Commercial Roof Repair in Charleston, SC

Hilton Head and Charleston have long been sought-after locales, but smaller inland towns in the region are seeing a surge in interest, particularly from young families.

June 2, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET

For two years a surprising front-runner has emerged in the luxury real estate market: Buyers still want to be on the water but are choosing to settle along the rivers of South Carolina’s Lowcountry and the small inland communities built around them, a Realtor.com/Wall Street Journal ranking has found.

Franklin Newell, an agent at the Broadhurst Group, a real estate firm on Hilton Head Island, S.C., said a combination of “great weather, low taxes and a beautiful natural setting” contributed to the area’s growth.

While Hilton Head and Charleston have long been sought-after South Carolina locales, smaller inland river towns like Bluffton and Beaufort are seeing a surge in homeownership, even surpassing cities like Tampa, Fla., and Nashville in popularity. With their sense of community and less-hectic lifestyle, these towns are attracting young families.

Palmetto Bluff, a luxury resort community in Bluffton, once was largely filled with retirees and second-home owners who found their way to the area through the five-star resort hotel on the property, the Montage Palmetto Bluff. Even before the Covid-19 pandemic began in 2020, families with young children were changing the demographics of Palmetto Bluff, but the pandemic accelerated that trend.

Mike Broadhurst of the Broadhurst Group attributed this change to work-from-home flexibility and people leaving high-tax states. (South Carolina ranks toward the middle of the 50 states in overall taxes.) He said that before the pandemic, he and Mr. Newell “had never sold a home to someone from California, and we’ve now sold half a dozen.”

Bryan Byrne, broker-in-charge for Palmetto Bluff Real Estate, said the community had always done well with residents from traditional cold weather locations like Detroit and Cleveland, as well as affluent northeast areas. “The surprise has been Florida,” he said, estimating 15 to 20 sales to families from Florida in the last two years.

Mr. Byrne said he also sees an exodus from high-tax states like California and New York to the area, including at Palmetto Bluff, where residents enjoy an array of amenities as part of their club experience. (The top tax bracket on income for South Carolina residents is 6.5 percent, while property taxes in Beaufort county, where Bluffton is located, average 0.45 percent.)

Palmetto Bluff has golf, of course, but it also features a conservancy on site with walking trails and hunting. The May River borders the property, and a newly constructed marina allows residents to store their boats and get out on the water, for fishing or water skiing.

Jeff and Michelle Solomon were visiting the resort for 10 years before they finally bought a vacation home in 2018. They were there at the onset of the pandemic and have never left. “We were talking to our friends and family in Michigan and up north in lockdown, and it was cold and nasty,” Michelle Solomon said. “They were stuck in their houses and here we are living our best life.”

The variety of outdoor activities available year-round, and the opportunity to be part of a community with young children — something their life in Michigan had lacked — made it easy for the Solomons to stay.

“We just flourished,” Ms. Solomon said. “In Michigan, we didn’t live in a neighborhood, and this was the first time that kids were knocking on our door at all hours of the day and night. Our daughter was outside from morning till night. No TV, no electronics. It was like this old-fashioned lifestyle.”

At Berkeley Hall, 25 minutes north by car, a similar narrative is developing. The community is situated on the Okatee River and, like Palmetto Bluff, is gated. Though more golf-centric, its club offers a number of other outdoor pursuits as well, like boating and fishing.

Alex Madeiros, director of sales and marketing for Berkeley Hall, said that, while there was a lot of interest in homes and relocation, “I think it’s the amenities and lifestyle that people are becoming most interested in.”

Those offerings were a factor in Lindsey and Chris DeSalvo’s decision to relocate from Western New York. They purchased land at Berkeley Hall and are waiting for their home to be built.

With one child in college and another finishing high school, the couple was looking for a location with an affordable cost of living and quality health care, according to Lindsey DeSalvo, a pharmacist. What appealed to them about the community was its proximity to Old Town Bluffton with its mix of entertainment and retail.

In both developments, club life is meant to offer residents a pace and ease of lifestyle, not to mention an instant community. All of this comes with a price tag, though. In addition to the cost of homes, which are averaging $697 per square foot at Palmetto Bluff, club membership fees are an added and required expense ($40,000 initially, then annual dues of $12,000; sporting, boating, club and golf fees are separate and optional). The membership fees, however, cover the amenities that many residents look for at luxury communities, like pools and spa facilities, as well as 24-hour security services.

