Lend your voice in support of Georgia’s salt marsh!
The Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Coastal Resources Division (CRD) has issued draft rules for private recreational dock construction and is now soliciting public comment. Those comments are due by July 24, 2026.
Click here to learn more about the draft rules and the public comment process
Click here to read Georgia Conservancy’s comments of concern (our letter is also posted below)
The decisions of CRD will directly impact the future of our coastal marshlands and the way private recreational docks are permitted and built in coastal Georgia.
Why The Rulemaking Process Matters
Currently, there are no formal rules governing the design, placement, or approval of private recreational docks in Georgia’s coastal marshland, only internal guidance. CRD is now preparing to formalize these guidance policies, and the decisions made now will shape the future of our coast for generations to come.
While some docks serve a legitimate, water-dependent use, our organization believes that stronger protections are necessary to preserve the ecological, scenic, and public value of Georgia’s marshlands.
Georgia Conservancy’s Concerns with Private Dock Proliferation
- Marshfront Does Not Equal Waterfront: Owning property on the marsh does not guarantee a right to build a dock to access deep water. That access is a privilege, not a right, as the marsh the dock must cross belongs to the people of Georgia and is managed by the state.
- Public Trust and Water Access: Outside of historic King’s grants, no private individual owns the marsh. It is public land held in trust, and any encroachment on it must be carefully considered.
- Water-Dependent Use Only: Docks should exist only to support water-dependent activities, such as boating or fishing.
- Viewshed and Aesthetic Impacts: The spread of oversized or “party docks” disrupts the scenic beauty that draws people to the coast and can negatively affect neighbors’ quality of life and viewshed.
- Marine Debris and Structural Resilience: As storms become more frequent and severe, poorly built or maintained docks are breaking apart, leaving marine debris in our marshes. Currently, dock owners bear no responsibility for cleaning up the debris; that burden rests on the State and Georgia taxpayers.
- Habitat Fragmentation: Docks can erode the integrity of the marsh ecosystem. Unbroken stretches of marshland provide exponentially greater habitat value than areas divided by crisscrossing docks, walkways, and platforms.
- We Must Protect What We Love: Our marshes are vast, healthy, and beautiful because of decades of protection, not because they were left to chance. If we relax the standards now, we risk undermining the very thing that makes our coast so special.
Your Voice Is Needed! CRD has issued draft rules, but those are not final. Public feedback at this stage can make a real difference in how the rules are written.
Need more information about the impact that docks can have on our marsh? Watch this webinar from our partners at One Hundred Miles, featuring Georgia Conservancy Coastal Director Courtney Reich.
Together, we can ensure Georgia’s coast remains a thriving, healthy environment for future generations!
Questions? Please reach out to Courtney Reich at creich@georgiaconservancy.org.
Georgia Conservancy’s July 13 Comment Letter to Georgia DNR Coastal Resources Division
RE: Proposed amendments to Subject 391-2-1 of the Rules of the Department of Natural Resources to establish rules for private docks located over state-owned tidal water bottoms
Dear Ms. Andrews:
On behalf of the Georgia Conservancy, I am submitting the following comments on the proposed Rules for Private Recreational Docks, issued by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Coastal Resources Division (CRD) on June 24, 2026. Georgia Conservancy is a Georgia-based conservation organization, formed in 1967 with a mission to support healthy lands, thriving communities, and a future where every Georgian can enjoy the outdoors for generations to come. We are uniquely blessed here in coastal Georgia to enjoy a vast, healthy marsh ecosystem due to the protection provided by the State of Georgia through the Coastal Marshlands Protection Act in 1970. DNR has been a dedicated steward of our coastal marshlands since that time.
Georgia Conservancy supports the CRD’s effort to adopt Rules to govern the design and construction of Private Recreational Docks, and we appreciate the due diligence that has gone into creating these standards and the challenges CRD staff face with their development and implementation. Georgia Conservancy staff served on the Private Recreational Dock Committee, and we applaud DNR’s efforts to regulate private recreational docks constructed over public trust tidal waters to ensure safety, consistency, and protection of our coastal marshlands.
Water access is a way of life in coastal Georgia. Residents and visitors are drawn to our coastal marshlands for the fishing, boating, and scenic views. DNR has long worked to provide access to these resources held in public trust for all of us by the State of Georgia. While private recreational docks do facilitate access for certain marsh-front property owners, they do not do so without impacts, and balancing this private privilege with public resource impacts is critical.
