SC wants to build its first new state park in 20 years. All it needs is $45 million
Kayaking on the Black River on a summer day, it’s easy to wonder how outsiders took so long to notice it.
The river is pristine — and slightly mysterious. Its waters, initially appearing as a putrid black, turn out to be refreshingly clean. If someone were to take a glass and scoop up the water, it would look like a glass of sweet tea, fitting, considering the river runs through the northern edges of South Carolina’s Lowcountry.
None of this is new to locals, especially the Gullah Geechee community, who have been visiting the Black River for decades. Locals have fished the river, lived by the river and gathered on the river’s shores.
What is new is that much of the river’s banks will become South Carolina’s first new state park in 20 years. For decades, private purchases and decisions by outsiders have made the river more and more closed off to the outside world, including locals who live nearby and have visited for years. Now, the land and the river are closer than ever to being opened up to more people to enjoy their beauty. But it will take tens of millions of dollars and up to a decade before the park comes to fruition.
“I have traveled all over the world,” said Maria Whitehead, the vice president of land for the Southeast at the Open Space Institute, an environmental conservation organization helping lead the park’s development. “But I do, personally, feel like this is one of the most beautiful places in North America. I’ve returned here every year since I was a little kid.”
The new Black River State Park will be part of the larger Black River Water Trail & Park Network, 12 parcels of land starting in Kingstree and ending in Georgetown that together will ensure the public’s access to the river forevermore.
The park, and the wider trail network, are far from done, though the project has even garnered support and assistance from the National Park Service. The state park needs $45 million to complete all the renovations necessary — picnic tables, cabins, trails and other amenities. Plus, some members of the local Gullah Geechee community are concerned that their needs and desires are not being fully heard.
If completed, though, the Black River Water Trail & Park Network would mark one of the biggest expansions of South Carolina’s state park system in decades and, organizers hope, encourage conservation by making more of the state’s natural spaces protected by and accessible to the public.
Why a new state park is needed
Over the years, the Black River has become less accessible to both outsiders and locals. Rocky Point, a boat landing long used by local Black families, was bought and cut off from the public for several years until it was purchased by environmental nonprofits the Open Spaces Institute and the Nature Conservancy and reopened by Georgetown County and Winyah Rivers Alliance.
The other problem with the river was that the public boat landings were just too few and far between. In the past, a kayaker might get on the river but would be forced to travel 20 miles to reach the next landing. For someone hoping to have an easy day on the river with family, that distance made it inaccessible.
“For many years, the conservation work along the river was private conservation and easement protection,” Whitehead said. “The forest and land along the river was protected by private land owners, but the public couldn’t go out there and enjoy it.”
Now, that private conservation is transforming into a public network of trails and parks to make the Black River accessible to all. There are other benefits, too, beyond just public access. Blocking the area off from development will help with flood mitigation, something surrounding communities like Horry County struggle with, as many subdivisions have been built in floodplains.
The Black River Water Trail & Park Network will comprise 12 parcels of land starting in Williamsburg County with the town of Kingstree and ending at the Rocky Point Community Forest in Georgetown County. Some of the parcels are connected to each other, but many of them are disparate patches of land.
Having these isolated checkpoints makes sense, though, Whitehead said. They allow people to get on the river, travel for a few miles and then hop off for a break or catch a ride back to where they started. The proposed water trail is nearly 70 miles long, but without all these patches of land, 40 miles of the river are largely inaccessible, Whitehead said.
Most people likely imagine a state park as one continuous tract of land. Myrtle Beach State Park, for example, is basically one rectangle of forest by the beach. The Black River Water Trail is anything but that, but, in this case, that’s exactly what works, Whitehead said.
Much of the river’s banks are private property, and buying up all 70 miles along the river would cost hundreds of millions of dollars. With the current plan, the Open Space Institute and state and local officials can strike a balance between expanding access to the river while coexisting with the private property owners along the shore.
The set-up for the broader Black River Park Network is also unconventional, but it works, Whitehead said. The Black River State Park will cover six of the 12 parcels of land. The other six parcels are owned by the town of Kingstree, Williamsburg County, the Butler Conservation Fund, Winyah Rivers Alliance and Georgetown County.
