Nikolai Mather: Jalyn - thanks for joining us. So, you recently reported on a fish kill out in Brunswick County, which apparently came from a development burning timber in the area. Tell us how you found out about it.
Jalyn Baldwin: So my colleague Peter actually sent a post in our group chat. It was a picture of a bunch of dead fish, like, floated to the top of a pond.
NM: Whose pond was it?
JB: The guy's name is Terry Boldt. He lives in Bolivia. He's lived there for quite a while. He's owned this land for quite a while. He didn't actually make this post on Facebook. His neighbor did it for him. She made the post for him, saying, "This happened to my neighbor. This is his pond that he walked out to this morning, and he thinks it's because of burning that is happening beside his land."
The controlled burn is for a development that was happening on Gilbert and Benton Road in Bolivia, right beside Terry Boldt's property. It's from McKee Homes. And the development has been in the works for the past, like two years or so. And it was a controlled burn, so yeah, they were just burning to get rid of the trees that were in the area.
NM: And that's like a 65-acre property, so that's a lot of trees. How long did they keep the fire going?
JB: So the development has been burning for around 30 to 40 days beside his house — which is very normal when it comes to controlled burning for developments of that size.
Boldt told me that since the burning has begun, though, there has been a lot of ash that's been blowing around in the air in the area, a lot of smoke. His neighbor, Alyssa, also let me know that she has seen some of the ash and the smoke blowing around. They've seen it on their cars and stuff. So Boldt thought that because of the ash in the air and it covering his pond, that it might have killed the fish.
NM: I see. So, something you get into in your article is, like, what legal recourse — if any — is available to Boldt. And if I understand correctly, it sounds like there are not a lot of avenues available.
JB: Yeah. And that's something that I found when I did my research, and that the landowner also found too. There's regulations when it comes to controlled burning. They're usually set by the NC DEQ and the NC Forest Service. And Brunswick County also has some regulations to burning… it's more if they're breaking those state agency regulations, then it kind of transfers over to Brunswick County.
So if this developer was breaking these regulations, which, from my knowledge, he was not, then the county could get involved, and there could be some recourse there. Because the regulations are they can't burn within certain hours, and depending on the weather – there's all kind of factors that go into it. But from my knowledge, he was not. The developer was not. So there's not much.
He reached out to DEQ, and I also reached out to DEQ, and pretty much all these agencies told us that if this developer is not breaking any of the regulations, then there's nothing they could really do about it. Now, Boldt can take legal action on his own, which is something that we discussed, and something that he said he might do if he can prove that the fish kill came from the burning. So far, that is the only legal recourse that did seem available. Boldt could file a civil lawsuit against the developer, but that would also take a lot of time, money. He would have to prove that the fish kill came from the burning. He would have to figure out how much money to replenish the pond, and he also mentioned that he thought that his horses may be having some effects from it, so – there's a lot of factors that go into that. But it would all be from Boldt's own, his own doing.
NM: The onus would be on him to prove all this stuff, rather than, you know, the company.
JB: Yes.
NM: Yeah. Well, what advice would you give to residents who are in similar situations?
JB: There's not a lot of recourse, but there is some. Residents can definitely reach out, like - speaking out is how to change these things. The DEQ and the NC Forest Service, they take citations. So if a resident, or if a landowner thought that something like that was happening, they can put a citation in or reach out to their county and to Brunswick County about it, and maybe some action can come from it, fingers crossed.
I think I would tell residents just to really do their research. There are regulations to what developers can do and how what they're doing can impact the environment. And there's a lot of DEQ and NC Forest Service regulations for those things. So I think I would just tell residents to look into those to make sure that they're being followed.
NM: That was Jalyn Baldwin from Port City Daily talking about her story on a Brunswick County fish kill. Thanks for joining us Jalyn!
JB: Yeah! Thanks so much for having me.
Click here to read more of Jalyn Baldwin's reporting.
