SURFSIDE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – After sitting vacant for more than 10 years, the old Deer Track Golf Resort in Surfside Beach is seeing new construction. Developers are building more than 100 single-family homes on the property, Retreat at Ocean Commons, but many neighbors are upset about the plans.
“I’ve been here for over 30 years. This is my home. I don’t want to have to move to get away from new development,” said Emma Williamson, a resident of the Deerfield Plantation community. She says flooding has always been a problem on her property. Now, Williamson is afraid new homes being built in her neighborhood will make it worse.
“I’m very worried about the drainage and the flooding. The ditch back here, no one ever takes care of it. My husband and I come out here, in fact, we did right before Hurricane Matthew, and cleaned from the highway as far as we could,” Williamson said.
D.R. Horton has started building the single-family home development on the former golf course, which sits right behind Kenneth Delahunt’s townhouse. For 15 years, he used to look out onto a golf course. “Now I got to look at whatever they’re putting up there, really small houses. See where the stick is. That’s as far out as I go, I think,” Delahnut said of his property line.
Delahunt says the new development is a lose-lose situation for him and his neighbors.
“They say my property value is going to go up. I can’t see how,” Williamson says her Property Owners Association filed several lawsuits to prevent the homes from being built. “Each homeowner had a lot of assessments to try and fight this lawsuit to no avail.”
Even though D.R. Horton will build seven ponds in the new development to help with drainage, Williamson is not confident it will help. “We’ve done all we could to try and stop it, but it’s still going to happen,” she said. “It’s a pity, it really is,” agreed Delahunt.
D.R. Horton has already started selling the new homes in the development. The company’s website says “the community will feature a mix of single story and two-story homes ranging in size from 1613 sq. ft. to 3164 sq. ft.”
News13 reached out to the company to find out when they plan to complete the development but was not able to get a hold of them.