CASTING OFF maritime news

Elementary school students, lawmakers at odds over state symbol

The Alice Drive Elementary School kids don't have a lobbyist, their teacher points out. They never would have thought they'd need one.

But the Sumter students' five-month school project campaign to get the endangered right whale named the state marine mammal may have just become endangered itself - because the State Ports Authority has stepped in to stop it. The SPA asked Sen. Chip Campsen, R-Isle of Palms, to introduce a counter-bill naming the bottlenose dolphin the state's sea mammal.

Both bills are in front of a Senate subcommittee on which Campsen and dolphin bill co-sponsor Paul Campbell, R-Goose Creek, sit. "Whoa," said fifth-grader

Granger Rabon - that was his first reaction. "We were stunned," said third-grader Jarred Dawkins.

The beleaguered ports authority, it seems, isn't comfortable with the image. It's already struggling to repair its battered image in the shipping world: It is dealing with the potential loss of its biggest customer; the state Legislature is moving to reconstitute the authority as an economic-development operation rather than a for-profit operation; and the SPA is cleaning up the fallout from giving executives bonuses during the worst economic downturn South Carolina has seen in decades.

And, of course, container ships that use the port now must slow down near the coast during the whale's winter calving season, under a new federal regulation. Asked if the move was made as a matter of concern for the state's image as a shipping port, Byron Miller, SPA public relations director, told The Post and Courier, "We love the dolphin."

Miller said the SPA has taken pro-whale measures such as paying for survey flights, showing its understanding of and commitment to the importance of the right whale species. But he said again, "The dolphin would be a fine state marine mammal."

Campsen could not be reached for comment.

The right whale is the enormous creature that whalers nearly wiped out in the 19th century. Fewer than 400 are known to exist, a number so critically low that researchers consider every living right whale vital to the survival of the species. It travels South Carolina waters back and forth from its Southeast Atlantic calving grounds, and in the past few years the state has been acknowledged as part of the calving waters.

Getting the whale named makes it a state symbol, a gesture that isn't any more than symbolic. The kids thought this rare, special animal was worth special attention by the state and were following the process. Sen.

Phil Leventis, D-Sumter, sponsored the bill. "I think if we make the right whale our state marine mammal, it may make more people want to help it," Granger told The Post and Courier.

The students were expecting the bill to pass in February when they were blindsided by the counter-bill. The dolphin bill is also co-sponsored by GOP Sens. Larry Grooms of Bonneau and Mike Rose of Summerville.

"The r ight whale, they're great, if you ever see one. I've never seen one. If you're talking about naming a state amphibious mammal, you're talking about the bottlenose dolphin," Grooms said.

Grooms said it's not about the students - part of the political motivation behind the right whale bill was to reduce container ship traffic into the port, and he couldn't

support that. The elementary school students' bill, however, never mentions threats to the whales or how they relate to container ship traffic.

"This is just straight from the heart from these kids," said Lynn Eldridge, the teacher working with them on the project. "These are kids who worked so hard for so long, and they really believed in the Legislature. ... They're walking around with incredulous looks on their faces."

Source: The Post and Courier