Originally published by Island Free Press: For Ocracoke, the ferry priority debate is about more than getting to the front of the line. Here’s why you should care
When Ocracoke residents gathered at the Community Center on Tuesday night to talk about the future of the Hatteras-Ocracoke ferry, relatively little of the conversation centered on the toll itself.
Instead, speaker after speaker focused on something that, until recently, many islanders had no reason to believe was in jeopardy: the ability of full-time Ocracoke residents to use a priority lane to get home.
For roughly 40 years, Ocracoke residents have been able to receive priority boarding on the Hatteras-Ocracoke ferry, a system that recognizes a geographic reality unlike virtually anywhere else in North Carolina. Residents cannot simply take another road home when ferry lines stretch for hours. They wait.
And beginning Jan. 1, unless the N.C. General Assembly intervenes, they may wait alongside everyone else.
The potential elimination of resident priority boarding was not explicitly ordered by Session Law 2026-41, the state budget legislation that requires tolls on every N.C. Ferry Division route by Jan. 1, 2027.
Rather, according to Ocracoke Access Alliance (OAA) Executive Director Justin LeBlanc, it emerged afterward from NCDOT’s legal interpretation of the new law.
That distinction has become increasingly important on Ocracoke, where the priority issue is now being cited as another example of the unresolved consequences of a tolling mandate that was passed less than six months before it must take effect.
The law tells the Ferry Division when tolling must begin. It establishes a $150 annual commuter pass for qualifying coastal residents and active-duty military personnel, and specifies that certain school and student transportation vehicles will not pay tolls.
But many of the details required to actually operate the system were not established by the legislation.
NCDOT is still evaluating toll rates, payment methods, collection technology, terminal infrastructure, traffic flow, customer service, and administration of passes. Toll rates are not scheduled to go before the N.C. Board of Transportation until October, with adoption expected in November — leaving less than two months to implement a brand-new system before the Jan. 1 deadline.
The law also does not specifically authorize Ocracoke’s existing resident priority program.
According to LeBlanc at Tuesday’s meeting, that omission has created a consequence that neither Ocracoke advocates nor many residents anticipated when the legislation was being negotiated.
“The priority pass system has operated without explicit authorization from the General Assembly for about 40 years,” LeBlanc told the crowd on Tuesday. “Nothing in the General Assembly statutes authorizes the Priority Pass program. Nothing in those statutes prohibits it.”
For decades, he said, priority boarding simply existed as an administrative policy.
With tolling now specifically regulating the Hatteras-Ocracoke route, LeBlanc said NCDOT attorneys have concluded that priority boarding must also be explicitly authorized in state law.
LeBlanc, and many others, made clear that he disagrees with that interpretation.
“The only way we get priority pass back is not with the Ferry Division, it’s not with NCDOT, it’s [by] getting a new law enacted by the General Assembly,” he said.
That means a ferry provision enacted in July now requires another legislative action before January if Ocracoke’s resident priority system is to continue.
Hyde County and the Ocracoke Access Alliance (OAA) have already drafted proposed language for that correction and are seeking its inclusion during a legislative session beginning Nov. 30, which LeBlanc said is the earliest opportunity for lawmakers to address the issue.
“We’ve come up with what language would work to provide priority access to continue to provide it for us,” LeBlanc said Tuesday. “We’re in the midst of shopping that to the General Assembly members, including our senator, Senator Sanderson, in hopes that we can get it included as a technical correction.”
A harried timeline that was questioned from the beginning
Questions about how quickly the new system could realistically be established surfaced almost immediately after the state budget was signed into law July 7.
Then-state Sen. Bobby Hanig, R-Currituck, who opposed imposing tolls on the historically free routes, told the Island Free Press in July that the absence of any implementation plan or accounting for other key details – like priority passes – reflected just how the mandate had been adopted.
“You can tell it’s agenda-driven because there’s no plan,” Hanig said. “A few leaders decided that this was what they wanted to do. There wasn’t a lot of thought put into how it would actually work.”
Hanig emphasized that his criticism was directed at the legislative process, not the Ferry Division employees tasked with carrying it out.
