House for Sale With Ocean View

This story slipped by me over the weekend, so special thanks to Chris Fitzsimon for covering things over at NC Policy Watch. For those of you who have been keeping up with the Realtor Ticks and their undue influence on public policy in North Carolina, go ahead and get out your bug spray. They're back.

The Realtors and homebuilders are clearly wealthy special interests that exert significant influence on elections and the state policymaking process. This weekend, the Charlotte Observer reminded us that state coastal management policy is also influenced by wealthy special interests, in this case by the well-heeled residents of Figure Eight Island, an exclusive, private, gated beach community just north of Wrightsville Beach.

I have no specific evidence that the Ticks are involved in the story you're about to read, though I do know of several Realtor types who are ringleaders among the Figure Eight Elite. And make no mistake, this story is about real estate interests trumping public interest straight down the line.

The homes on the northern edge of the island are now threatened by the shifting beach sands and want to build an underwater seawall to maintain the beach in front of the homes. But state law prohibits hardened structures because they only increase beach erosion further down the shore. The island’s homeowners association wants an exemption from the law. The (Charlotte) Observer reports that the association has formed a political action committee that has donated $44,000 to political campaigns in the last three years and has hired three lobbyists to take their case to lawmakers, including former Lieutenant Governor Dennis Wicker. Residents of the island have also made generous individual contributions to politicians.

None of that is illegal. That is the way the system works. Wealthy interests make campaign contributions and hired well-connected lobbyists to get their way, and the Figure Eight folks are halfway there. The Senate last session passed legislation 41-8 to allow the Coastal Resources Commission to authorize the seawall as a pilot program to study its effect on the coast.

Experts already know the effect. It would protect the beach in front of the mansions and cause more erosion down the shore. The bill will be before the House when the General Assembly reconvenes in May and is likely to pass if recent history is any indication. Wealthy coastal interests often get their way.

I say let them build their damn wall with a small construction fee of $1 million per cubic yard of hardened material. The money should be left in an escrow account to buy out homeowners whose nearby properties are destroyed as a result of the project. Short of that, kill the sucker the minute it comes up in the House. Because if it gets to the floor, every person in North Carolina will see exactly how our government is for sale to the highest bidder.

Unless somebody in power stands up to them, the mansions will be protected and the beach will disappear from in front of property owned by people without lobbyists and political action committees.

That someone is Speaker Joe Hackney.

A

PS Can anyone tell me how Senator Kay Hagan voted on this particular bill last session? I'm holding my breath hoping she voted for the environment instead of wealthy business interests. (Or better yet, teach me to fish. I should know how to find out stuff like this by now.)