White Tract Will Be Permanently Protected — and Why the Grand Strand Should Pay Attention

Posted Friday, November 6, 2026 11:52 am

David Hucks (via MyrtleBeachSC)

Nov 6, 2026 · @ https://x.com/myrtlebeachnews

For four years, a patch of pine woods at the corner of Sewee and Bulls Island roads in Awendaw has been one of South Carolina’s most closely watched land fights. On Friday, it ended. Homebuilder Pulte Home Company agreed to sell the White Tract to the Open Space Institute, a conservation nonprofit, so the land can be preserved for good and later folded into the Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026].

The White Tract is in Charleston County, roughly 80 miles down U.S. 17 from Myrtle Beach. So why should anyone in Horry County care? Because the same nonprofit, the same state money and the same playbook are already at work here: on Waties Island near Little River, along the Waccamaw River and, just over the county line, at Arcadia East in Georgetown County. How the White Tract was saved is a preview of how land gets protected along the Grand Strand, and of the questions taxpayers should ask when it does.

What was announced

The deal came out of a settlement, not a courtroom verdict. Three groups — the Coastal Conservation League, Friends of Coastal South Carolina and Charleston Waterkeeper — had been fighting the subdivision with lawyers from the South Carolina Environmental Law Project (SCELP). This week those groups and Pulte reached an agreement under which Pulte will sell the property to the Open Space Institute (OSI) for permanent conservation [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026].

According to the joint announcement, Pulte became a willing seller only after OSI found a likely way to pay for the land. As part of the package, the builder also agreed to add environmental improvements at two other neighborhoods it is building elsewhere in the Lowcountry: Farms at Longleaf in the Town of Hollywood and Rock Six in Dorchester County. SCELP’s pending lawsuits will be dropped once the land is permanently conserved. Friends of Coastal South Carolina director Grace Gasper called the outcome “a huge victory for the ongoing protection of Cape Romain” [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026].

Just as important is what the announcement leaves out. It gives no purchase price, no closing date and no timeline for handing the land to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Earlier reporting put the expected cost at about $17 million in state money [Post and Courier, 2026]. Even the size of the property shifts depending on who is counting: the settlement release says 229 acres, local TV and newspaper coverage this summer said 206 [Live 5 News, 2026], and SCELP itself described a 208-acre parcel in 2025 [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2025]. The gap is probably a matter of which parcels are included, but the final deed should settle it.

To understand why a national homebuilder decided to walk away from an approved project, you have to go back to 2022.

How a subdivision became a statewide fight

In the spring of 2022, local planners approved a subdivision of roughly 200 houses on the White Tract, a parcel that touches Bulls Bay and sits inside the boundary Congress drew for possible future additions to Cape Romain [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2022]. Pulte’s later application called for 208 homes on land hemmed in by the refuge on one side and the Francis Marion National Forest on the other [Live 5 News, 2025].

The objection was never really about houses. It was about what the houses would sit on. Every home was planned with its own septic tank, and neighbors and conservation groups warned that failing systems and stormwater runoff would carry pollution straight into the refuge’s marshes [Post and Courier, 2025]. That is no small concern: Cape Romain stretches about 22 miles and roughly 66,000 acres of islands, wetlands and maritime forest, and runoff from Awendaw drains directly into it [Post and Courier, 2026a].

Opposition grew well beyond environmental groups. Residents, town and county officials and state Sen. Chip Campsen packed a standing-room-only hearing in July 2025 [Post and Courier, 2025]. Awendaw has also kept a moratorium on new subdivisions for more than two years as it absorbed a population boom [Post and Courier, 2026b].

The turning point came from the S.C. Supreme Court. A lower-court judge had allowed construction to move ahead, but in late 2025 the high court put the pause back in place while the permit challenges ran their course [Post and Courier, 2026b].

Here is the part worth underlining. The lawsuits did not, in the end, win the case on the merits. What they won was time. Every month a project sits frozen in court is a month a builder carries land it cannot sell, which can make a buyout look better than the fight. Time is what allowed a buyer to step in, and that buyer did not come out of nowhere.

The state’s quiet land-buying machine

The money behind the White Tract deal runs through the South Carolina Office of Resilience, an agency most Grand Strand residents have probably never heard of. The office does not buy land itself. Instead it hands out grants and coordinates conservation deals carried out by state agencies and nonprofit partners [Post and Courier, 2026b].

