A Georgia beach aims to disrupt Black students’ spring bash after big crowds brought chaos in 2023

By RUSS BYNUM
Associated Press

TYBEE ISLAND, Ga. (AP) — Thousands of Black college students expected this weekend for an annual spring bash at Georgia’s largest public beach shouldn’t expect a warm welcome. Tybee Island’s city leaders are bringing in dozens of extra police officers and using barricades to block parking lots and residential streets during Orange Crush, a sprawling beach party begun three decades ago. Island Mayor Brian West says huge crowds a year ago overwhelmed police with reports of gunfire, drug overdoses, traffic jams and fighting. West says he hopes this year’s measures will put an end to that. Julia Pearce is one of the island’s few Black residents and says the crackdown appears racially motivated.