Greenwood County Beginning Lake Locator Initiative 

Greenwood County Beginning Lake Locator Initiative
Greenwood, S.C. – Greenwood County announced today an initiative to label all docks on the waters of Lake Greenwood. This project, being led by Greenwood County Emergency Management, will help both emergency responders as well as recreational lake goers. Each dock on Lake Greenwood will receive a reflective panel sign with an identifying number that coordinates to a physical address, enabling emergency services to be deployed faster and more accurately.
“Currently, when there is an emergency on Lake Greenwood such as a boating accident or drowning, witnesses and bystanders may have difficulty explaining their location to emergency personnel due to location recognition issues,” Jamie Parrish, Emergency Management coordinator, said. “Labeling all the docks on Lake Greenwood will provide boaters and lake goers a quick and easy way to identify where they are and relay that information to 911 dispatch, if it is needed.”
All docks on Lake Greenwood will be assigned a unique number that is associated with the property’s physical address so that 911 dispatch can deploy crews to the scene by water and land. Property owners’ physical addresses will only be accessible to emergency services.
The Lake Locator Initiative signs will be placed onto the front of all docks where they will be visible from the water. The reflective signs are 4” x 18” and are color coordinated with the property’s county designation (green for Greenwood County, red for Laurens County and blue for Newberry County).
Dock owners will be required to pay a one-time, nominal fee of $5 for the sign. The funds for signs on Greenwood County docks will be collected by an additional transfer to the Lake Management Fund and dock owners who live in Newberry and Laurens counties will see the one-time fee added to their annual dock fee billed in July 2023. For new construction, property owners will pay the fee when they obtain an encroachment permit from Greenwood County Lake Management.
Since Greenwood County has the authority to access and make modifications to all docks in Lake Greenwood and to ensure this initiative rollout is as hassle-free as possible for dock owners, a volunteer crew will place signs on all docks. Signs will be placed on docks beginning Saturday, October 29, through Sunday, November 13. Property owners wishing

to install their own sign may attend the volunteer meeting, which will be held Sunday, October 23 at 2 p.m. at the new boat ramp pavilion located at the Highway 72/221 bridge.
In addition to emergency management purposes, the Lake Locator Initiative signs will also benefit property owners and lake goers alike in reporting lake issues such as: vandalism, theft or reckless boaters; providing a navigational system for those less familiar with Lake Greenwood and providing location information for county-specific issues that may arise.
For more information on the Lake Greenwood Lake Locator Initiative, or if you are interested in volunteering to distribute signs, please contact (864) 942-8553. Online volunteer registration can be found at https://bit.ly/3dF4dca.