At Berkeley Hall, which has an average home price of $463 per square foot, each homeowner is also a club member. At Palmetto Bluff, however, there is a menu of options that come with club membership. Homeowners can choose from additional golf, boating or shooting club memberships and may opt in for all, none or some.

Josh Bischoff, who works in financial services, and has lived in Palmetto Bluff since May 2019 but had a vacation home there since 2014, said the largest piece of the puzzle when he and his family made the move from New Jersey was finding a school for his children. He and his wife, Megan, send their children to school in Savannah, Ga., about 35 minutes away, to a school comparable to the one they had attended in New Jersey. He said he had seen firsthand the changing demographics of Palmetto Bluff from retirees to families like his, and they’ve benefited from a variety of programming the club offers, including summer camps.

Like other homeowners in both communities, he feels a sense of security and even nostalgia. “It kind of gives the kids the same experience a lot of us had growing up,” he said, “where you had a little more freedom and go hang out with your friends and be home for dinner, and where your parents kind of felt like every parent looks out for every kid.”

Mr. Bischoff said that, Covid aside, the hustle and bustle of living in the northeast increasingly made his family’s lifestyle more difficult. “The density of the place just kind of grinds on you after a while,” he said, and on each visit to the Lowcountry, “it became harder and harder to leave.”

He pointed out some trade-offs, though. “It’s a phenomenal community and phenomenal people, but there isn’t a decent Chinese restaurant in the area,” he joked. “But I’ll give up decent Chinese food for a much nicer climate, a real community to live in and the amenities Palmetto Bluff has.”

The Charleston County School District Superintendent has sent a cease-and-desist letter to a member of the school board.

Published: Thu Jun 01 2023

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - The Charleston County School District Superintendent has sent a cease-and-desist letter to a member of the school board alleging “defamatory, slanderous and libelous” social media posts.

In the letter, obtained exclusively by Live 5 News, Superintendent Don Kennedy accuses board member Keith Grybowski of writing posts on a Moms for Liberty Facebook group, in which he describes the search for a new superintendent as “long” and “extensive”.

In reality, Kennedy says the current board’s process began on March 13 and effectively ended this week. He says staff gave up time off to move the process ahead, saying it took only 50 business days to launch a search and enter into contract negotiation with a new superintendent.

“CCSD Staff worked tirelessly to schedule stakeholder engagement events, some of which were held over Spring Break. Their involvement in the planning of the “board-led” initiative placed them in a tenuous position and required them to work during time that should have been spent with their families,” Kennedy wrote.

Kennedy further accuses Grybowski and demands from the board have made his job and the job staff particularly difficult.

“I admit that my engagement with the Board has publicly been, at times, tense, but the public and private demands for increased Board oversight, along with the stripping of duties and responsibilities delegated to the Superintendent, cast doubts upon the professional reputation of all educator in CCSD, including me,” Kennedy wrote.

Last week, the board voted to delay the approval of the district’s $650+ million budget citing a need for more transparency. Board members wanted to ask more questions about the district’s various accounts among other questions they district staff have refused to answer.

Kennedy’s letter accuses of Grybowski, the chair of the Audit and Finance Committee, of refusing to meet with the finance department staff to better understand the budget. According to Kennedy, Grybowski referred to the budget as a “disaster”.

“The assertation that the school district has “nothing to show” for $300,000,000.00 is blatantly false,” Kennedy said. “The insinuation that the Board has not been provided with ample information for the Budget cycle is false, and blaming the current budget situation on my work and the work of my staff is slanderous.”

Kennedy says the environment created by Grybowski and board lead to the departure of “one of the nation’s most capable minority CFOs”. While Kennedy didn’t mention her by name, the district’s last CFO was Channa Williams who resigned in February.

Kennedy claims the former CFO would testify to the harassment received from the board.

“The budgeting process has arrived at a place that was inevitable when one considers the obvious obstruction caused by the Audit and Finance Committee Chair’s refusal to meet with the prior CFO,” Kennedy said.

