River shacks on Lake Marion a blight?
Low Falls homeowners tackle removal of structures used by fishermen, hunters
By LORETTA DEMKO, T&D Correspondent
Sunday, February 04, 2007
LOW FALLS LANDING – When Jan Pittard and her husband moved to Low Falls Landing in Calhoun County, the area was just a fishing camp, with some weekend retreats located there but no permanent homes. Soon, the serene beauty of Lake Marion lured more people to build homes and live year-round at Low Falls.
Now, according to Pittard and members of the Low Falls Homeowners’ Association, the beauty and navigability of the lake is being spoiled by the increasing number of river shacks used by fishermen and hunters on the lake, and they want the shacks removed.
Environmentalists also want the state to force the removal of the river shacks.
The shacks are usually a wooden deck floating on a bed of 55-gallon drums. The enclosures often resemble the large tool sheds sold at hardware stores. In some cases, old camper shells have been placed on the bases.
Two decades ago, only a few of the structures could be found. But a recent survey by the South Carolina Coastal Conservation League counted 135 on nine rivers, mostly in the Lowcountry, and Lake Marion.
And, the State Legislature is jumping on the bandwagon to have the structures removed, too. Rep. David Umphlett, R-Moncks Corner, is planning to introduce legislation that calls for giving river shack owners five years to get them off the water and punishing the construction or use of new shacks as a misdemeanor with a $1,000 fine.
“We are finding them on rivers where there were none last year,” said Patrick Moore, project manager with Coastal Conservation League and American Rivers. “Unless we handle this now, what has been predominantly a Lowcountry problem will snowball into a statewide blight.”
Rep. Liston Barfield plans to fight the bill.
“I don’t own one, but I do use them. If you’re down there on the river and a storm comes up and you need (shelter), you better pray there’s one around. It could literally save your life,” said Barfield, R-Conway.
There are regulations the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the state Department of Health and Environmental Control could use against the shacks, but they all have major loopholes.
Regulations prohibit permanent structures that impede river navigation. But except in the cases of a few shacks bolted to trees, the owners could simply untie their structures and float down the river, claiming each site is temporary.
DHEC also could enforce sewage regulations because most of the shacks have sinks and toilets that flow directly into the water, which is against the law.
But no river shack owners have been fined, in part because making a case requires catching them in the act, said Rheta Geddings, assistant chief of DHEC’s Bureau of Water.
Officials have instead decided to ignore the structures, but that appears to have led to the building of more, and more intricate, shacks, some with gas generators, satellite television dishes and window air conditioners.
“The more they’re are out there, the more legal they seem,” Moore said.
As for Pittard, she says the river shacks have increased to the point where there are literally “subdivisions” of them lining the banks of Lake Marion.
“The Homeowners’ Association was started prior to 1988,” Pittard said. “We started it at that time, because there were a lot of robberies. After two years of being robbed, we decided to start a crime watchers’ group and see what could be done.”
The Association also decided to tackle the problem of river shacks.
“The river shacks were always here,” Pittard said, “but only about half as many as now, and for a long time we tolerated them.”
Then, about a year ago, a river shack was parked across the channel from a neighbor’s house, which Pittard said spoiled the view. That’s when the local residents got together with the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources and various politicians and law enforcement agencies to see what could be done about the structures.
One day Pittard saw a Department of Natural Resources boat, several other boats and a game warden across the channel near the new river shack, she said. The structure, however, was not removed from the lake but relocated further down the bank, Pittard said.
She complained that even though residents cannot by law put a sink for cleaning fish on their docks, the river shacks routinely empty sinks and toilets directly into Lake Marion. In addition, damaged or sinking shacks are just abandoned, Pittard said.
“Santee Cooper can’t burn them or blow them up,” she said, “so they become a hazard to navigation.”
According to Pittard, the shacks are extensively used around Thanksgiving by duck hunters. Many of these hunters are doctors, lawyers and politicians, she said, suggesting that’s probably a major reason why the structures are being protected.
Pittard says she and the other members of the Low Falls Homeowners’ Association are hoping Rep. Umphlett’s legislation will be passed. Umphlett attended one of the Homeowners’ meetings and told the group then that he planned to introduce the legislation.
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