“The Ferry Division is working their tail off right now to try to figure out how to get this done, but I don’t see a foreseeable way for them to get it done without a bunch of hiccups,” he said. “There’s so much that has to go into it.”
Less than two months later, the priority-pass issue has become one of those complications.
It isn’t the only detail that remains unsettled.
NCDOT’s current guidance says school buses and other student transportation vehicles are exempt from tolls, as are individuals using the ferry during declared emergencies. The legislation does not specifically provide the same exemption for ambulances, utility trucks, or other emergency response vehicles.
That distinction also surfaced during Tuesday’s meeting, when one resident questioned why the legislation specifically protected school transportation but did not similarly address ambulances.
It is one of numerous questions NCDOT must resolve before January — alongside how drivers will pay, how annual commuter passes will be verified, how exemptions will be recognized, how vehicles and trailers will be classified, and how a collection system can be added without creating additional backups at already-congested ferry terminals.
The Hatteras-Ocracoke route presents a particularly unusual challenge.
Unlike the longer Cedar Island-Ocracoke and Swan Quarter-Ocracoke routes, Hatteras-Ocracoke does not operate primarily through reservations. Vehicles generally arrive, enter a stacking lane, and board as space becomes available.
On busy summer days, waits can already stretch for hours.
Adding toll collection and removing resident priority at essentially the same time would therefore change both the cost of the trip and the way island residents move through the lines in a route that has up to 52 crossings per day.
‘The ferry is not simply a transportation option’
The debate over ferry funding has also highlighted differing views in Raleigh and coastal communities over the role ferries play in North Carolina’s transportation system, sometimes underscoring what coastal residents have long viewed as a lack of understanding about how transportation fundamentally works in the easternmost reaches of the state – areas that funnel lots of tourism dollars back into Raleigh’s coffers.
State Sen. Vickie Sawyer, R-Iredell, who now serves as a co-chair of both the Senate Transportation Committee and Senate Appropriations on the Department of Transportation, expressed support for expanding ferry tolls during an earlier debate in 2023, citing the toll-free Bayview-Aurora route as an example.
“It is absolutely not a good use of DOT dollars,” Sawyer told WBTV Charlotte at the time. “When I’m paying $25 for my family to be able to access the city of Charlotte, then these people who are going across the beautiful Pamlico River should be able to pay a toll as well.”
For Ocracoke residents, however, Tuesday’s meeting illustrated a fundamental difference: The ferry is not simply one transportation option among several. There is no bridge or alternate highway connecting Ocracoke to the rest of North Carolina.
Hyde County Schools Superintendent Melanie Shaver described a school district split by water, with employees traveling between the mainland and Ocracoke to serve students.
“The ferry is not simply a transportation option; it is the road that connects our communities, our schools, and our services,” Shaver said.
For a visitor, she said, missing a ferry may mean waiting for another boat.
For an island resident, the consequences can be substantially different.
“That ferry means missing a dental or medical appointment, attending a school event to see their child, accessing services, or simply just getting home,” she said.
Ocracoke School counselor and athletic director Mary McKnight offered another example.
She estimated Ocracoke School teams use the ferry about 60 times during a school year for athletics alone, not including field trips and other school travel. The average one-way trip for a sporting event is about four hours, she said.
If a student is injured during an away game and a parent must leave Ocracoke to reach the hospital, priority boarding can become far more consequential than simply saving time.
“You need to go get your sick or injured child out of the hospital,” McKnight said.
Without priority, she said, a parent would have to wonder whether the already four-hour trip would become five or six.
“I just want you all to think about what that would mean for you… how that would feel, the anxiety it would cause,” McKnight said.
Ocracoke Preservation Society President Ken DeBarth, who said he has lived on Ocracoke since 1995, recalled returning to the island after surgery.
His wife drove to the priority lane and they boarded the next ferry.
“If I had to sit in a parking lot for three hours before we could get on a boat, it would have been a much worse experience,” he said.
DeBarth’s request to lawmakers was straightforward.
“We need the priority pass,” he said. “Please make a correction.”
