Renourisment in Folly’s Future

Folly’s beaches are about to get lot of sand. $20.4 million worth of sand, in fact. The Fiscal Year 2013 Work Plan by the Office of Management and Budget released this month includes over $20 million for the US Army Corps of Engineers to renourish Folly.

The barrier island looses a little more sand with every tropical storm or hurricane that brushes the coast. And dwindling beaches, houses very close to the water’s edge, and closed county parks are just some of the symptoms of beach erosion. The issue also plagues the island’s wildlife, like the loggerhead turtles who come to nest each year.

But the approved funds, along with the City of Folly Beach’s 15 percent cost share, means that 1.5 million cubic yards of sand can be pumped from the bottom of the ocean to the almost five and a half miles of Folly’s beaches.

“Please drop a line of thanks to Sen. Lindsey Graham, who fought long and hard to get us $20,400,000,” writes Mayor Tim Goodwin in the July Sandspur, the monthly publication from the City of Folly Beach. “Rep. Jim Clyburn was also very helpful.”

This renourishment project will work in harmony with the renourishment project recently completed at the Folly Beach County Park site, which has just invested $3.5 million to add more sand to the park space and to build a terminal groin to help alleviate future erosion.

Construction is scheduled to begin at the end of October.