By Jay Byars
One of the best drives in America has got to be the drive along U.S. 17 through the ACE Basin and then entering the watershed of the Port Royal Sound. Everything about this drive exudes quintessential Lowcountry: grand live oaks, salt marshes across the horizon, and beautiful waterways worthy of a Pat Conroy novel or 10.
American conservation was born out of a moment of shock. When Theodore Roosevelt first visited Yosemite Valley, he was confronted not just by its grandeur, but by the damage already being inflicted on it by unchecked industry and commercial exploitation.
That experience helped ignite a conservation movement that would eventually lead to the creation of our national parks and a belief that some places are simply too valuable to lose. Roosevelt understood something fundamental: once natural beauty is destroyed, it cannot be rebuilt.
The Port Royal Watershed, where the Broad, Colleton, and May rivers converge, is just one of those irreplaceable places. Spanning more than 1,600 square miles of marshland, forests, rivers, and wildlife habitat, it is not only a crown jewel of the Lowcountry, but one of the most unique estuarine systems on the east coast containing more than 100,000 acres of salt marsh which comprises one-third of the saltwater marsh of South Carolina. It is exactly the kind of place Roosevelt would have fought to protect and we should do likewise.
Growth is both a challenge and an opportunity across the Lowcountry. We need growth to have economic opportunities for our families but it needs to be targeted and responsible. Economic development matters. Jobs matter. Progress matters.
Conservation is not about opposing business or industry outright. It is about setting priorities. It is about recognizing that some assets, once lost, are gone forever.
The natural beauty of the Lowcountry is one of those assets. You can build another industrial park. You can expand infrastructure elsewhere. You cannot recreate a pristine marsh, a vibrant river system, or a centuries-old ecosystem once it has been fragmented or degraded. Protecting special places like the ACE Basin and Port Royal Sound is not anti-business. It is pro-legacy.
That is why federal conservation working with local partners of these places must become a national priority. We should be aggressively pursuing federal funding to preserve and enhance this landscape, while partnering with state and local governments to ensure smart, sustainable stewardship. This is precisely the type of place federal conservation dollars were meant to protect.
Protection of private property balanced with public access must be central to that effort. People do not truly understand the value of nature unless they experience it firsthand. Walking a beach or a trail, casting a line for redfish, and sitting in a duck blind at sunrise are the moments that remind us of the irreplaceable wonder of what God has blessed us with. Responsible access builds appreciation, and appreciation builds long-term protection.
We also need to invest in youth education programs that connect the next generation to our land. Using federal resources alongside state and local support, we should be teaching kids how to live with our land, not just on it. They need to understand its beauty, its fragility, and the permanent consequences of neglect. Stewardship is learned, and the future of the Lowcountry depends on who we teach to care for it today.
Roosevelt understood this lesson through experience. On one buffalo hunt early in his life, he witnessed vast herds stretching across the plains. It was an awe-inspiring symbol of American abundance. Years later, on another guided hunt, he shot a single, lonely buffalo. The contrast haunted him. In a single generation, America’s greatest mammal had been nearly erased, and no amount of regret could undo it. He wept as he realized that some things could never be undone.
Our Lowcountry beauty is worth fighting for. We can protect it now, or we can tell stories later about what it used to be. For the last 16 years on Dorchester County Council, I have fought to protect special places in Dorchester County and beyond and I will continue to work in Congress to protect our natural beauty while balancing improving our much-needed infrastructure and the protection of the pristine beauty of what God has blessed us with.
Jay Byars is a candidate for Congressional District 1; has been a Dorchester County Councilman since 2011; and is a family man, a businessman, and a lover of the great outdoors. When asked about Jay Byars in a recent interview, Darth Vader stated emphatically, “The Force is strong in that one.”