On August 22, the City of Beaufort announced that Safe Harbor will hold a feedback forum in Waterfront Park about their future plans for the downtown marina. On March 26, Safe Harbor’s original plan was presented in a City Council work session. The plan at that time was to greatly expand the marina. The resistance that followed from the public and City Council sent Safe Harbor back to the drawing board. The forum scheduled for September 5 at 5:30pm is for Safe Harbor to present a revised layout of those plans. The city’s media release states that the forum will include a “Q&A session” for those attending.
However, not everyone is convinced that the upcoming forum will offer meaningful opportunities for community input, or rather, that the topic being discussed will not yield the answers the community wants. At the Beaufort City Council meeting on August 27, Catherine Scarborough, a concerned resident, expressed distaste about the upcoming event. “Why the September 5 session? What is concerning is that the Sept 5th show and tell is simply that, a show and tell. With no possibility for our citizens to have [prior] input,” Scarborough stated. She explained her criticisms saying, “Let’s be realistic about the intentions of Safe Harbor. They will expand as far as the city allows into our fragile beautiful Beaufort Bay, spoiling our historic views, destroying our dolphin habitat, and in turn killing the use and livability of Beaufort for citizens and tourists alike… all to get ready for next year‘s cruise season.”
During the council’s discussion later in the meeting, all the council members present and the City Manager Scott Marshall acknowledged they had met with Safe Harbor since the March 26 presentation and discussed plans for the marina. Councilman Neil Lipsitz detailed his meeting, “I met with Safe Harbor too, and I found them to be a very honorable partner. They walked in, they knew me as the hell no guy because I said hell no to expanding the marina down protecting people’s view of the bay.” And confirming Scarborough’s concern that Safe Harbor would be presenting a plan that had been agreed to prior to the September 5th forum, Lipsitz continued, “And they [Safe Harbor] presented a plan that was exactly what I asked for. And I asked a few other things and they said we knew you were going to ask that, I just turned the page and there it was. You’ll just have to see it on September 5th.”
As previously reported by Beaufort Insider, Scarborough along with several others took a stand against the legality of the Safe Harbor lease at the August 27th City Council meeting. With these existential questions about the lease left unanswered and unsettled, the opponents of Safe Harbor would like a public forum to discuss the future of the marina and the lease as a whole. Instead, they are offered a forum where a plan will be presented to further Safe Harbor’s hold on Beaufort’s downtown marina.
Beaufort Insiders are encouraged to attend the session to hear the latest updates and voice their opinions directly to Safe Harbor and city officials. The meeting will be held at the pavilion in Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park, September 5, at 5:30pm.
