By Shannon Cavanaugh
Contributing Writer

Folly Beach residents watched as $12 million and a summer-long U.S. Army Corps of Engineers beach renourishment effort washed out to sea.

“This is absolutely unbelievable. One week ago where the waves are breaking now was sand, and it’s gone,” said Dave Dixon, building contractor and local surfer. “This is crazy. The water’s almost up to the dunes again here on the east end of the island. The renourishment is such a waste, but what else can you do to fix it?”

Though the project was 50% completed, some, like Dixon, are calling it a wash out. In May, the corps started pumping in 2.3 million cubic yards of sand from three miles offshore to spread out and renourish more than five miles of Folly Beach. It was an attempt to put back what tropical storms and Hurricane Gaston took in 2004 and to rebuild a buffer to protect homes and a tourism industry that attracts more than 650,000 people to the area each year.

A spokeswoman with the corps’ Charleston District office confirmed that parts of the renourished beach are eroding at a much higher rate than expected due to strong winds and the wave action from Hurricane Ophelia that sat offshore for days, beating against the renewed beach. The corps shut down the project until the storm passed and was to restart Sept. 19.

“At this point, it’s speculative. We’re monitoring and measuring the beach to see how much new sand we’ve lost. When we renourish, we always put more sand than is necessary and let it level out,” said Alicia Gregory, the corps’ public affairs officer. “But with these strong winds coming from the north, it causes more beach erosion. The extra sand doesn’t have time to settle.”

The corps does not “legislate” when to renourish the beach. Congress does, and they required the Corps to spend the $12 million by the end of the fiscal year, Sept. 30, or lose it, Gregory said.

The corps moved “quickly” to bid out the project within four months and started pumping sand in mid-May with a goal to finish in September. But equipment problems and uncontrollable weather have delayed the project. Crews still have about 2.5 miles of beach to renourish from the Folly Beach pier to the Charleston County park on the west end of the island.

“It’s like playing Russian Roulette, but I would do it all over again. If these homeowners didn’t have the new sand we’ve put down so far, they wouldn’t have a home. They would take a direct hit from the ocean and that would have caused complete devastation,” said a crewman who asked to remain anonymous.

“What we’re doing is buying property owners more time. You can just see the property values go up as we go by with our equipment and spread out the new sand. Like anywhere else, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. Right now, Edisto’s hollering for more sand, and they’ll probably get their money next year.”

Congress has listened twice to the calls of help from Folly Beach for more sand. In 1993, the federal government spent $11.7 million to renourish the shores of Folly Beach and repair nine groins. That project started in January and finished in May. Sand that was expected to last five years lasted more than eight.

During the 1993 project, the corps had to go back and replace part of the renourished area with an additional 300,000 cubic yards of sand as the result of a March storm. The 1993-renourishment efforts saved $1.9 million in storm damage costs and added $1.4 million annually in recreation benefits, the corps said.

The need for this year’s renourishment came ahead of schedule, after a heavy hurricane season in 2004. Erosion was so bad that some houses and even a main island street were about to fall into the water. Again Congress approved funding, costing around $12 million, but only after U.S. Rep. Henry Brown, R-Hanahan, lobbied hard to stop legislators from eliminating beach renourishment funds from the corps’ 2005 budget, making it possible for Folly Beach to apply for the Pre-Disaster Mitigation grant administrated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

While there are no corps measurements as of now on the effectiveness of taxpayers’ money or the total amount of sand loss from the “nor-easter” winds, volunteers who walk the beach each day checking on nesting turtles reported on their Web site that about one-third of the new sand is gone.

Folly Beach resident Bob Poole calls it a big disappointment. He anticipated the sand would last much longer.

“Just a year ago when I stepped off the 11th street walk over, water splashed at my feet,” said Poole. “There’s sand there now, but what a disappointment. I’m really surprised at how quickly the new sand eroded. It’s terrible, but it’s Mother Nature, and what are you going to do?”

Other homeowners and developers are calling city officials with their complaints and concerns, not understanding why sand that was supposed to last for years is eroding in a matter of days.

“What people don’t understand is that the renourishment is working, doing exactly what it’s supposed to. It’s there to protect their property, not just give them a pretty beach to lie on. Renourishment is to prevent storm damage,” said Aaron Pope, Folly Beach’s zoning administrator. “The city here does not require any setbacks from the oceanfront property other than the baseline enforced by the Office of Coastal Resource Management. But just because you can legally build that close to the ocean, doesn’t mean you should. There’s a very high risk of erosion and damage.”

The homeowner at 2 Summer Place is giving up and moving to higher ground. Joanne Schultz has spent more than $130,000 in three years buying rocks and sand bags, building controversial seawalls and paying for legal fees to keep her home from falling into the ocean. Unlike other ocean front homeowners on Folly, Schultz and three other families had to pay $10,000 each to the government before the corps would renourish the beach in front of their homes because their homes, on the east end of the island, were not included in the original renourishment plan.

“I was more than happy to pay for the sand. The water was lapping at my pilings, but I’m just tired of fighting it and decided to get rid of the house. I have to say the (ocean) scared the heck out of me,” said Schultz, who bought the house three years ago. “Before renourishment, the house was not sellable, but now it’s safe, safe as any house built on the ocean at Folly Beach. What I don’t understand is why people keep building so close to the ocean.”

A seashell’s throw away from Schultz’ home, two new homes are going up on property that Schultz says was once partially under water until the corps renourished the beach in June.

Greenville developer Pete Manos bought a quarter-acre beachfront lot, divided it and resold it as two, one-eighth-acre lots. Dixon told the Business Journal he is supposed to build a 2,800-square-foot home and a swimming pool on each lot.

Dixon is rebuilding one seawall, making it six feet deeper and tying it into a second seawall to hold back the waters that are sure to come. From the 40-miles-per-hour winds of Hurricane Ophelia, water pushed within feet of the property’s first seawall and took with it another chunk of sand.

“I’m not an engineer, but I’m not a dummy either,” said Dixon as he looks over the construction site. “The ocean’s a lot stronger than anything the corps can ever do or anything I can ever build.”

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