Off-handed joke about NMB residents was lapse in judgment

Re “North Myrtle Beach residents do not casually trash canals” letter by Sue Neely.

This is in response to Neely’s letter in which she takes me to task for a comment I made regarding how a wide variety of materials found in the canals during the recent Cherry Grove Dredging Project might have wound up there.

There were a few moments during my interview with the reporter when we engaged in a bit of levity, and I made the off-handed remark in that spirit. I did not expect to see it wind up in print, but the conversation was on the record and I’m old enough to know better.

Most of the materials found in the canals appeared to be pre-Hurricane Matthew, and the whole point of that section of the interview was to emphasize the diverse nature of debris found underneath the volume of mud and sand that had settled in the canals over the decades.

My apologies to Sue and anyone else who may have been offended by my lapse in judgment.

This story was originally published May 10, 2017 at 8:23 AM with the headline "Off-handed joke about NMB residents was lapse in judgment."