Brunswick Beacon, 10.03.24
On 9/17, I tried driving to Wilmington for a doctor’s appointment. I spent three hours driving in circles following detours around washed-out sections of Rte. 17. Every detour I took led to another state trooper and another detour. I finally gave up, concluding, as New Englanders say, “you can’t get there from here.”
September’s unnamed storm dropped 20 inches of rain on Brunswick County, our third 1,000-year rainfall event in nine years, after Hurricanes Joaquin in 2015 and Florence in 2018! While NC’s Republican federal, state and local officials denied and ignored climate change, Mother Nature just said, “hold my beer.”
But Mother Nature also gave us a free, healthy, beautiful way to drink up that rain before it causes destructive floods. One celebrated by poets like Joyce Kilmer: “I think that I shall never see, a poem lovely as a tree. A tree whose hungry mouth is pressed against the earth's sweet flowing breast.”
You’d have to be incredibly short-sighted (or greedy) to let developers destroy something that precious. Brunswick is NC’s fastest-growing county, and seventh fastest-growing in the country, because our County Commissioners protect developers, who fund their campaigns, instead of residents, who they are elected to serve. When residents object, they’re cut off, ignored, excluded from meetings and told to be grateful! After this deluge, Chairman Forte heartlessly said, “only one person died, and it was his fault.”
Commissioners have approved 34,005 housing units since January 2021, and have allowed a super-abundance of golf courses, which clear-cut trees for views. Bloomberg’s land-use map of the US tellingly labels Brunswick County’s usage as “golf.”
In “The Prince of Tides,” Jimmy Buffett sang this warning: “The low country sinks, she cannot swim. The dogwood feels the hurt. While the foursome plays on borrowed days, in their alligator shirts.”
Trees can’t vote. You can. Stop overdevelopment. Elect Tom Simmons, Jonathan D’Amico, and Bob Fulton as County Commissioners.
Vince Amoroso
Sunset Beach
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