The company that orchestrates new development on Kiawah Island says a spit of land off the southern end of their island is very stable, and that lawmakers should let them have access to tax-payer resources to encourage development.

But many say Kiawah Development Partners’ plan to develop the spit is fools gold and it’d be madness to allow access to federal flood insurance to encourage home ownership on the spit.

Generally, coastal areas are covered by the federal insurance but some areas fall in the “Coastal Barrier Resources System” and are considered too vulnerable and too ecologically important to be eligible for federal dollars. It’s a political, “No. I won’t buy you a car so you can drive it into that grocery store.”

And here’s why that law’s there: The spit of land, just south of Charleston County’s Beachwalker Park, shares a unique relationship with Seabrook Island, over the centuries the spit is joined only to Seabrook, or disappears completely, or becomes its own island.

Hurricane Hugo showed how this can play out on spits of land when it ruptured a spit on Pawleys Island similar to the one on Kiawah Island. A very similar thing also happened in 1954.

What’s it mean? And how’s it affect my pocket?

There’s nothing really stopping Kiawah Development Partners from building, but if they can get the land removed from the Coastal Barrier Resources System, it would make it more attractive to homeowners and make the land worth far more. And they had hoped our U.S. Rep. Henry Brown could get that classification changed.

But after a ton of outcry Brown removed his proposal to change the classification of the spit.

So now when you hear people talking about this spit, you’ll know what’s going on.

Want more background? Hop over to The Post and Courier. Want more rant? Head over to the Charleston City Paper.

Personally, I’ve always found building anywhere near the beach to be borderline madness. Wasn’t there something in the Bible about this?

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