Flooding plagues Beaufort Co. neighborhood as finger-pointing prolongs solution
After a few inches of rainfall, the Alljoy community is often blanketed in water.
Sometimes, the flooding is so bad that water blurs street lines and overfills drainage ditches, making it difficult to differentiate between the road and ditches. This happened in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in 2017.
In the community near Bluffton, residents rely on septic systems. Some say that when a torrent hits, water inundates their septic systems, which causes waste to seep into the flooded streets and makes it impossible for some people to flush their toilets.
“That smell isn’t the Lowcountry,” said longtime resident Bill Bodiford, who lives off Shad Avenue.
Bodiford and other Alljoy residents say it’s been this way for at least a decade. With more people moving into the low-lying neighborhood that abuts the May River, the problem has only gotten worse.
Locals worry about pollution in the 15-mile long waterway. They fear damage to their homes. And many say they’ve been decrying the flooding problems but that “no one is taking ownership” for cleaning out the stopped-up ditches, which block water from flowing as it should. Some say their drainage ditches haven’t been cleaned out in over a decade.
Beaufort County leaders said they have taken several steps to alleviate the problem. The most recent attempt came in 2019, when the county’s storm water management utility board launched a study that would’ve sought solutions such as a storm water pond and a small pump station. However, residents balked because the plan would’ve required property buyouts and easements.
Now, as recent storms have brought heavy rains, residents, county leaders, the area and the fate of the May River hang in limbo. And any overhaul to fully alleviate the flooding won’t happen overnight and will likely come with a price tag in the millions.
‘We mess up the May River, we’re done’
At the corner of Garnett Street and Thomas Lawton Drive, a drainage ditch thick with vegetation had overflowed after a night of rain in July. The water pooled into the street and crept into Brad Young’s front yard, where another drainage ditch brimmed.
To Young, an Alljoy resident and owner of May River Oyster Company, that rain shower was nowhere near the worst he’s experienced. Other times, flooding has caused his septic system to fail, making it impossible to flush the toilets in the home.
“It’s a constant struggle,” Young said.
He said he’s made many calls to the state transportation department, which owns and manages the drainage ditches on Thomas Lawton Drive that run in front of his home. Nothing was done, he said.
According to SCDOT records, sections of Thomas Lawton’s drainage pipes were cleaned between 2017 and 2022. Two of the cleanings included nearly the whole street — once in November 2017 and the second in March 2019. The most recent cleaning of the drainage pipes, in March, covered about two-thirds of the street.
Young points to problems created when the drainage pipes were laid in Alljoy, saying some go uphill or are curved, meaning it’s harder for the water to flow straight into the May River.
In some drainage ditches, the still water is green and bubbling, which Young said was caused by some neighbors spraying weed killer. But the weed killer is just one worry when it comes to runoff. Residents say they’re also concerned about septic waste flowing to the May River after significant flooding.
Bodiford said the waterway is so vital to the ecology of the Lowcountry that he likened it to chicken soup used to cure a cold.
“We mess up the May River, we’re done,” Bodiford said.
A 2020 May River Watershed Action Plan indicated that as Bluffton has rapidly grown, fecal coliform levels found in the waterway have risen, sometimes forcing the closure of shellfish beds. Fecal coliform is a bacteria that appears in the intestines and feces of people and animals. When the bacteria is in a water sample it often indicates recent fecal contamination.
A plan shot down
Eighteen-year resident Bob Williams’ home is about a 10-minute walk from the Alljoy boat landing.
Recently, he said that after years of sending photos and asking the county to fix the ditch near his Martha Lane home, the drainage ditch was cleaned. However, he added, the county did not clean out the adjacent ditches, meaning overflow in those ditches would continue posing flooding issues.
Williams in part blames the dirt road for the blocked drainage ditches along Martha Lane. If the road was paved, he said dirt sediment wouldn’t end up plugging the ditches so easily.
Chris Ophardt, the county’s public information officer, said routine maintenance of drainage ditches in county-owned areas is “based on size, watershed, tidal influence, reported problems, and visual inspections.”
However, because they require more planning and effort, the county’s large canals and flow areas are maintained every five to 10 years. Katie Herrera, the county’s storm water manager, said some vegetation can help absorb the water volume.