The model works in three steps. A nonprofit such as OSI moves quickly to buy the land. It holds the property for a while. Then it passes title to a public owner — here, the federal refuge [Post and Courier, 2026b]. Before any state dollars can be spent, the Legislature has to sign off, and the Resilience Office said it wanted local backing first [Post and Courier, 2026b]. Charleston County Council gave that backing in August with a letter of support [Live 5 News, 2026]. The county’s stake was small in tax terms: the land generated only about $1,000 in county property taxes in 2025 [Post and Courier, 2026b].

That same machinery is already running in our backyard. In February 2025, OSI announced it had bought 115 acres on and around Waties Island, one of the last undeveloped barrier islands in the state, using Resilience Office money administered by the South Carolina Conservation Bank, with plans to hand the land to the state [Open Space Institute, 2025]. In September, Georgetown County Council unanimously backed a plan for OSI and Ducks Unlimited to buy the nearly 3,500-acre Arcadia East tract off U.S. 17 — land that had been approved for more than 3,300 homes, office space, retail and a hotel. If the state review goes through, that purchase is expected to close in early 2027 [WPDE, 2026]. And state natural resources officials have proposed adding 5,728 acres in Horry County to the Waccamaw River Heritage Preserve [SC Daily Gazette, 2026].

Taken together, these deals show a pattern. A small group of agencies and nonprofits is deciding, parcel by parcel, which pieces of the coast stay wild. Most of those choices look good for the public. But they involve a lot of public money, and they are made at tables most residents never see. Using the $17 million estimate, the White Tract works out to roughly $74,000 to $83,000 an acre, depending on which acreage figure is right — our own math, since the actual price has not been released.

What it means for Horry County

Horry County is one of the fastest-growing places in South Carolina, and state wildlife officials have said plainly that development here threatens the area’s wildlife [SC Daily Gazette, 2026]. Read with that in mind, the White Tract story holds four lessons for people who live here.

An approval is not the end of the story. Both the White Tract and Arcadia East had development approvals in hand, and both are now headed toward conservation [Post and Courier, 2026b; WPDE, 2026]. Residents who assume a rezoning or a permit is final may be giving up too early. Appeals of permits, especially stormwater and wastewater permits, can change the math for a developer.

Septic and stormwater are the issues that move courts. The Awendaw fight centered on wastewater and runoff, not traffic or density [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2022]. In a county where so much new building sits near rivers, marsh and wetlands, the questions about where the water goes are the ones most likely to get traction.

Buyouts need willing sellers and real money. The White Tract was saved because a buyer showed up with a funding source and the builder chose to sell [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026]. That will not happen on every contested tract. Conservation buyouts are a tool, not a substitute for zoning and land-use decisions made in public by elected officials.

Taxpayers deserve the numbers. If roughly $17 million in state money is going into one Awendaw property, the public should see the final price, the appraisal and the terms when the deal closes. The same goes for Arcadia East, Waties Island and any future Grand Strand purchase. County councils are asked to sign letters of support before the state commits money [Post and Courier, 2026b], which gives local residents a natural moment to ask those questions in public.

What’s next

Friday’s announcement is an agreement, not a finished transaction. Several steps still stand between the White Tract and permanent protection:

Closing. OSI still has to complete the purchase. The release sets no date [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026].
State funding. Resilience Office money cannot be spent without legislative approval [Post and Courier, 2026b]. Watch for the request when lawmakers return to Columbia in January.
Transfer to the refuge. OSI is expected to hold the land for an interim period before it goes to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service [Post and Courier, 2026b]. No timeline has been made public.
The lawsuits. SCELP’s legal challenges will be dismissed only after the land is permanently conserved [South Carolina Environmental Law Project, 2026].

Closer to home, the Arcadia East purchase in Georgetown County is expected to close in early 2027 if state approvals come through [WPDE, 2026], and the Waccamaw River Heritage Preserve expansion is still working through the state process [SC Daily Gazette, 2026].

We will keep asking for the final price, the appraisals and the transfer terms on each of these deals, and we will report them as soon as they are public. If you know of a tract in Horry or Georgetown County that is being eyed for conservation — or for development — tell us.