By Peter Biello
Wilmington, NC – Oak Island Mayor Johnie Vereen says he wants to use as little of his town's money as possible to pay for Yaupon Pier.
The town council approved using half a million dollars to pay for a matching grant from the State Parks and Recreation Trust Fund. That leaves the town with $800,000 to raise.
Vereen says he'd rather use state and federal grants to make up the difference.
"Yaupon Pier has been the home and the heritage to a lot of folks, whose great grandfather, father, son, grandson came here to learn to fish," says Vereen. "And it's been handed down since 1954, so fifty years of something is a long time."
Vereen says Oak Island has applied for a $300,000 Coastal Area Management Act grant and is looking for others.
Yaupon is one of twenty piers on the North Carolina coast and was foreclosed on earlier this year.
Do you have insight or expertise on this topic? Please email us, we'd like to hear from you. news@whqr.org.