Pamela Mitchell, who said she worked for the NCDOT Ferry Division for 35 years and commuted between Ocracoke and Hatteras for 14 of them, said she understands that tolls are coming.
“We understand we’re going to pay a toll, and that’s okay,” Mitchell said. “But we do need to get back and forth to the mainland.”
That distinction — between paying for the ferry and being able to reliably use it — was repeated throughout the meeting, by dozens of residents, business owners, and employees whose lives would be profoundly affected.
A commuter pass is not a priority pass
The distinction has also created some potential for public confusion.
Session Law 2026-41 establishes a $150 annual commuter pass for permanent residents of North Carolina’s 20 coastal counties and active-duty military personnel. A qualifying pass holder can use state ferry routes for a year without paying an additional fare for each trip.
But that commuter pass is not the same thing as Ocracoke’s resident priority pass.
The $150 pass addresses price.
The resident priority pass addresses access.
An Ocracoke resident could therefore possess a commuter pass allowing unlimited ferry travel without additional fares and still potentially sit for hours in the general vehicle line when returning home.
That is the problem Hyde County is asking lawmakers to correct.
The Hyde County Board of Commissioners approved two ferry-related resolutions Sept. 2. One joins eight other coastal counties in seeking a permanent toll exemption for locally registered vehicles in counties with ferry terminals.
The other is specific to Ocracoke and asks the General Assembly to amend state law to preserve resident priority boarding.
The county has since established a dedicated ferry information website, while an online petition is also circulating seeking restoration of the priority program.
What happens if the priority system goes away?
For Ocracoke residents, the most immediate and provable consequence would be uncertainty.
Garick Kalna, who said he and his wife, Jackie, own and operate 1718 Brewing, described reliable ferry access as both a personal and business necessity.
Island businesses depend on ferries to move supplies, employees, and other goods, he said.
Kalna acknowledged the need for revenue to replace aging ferry vessels but questioned implementing tolling so quickly while simultaneously removing priority.
“The way the tolling is being implemented is too swift and without consideration at all for any of the residents of Ocracoke by removing the priority pass,” he said.
Other speakers described the practical implications in more personal terms: missed medical appointments, longer waits to return home, uncertainty surrounding school and athletic trips, and the possibility that routine errands on the mainland could consume substantially more of a day.
The potential consequences are difficult to quantify before the change occurs. Claims made at the meeting about effects on property values, employment, or whether residents would ultimately leave the island remain predictions rather than established outcomes, albeit logical ones based on residents’ experiences with ferry delays and island life.
But the transportation problem underlying those concerns is measurable: Ocracoke has no bridge connecting it to the rest of North Carolina, and residents routinely must leave the island for medical care, employment, and services unavailable locally.
Priority boarding has been the one mechanism for making that geography manageable.
If you don’t live on Ocracoke, why should you care?
For North Carolinians who do not live on Ocracoke, the fate of a priority lane at a ferry terminal may seem like a distinctly local issue.
But the consequences described Tuesday do not necessarily stop with the people who carry an Ocracoke driver’s license.
The same ferry that takes residents to medical appointments, grocery stores, and jobs also carries the workers and business owners who sustain an island economy built almost solely around tourism. During the busiest months of the year, visitors arriving on Ocracoke expect restaurants to be staffed, hotel rooms and vacation rentals to be ready, stores to be open, and everyday services – like the island’s lone medical center – to be available.
One speaker at Tuesday’s meeting recalled what happened after a past hurricane evacuation when residents and visitors returned to the island without priority loading. Tourists made it onto the ferries while some employees remained in line on the other side.
“Businesses kind of opened, but not really because the employees were still waiting to get on the ferry,” she said. “All the tourists got on the ferry first. It was first come, first serve.”
Without resident priority, she said, a version of that scenario could become part of ordinary life during periods of heavy ferry traffic.
“They’re not going to make it back to their service industry jobs before the people that they’re trying to serve,” she said. “So, the people that they’re trying to serve are going to be in their restaurant or in their hotel waiting to get checked in, or waiting to be served. Nobody’s going to be there to [help] them.”