“The vision here is that the state park is just one of the partners to create these (natural) spaces and the larger experience,” Whitehead said.
What matters, though, is not the set-up of the Black River access points, but the fact that they will exist at all, Whitehead said. The ultimate goal is to ensure that these beautiful landscapes, with swamps and forests and wildlife, are preserved and help teach people a love for conservation, she said.
“I have a very close personal connection to the Black River,” said Whitehead, who grew up in Florence has a cabin on the Black River she used to visit. “I baptized my three daughters with water from the river. It’s a sacred place.”
Reconnecting the land to the local community
The Rocky Point Community Forest, the starting point for the Black River Water Trail in Georgetown County, almost “turned into a McMansion subdivision,” Georgetown County’s recreation director Beth Goodale said.
“What sets Georgetown apart is out natural resources,” Goodale said, losing the Rocky Point forest would’ve been a travesty.
“Five rivers intersect our county,” she said. “We are more of an outdoor natural resources community. We are not as grouped up or metropolitan as our neighbors are. Hunting, fishing and boating is what generations of people have grown up enjoying. That is a huge part of why this forest is so important.”
The Rocky Point boat landing also has ties to local African Americans, many of whom grew up visiting it and the Black River during segregation, whereas Browns Ferry boat ramp downstream was developed for white families, Goodale said.
Before the Rocky Point forest and its boat landing were bought and reopened, there were no rules requiring the preservation of the forest, so it was at risk of being razed and turned into a subdivision.
After the Rocky Point Community Forest was saved in 2015, it will now serve as the anchor point for the Black River project. The project isn’t just about Rocky Point, though. The other end of the Black River Water Trail, in Kingstree, is in Williamsburg County, bringing new access to the Black River to those residents, too.
“It kind of brings us a sort of beachfront, but it’s the riverfront,” Williamsburg County’s recreation director, Turquoise Rouse, said. “It’s just a different opportunity that most people won’t have (without) going to other areas to go to a waterfront.
“They can actually do it right here at home.”
Gullah Geechee Chamber of Commerce CEO Marilyn Hemingway’s relationship to the river exemplifies that of her broader Gullah Geechee community. She said her community has been tied to the water and the waterways for centuries.
“I’ve been on these rivers, most of them, in Georgetown for years. I’ve fished and crabbed on them,” she said. The Black River is more than just a river. It’s “an economic opportunity that can benefit the community.”
Hemingway wants the Black River to become more than just a place for recreation. She wants it to be a driver of growth for locals, for the Gullah Geechee community and for Georgetown County. As the popularity of the river grows, so will the need for businesses to serve it, such as tours, shops and restaurants, she said.
All of that would need to be within the confines of protecting the environment, of course, but for the Black River project to be fully realized, it needs to be a driver of local business, Hemingway said.
“With the Black River State Park, there are so many cultural touchpoints that could be used to create economic opportunity,” Hemingway said. “Historically, Gullah Geechee, African Ameircan and Black folks have been left out of ownership when it comes to tourism. We are usually the labor. This an opportunity for ownership based on our culture.”
Skepticism from a Gullah Geechee leader
The path to creating the Black River Water Trail & Park Network mostly seems to be smooth sailing.
But Hemingway, as both a member of the local Gullah Geechee community and as the head of its Chamber of Commerce, has some big concerns. The biggest is that she says the organizers of the Black River Initiative have not done a good enough job of reaching out to both the local Gullah Geechee community but also the homeowners on the banks of the Black River.
The organizers of the Black River Initiative have had public meetings to talk about the project, but Hemingway said they need to focus on more direct outreach — door knocking, contacting local community leaders to disseminate information.
“You can’t just invite people to a meeting. You can’t assume that because it’s in the newspaper that they are reading it. You can’t assume that they didn’t come out to your community if you didn’t do all you could to reach them,” Hemingway said. “They reached out to me, but I don’t reach everybody.”
