Government is being increasingly weaponized against its citizens in so many ways that we have forgotten the concept of “we the people.” We are being forced to forget that government works for us. The police powers being exercised by various government entities is frightening. They pull out the entire tool kit, including trying to pit citizen against citizen.
The latest is the land grab by SCDHEC/OCRM. For waterfront properties, regardless of property lines – for which we’ve paid money and pay taxes – the state has historically had jurisdiction seaward of a setback line that is evaluated every seven to 10 years. Landward of that line is the property owner’s jurisdiction. The latest interpretation by unelected OCRM bureaucrats of this clear jurisdictional separation is that if a storm knocks out any waterfront property, they automatically have jurisdiction over your private property to the new eroded line – not just beachfront but any waterfront property. Say what?
We are a constitutional republic. In its simplest form, this means the U.S. Constitution is the supreme law of the land. Both the 14th and Fifth Amendments clearly indicate that private property ownership and protection is one of the cornerstones of liberty. If we don’t have the ability to own and protect our property, the very tenets of freedom are threatened. Every homeowner has a right to protect his or her property, and government cannot take that away without buying that property for “just compensation,” defined by the U.S. Supreme Court as fair market value.
When it comes to waterfront properties of any kind, the state used to follow a strategy of “retreat,” which means that water and nature will do their thing, and, instead of fighting it, we retreat, and the government buys up any private property that is impacted. That policy was changed recently to “hold the line,” as governments realized that with rising ocean levels, climate change and very aggressive water, there was no viable, economic way to keep retreating.
However, even though the policy was changed, the regulations were not. Government now uses retreat regulations to threaten and harass citizens and take their land without compensation. Even the Isle of Palms has retreat regulations that do not let homeowners protect their property in any way from these dangerous waters and forces homeowners to suffer the consequences. Why is IOP the only coastal community that has an ordinance giving its government jurisdiction essentially over your entire property landward of the setback line? IOP bows to the OCRM land grab and supports its illegal and unconstitutional actions.
The result is a brewing disaster. In the last nine months, there has been massive property and beach damage. The government so far has spent 80% of its money and effort digging holes in the beach and scraping sand, which does nothing to renourish the beach and drags water into the holes and closer to the shore. Insurance companies are getting nervous, which will impact the availability and cost of insurance for the entire island.
Compare this to Florida, which looked at the same data and the ferocious damage caused by the water and approved 50/50 matching grants to homeowners to build structures that protect their properties. Many of these structures are called terminal walls – versus seawalls – that remain hidden and covered by sand and landscaping and are maintained by the homeowner. Government continues to maintain a dune system that supports natural habitat – and we all support that. The protective structures prevent property damage, are exposed only as a result of a catastrophic event and are covered up shortly after. This gets the government out of the business of managing the destruction of private property.
The results of the Florida strategy have been stunningly effective. This is how they shifted from retreat to hold the line and how government supports the protection of private property rather than working against it.
Our local politicians should understand the issues clearly and learn from others instead of hanging onto old regulations that are clearly producing disastrous results. This is not the time to pit citizen against citizen and divide us. We are one minor storm away from a home falling into the ocean. Once that happens, the boomerang impact on property values and insurance rates for everyone will be catastrophic. The focus should be exclusively on property protection and holding the line, not on exercising police powers using outdated regulations.
Reddy or Not represents the opinion of Lucky Dog Publishing owner Rom Reddy but not necessarily the opinion of the newspaper. In keeping with our philosophy of publishing all opinions, we welcome responses, which must be limited to 400 words and will be published on a space-available basis.
