Agency seeks to preserve shorelines

With climate change pushing sea water levels even higher, maintaining local shorelines is becoming even more of a challenge.

Middle Peninsula Chesapeake Bay Public Access Authority (PAA) is charged with setting aside public access sites for all types of recreational activities important to the area’s economy and finding ways of maintaining the area’s shoreline and protecting the valuable waterfront tax base that is associated with it.

Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission (MPPDC) Executive Director Lewis “Lewie” Lawrence said sea level rise and shoreline protection is one of the greatest challenges for waterfront landowners and that PAA is partnering with and supporting private enterprise in developing “trailblazing” shoreline protection technology.

“This is a coastal wide problem and (sea level rise) is a coastal cancer that is slowly killing our natural environment,” said Lawrence to a group of 10 local public officials on the boat.

The PAA has been working with the private sector in finding “more environmentally effective and affordable” shoreline protection methods for waterfront landowners, said Lawrence.

Ron Gorton III, vice president of GOMSB, has recently purchased waterfront land on Perrin River where he hopes to create a “Home Depot” to showcase innovative shoreline reef structures and other methods of saving the shoreline.

“We want this site to be where waterfront landowners can come and see all of the different technology available and where they can select the one that is best suited for them,” he said.