Hemingway said it’s essential that local community members — all of them — understand the work being done on the state park and other projects. Erin Donmoyer, the Black River keeper for the Winyah Rivers Alliance, echoed Hemingway’s sentiment.
“With the park planning that’s happening, a lot of projected drawings and plans have been made for what the land based sites along the trail will look like,” she said. “My main objective right now is just to make sure it reflects what the community has asked for.”
The landowners on the river need to be made aware, especially, how it could effect them, Hemingway said. For instance, if there are more people kayaking down the river, how will they know if they are stopping off on private property, rather than a public boat landing? What will the state and the other entities controlling the new river accesses do to protect those property owners?
“There are some folks who don’t want people on their land,” Hemingway said. “I’ve had conversations with people who have traveled certain areas, and they have had someone on the river near their land and have heard gunshots. Has someone even thought about stuff like that? Not everyone wants to be part of the state park.”
Whitehead said Hemingway’s concerns are being addressed. After an initial round of outreach yielded few responses from the local Black community, she said the committee running the Black River park project began more direct contacts with landowners, churches and community leaders. However, she acknowledged that the education and outreach will be an ongoing issue. It’s not something they will simply be “finished with” at some point down the line.
As for issues with growing public access encroaching on private land, Whitehead said they do not plan to add any new landings for large, powered boats. The only new landings will be for kayaks and canoes. And, all of the landings, new and existing will be well staffed and marked so people know where they can and can’t get off, she said.
Intentionality is the most important part any outreach as the Black River project comes to fruition, Hemingway said. All of these grand ideas, adding picnic tables and boat landings and restrooms, might sound great. But if the local community doesn’t feel like it’s a part of the process in building it, Hemingway said, the project could be tainted with an air of gentrification.
“Does the community feel comfortable using that park?” Hemingway said. “These are the unintended consequences when you are not intentional. ... Just because you improve it, you don’t know that it will actually be better (because) people feel like it’s not part of our community anymore.”
What is still left to be done
The price tag to complete the water trail?
$45 million.
Some of the fundraising is already done. Roughly $7 million has been secured from state and private sources.
The price tag grew after initial community outreach showed interest in building a wide trail network, picnic tables, cabins, restrooms and maybe even tree houses.
Right now, the Cypress Preserve tract, owned by the Butler Conservation Fund, is the model the Open Space Institute and its state and local partners hope to replicate throughout the rest of the Black River Initiative. The tract has gravel-lined trails to make walking easier and reduce impact on the environment. While the park is not wide open to the public, Butler has been working with groups who want to use it, and visitors have been able to utilize trails, a boat landing with kayaks and buildings for public gatherings.
“The natural spaces here and the environment are just remarkably beautiful and pretty remote. These swamps that border the Black River are sort of comparable to the Amazon,” Donmoyer said. “It’s just a wild and super diverse ecosystem. Some of the bald cypress and tupelo swamps have cypress trees that are thousands of years old.”
Despite the price tag, Whitehead is hopeful the money will come. The state Parks, Recreation and Tourism department is supportive of the project. U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, too, has filed a $4.6 million appropriation request from the future federal budget to help pay for the state park, as well.
“Gov. McMaster has been supportive of this,” Whitehead said. “Congressmen (Jim) Clyburn and (Tom) Rice and Sens. (Tim) Scott and Graham have all been very supportive, too.”
Whitehead said it will take up to 10 years for the project to become full realized.
Whitehead hopes for both big and small dollar donations and grants to support the project, anything that puts them closer to making it a reality.
In the meantime, visitors can enjoy places like Rocky Point, a sort of capstone for the Black River, and the serene beauty it already has to offer.
“The fact that there are so many partners now working together, it’s a pretty unique concept,” Goodale, the Georgetown recreation director, said. “Our National Park Service person, who’s been working with us since the very beginning, has remarked that you don’t see this kind of momentum anymore.
“It’s a project that will happen. We just have to all work together to make it happen.”
This story was originally published August 2, 2022 at 5:00 AM with the headline "SC wants to build its first new state park in 20 years. All it needs is $45 million."
