic site conveyed the stories of the Revolutionary War-era grounds.

But in light of recent directives from the Trump administration, he's worried that effort could be undone.

Michael Allen worked at the Fort Moultrie and Fort Sumter historical sites for roughly 40 years. His work shaped much of how the National Park Service site looks today.

Recently, signs were posted at all National Park Service sites seeking feedback from visitors. The signs ask for comments related to any areas that need repair or services that need improvement.

They also instruct visitors to report any "signs or other information that are negative about either past or living Americans," including messaging that fails to "emphasize the beauty, grandeur, and abundance of landscapes and other natural features."

The first two requests are standard, Allen said. It's the third and final line on the signs he has trouble with.

"Being in this environment and climate that we're in now, I'm concerned," Allen said.

He said he's worried the feedback could be used to remove installations about people and events that have often been untold.

Allen helped push for the inclusion of information on the experiences of enslaved Africans who were brought to the United States and quarantined in pestilence houses in the 18th century.

A bench was installed at the site in 2008, placed and maintained by the park service to provide a space for visitors to reflect on the arduous journey from Africa to Charleston that hundreds of thousands were forced to take.

The Bench by the Road is tucked near the Intracoastal Waterway at the Fort Moultrie Visitor’s Center, inspired by the words of famed poet Toni Morrison. It was the first of 20 benches installed as part of the Toni Morrison Society’s Bench by the Road Project.

The bench helps to tell a fuller, more inclusive — and often more accurate — rendition of well-known slices of American history, Allen said.

"Having that bench there helps to convey a message, helps to tell a story," Allen said. "But it also fills a narrative that has not always been presented."

Allen, as well as park advocates and historians, worry that exhibits and installation like the Bench by the Road at Fort Moultrie, could go away.

A directive from Department of the Interior Secretary Doug Burgum on May 20 gave staff at all national historic sites a 90-day deadline to review all public-facing monuments, memorials and markers, and catalog anything inappropriate or that disparages any American, alive or dead, including those that lived in colonial times. That deadline expires on Aug. 18.

Thirty days after that deadline, or on Sept. 17, content fitting that criteria must be removed and replaced by information that focuses on American achievements and progress.

"I would just not want that bench that's there, the first one that was placed as part of (Morrison's) program, to be gone," Allen said. "Just as well as I would not want African passages taken out of the Visitor Center at Fort Moultrie."

The directive quickly received pushback from historians and the National Parks Conservancy Association, a nonprofit advocacy group.

"The Trump administration is trying to erase and rewrite history. But that’s not what the American people want," Theresa Pierno, president and CEO for the National Parks Conservation Association, said in a statement. "Our national parks should reflect the full complexity of the land, its beauty, its past, and the people who have shaped it for generations."

South Carolina is home to one national park, Congaree National Park in Hopkins, and a handful of sites that commemorate historic figures, battles and time periods.

According to survey responses spanning June 6 to June 16 obtained by the NPCA and provided to The Post and Courier, only three South Carolina-based sites were the subject of visitor feedback, which were mostly positive.

"The park takes a very complex time in American history and seeks to tell the story. Thank you for all your work," one visitor wrote of the Reconstruction Era National Historical Park in Beaufort, a relatively new park that tells the story of newly freed African Americans in the late 19th century.

A similar comment was submitted on June 12 regarding the Kings Mountain National Military Historical Site (site of an important American victory in the Revolutionary War), applauding the "exemplary" rangers that staff the park.

There was one brief complaint made about Congaree National Park on June 10.

"Too many mosquitos," the visitor wrote.

Phil Francis started his decades-long career in the parks service at the Kings Mountain National Military Park in Blacksburg. In his retirement, he serves as a member and chairman of the Coalition to Protect America's National Parks, a nonprofit organization made up of past parks employees and volunteers.

Francis said the feedback initiative is another attempt from the Trump administration to de-value the agency.

Several sites are already feeling the effects of slashed budgets and staffing shortages. History, and the NPS sites that are tasked with educating the American people, are apolitical, he added, and they should stay that way.

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCIV) — Earlier this week, a national research group released its 'Safe for Swimming?' report regarding water quality at beaches across the U.S.

“All too often there is bacteria at our beaches," said John Rumpler, Clean Water Director for Environment America, the authors of the report. "We compared it to a safety threshold which has to do with the risk of swimmers getting sick. And we found that all too often many of South Carolina's beaches exceeded that safety threshold for bacteria last year.”

It is important to note that the group's safety threshold differs from the one upheld by the state Department of Environmental Services.

In the report, Sullivan's Island is noted as being potentially unsafe for swimming, however SCDES says the water is up to the state's standard.

"That beach was only tested on 12 days last year. Of those 12 days, it exceeded the safety value for fecal indicator bacteria on four of those days, or about one third of the time," said Rumpler.

SCDES says it conducts tests every two weeks on Sullivan's Island between May 1 and Oct. 1.

"The EPA recommends that coastal states' beach monitoring programs use the standard for Enterococcus bacteria of 110 MPN/100 mL. However, SCDES uses an even more conservative standard: 104 MPN/100 mL. This means that South Carolina's beach monitoring program is even more protective of people's health," SCDES said in a statement.

In Environment America's report, the safety threshold measures as the strictest of the three groups, at 60 MPN/100mL.

SCDES said "The Environment America’s assessment approach doesn't align with South Carolina's or the EPA's recommended standards for ocean water monitoring."

Andrew Wunderley, Executive Director of Charleston Waterkeeper, says water quality varies with the weather.

"Bacteria levels spike after rains and floods. And so, what's happening during those events? You have sewers overflowing, you have septic tanks that get washed out, dog waste, pet waste, wildlife, all that gets washed into the water. And when that happens, the bacteria level spike and swimming and other recreational activities can be a risk to your health," he said.

Charleston Waterkeeper shares a weekly Swim Alert with results of bacteria tests from local waterways.

Both Wunderley and Rumpler say infrastructure issues contribute to higher levels of bacteria in water.

"There are communities across the country that are investing in upgrading and fixing their sewage infrastructure, replacing leaky pipes, fixing sewage treatment plants or expanding their capacity, helping homeowners to replace or repair leaky septic systems and also using what we call green infrastructure," said Rumpler.

"We need really resilient, well maintained, well operated, and well upgraded sewer treatment systems," said Wunderley. To reduce levels of bacteria in waterways, Wunderley encourages people to make sure they're cleaning up after their pets and properly maintaining septic systems.

"Nobody wants to go swimming in the water with their family and then have their kid's getting diarrhea and rashes and ear infections. That's just no fun for everybody," said Rumpler. "So, let's pull together and invest in fixing our water infrastructure so our water can always be safe for swimming."

Before you head to the beach, Wunderley suggests people check current available data about the location's water quality online. Both SCDES and Charleston Waterkeeper post bacteria test results online.

If the bacteria level ever exceeds the state’s threshold, SCDES will issue either a long-term or short-term swimming advisory in the affected area.