‘Mother Nature's mad at us': City takes first step to permanent Norriego Point fix (with ARCHIVE PHOTOS and VIDEO)

If Destin is going to spend $7.5 million expanding and armoring Norriego Point, it had better do the job right, the City Council says.

“I don’t want you to come back in two years and say ‘the sheeting’s rusted, we have to replace it,’ ” Councilor Sandy Trammell told

Douglas Mann of Coastal Planning at Monday’s meeting, after Mann said expanding the point and armoring it would cost $5.2 or $7.5 million, depending on the size of the expansion.

The council voted unanimously to have staff draw up a funding plan for those alternatives, or for a third alternative falling between them.

“We have to start somewhere,” Councilor Sam Seevers said. “Get the motion passed ... then we start on the heavy lifting.”

Click here for the play-by-play of the meeting.

Over the past 20 years, according to Mann’s report, more than 600,000 cubic yards of sand has been dredged from East Pass and placed on Norriego Point to compensate for erosion there. The city spent $75,000 on one dredging project in 2008, $72,000 earlier this year and $143,000 for Coastal Planning to study the point and recommend a permanent solution.

“We haven’t had a natural harbor since 1998 … Mother Nature’s mad at us, and she’s determined to show us who’s boss,” said Councilor Kelly Windes, who is also a boat captain.

Mann reccomended four possible solutions:

•Do nothing and dredging year after year.

•Add enough sand to rebuild Norriego Point back to its largest footprint of the past decade, then armor it with T-groins and sheet piles, for a price of $7.5 million

•Rebuild to a smaller footprint, with armoring, for a total of $5.2 million.

•Expand the point, but don’t armor it. The cost would only be $500,000, but there would be more expenses down the line to rebuild the point and dredge the harbor channel, where sand from Norriego Point winds up.

City Manager Greg Kisela said any solution except doing nothing would require permits from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and possibly other agencies.

The city has requested Okaloosa County, which claims the land, turn it over to Destin by quitclaim deed. Kisela said the County Commission will take that up this month, but since the county dedicated part of Norriego to the state for recreation, Florida officials — some of whom claim the point is state property — will also get to weigh in.

Councilors Dewey Destin and Sam Seevers asked why T-groins would work when the point was eroding faster between the stone groins landowner Rod Wright placed there six years ago. Mann said the groins were effective, but had been placed too far apart.

Other council members said the point was eroding because seawalls and coastal armor further east on Holiday Isle had channeled wave action to Norriego’s unwalled sands; would further altering the natural coastline shift the impact somewhere else?

“We’re kicking the can down the road,” Councilor Jim Bagby said. “Eventually Mr. Destin will have a nice restaurant out there (on the harbor) with rocks in front of it.”

The councilors also discussed the effect that completely armoring the Gulf side and tip of the point would have on recreation, but agreed it was more important to proceed with the armoring and shift recreation to the back of the point.

“We’ve got to decide if we want to protect this fleet,” Windes said. “If we want to protect this harbor, if we have to sacrifice a few hundred feet for recreational boaters, so be it.”