OAK ISLAND — Leaders in a Brunswick County beach town are prioritizing stormwater infrastructure and road safety after historic flooding inundated roadways and forced the town wastewater utility to suspend service.
READ MORE: Sewer utility services halted for some Oak Island residents
ALSO: With few answers, NCDOT asks for patience as it works toward opening collapsed roadways
Oak Island and other Brunswick County towns declared a state of emergency after a tropical cyclone rapidly poured almost 2 feet of rain in areas of the county within days.
“I’ve been here my whole life,” resident Luke Davis said. “I’ve never seen a hurricane dump that much rain that quickly.”
Mayor Elizabeth White said the storm will reorient the council to focus on long-term storm resiliency. She said she’d prioritize stormwater drainage upgrades, including routine maintenance and capital improvement projects, as well as planning for future storms.
“Our focus has always been to get people off the island to safety,” she said. “What was unique about this is, we were having to encourage people to stay in place because it wasn’t safe to go anywhere. Those are two very different paradigms from a planning perspective.”
White estimated emergency workers carried out 45 rescues Monday. She noted the town’s damage assessment team hasn’t been able to survey the full impact of the storm; the town is requesting residents provide flood damage reports on its site.
“Our beaches fared fairly well, but our streets are an absolute mess,” she said Tuesday.
Town spokesperson Michael Emory told Port City Daily Wednesday most of Oak Island’s major streets have reopened, but beachfront roads, including Ocean Drive and Pelican Drive, remain closed.
Oak Island paused wastewater services in neighborhoods throughout the town after rain inundated pump stations Monday; services are expected to fully return Wednesday.
According to the town’s most recent notice, service areas still affected include:
- All homes on SE 49th Street through SE 57th Street
- Homes on E Pelican Drive from SE 46th Street to SE 58th Street
Councilmember Bob Ciullo noted the town hadn’t been forced to shut off sewer services since Hurricane Isaias struck the island in 2020. Town officials estimated Isaias caused $40 to $45 million in damage to property, infrastructure, and the town’s dunes.
Ciullo praised ongoing recovery efforts by town staff and favorably compared Oak Island’s local situation to other regions in the county.
“We’ve got the sewer issue,” he said. “On a global level, it’s much deeper. On a Brunswick County level, it’s very different.”
Brunswick County spokesperson Meagan Kascsak told Port City Daily Tuesday evening around 130 roads were closed by the storm. Around 25 roads remain blocked countywide, according to NCDOT’s traffic information website. Even as flood water recedes, there are at least 13 massive sinkholes to nine full collapses.
“The sewer is probably the least of our problems,” White said.
The mayor is primarily concerned with the long-term viability and safety of the county’s road system. The North Carolina Department of Transportation stated portions of U.S. 17 and N.C. 211 will remain closed for the foreseeable future due to the storm.
Resident Luke Davis argued the fast pace of development in the area has strained infrastructure and diminished flood resiliency.
“They need to do something about all the building,” he said. “Because that’s a new problem. We don’t have as many trees and wetlands to take in the water.”
Davis cited recent clearcutting near Southport, as well as the Williamson Tract, a 7,200-unit proposed development near Swain’s Cut Bridge in Oak Island’s mainland.
Ciullo said it was possible development contributed to standing water but didn’t view it as a driving factor in Oak Island’s current flooding. However, he argued the storm should serve as a wake-up call to ensure infrastructure is in place to maintain safety.
“You know in towns when people say: ‘Instead of a stop sign here, we need a red light?’” he asked. “Because somebody’s going to get killed here someday. Then somebody runs a stop sign and kills somebody. Then they put a red light in. Sometimes it takes a catastrophic situation to happen before action is taken.”
Councilmember Bill Craft disputed arguments that development contributed to the historic flooding. He praised recent accomplishments from town council — including tree ordinance policy and house size limits — but advocated for more emphasis on stormwater management in upcoming meetings.
“We do so many things right, but I think we have put stormwater management on the backburner,” councilmember Bill Craft said. “And this may be our call to action to get it off the backburner.”
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