Oak Island to restore vegetation line

OAK ISLAND — The decision to allow people to build closer to the water is getting positive reactions on Oak Island.

Sections of Oak Island were devastated in Hurricane Floyd, especially its beach. After a number of beach re-nourishment projects Oak Island town officials are giving some beach front homeowners the option of rebuilding or adding to their property.

After Hurricane Floyd coastal management officials deemed certain parts of the beach unstable to rebuild on and designated a vegetation line. That meant homeowners on or in front of that line were only allowed to repair or maintain their homes, and could not make any additions to them.

But after a unanimous vote from the Coastal Resources Commission, the vegetation line will be restored back to where it was in 1998, before Hurricane Floyd.

Now more than 40 homeowners will have the room to upgrade.

Oak Island Mayor Johnnie Vereen says natural disasters are things you can’t predict, but, giving people the right to build on their own property is something you can.

Vereen said, “It doesn’t take a hurricane to remove a house. If they burn down they’ll be able to rebuild and people are entitled to that, they bought the property.”

The new line extension is scheduled to come into effect sometime in April. A month later, town officials hope to further extend the line of vegetation to encompass as many as four hundred homes if the town of Oak Island will continue an annual beach nourishment project.