DNR backtracks on dock length, settling on 1,000-foot limit

Private recreational docks in Coastal Georgia will be limited to 1,000 feet long or 1,100 feet with a variance under rules approved Tuesday by a committee of the Georgia Board of Natural Resources. The recommendation won’t be formalized until the full board votes on the measure at its next meeting in December.

Dock size has proven to be a contentious issue. The board went into Tuesday’s meeting prepared to vote on a proposal that would have allowed private recreational docks reaching up to 1,650 feet into the publicly owned salt marsh. That length would have outstripped what neighboring states allow and would have increased by more than 50% the current limit in Georgia.

But Coastal Georgians are proud and protective of their salt marsh, a swath of nearly 400,000 acres of salt-tolerant grasses that provides recreation, flood protection, wildlife habitat, and spectacular views from Cumberland Island to Tybee. Of 342 written comments to DNR about the proposed regulations, only four supported them as written. The remainder objected, many of them focused on the length of the fixed walkway.

“The real objection was the extension from 1,000 feet up to 1,500 feet,” Jill Andrews, the assistant director at the Coastal Resources Division, told the board.

Dozens of people traveled to the board meeting in Atlanta Tuesday and eight spoke against the proposed rule, with most zeroing in on length. Alice Keyes of One Hundred Miles spoke out against long docks that would benefit only a few individuals “with wealth and political influence,” as public documents obtained by both One Hundred Miles and The Current GA revealed.

“Including the allowance of 1,500-foot walkways was a change made in the 11th hour, without consultation with division staff, experts, or scientists, and without due consideration for the stakeholder report or public concerns,” Keyes said. “Adopting the rule in its current form will enable a few well-connected individuals to immediately get what they want. But once a harmful rule is adopted, the door is wide open for anyone else to come and do the same, privatizing and diminishing our precious public salt marsh.”

Carolyn Rader, a board member of the Center for a Sustainable Coast, also noted that “there’s just a few people who want this 1,500 feet because they want to have access to water.”

“Well, they should have figured that out before they bought their property,” said Rader, whose father helped found the Center. “So I’m sorry. Sometimes some people have to be told no, just like children have to be told no.”

Speakers from other environmental groups, including The Nature Conservancy, the Georgia Conservancy, Birds Georgia, the Southern Environmental Law Center piled on reasons to reject docks that would be “longer than the Bank of America building is tall,” as Courtney Reich of the Georgia Conservancy put it.

The long docks are an eyesore, they harm marsh birds, they potentially increase the amount of marine debris created in hurricanes, the commenters said.

Michael O’Reilly, director of government relations for the Nature Conservancy, urged the board to honor the 1970 Coastal Marshlands Protection Act, a landmark state law credited with preserving the salt marsh. Attorney Craig Pendergrass noted that the state leases the state property on which these long docks would be built at no cost, a “very clear problem under the Georgia Constitution’s gratuities clause.”

When the public comment concluded, Coastal Committee member Bill Jones, chairman emeritus and a director of the Broadmoor/Sea Island Company and director of the Peter Millar Company, immediately made a motion.

“I’d like to make this motion based on the comments we did receive prior to this meeting, and based on the thoughtful comments we got at this meeting, so I would move that we limit the fixed walkway length to 1,000 feet with a 10% variance,” Jones said.

The new rule still includes changes that environmentalists and others reject, including an allowed width of 6 feet for dock walkways to accommodate golf carts, and a failure to address electrical inspections. But there was relief that the longest docks were no longer under consideration.

“We’re grateful to the DNR board for listening to the hundreds of Georgians who spoke out for balanced rules for private recreational docks — and for honoring our state’s long history of working together to protect our salt marsh,” Keyes wrote in a statement to The Current GA. “While the proposed new rule isn’t perfect, the amendments added today represent a big victory for all of us who love our coast and want to protect it for future generations.”

Coastal Committee Chair Nancy Addison confirmed that the full board will vote on the revised rules at the Dec. 1 board meeting at Lake Blackshear Resort after a 30-day public comment period.