North Carolina has led the way in protecting its natural resources since the mid 1970s, with the Coastal Area Management Act, the Clean Water Act, and other legislation and initiatives.
But state and local governments have only been able to go so far and do so much.
Created after a citizen-led effort to block plans for a massive strip mine in what is now a massive wildlife refuge, the North Carolina Coastal Federation has been leading the way for the last four decades in safeguarding our coastal rivers, creeks, sounds, and beaches.
Erin Fleckenstein, NCCF’s Oyster Program Director, joins us this week to give insight into how the N.C. Coastal Federation has been Building and Shaping with the people who live, work and play here to protect our unique environment, and to create and support a growing aquaculture industry across the Greater Outer Banks.
Who do you serve, and how?
We serve people from all walks of life through direct, hands-on efforts to preserve and improve our coast. We tackle issues like: making sure the coast remains a place that is swimmable, fishable and accessible to all; creating coastal habitats like living shorelines, marshes, wetlands and oyster reefs that benefit our coast’s resilience, water quality and provide high quality habitat for our coastal fisheries; removing marine debris like lost fishing gear and abandoned boats from our sounds, and addressing coastal management concerns.
We are a small staff and our work would not be possible without the dedication of our partners and volunteers. We work very closely with towns and municipalities as well as state parks, national parks, aquariums, other area non-profit and volunteer groups, schools, universities, marine contractors and engineers, and concerned citizens.
You may know us locally from our daily news publication, Coastal Review Online; our Restaurant-to-Reef Oyster Shell Recycling program; Lost Fishing Gear Recovery Program (going into its 10th year); Jockey’s Ridge Living Shoreline work; efforts to partner with the county, National Park Service and N.C. Division of Coastal Management to tackle the issue of derelict homes on the beach; or our work on the watershed restoration plan for Lake Mattamuskeet, among others.
When and why was your nonprofit created?
Our organization was founded in 1982 by our Executive Director Todd Miller, in order to stop peat mining on the Albemarle-Pamlico peninsula.
If those plans had proceeded, it would have caused serious degradation to our sounds, impacting the area’s water quality and fisheries.
Through grassroots organizing, the public came forward to stop the peat mining plans and support the conservation of the Albemarle-Pamlico Peninsula.
In collaboration with other conservation partners, the land is now permanently protected and is known as the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge and Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge.
We strongly believe that an informed public and decision makers will make choices that are in balance with the natural world.
What are some of the benefits of your organization’s work?
We work in tangible ways to cultivate a sense of stewardship and care for the environment. You can see the results of our work in our partnerships, through the students and volunteers that we work with, and in the on-the-ground projects that we’ve partnered to complete.
In the Pamlico Sound, we’ve partnered to build over 100 acres of new oyster habitat in the last 15 years.
We’ve also worked to sustainably grow the oyster farming industry, seeing it go from a $3 million industry in 2015 to a nearly $27 million industry in 2022.
Our school education program annually provides hands-on activities and lessons to hundreds of Outer Banks students – helping to educate the next generation on how they can be stewards of our coast.
We’ve locally worked to restore or protect over five acres of coastal marsh (nearly two miles of shoreline) through our living shoreline projects at places like Jockey’s Ridge State Park, Moore Shore Road, the Wanchese Marine Industrial Park, Hatteras Harbor, and on Ocracoke Island – preserving some of the most important habitats we have on the coast that provide protection from erosion and create nursery areas for our commercial and recreational fisheries.
On the Hyde County mainland we’ve partnered with local landowners and farmers to restore over 4,500 acres of prior converted wetlands back to wetland status.
In the past five years we’ve partnered up and down the coast to remove more than 100 abandoned boats from our sounds. Annually we partner with local fishermen to identify and remove abandoned fishing gear.
Last year we collected nearly 2,000 crab pots that would have otherwise been navigational or fishing hazards in the sound.
Do you think the issues you address will ever go away? Why or why not?
I would love to believe that yes, these issues will be resolved. However, the reality is that the issues we address as an organization are not going away.
And in fact, with projections of sea level rise, climate change and increased pressure on our natural resources, it will continue to be an uphill battle.
We have seen local successes. It is so gratifying to see a student who lives an hour from the coast or right down the road, come to a marsh grass planting and explore the sound for the first time in their lives; to know that several of our previous interns have gone onto pursue careers in the environment; to see an eroding shoreline, like at Jockey’s Ridge State Park, go from an erosional area to a newly restored and protected coastal marsh; to know that many of our oyster restoration efforts have been tremendously successful in growing high numbers of new oysters; to have the partnerships of local fishermen year in and year out who help support our annual lost fishing gear recovery program; to partner with local restaurants and community volunteers to collect and recycle oyster shell in Dare County.
These successes provide the spark and hope that keeps us moving forward. Living in balance is a very worthy fight, and a fight we will continue for as long as it takes.
What else would you like readers to know (perhaps an interesting project or unanticipated, positive outcome)?
I think it’s important to remember there is more that connects us than divides us. Our members, partners and supporters recognize the value, rare beauty and importance of the North Carolina coast and are willing to take steps to actively protect this gem for the present and future generations.
What’s new? What are your upcoming events or initiatives?
So many exciting things on the horizon, I can’t cover them all but a few highlights include:
We’ve recently received news from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that we have been recommended for two new grants. One, a $15 million grant, would support our oyster work.
Once received, it will be used to build an additional 120 acres of oyster habitat in Pamlico Sound, work with NC State University and NC Central University to train the next generation of coastal scientists, allow us to complete our plans for a new interactive exhibit at the NC Aquarium on Roanoke Island that will feature oysters, and perform an economic analysis of all of this work to understand how these large-scale projects benefit our coastal communities.
Additionally, we recently launched a Farm to Fork kayak tour from our office in Wanchese. This event was held for five weeks this past spring and will be held again every Thursday in October.
Participants get the chance to kayak around our demonstration oyster farm in Wanchese in kayaks provided by Outer Banks Kayak Adventures, learning about the oyster farm and what it takes to grow oysters in North Carolina.
Then they receive a voucher to try a half dozen N.C. oysters and an oyster shooter at Blue Water Grill and Raw Bar.
The N.C. Coastal Federation is headquartered in Newport, with offices in Wanchese and Wrightsville Beach. Find out more at the N.C. Coastal Federation website: https://www.nccoast.org/ Coastal Review, the NCCF’s daily news service: https://coastalreview.org/, the NCCF Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/nccoastalfed and NCCF Twitter page: https://twitter.com/NCCoastalFed.
In conjunction with the Outer Banks Community Foundation and the Outer Banks Visitors Bureau, WOBX has launched “Builders and Shapers: Nonprofits for a Greater Outer Banks” a weekly series featuring the nonprofits that serve our area. They share details about how they are working to make northeastern North Carolina and the Outer Banks a better place to live, work and play.
