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horeli
The
December 2007 • Vol. 4, No. 6 A Shoreline Community, Pine Knoll Shores, N.C. Town Hall 247-4353
Mayoral Election a Close Encounter;
Edwards, Danehy Win Board Seats
By Bill White
It was a week before anyone could
say with certainty who won the Nov. 6
mayoral election in Pine Knoll Shores.
When the polls closed on Election Day,
incumbent Mayor Joan Lamson led her
opponent, Ken Jones, by eleven votes.
In view of the closeness of the vote,
and the possibility of challenges based
on residential eligibility, the eventual
outcome remained in doubt.
When the Carteret County Board of
Elections met a week later to certify the
vote, Jones was on hand to challenge
seven ballots, maintaining the votes
were cast by people who were not
actually residents of PKS. The residency
question popped up in a number of
coastal communities this year as leaders
of condo associations, the majority
of whose members have two homes,
sought to have fellow owners transfer
their voter registration to their shore
properties, thereby permitting the condo
interests to be better represented at the
polls and, by extension, in the affairs of
the communities involved.
In the case of the PKS challenges, the
elections board, which had expressed
concerns about the residency questions
in the days before the election, voted
tmanimously to reject the Jones challenges
on the grounds that he did not provide
sufficient proof that the voters in
question were not residents of the town.
Bill Henderson, board chairman, noted
that the burden of proof lies with the
challenger, not the challenged.
Both Jones and board members voiced
the opinion that disproving residency
would be a difficult thing to do, and
board member Sue Verdon said the N.C.
General Assembly needed to address the
issue of people owning two homes and
being able to change their registration
(Mayoral Election) Continued on Page 2
It's all aboard as colorfully-garbed youngsters set out on a Halloween
trick-or-treat hayride. (See story on page 4)
An architect's rendering of the storm-resistant fishing pier the North Carolina
Aquariums are ready to begin building in Nags Head. The aquariums plan a
similar facility in Emerald Isle on Bogue Banks
Storm-Resistant Fishing Pier
On the Horizon
By Bill White
A new concrete, storm-resistant ocean
fishing pier appears to be on the horizon
for Bogue Banks as part of an initiative
being pushed by the North Carolina
Aquariums to build three such piers
along the North Carolina Coast.
The piers would be built as adjuncts to
the three aquariums that now serve the
state, one on Roanoke Island, another
at Fort Fisher outside of Wilmington,
and the third in Pine Knoll Shores. The
three facilities, which opened in 1976 and
recently underwent major expansions,
attract more than a million visitors
annually.
The pier initiative is aimed at preserving
for future generations a popular form of
recreation that is threatening to vanish
from the coast. Aquarium officials point
out that a series of hurricanes in the late
1990s wiped out many of the fishing piers
along the coast and that soaring real
estate values have spelled the doom of
many others in the last decade. The price
of oceanfront real estate makes private
investment in fishing piers unlikely.
The prospect of a fishing pier able
to stand up to the worst of weather and
insulated from development pressures
should be music to the ears of Pine Knoll
Shores residents. Many of the nearly 500
PKS property owners who responded to
the recent survey that sought to marshal
(Storm-Resistant) Continued on Page 2
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