Windfall stirs up beach battle: Preservation of shoreline: good sense or a perk for rich homeowners? (Kevin Moran, Houston Chronicle)
Texas is poised to receive $240 million in federal money to preserve erosion-prone parts of the state’s 367-mile Gulf coastline, but some question whether it is wise to keep building and rebuilding beaches that could quickly be destroyed by a storm.
Some people involved in coastal issues say such projects make good sense because they help maintain the tourism industry, which pumps an estimated $7.5 billion a year into the economies of the state’s 18 coastal counties. The supporters say the projects also promote development that boosts property-tax revenues in cash-strapped coastal cities such as Galveston and Corpus Christi.
Critics of beach building, however, say adding sand to existing beaches or renourishing eroded ones protects the property of a relative few who can afford beach homes.
“There’s just a bunch of well-off people who have been very imprudent, even stupid, and they’ve built their buildings right next to a beach,” said Orrin Pilkey, a coastal geologist and director of Duke University’s Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines. “They’re asking us to pay for restoring the beach when all we have to do is tell them to move their buildings and the beach will be restored.”
In the end, Mother Nature is going to win, but it’s worth considering sensible ways that we can work to slow erosion while protecting public access to Texas beaches.
It’s surprising that Ellis Pickett, a local beach erosion expert/activist, was not quoted or mentioned in the story.