By DOTTY NIST
There have been a number of theories on the reason for the proposed Walton County Hurricane and Storm Damage Reduction Project. Brad Pickel, Walton County beach management consultant, provided the official reasons for the project at an Oct. 7 public workshop at the Walton County Tourist Development Council (TDC) office.
Pickel, who has been involved with the project for over 12 years, commented, “We get hit by a hurricane roughly every 10 years.”
He displayed photos of damage to the beach in Walton County and homes in the wake of hurricane and storm impacts. Pickel reminded residents that homes, property and money are lost as a result of these impacts.
He noted that the storm does not even have to be a hurricane to cause significant damage. In Tropical Storm Isadore in 2001, 20 cubic yards of sand per linear foot were lost from various sections on the beach, Pickel noted.
The beach restoration project, which could optimistically go under construction in about a year, would build a dune, raise the beach and extend into the water. It would, Pickel explained, add 9.7 million cubic yards of sand to the beach over a 50-year period with at least several successive renourishments. The project area extends over most of the county’s non-state-park beachfront.
Pickel noted that all local funding for the project would be through the portion of the TDC bed tax collected for the purpose and money borrowed and repaid through that account.
The project is a federal project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) as a partner. Doing the project would ensure that the ACOE would be an advocate for the county in the wake of future storm damage impact, Pickel said, including for funding to repair that damage.
Pickel displayed a long list of counties and municipalities in the state that have done large-scale beach restoration projects, encompassing over 300 miles in all.
Language for easements associated with the Walton County Hurricane and Storm Damage Reduction Project has been in the process of being revised and finalized over the past 10 months, with public input taken. Beachfront property owners will be asked to sign easements that will allow contractors for the project to go onto their lots in order to build the project, which is to be constructed both on public and private property.
Pickel said that the easement language is in its final form and will be going before the Walton County Board of County Commissioners (BCC) for consideration on Oct. 28.
He also reported that there had recently been minor modifications to the project design, including a different slope on the front part of the beach. The changes, Pickel said, will result in a somewhat wider and more usable beach.
As in past recent workshops and a BCC special meeting on the matter, public input on the project continued to be negative.
Blue Mountain Beach homeowner Emmett Hildreth said he has heard every argument that Pickel and Jim Bagby, TDC executive director, had made. “We violently disagree,” he said.
He charged that property values would go down as a result of the project and expressed concern about the “hoards of tourists” that would come onto the beach due to the project.
In conjunction with the project, an Erosion Control Line (ECL) is to be established through a legal process in the approximate area of the current Mean High Water Line (MHWL). This was done in 2003 in preparation for the county’s first large-scale beach restoration project on the west end of the county, with the ECL becoming the line separating upland property deeded to the MHWL from state sovereignty property reclaimed by the addition of sand.
Hildreth said he had no confidence that tourists would stop at this “imaginary line” and not come onto his property.
Fort Panic homeowner Ed Goodwin expressed concern that there could be vending on the new beachfront property that would be created. Bagby and Pickel assured him that there could be no beach vending without the permission of the upland property owner, as both county ordinance and state statute would disallow this.
Property owners have the ability to sign or not sign an easement for the project. If they do not sign, they likely will not receive project sand on their property. However, the ECL may still be established on their property if the project crosses it.
If an insufficient number of property owners sign easements and the project is therefore judged not financially feasible, it will not proceed.
Pickel later commented that it would be possible for homeowners to petition to have the ECL vacated on their property by the state if the project is not built.
Beachfront property owner Lisa Boushy explained that the reason many owners have a problem with the project is that they will not own the beach that is created between their private property and the water.
Pickel agreed that this has been the number one issue for property owners. However, the creation of the ECL and the requirement for sand placed in state sovereignty waters to become public property stem from Florida law and the state Constitution rather than from any requirement of the county or the ACOE.
One attendee said that one reason she had bought her property where she did was that no beach nourishment project had been done there. “Don’t do this…don’t take away my right to my private beach,” she urged.
Hildreth also protested that the feasibility study for the project had not addressed how it would affect homeowners’ property values. In addition, he raised the issue that representatives of the ACOE in attendance had stated that the project had not been designed for the purpose of recreation.
However, the feasibility study for the project does list increasing recreational opportunities as one of the planning goals and objectives of the project, along with reduction of shoreline erosion and reduction of the potential for storm damage.
“Shore protection projects are formulated to provide hurricane and storm damage reduction while recreation benefits are incidental,” the report also states.
After the meeting, Hildreth provided the press with written material. “This is the position of the beachfront property owners,” he stated.
With the attribution “CONCERNED WALTON COUNTY PROPERTY OWNERS,” the material referred to the easements as “a Grant and Conveyance of a private property land title interest in your land and property to Walton County and Assigns forever.”
It further alleged: “The argument that sand protects cannot be substantiated; The argument that value increases cannot be substantiated,” that privacy would be lost due to the project, and that potential renters would be “turned off” because the beach south of homes would be public as a result of the project.
The statement also noted that the easement would be recorded and would require disclosure in the instance of the sale of the property.
Pickel and Bagby have conducted and are scheduling informational meetings with homeowners’ associations and other groups on the topic of the project. Updated information on the project, including the easements in their final form, is also available on the web site, www.protectwaltoncountybeaches.com.