Georgia Conservancy was pleased to see that the proposed Rules create a comprehensive framework for regulating dock construction that includes requirements for electrical permitting, restrictions on use of construction equipment in the marsh, and protection of manatees. We also support the requirement that dock owners must promptly remove and properly dispose of all debris that originates from, or is generated by, their private dock. All of these requirements will benefit coastal Georgians and protect our coastal marshlands.
While some recommendations of the Private Recreational Dock Committee were addressed, the Report of this Committee, which represented the majority of members, recommended the following elements that were not included in the proposed rules. We recommend that DNR consider addressing these issues through this Rule adoption process:
- An objective and science-based process to consider how variances to current dock standards, including maximum dock dimensions, are granted.
- Adoption of a dock builder certification program and design standards for docks.
- Collaboration with local governments to ensure that docks are subject to building permits and inspections. This is not currently the case throughout coastal Georgia, and a lack of enforceable building standards and oversight during construction makes docks less safe and resilient to storms.
Georgia Conservancy is particularly concerned with the significantly expanded maximum dock dimensions allowed by these new rules, which were not supported by the majority of the CRD Dock Committee. Specifically, these proposed rules allow a more than 100% increase in the maximum allowable footprint of the boardwalk over the marsh, expanding from a limit of 3,000 sq. ft. to 6,600 sq. ft. This represents more than a doubling of shading impacts despite the known science, commissioned by DNR, which demonstrated that shading of marsh grass by dock walkways directly reduces marsh productivity. This new maximum footprint is more than 50% larger than South Carolina’s maximum dock square footage of 4,000 sq. ft. Among our peer states, South Carolina’s low coastline and marsh conditions are most similar to Georgia’s, so why would Georgia marsh front property owners require docks so much larger than those in South Carolina?
Most notably, there are no provisions for dock owners to demonstrate a reasonable need for larger docks or to mitigate this additional impact on the marsh, even though this new standard will allow docks to impact well over 0.1 acres of marsh by right. This exceeds the 1/10th acre threshold that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) uses to trigger compensatory mitigation requirements for jurisdictional wetland impacts. If this level of impact is significant for freshwater wetlands, then why would the same not be true for salt marshes?
Significant expansion of the size of private docks allowed over our marshlands is not a way to “facilitate reasonable access” to the public. It does, however, provide an expanded private right to certain marsh front landowners despite the impact (known and potential) to our coastal marshlands held in public trust. As DNR deliberates the proposed Rules, Georgia Conservancy encourages the Board to consider the following:
- Marsh front ≠ Waterfront: Owning property on the marsh does not guarantee a right to build a dock to access deep water. That access is a privilege, not a right, as the marshland the dock crosses belongs to the people of Georgia and is held in trust by the State of Georgia.
- Public Trust and Water Access: Outside of historic King’s grants, no private individual owns the marsh. It is public land held in trust, and any encroachment on it must be carefully considered.
- Water-Dependent Use Only: Docks should exist only to support water-dependent activities, such as boating or fishing – not outdoor living space – and should be sized accordingly.
- Viewshed and Aesthetic Impacts: The spread of oversized or “party docks” disrupts the scenic beauty that draws people to the coast and can negatively affect neighbors’ quality of life and viewshed.
- Habitat Fragmentation: Docks can erode the integrity of the marsh ecosystem. Unbroken stretches of marshland provide exponentially greater habitat value than areas divided by expansive boardwalks, walkways, and platforms.
- Marine Debris and Structural Resilience: As storms become more frequent and severe, poorly built or maintained docks become marine debris littering our marshes. Limiting dock sizes and ensuring that responsible contractors build to acceptable standards are the most effective ways to limit future impacts to the marsh from dock debris.
We Must Protect What We Love: Our marshes are vast, healthy, and beautiful because of decades of protection by DNR, not because they were left to chance. If we relax the standards now, we risk undermining the very thing that makes our coast so special.
We encourage DNR to maintain the current policy limiting dock size and adopt stronger regulations governing their construction and maintenance. These protections are necessary to preserve the ecological, scenic, and public value of our coastal marshlands now and for future generations.
We appreciate the efforts of the Board of Natural Resources and CRD in seeking input on this important topic, allowing Georgia Conservancy to participate in the Private Recreational Dock Stakeholder Committee, and considering our comments and concerns on the proposed Rules.
Sincerely,
Courtney Reich
Coastal Director
Katherine Moore
President