COASTAL OBSERVER

Over the next 10 years, Georgetown County plans to spend $1 million on beach access improvements to keep pace with its growing population.

Beth Goodale, the director of Parks and Recreation, knows that won’t be enough.

“We need more beach access and parking, but above all we need more ADA accessibility,” she said, referring to the federal Americans With Disabilities Act.

She has also talked with state and local leaders about keeping road rights of way free from encroachments that limit parking. A group of Pawleys Island area residents pressed the Town Council last week to help remove encroachments from Atlantic Avenue on the island’s north end.

“That’s the same conversation that the Litchfield folks are having,” Goodale said.

It’s a conversation that will ultimately involve the state Department of Transportation, which holds the right of way and is charged with keeping it clear.

The $1 million for improvements is a portion of about $18 million the county plans to collect from impact fees on new construction. The county adopted the fees in 2008 and revised them this year. They will raise about $7 million for transportation projects, $6 million for law enforcement and $5 million for recreation.

The recreation portion of the fee was initially used to build regional facilities. They were based on projections that the county would have 75,000 to 82,000 residents by 2030. That’s now expected to be 68,000, according to the state Office of Revenue and Fiscal Affairs, which estimates the county population will be still under 70,000 in 2042.

“We really don’t have capacity issues except in our water access,” Goodale said. “That was the only area we could support with facts and data.”

The $1 million from impact fees will be used to improve access at five locations with three of those featuring handicapped access. The plan is to make those improvements at Garden City, Goodale said.

“At Garden City, we have some room for improved accesses,” she said, adding that buying property on or near the beach is too expensive. “No one’s going to sell us an inch if they think it’s going to be used for access.”

There’s also an opportunity for the county to improve access by making sure its own rights of way are clear, said John Martin, president of the Litchfield Beaches Property Owners Association.

Those are on the unpaved street ends that lead to the beach accesses in North Litchfield. The association checked deeds and got surveys.

“Those are county owned roadways,” Martin said. “There’s 60-foot-wide right of way in most cases.”

Adjoining property owners have extended their landscaping into the rights of way.

“People try to drive their golf carts; there’s no place to park,” he said.

The golf carts are used by people living or vacationing in the neighborhood, but that impacts people who come from other places to use the beach, Martin said.

That’s why he thinks the county should clear the encroachments for golf carts.

“More people use less space,” Martin said, adding that, “I can see why the county is focused more on Garden City, because the density’s higher.”

But Goodale noted that the language in the impact fee ordinance that County Council adopted doesn’t actually specify Garden City. If other opportunities arise during the 10-year cycle, the money could fund them, she said.

The rest of the money collected for recreation will be used to build a courtesy dock at the Veterans Pier that adjoins the Murrells Inlet Marshwalk, improve the Murrells Inlet Boat Landing and landings on the Waccamaw River at Wachesaw and Hagley.

The impact fee isn’t the only source of funds for beach access. The county plans to start work this fall to renovate the south end parking lot on Pawleys Island. Even though it’s in the town limits, it is owned by the county and, with 79 spaces, is the largest free beach access in the county.

The county will use a grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to upgrade the surface and improve drainage. Goodale said the county has been working with the agency since the lot was submerged by the storm surge from Hurricane Dorian in 2019.

“Everything has now been approved,” she said. “That’s a huge thing. We can’t keep it the way it is.”

Goodale hopes that reconfiguring the lot might add a couple of extra parking spaces.

The access got an early upgrade this month when a nonprofit donated a woven plastic mat and a beach wheelchair. The Adaptive Surf Project started working with the town last year to install a Mobi-mat over the dune where a wooden walkway had been destroyed and then covered with sand from a renourishment project.

“Anybody with money that wants to partner, we say, ‘heck yes,’” Goodale said.

To make large-scale changes to beach access will involve the state, Goodale said. She spoke with state Rep. Lee Hewitt last year about getting the state Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism to expand parking at Huntington Beach State Park.

“Huntington’s got tons of land on that south end that could be used for parking,” she said.

The property is owned by Brookgreen Gardens and leased to the state.

“I have reached out to PRT and had those conversations,” Hewitt said. “I’ve had a lot of inquiries in the past about people lined up waiting to get in.”

He was told that the expanded parking would be on the agenda when the agency discusses Huntington Beach State Park.