Holden Beach town leaders hammer out noise ordinance

HOLDEN BEACH, NC (WWAY) — Holden Beach town leaders are fine tuning their noise ordinance.

April of last year the Holden Beach Property’s Owners Association went to the town commission about its noise ordinance.

Tom Myers, Holden Beach Property Owners Association President, said they wanted a more specific ordinance with an actually number of decibel levels to determine if there’s excessive noise. He said they wanted the ordinance to model Brunswick County’s which had recently adopted a new ordinance. He said Brunswick County’s ordinance called for measuring noise decibel levels.

“Our members thought there needed to be a more objective ordinance that needed to be more consistently enforced,” said Myers.

Myers said big wedding receptions and loud parties were disrupting the quiet beach town.

“People come here to relax, enjoy time with their families, they don’t want to be interrupted,” said Myers.

Town Commissioner Kim Isenhour said the noise ordinance was a short paragraph that instructed people to call the police for noise complaints.

“It did not protect our police officers when they showed up at a scene and it certainly did not protect anybody who was suffering from any sort of noise issue,” said Isenhour.

Isenhour said the updated ordinance is meant to resolve that issue. She said it allows for noise levels to reach 60 decibels during the day and 50 decibels at night between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. in residential areas.

“Basically a police officer can then take that decibel meter and it’s like a radar gun. It is a definite number that our police officers can use it to say this activity is too loud,” said Isenhour.