The following is the speech Mac Montgomery, former mayor of Kure Beach and current Treasurer of the NC League of Conservation Voters’ Board of Directors, gave on July 21, 2015 during a public hearing in front of the House Environment Committee. The hearing centered around the Regulatory Reform Act of 2015 (HB765). You can read more about this hearing and others who spoke in the Coastal Review Online article here.

Good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

My name is Mac Montgomery. My wife and I have lived at Kure Beach for over 15 years. I was privileged to be the Mayor Pro-tem of Kure Beach from 2005-2007 and the Mayor from 2007-2010. I served 24 years in the U. S. Army and was the Dean of a N.C. Community College – so public service is very important to me.

Of the many reasons my wife and I chose live at our beautiful coast and raise our family there is our clean coastal waters and the productivity those waters provide all of our citizens.

At Kure Beach, we demonstrated innovative techniques to combat one of the greatest threats to our coast, polluted stormwater. As you may know, stormwater is the largest source of non-point water pollution on the coast.

To address it, Kure Beach implemented an innovative stormwater treatment system that used our sand dunes to clean polluted stormwater. We invested in this effort because we knew that clean beaches and clean water are the very lifeblood of a productive coastal economy. No one wants to visit a beach when it’s shut down because the water has bacteria and dangerous chemicals in it. No one wants to buy a house or develop a business on parts of the coast where the water isn’t clean, where you can’t swim or fish.

In 2008 the town of Kure Beach and I, as the mayor and a resident of our coast, also supported the long overdue new Coastal Stormwater regulations passed by the General Assembly. At that time extensive data and scientific research showed that the stormwater rules in place prior to 2008 were not working and that without more effective protections, our water quality would continue to decline.

Indeed, Tom Reeder, who is now the Director of our State Division of Water Resources and an expert in coastal water quality, stated in 2008 that the stormwater rules that existed prior to 2008 were an abysmal failure and need to be changed.

All of which forces us to question the Senate proposal to weaken the current rules – and to go back to old ones that we already know did not do the job of keeping our water clean.

Furthermore, the Senate language on stormwater would weaken the current rules and then do a study about whether doing so is a good idea.

That doesn’t make any sense to me – change the rules and then study whether we should change them? When we already know they failed?

What we should be doing instead is exploring ways to evaluate the current stormwater rules, their effectiveness at protecting our coastal waters from polluted stormwater and then recommending needed changes that will make our water cleaner – not dirtier.

I urge this committee and the rest of the General Assembly to take hard look at the provisions in the Senate Regulatory Reform bill and specifically section 4:19.

Let’s forget about going back to the old failed rules and instead use science to do a comprehensive look at what works and what does not. I urge you to establish a blue ribbon panel of experts to review the current stormwater rule and recommend further improvements and techniques to improve that rule.

But whatever you do, please, do not revert back to the old rules we already know do not work. Local governments and non-governmental organizations have been working together up and down the coast on innovative programs and policies to protect our coastal waters further.

Section 4:19 is a step backwards that will undermine these efforts and result in more polluted water, dirtier beaches, less productive fishing and a drag on our multi-billion dollar coastal economy.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today and, again, thank you for your support of our coastal economy, our waters and the people who live, work and play at our coast.

NCLCV note: a big thank you to Mac and all who spoke up at this hearing! The NC House rejected the Senate’s version of HB765. Now, the bill sits in committee where members of both chambers will weigh in on the final version. Stay tuned!