Casting OFF: maritime news

A five-year-long effort to revamp South Carolina’s crabbing laws might pick up steam this year.

Though the plan is far from settled, some suggestions winding their way through the state’s bureaucracy include:

• Reducing the number of commercial pots by 25 percent and limiting the number of new commercial licenses issued.

• Raising in-state commercial crabbing fees to $125 per license and $2 per pot. Fees are currently $50 and $1 per pot. License fees for out-of-state crabbers would increase substantially.

• Requiring “escape rings” on recreational pots for smaller crabs and turtles.

• Establishing programs to remove abandoned crab traps that continually catch and kill crabs and other marine life.

The state’s Marine Resource Advisory Committee endorsed these and other measures in September. But changes to the proposed laws are possible as they move to the S.C. Natural Resources Board and eventually the S.C. Legislature. Efforts to revamp crabbing laws began in 2002, but proposals failed to garner sufficient legislative sup- port. The renewed effort is spurred on in part by declining catches, effects of the ongoing drought and fears that out-of-state crabbers will take advantage of relatively lax licensing requirements.

Pier planned for James Island park

The 2.5-acre plot of waterfront property on James Island known as Sunrise Park is expected to undergo a few changes in the coming months, namely the addition of a pier.

The city of Charleston has budgeted up to $450,000 to build a 190-foot pier with a 20-foot by 20-foot pierhead and a 40-foot floating dock at the park, which was officially renamed Milton P. Demetre Park in 2000. The park is located on Wampler Drive near the James Island Yacht Club.

But parkgoers are split on whether the pier will make the park more enjoyable or take away from its quiet charm and air of solitude.

On one hand, the pier will afford a place in the park for anglers and crabbers and also give canoeists and kayakers access to the water.

“This is an opportunity to keep it a passive park and give the public some other options,” City Council- woman Kathleen Wilson told The Post and Courier.

Some residents, however, see the park as a sort of natural sanctuary that, if given a pier, would attract too many people

Wilson said the city is communicating with park’s neighbors about pier plans and efforts that will be made to prevent parking and traffic problems and to keep the park passive. Park hours — dawn to dusk — will be posted, she said, and police are being asked to patrol the area to keep it from be- coming a late-night hangout.

Commercial anglers get small tax break

Much like farmers, commercial fishermen are at the mercy of Mother Nature, with their own versions of droughts and floods to deal with, not to mention having to compete with prices set by traders on faraway markets.

That’s why the Internal Revenue Services decided to extend commercial fishermen a potential tax break previously available only to farmers. Under the American Jobs Creation Act of 2004, farmers were allowed to smooth out the ups and downs of their income cycles by averaging their income over a three-year period.

Now, local fishermen can do the same. Essentially, the provision applies to income from fishing “in which the fish harvested are intended to or do enter commerce through sale, barter or trade,” according to the IRS. For more information, visit www.irs.gov.>

Aquarium opens ‘marine debris’ exhibit

Cyrus Buffum

Charleston’s waters have a new pollution watchdog in town, and his name is Cyrus Buffum.

After working single-handedly for months to take on the role, the Waterkeeper Alliance asked him to do the job. The alliance is a network of more than 120 independent groups across the country and the world who patrol in boats looking for polluters, dumpers and anybody else who’s dirtying rivers and streams, then reports them to authorities.

Buffum, 24, has a physics degree from the College of Charleston and teaches sailing. He must now drum up community involvement, recruit research and legal experts, raise an estimated $100,000 to start up and operate the first year, and buy a boat.

Navy looks at Fla., S.C. for sonar range

A new U.S. Navy study is the basis of a proposal to build a massive sonar training range along the ocean bottom of the Southeast coast. The proposal is the Navy’s second attempt; the first plan was opposed by wildlife agencies and conservation groups worried about right whales and other marine species.

Using “new science” to study environmental impact, the Navy has concluded again (the previous study was done in 2006) that the 575-square mile grid of sonar noisemaking devices wouldn’t do any more than temporarily disrupt the whales. Conservationists worry that sonar and other man-made noises could deafen the whales or frighten them into lethal beach strandings and rapid surfacing.

The new study moves the Navy’s “preferred location” from off North Carolina, where three dozen whales of different species beached and died in 2005 after sonar blasts offshore, to off Jacksonville, Fla., considered the heart of the winter calving grounds. The range in Jacksonville would start 30 nautical miles farther out to sea than the designated critical habitat for the whale. The ocean off Charleston is one of two other alternatives in both studies.

Public hearings on the environmental impact statement were held in four cities, including Charleston on Oct. 6.

Charges dropped in surfer’s stabbing death

Prosecutors dropped murder and assault charges against Charles Richard Dobson Jr., of James Island last month. The 19-year-old fatally stabbed Craig Massey, a popular local surfer, and wounded two others during a confrontation at his home on July 2.

Solicitor Scarlett Wilson told The Post and Courier that witness statements and other evidence led prosecutors to conclude that Dobson acted in self-defense after Massey, 20, entered Dobson’s Teal Marsh Road home without invitation and attacked him. Some involved in the case have said the dispute was over a young woman.

