Cliffs' Mountain Park Development Proposal

A coalition of six conservation organizations, representing over 20,000 citizens, has challenged the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control’s approval of a new golf course at the Cliffs’ Mountain Park development in northern Greenville County. The organizations include Save Our Saluda, Upstate Forever, Sierra Club, South Carolina Native Plant Society, Trout Unlimited, and the South Carolina Wildlife Federation.

In addition, during DHEC’s administrative process, over 3,000 citizens signed petitions or sent letters opposing the golf course.

The proposed 18-hole golf course, designed by the Gary Player Group, would be built along both sides of the North Saluda River for a distance of two and a half miles, almost the entire reach from Highway 25 to Highway 11. Player and the Cliffs propose 16 bridges across the river – 15 for golfers to use as they play back and forth across the river and one vehicular bridge that will connect the Mountain Park residential community to the golf course.

”We have only 200 miles of rivers and streams in the entire state of South Carolina that are capable of supporting trout, and the North Saluda is one of them,” said Chuck Adams, President of the Mountain Bridge Chapter of Trout Unlimited. “Protection of this extraordinary resource should be one of the top priorities of natural resource management in South Carolina. All doubts should be resolved in favor of protecting the resource, not in favor of permitting yet another golf course.”

One of the conservation groups’ key points relates to alternatives. Brad Wyche, Executive Director of Upstate Forever, said, “The Cliffs did a completely unacceptable job in evaluating other sites for the golf course. The regulations are very clear that all feasible alternatives have to be studied and that the alternative with the least environmental impact is the one that must be used. The Mountain Park development consists of 5,000 acres. There are plenty of other feasible sites for the golf course that would have no impact at all on the North Saluda. No one is saying that the Cliffs shouldn’t have a golf course. It just shouldn’t be built along the river.”

Ben Gregg, Executive Director of the South Carolina Wildlife Federation, said, “The feasible alternative issue in this case has huge implications for the entire state, especially when public resources are at stake. A linchpin of many environmental and natural resource programs is the requirement to carefully and thoroughly analyze all feasible alternatives. The Cliffs clearly failed to do that here.”

In the appeal, the conservation groups will also contest several aspects relating to the golf course design itself, such as the width and nature of the buffer along the river, the number and height of the bridges, and the extent of channel alteration work. “There shouldn’t be a golf course wrapped around this river, but if that is permitted, additional measures and practices must be imposed to reduce impacts. The current design will fragment and degrade the natural buffer along the North Saluda, causing harm to the river and fish and wildlife resources,” said Dianne Anastos, Chair of Save Our Saluda. “This is not an environmentally sensitive design. DHEC is letting us all down in approving it.”

Other issues include impairment of navigation on the river due to the design of the 16 bridges, loss of public access for trout fishing, and the vague language and lack of enforceability of several of the other permit conditions.

Tyger River Dam Proposal

For some time, a group based in Union County has proposed damming the Tyger River, thus flooding and destroying approximately 5,000 acres of our National Forest and blocking one of South Carolina’s few remaining free-flowing rivers. The proposal would destroy some 1 million trees in the Upstate. The Native Plant Society has opposed this proposal from the beginning.

On January 4, 2008, the Native Plant Society joined the Sierra Club, Upstate Forever, Audubon South Carolina, and the S.C. Wildlife Federation in a press release disclosing a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers study indicating that the proposed dam is not economically viable and would be built on two earthquake faults. The Corps of Engineers has withheld the study from the conservation groups and the public, but Dennis Chamberlain, an attorney for the conservation groups and a long-time Sierra Club leader, reviewed a copy of the report and revealed its conclusions.

The Corps study concludes that the project is not economically viable. It finds that the area around the dam does not need the reservoir for water resources. The Native Plant Society and the other conservation groups have opposed the project because it would take a National Forest and turn it over to private interests, because it would dam the Tyger River, because it would destroy thousands of acres of public forests, because it would destroy habitat for wildlife and tens of thousands of birds, and because it would eliminate thousands of acres of public recreational and hunting lands.

Rick Huffman, President of the Upstate Chapter of the SCNPS, joined Dennis Chamberlain at a Greenville news conference to discuss the press release. The Upstate Chapter will continue to work to oppose this ill-advised project. Please contact U.S. Representatives Bob Inglis and John Spratt and U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint and express your concern about this proposal.

SCNPS Freedom of Information Act Request for US Army Corps Tyger River Dam Study

US Army Corp Denial of Request for a copy of the Tyger River Dam Study

January 16, 2008: SCNPS APPEAL of Denial to release Tyger River Dam Study

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