ATLANTIC BEACH - Former Atlantic Beach Mayor Retha Pierce and seven others filed a Federal lawsuit against the Town of Atlantic Beach and several Horry County leaders over Civil Rights violations.
According to court documents filed in Florence July 2, the defendants conspired to bring about the demise of the town of Atlantic Beach. The town is one of the last fully chartered predominantly black oceanfront municipalities left in the nation.
The documents said the town tampered with its elections and voting districts, strategically reducing the town’s population and eliminating its largest and strongest voting base, mismanagement of tax dollars and town government, and changing legal documents to blur the town’s identity as a municipality separate and apart from the City of North Myrtle Beach.
It stated that several local, state, and federal laws were broken in the Defendants’ scheme that violated the rights of the Plaintiffs and other landowners and residents for a sustained period of more than thirty years.
The suit names the following as defendants: Town of Atlantic Beach, Irene Armstrong, former Mayor of Atlantic Beach, Gary Bell, Chair of the Board of the Housing Authority of Atlantic Beach, Lynda Booker, Municipal Election Commissioner, William Booker, Atlantic Beach Town Manager, Marcia Conner, former Atlantic Beach Town Manager, Elneta Counts, S. C. Rep. Tracy Edge, S.C. Senator Dick Elliott, Councilman Jake Evans, Jacqueline Gore, Clerk, Alice Graham, Municipal Election Commission Chair, Councilwoman Josephine Isom, David Meachem of the Statesville Housing Authority, Cheryl Pereira, Town Clerk and Clerk to Atlantic Beach Municipal Election Commission, and Mayor Charlene Taylor.
The plantiffs in the case are listed as follows: Nicole Kenion Commissioner, Atlantic Beach Municipal Election, Patricia Bellamy, Atlantic Beach Concerned Citizens, Tema Hill, President HAABRA, Housing Authority of Atlantic Beach Residents Association, Harriet Cochran President ABLOA, Atlantic Beach Landowners Association, Former Mayor Retha Pierce, Bobby Suggs, Kantrese Wright, and Derrick Stanley.
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