County may maintain pier in Mt. Pleasant

The Charleston County Parks system and the town of Mount Pleasant are negotiating for the county to run and maintain the new 1,250-foot-long pier at Memorial Waterfront Park. “They run a pier, they run major parks. It makes really great sense,” Town Administrator Mac Burdette told The Post and Courier.

The agreement will go to Town Council and the PRC for approval as early as November.

If the agreement is approved, the town pier would be a county facility like the Folly Beach pier, PRC Executive Director Tom O’Rourke said, with one difference — it will be “an event pier that has fishing on it” as opposed to a “fishing pier that has events on it.”

The plan is for the PRC to receive proceeds from fishing fees and special events tickets as well as gift/tackle/snack shop sales in exchange for operating the pier, according to officials. The $14 million park next to the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge is scheduled to open in May or June 2009.

Researchers to scrutinize flushed medicines

Charleston Water System and Mount Pleasant Waterworks are participating in a two-year research project that will analyze trace amounts of medicines and personal care products flowing into the Plum Island sewer plant and, eventually, Charleston Harbor.

Conducted by the College of Charleston, the S.C. Sea Grant Consortium and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad- ministration (NOAA), the studies will attempt to pinpoint adjustments that could be made in the treatment process at Plum Island to minimize pharmaceuticals and like chemicals being discharged, according to CWS Chief Operating Officer Andy Fairey.

Charleston Water System also is participating in a separate NOAA study looking at triclosan, a common anti-bacterial ingredient in soaps, and it presence in the marine environment. Reseachers will measure the amount of triclosan being discharged from the Plum Island plant and then measure the amount of the chemical in local dolphins.

Charleston loses, then gains, a cruise ship

Charleston may be losing the Norwegian Majesty — the cruise ship that accounts for nearly three-quarters of the city’s cruise calls — but it’s gaining a 1,900-passenger luxury liner from Celebrity Cruises.

The Majesty was sold a few months ago to a company that sails overseas, casting a shadow over the future of cruise traffic in Charleston and concerning some tourism industry professionals. Beginning next year, the Mercury, which can hold about 400 more passengers than the Norwegian Majesty, will dock at the foot of Market Street. The ship will pull into Charleston four times between November 2009 and February 2010.

Field & Stream honors Charleston man

Field & Stream Magazine has named Charles Lane of Charleston a 2008 Hero of Conservation, an award that recognizes sportsmen dedicated to the grassroots protection of fish, wildlife and habitat.

Lane is featured in the October issue of the magazine and was in an episode of Field & Stream’s “HOC TV” that aired on www.FieldandStream.com/heroes in September. Lane will be honored along with six other heroes at a gala in New York City where he could be named Hero of the Year and be awarded a new Toyota Tundra. Each nominee will receive a $5,000 grant from Toyota to support his or her conservation projects. In 1989, Lane helped found the ACE Basin Project, which has protected more than 172,000 acres, including 40,000 acres of public hunting land.

Program could promote maritime careers

Representatives from the State Ports Authority, Charleston City Council, the Navy recruiting office and the ship repair industry met in September aboard the USS Philippine Sea to discuss helping Charleston County’s secondary schools prepare students for maritime careers.

The Navy cruiser, based in Mayport Naval Station near Jacksonville, Fla., motored to Pier Mike on the former Charleston Naval Base for the meeting.

“Not every kid who graduates is going to go to college,” re- tired Navy Rear Adm. Bob Besal told The Post and Courier. “We want a program where students come out of high school with a certificate of training that can put them into a job immediately making close to $40,000 to $50,000 a year.”

Sources: Tideline magazine staff, The Post and Courier and The Associated Press

Monster alligators bagged in first hunts

Mark Merting bagged this 12-foot, 2-inch brute on Lake Moultrie

Coastal hunters tangled with some true monsters this fall during South Carolina’s first alligator hunting season. Summerville resident Mark Merting (above) bagged this 12-foot, 2-inch brute on Lake Moultrie after 3½ hours of twisting, pulling and rope burns. A trio of hunters on Lake Marion also reportedly killed a gator topping 13 feet and 800 pounds.

The hunt goes through Oct. 11 and is open only to hunters who have secured one of the 1,000 permits distributed in a state-issued lottery.

Source: The Post and Courier

Ashley Hall girls chip in for Spirit

The Post and Courier

Spirit of South Carolina

Students at Ashley Hall’s upper school recently raised more than $4,000 toward ongo- ing repairs to Spirit of South Carolina, which is undergoing extensive repairs after the ship was struck by lightning earlier this summer off Block Island, R.I..

Many of the school’s students sailed aboard the ship during the 2007-08 school year. Ashley Hall, a Charleston private school for girls dating back to 1909, dedicated its Jeans Day on Sept. 13 to the tall ship. On Jeans Day, each student may attend school dressed in something other than the standard uniform in exchange for a 50-cent donation. Parents and teachers also pitched in to help fund the Spirit’s repairs.

Source: The Post and Courier