By admin 
A proposed major interstate that will connect Interstate 95 to the Myrtle Beach area would cross land sacred to the Waccamaw Indian People.
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It is one reason that Chief Cheryl Cail helped established the Waccamaw Indian People’s “Rights of Nature” policy, which declares the right for natural landscapes to exist free from abuse.
Cail said the Rights of Nature declaration is more about preserving a “relationship with nature,” one that has been displaced as development has boomed in coastal South Carolina, including Horry County. It’s also an attempt to reclaim their voices as Waccamaw in decisions made about the environment, which were silenced for centuries, the chief said.
“We are stepping into this with complete understanding that it might not work, but you gotta try,” Cail said. “We’re exerting our sovereignty.”
“Hyperdevelopment” in the region has already diminished the quality of natural resources, Cail said, and upcoming projects including Interstate 73 and Horry County’s Industrial Corridor pose additional threats, especially to water quality.
While at a special campaign for Sen. Darline Graham in Myrtle Beach on Aug. 21, President Donald Trump promised funding for I-73, which is slated to cost at least $2 billion.
Interstate 73 would connect I-95 to the Myrtle Beach area, a project that has been planned for years but has lacked funding necessary for completion. The selected route would cross the Little Pee Dee River, one of the many waterways in the Yadkin-Pee Dee watershed used by Waccamaw ancestors and was declared one of America’s most endangered rivers in 2024, Cail said.
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Cail said the amount of money needed to complete the project could be fixing deteriorated roads that already exist in the county, and there are alternative ways for responsible development.
“Nature is living. It provides, it consumes, it does everything that humans do,” Cail said. “We certainly shouldn’t abuse the water that we then rely on to provide for us.”
The policy declares four fundamental rights for the Yadkin-Pee Dee Watershed, including the right to exist, flourish and regenerate; the right to be free of contamination; the right to restoration; and the right to be respected as a living community.
The remaining 18.5 acres of Tribal Grounds that exist today in Aynor trace back to John Dimery’s 300-acre settlement near Dog Bluff that was purchased in the early 1800s, but the modern tribe was only state-recognized in 2005, the first to earn that title in South Carolina. The tribe is still fighting for federal recognition.
The Waccamaw Indian People became the first tribe in South Carolina to join the growing Rights of Nature movement, based on the United Nations’ declaration. It’s the first environmental policy under Chief Cail’s leadership, and it was a collaboration between the Tribe, South Carolina Environmental Law Project and Coastal Conservation League.
“The hope is that we’ll at least have a voice, one of the things that has not happened (in the past),” Cail said.
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