By BILL HERBKERSMAN
STATE REPRESENTATIVE

In last week’s column, I addressed the fact that I had received quite a few letters, e-mails and calls from the good folks in Sun City regarding the Phase V lagoon and stormwater management system, and the ongoing enforcement difficulties with the developer. From what these communications convey, there are issues that need to be addressed.

I have passed these concerns, as well as my own, to the authorities at the state Department of Health and Environmental Control Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management. The environmental regulators at the state level know me, and the seriousness with which I view these matters. They hear from me often and they know I will follow up, and if their response is not timely and/or satisfactory, there will be consequences.

Having said that, let me also say that the scientists and technicians working for us at DHEC-OCRM are a smart and dedicated group of public servants who have endured perennial underfunding and still manage to do a creditable job.

However, they are rarely as timely in their investigations or as decisive in their findings as I would like. They do the best they can, given the resources at their disposal.

The stormwater management problem at Sun City exemplifies the single most serious threat, short of a catastrophic hurricane or earthquake, facing the Lowcountry and specifically Beaufort County. At high tide, almost 60 percent of our county is covered in water. If we allow the runoff from all our roads, rooftops and driveways to join that diurnal inundation without proper filtration, we will not be living in paradise for long. If we let our water quality go bad, we can kiss our property values goodbye, not to mention our visitor-based economy.

As a developer, I know that good stormwater management is expensive. As an informed legislator and charter member of Friends of the Rivers, I know what it takes to protect and maintain the water quality that is the foundation of our prosperity in Beaufort County.

In fact, my latest development, the Calhoun Street Promenade in downtown Bluffton is engineered so that, except for 100-year storms, all our runoff is contained on the site. Any water flowing to the May River is at least as clean as when it fell from the sky.

In addition, my system takes runoff from surrounding areas and infiltrates it back into the earth, a far more costly but infinitely more effective system than is currently required.

Needless to say, I am pushing as hard as possible for a solution to the Sun City situation. I am also impressed and gratified that this community is as energized about the necessity of proper Best Management Practices (BMP) for stormwater as they are. I have received well over 100 letters, e-mails and calls from just this neighborhood. They are seeing firsthand some of the consequences of a system that may have been poorly designed, or perhaps simply not properly maintained.

Interestingly, both Beaufort County and Bluffton, after years of study, now have state-of-the-art design manuals for their Best Management Practices (BMP) for stormwater. We may be seeing the first instance of the retrofitting of older systems to conform to the newer BMPs.

With our rivers, our economy, and our property values at stake, the concerned and engaged residents of Sun City just may provide the political muscle to make it happen.

Bill Herbkersman is chairman of the Beaufort County Legislative Delegation. He represents District 118 in the S.C. House of Representatives. Contact him by phone at 757-7900 or via his Web site: www.herbkersman.com