Like Beaufort County, the state Department of Transportation, which maintains the state-owned drainage ditches, maintains those ditches on a rotation but notes the county responds to individual maintenance requests. SCDOT’s statewide aim is to maintain drainage ditches every six years, said the department’s director of communications, Pete Poore.
Over the past two years and after multiple meetings with Alljoy residents, the county has responded “many” times “in an attempt to help alleviate any flooding or perceived flooding issues,” Ophardt said. He added that the state and county share responsibility for some streets, like Thomas Lawton Drive and Alljoy Road.
The county’s work included the following projects, which totaled about $100,000:
Cleaning out the main outfall channel located at Thomas Lawton Drive and Oyster Street.
Reconstructing the outfall at Brighton Beach.
Cleaning roadside ditches at nine locations, including Thomas Lawton Drive and Martha Lane.
Cleaning about 60 driveway and cross-line pipes in the area.
Despite the maintenance the county and state have recorded, it hasn’t stopped widespread flooding after storms from inundating the neighborhood. And the problem doesn’t just lie in Alljoy.
While the problem primarily affects Alljoy, some nearby communities also suffer. About 5 minutes away on higher ground and in Bluffton after a heavy storm following days of rain, Melissa Perri’s home on Drayson Circle was surrounded by water like a moat.
After numerous calls to the county and state — and after both said it was the other’s responsibility — a SCDOT representative visited. But because the drain of concern, the one that runs behind Perri’s house, is county-owned, the SCDOT representative said the state couldn’t help. All SCDOT could do was watch Perri and her neighbor dig out the drain themselves, Perri said. Twenty minutes after the two scooped out the drain, the water had significantly dissipated.
“What happens during hurricane season if we get a bad one?” Perri asked. “Some of my neighbors were telling me they have tried everything and they just gave up because nobody responded.”
Town-wide problem
The county assures it’s “certainly aware” that the low-lying Alljoy needs a comprehensive plan to deal with flooding issues.
In February 2019, two years after Hurricane Irma, the county’s storm water management utility board proposed a study that would’ve addressed flooding from rain and higher tides.
Likely, the fix would’ve required some residents to sell their houses and move; some other residents to give up control over portions of their land through easements; and development of a storm water pond and a small pump station.
The easements would’ve helped with storm water but would have restricted property owners’ fences and future structures, Ophardt said. However, it would’ve allowed the county full access to keep clear and in some places dig culverts and ditches.
The county had identified 27 properties in the area that would’ve been affected, according to the 2019 proposal presented in a Stormwater Management Utility Board meeting. Three properties would’ve required buyouts and the rest easements. Alljoy, including a section called Brighton Beach, has 310 houses.
When recently asked if they remember the proposal, a handful of residents had no recollection of it, saying they were never told. Other residents owning private property balked at the plan because they didn’t want to give up their land, which stopped it in its tracks, according to the county.
“We just can’t come in blazing and take your property if you’re not willing to participate,” Herrera said.
Had the project moved forward and not been shot down by November 2019, estimated costs of completion could’ve been in the millions, coming from grants, cost shares and storm water utility fees. Herrera pointed to the Shell Point assessment – in a similarly sized neighborhood that lies north of the Broad River – that aims to fix flooding issues that has a price tag of $7.5 million.
Now, the county is looking to nail down a federal grant from the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program to study the issue. The study would take about 1.5 years to complete and provide a comprehensive, community-wide plan to address flooding in Alljoy, Herrera explained.
“It’s not an option to never flood, unfortunately,” she said.
Ophardt added that the conditions existed in Alljoy before any development or building happened in the area.
Cart before the horse
Luckily, Perri and her neighbors are connected to the sewer line, which keeps waste from running into the floodwater. But in Alljoy, septic systems worsen the problems caused by flooding, leaving it with floating waste, residents say.
In January 2021, a letter from the Beaufort-Jasper Water and Sewer Authority noted it was considering installing a public sewer line.
“We are considering at the request of several of your neighbors near Scotia Street, Tillman Street, and Thomas Lawton Drive and some other neighboring streets,” the letter read.
At an Alljoy Preservation Commission meeting on Aug. 2, Beaufort County Councilman Mark Lawson attending residents said he repeatedly told residents they have to make their voices heard. When it comes to getting a sewer system and fixing drainage issues, he said the “squeaky wheel gets the grease.”
Residents say they’ve repeatedly voiced concerns, it just feels like they’re shouting into a void.
This story was originally published September 19, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
