Oak Island’s council committed June 10 to buy the Yaupon Beach Fishing Pier after receiving a $500,000 state grant. But the town will have to match the grant and pay Cooperative Bank an additional $834,100 to buy the pier.
The pier was closed after it went into foreclosure during a legal battle between previous owners. Cooperative Bank, which shut off access to the pier during April, purchased the pier at auction during March for $1.6 million.
The Oak Island council voted 4-1, after going into closed session to talk about land acquisition, to accept the grant and its terms.
Councilwoman Dara Royal opposed the plan, citing questions about the town’s potential ownership of the pier and its obligations.
To obtain the half-million dollars in state grant money, the agreement said the town must complete the project, which has a cost of $1,834,100.
The pier had been appraised at $1.6 million and $1.8 million. The land acquisition would be 1.2 acres.
The town made a $2.2 million bid for Yaupon Pier when it was first was offered for sale, but the 2007 council didn’t approve the deal.
“(Pier acquisition) is a lot closer than it was,” Oak Island Mayor Johnie Vereen told the Wilmington Star-News.
Town Manager Jerry Walters and Vereen said the next step is to find more money. Vereen said he is confident there will be more state funding.
Cooperative Bank CEO Rick Willetts told the Star-News he has received inquiries about the pier property from development interests but would like to see it in public hands.
The pier sits at rapidly eroding land that, under current rules, couldn’t be developed for residential use.
Officials with the island’s only other fishing pier, Ocean Crest Pier, have opposed the town’s purchase of Yaupon Beach Pier, and said the buy would create unfair competition. Other critics said the town should not be in the pier-owning or operating business.
However, many local citizens and fishermen have decried the pier’s closing since last fall.
Yaupon Pier was built in 1955 and rebuilt in 1972 and 1992 after hurricanes. At 27 feet above sea level, the pier is the tallest in North Carolina.
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