Resident Vince O’Neal made a similar point near the end of the meeting, asking lawmakers to consider not only medical appointments and families, but the workforce that keeps Ocracoke operating.
“You want all the tourists to go ahead of you,” he said. “Okay, so here’s your waiters, your cooks, your house cleaners. Everybody’s got to get back here to provide the services.”
The effects of disruptions to everyday business on Ocracoke ripple well beyond the island.
Ocracoke is part of a coastal tourism economy that generates spending, jobs, and tax revenue benefiting communities and governments far beyond Hyde County.
In 2025, visitors spent an estimated $61.15 million in Hyde County, primarily on Ocracoke Island, according to an annual analysis prepared by Tourism Economics for Visit North Carolina. That visitor activity supported an estimated 378 jobs, generated $12.71 million in personal income and produced approximately $1.93 million in state tax revenue.
And Ocracoke is part of a much larger Outer Banks tourism economy. Neighboring Dare County generated approximately $2.09 billion in visitor spending in 2025 — the fourth-highest total among North Carolina’s 100 counties — and an estimated $68.11 million in state tax revenue.
Only Mecklenburg, Wake, and Buncombe counties generated more visitor spending, despite having substantially larger populations. Dare County had an estimated 38,245 residents in 2025, compared with 1.23 million in Mecklenburg County, 1.26 million in Wake County and 277,417 in Buncombe County, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.
So combined, Dare and Hyde counties accounted for roughly $2.15 billion in visitor spending in 2025, or about 5.8% of the statewide total, and approximately $70.04 million in state tax revenue.
Those figures put a broader economic context around the concerns raised Tuesday. The ability of Ocracoke’s workers and business owners to reliably reach the island does not affect only the people waiting at the ferry terminal. When transportation problems interfere with restaurants, accommodations, stores, and other businesses serving visitors, the effects can negatively dip into a tourism economy that sends millions of dollars in tax revenue to the state each year.
The larger question, then, is not simply whether Ocracoke residents should be allowed to move ahead in a ferry line.
It is what happens to a ferry-dependent community — and the visitors, businesses, and state tourism economy that depend on it — when the people who live and work there can no longer reliably leave or go home.
That distinction also surfaced repeatedly on Tuesday.
As Hyde County Schools Superintendent Melanie Shaver put it earlier in the meeting, the ferry is Ocracoke’s road. For residents, priority boarding is the mechanism that has helped make that road reliably usable for roughly four decades.
And for anyone who vacations on Ocracoke or takes a day-trip to the island, eats in its restaurants, stays in its accommodations, shops in its stores, or simply expects the island to function when they arrive, whether that road works for the people who live there may ultimately matter to them, too.
A correction that can still be made before Jan. 1
There is still time for the issue to be addressed.
According to LeBlanc, Hyde County and the OAA have prepared legislative language that would explicitly authorize resident priority boarding, and local officials said Tuesday that Sen. Norm Sanderson has indicated support for pursuing a correction.
Meanwhile, the Ferry Division has its own deadline.
NCDOT plans to release a summary of public comments by Sept. 22. Recommended toll rates and the methodology used to establish them are scheduled to go before the Board of Transportation Oct. 8, with the board expected to consider adoption Nov. 5.
Tolls must begin Jan. 1.
That leaves the state simultaneously working to determine what motorists will pay, how they will pay it, how exemptions will work, how the system will operate at terminals, and whether Ocracoke residents will retain a boarding system that existed long before tolling was even contemplated.
At Tuesday’s meeting, one speaker pointed out that restoring priority would not require another appropriation for Ocracoke.
“How often do your constituents ask you for something that doesn’t cost any money?” he said. “Restore the priority pass. We’re not asking for anything that costs money. We’re just asking you to correct an error.”
Whether lawmakers agree that the omission is something that needs to be fixed will ultimately be decided in Raleigh.
But the packed Ocracoke meeting made clear that, for many island residents, the most consequential question created by the new ferry law may no longer be how much it will cost them to cross Hatteras Inlet.
It is whether they can reliably get home.