Daufuskie wanted more cops for tourists. Now, they’re saying police making it ‘miserable’

Two months after requesting an increase in police presence — in the hopes of discouraging public drinking and reckless golf cart use by tourists — some Daufuskie Island residents and leaders are complaining about what one state representative called “petty” and “punitive” policing.

On Tuesday, Daufuskie Island Council held a special meeting at which residents shared concerns with S.C. Rep. Jeffrey Bradley and Lt. Chris Sankowski of the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office about the increase in policing on the island.

Residents also discussed a permit issue they say has resulted in more tickets and warnings for golf cart drivers on the small island — which is only accessible by boat and has about 400 residents.

Bradley said residents told him they were getting ticketed for “what they perceive to be nitpicky items” and that he plans to pursue a change in legislation to help them. Bradley said Friday he hadn’t seen data from the sheriff’s office showing how many tickets they were actually giving out.

In a Wednesday morning interview with The Island Packet, Bradley called the policing “punitive” and said that the tickets were “petty” responses from deputies for having to make the trip from Hilton Head Island to Daufuskie, which can take up to an hour depending on the weather and launch point.

In July, the Sheriff’s Office agreed to provide a presence seven days a week on Daufuskie after residents asked Sheriff P.J. Tanner for more officers to help control tourist behavior, according to Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Capt. Bob Bromage.

The increase in patrols represents a drastic change for islanders, who were accustomed to deputies only coming to the island in response to emergency calls. Bromage said the number of calls to Daufuskie each month were “relatively few” before the change.

The uptick in tourism on the island in recent years has led to “a real spike in visitor problems,” including impaired driving and damage to rental golf carts, Daufuskie Island Council Chairperson Deborah Smith told The Island Packet.

Now, Smith said residents are facing a new problem on Daufuskie.

She accused deputies of “camping out” on roads to write tickets for unregistered vehicles. She said deputies have taken an approach that has residents “almost afraid to go out and drive their golf carts.”

Bromage disputed the characterization and dismissed Bradley’s comment that the Sheriff’s Office was being “punitive” as “grand-standing.”

“That’s not what we do. We don’t wait around to give people tickets,” he said. “We move around ... we evenly patrol the island.”

How many tickets are they giving out?

Data from the Sheriff’s Office tells a different story from the problem Bradley and residents described.

From July 20 to Sept. 23:

• 67 traffic stops on Daufuskie Island resulted in warnings.
• Deputies issued nine tickets — three for open container law violations; one for a violation of child restraint laws; one for an unregistered vehicle; and one for a driver who did not have a license. A single driver received the remaining three tickets for operating a car with a suspended license, no registration and no insurance for the vehicle.
• The most common warnings were for unregistered vehicles and open container violations.
• At least one of the warnings was for driving on the beach.

Bromage said deputies issue many more warnings than actual tickets so that residents will change their behavior without having to pay a fine.

“We are trying to work with residents on Daufuskie Island to better educate them on the laws as it pertains to vehicles on public roadways,” he said.

After speaking with Tanner on Wednesday afternoon, Bradley changed his opinion of the deputies’ practices, and said he would no longer use the word “punitive” to describe the policing on Daufuskie.

Bradley did not clarify why he saw things differently now, but said he will still pursue a change in legislation so people on Daufuskie have a clear understanding of what is legal on island roads.

Problem with the law?

Smith and Bradley said Daufuskie Island residents — most of whom use golf carts as their main mode of transportation around the island — are getting warnings and tickets because of a technicality in state law.

The problem, Bradley said, is that the golf carts some residents use are not, in fact, golf carts, and are instead utility vehicles that look like a cross between an ATV and a golf cart.

Whereas regular golf carts are covered by a South Carolina law that only requires carts to be registered with the DMV, these utility vehicles do not qualify for registration under the law.

Bradley said he plans to meet with the DMV to talk about the issue, and that he proposes a technical correction in state law that will “make it easier for people on Daufuskie to use these vehicles.”

“We’re going to work to change the law so that it is understandable to the people of Daufuskie and the Sheriff’s Office,” he said.

Although he wants to close a gap in the law that resulted in only one ticket on Daufuskie since July, Bradley said he was still pursuing the change in legislation to clear up “confusion.”

Tourist problem?

Tourists are also complaining about the increase in law enforcement.

When Gale Rudolph, who wrote a letter about her experience in The Island Packet, and her husband visited from Utah this summer, she said a deputy pulled over their rented golf cart on their drive home from dinner. She said her husband, who was not driving, was holding a beer can and received an $82 ticket for an open container violation. Another person in the six-person cart was also issued an open container violation ticket, according to Rudolph.

“I understand the law and we were breaking it,” she said. “I think it was very humiliating the way the deputy handled it,” she added, saying the deputy stopped her and her party on the side of the road for almost 30 minutes.

Rudolph said the incident embarrassed her so much that it’s “doubtful I’ll ever set foot back on Daufuskie with those kinds of policies and that kind of welcoming.”

Smith, speaking on behalf of Daufuskie residents, fired back at the tourists in her own letter to the editor.

Smith wrote that Daufuskie doesn’t “welcome those who threaten our wildlife and put others in harm’s way by ignoring the law.”

But now, Smith said the Sheriff’s Office is taking it too far by pulling over residents too often.

“It’s a long way from when we were hoping to have (the) Sheriff’s Office help us with these visitor issues,” she said.

What’s next?

Bradley suggested there is less of a need for law enforcement on Daufuskie now that tourist season is over.

“Maybe they should just go back to business as usual,” he said Wednesday.

But Bromage said the Sheriff’s Office is doing the job residents asked them to do on the island. He said although there were few calls for service before, the deputies have been cracking down on impaired driving and unregistered vehicles because they cannot enforce some laws and not others.

Smith said she was unsure on how to fix the problem going forward.

“We shouldn’t have this choice of ‘we have no law enforcement and no protection,’ or ‘everyone’s lives are made miserable,’” she said.

This story was originally published September 28, 2018 at 5:57 PM.