“The multiple insinuations of insubordination, accusations of lying, questioning of qualifications of professional firms, publicly stated from the dais, are damaging and demeaning. Several of our partners have been appalled by the crass comments and inability to collaborate with all partners for the betterment of children. This has created a hostile work environment. . .”

Kennedy finishes his letter by rejecting the Grybowski’s suggestion that CCSD’s education is inadequately preparing student. Kennedy says the education data from the latest round of tests are embargoed to the public but show “significantly increased academic performance”, suggesting Kennedy’s approach to the district’s turnaround effort is working.

“To call into question publicly, and in your official capacity, my ability to provide oversight is hostile, troublesome, and again defamatory,” Kennedy wrote.

Grybowski has not responded to a request for comment, but he did send a letter to board members saying he does not intend to respond to Kennedy.

“I find it on the verge of insubordination for an employee to question my right to advise my constituents,” Grybowski wrote. “I will not let this stop the transparency concern we pledged to our constituents.”

Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved.

When it comes to Union Pier, we need to stop talking about the State Ports Authority. The state of South Carolina is the owner, and it is acting like a private developer trying to squeeze every last dollar out of land it was given decades ago.

The owner is one arm of government seeking the approval of another arm of government (Charleston City Council) to secure a big payday. The simple fact is this is not private property. Union Pier belongs to the public.

Anyone who has been paying the slightest bit of attention to the Union Pier saga knows there is no local constituency for what the state and its designated agent, Los Angeles-based Lowe, is selling. All that noise you are hearing is not a few disgruntled neighbors, but a city shouting NO!

In the end, State Ports boss Barbara Melvin, who is running the deal for the state, is counting on the apathy of suburban council members and a grand last-minute concession to maybe double (or whatever it takes) the number of on-site affordable housing units to buy off enough other council votes to get to seven.

Never said but always present is the quiet threat that if Charleston doesn’t like what’s on offer, there’s something else that it will like even less. Too many hotel rooms and pricey apartments? We could sell off Union Pier piece by piece. Or park BMWs there. Maybe more cruise ships rather than fewer?

This is not how government is supposed to work. The entire deal has been rife with conflicts of interest and cronyism from the start.

The Ports Authority, a government agency, hired Lowe, a private developer, to get Union Pier through the city approval process on its timeline. This is the same company that paid the authority $38 million for its former waterfront headquarters on Concord Street in 2017; State Ports then paid Lowe $69,000 a month to lease back the building while it was finishing its new digs on the Wando.

This cozy relationship led the Ports Authority to hire Lowe at $50,000 a month to permit Union Pier. Lowe went on to recruit Jacob Lindsey, Charleston’s former planning director, to negotiate the city’s political gantlet. The most audacious touch of all: Lowe’s absurd sweetheart deal with the Ports Authority for a 9.5% commission if any other developer is chosen.

This is all about the money. The state wants the highest price possible for its 64 acres of waterfront property, which the city foolishly gave away not once but twice, in 1947 and 1994. Imagine where we would be today if the city had leased its waterfront for $1 a year instead of gifting it to the state.

The sale is supposed to finance the expansion of Leatherman Terminal, which today remains mostly idle because of an endless labor dispute the Ports Authority is currently losing. (See cranes sitting silently on the docks.)

If the state wants to expand Leatherman, it should do what it always does: Write a check to the Ports Authority. In 2021, the Legislature agreed to provide $550 million to build a rail yard and operate barges to move cargo containers at the terminal. Write another.

State Ports never tires of reminding us it is responsible for 1 in 10 jobs in South Carolina, but much less discussed is that the vast majority of that economic impact benefits the Upstate and Midlands.

South Carolina is, in fact, rolling in dough. The state is one of the fastest-growing in the country, and its new revenue last year ballooned to $3.8 billion. The state’s debt is the lowest in memory.

There is no reason Charleston should have to live forever with too-tall, too-dense development on its waterfront to pay an outsize share of the cost of Leatherman’s expansion.

The solution to Union Pier lies not in Charleston but in Columbia.

It makes you long for days of the powerful Charleston delegation we no longer have. Gov. Henry McMaster needs to pick up the phone and tell Bill Stern, Ports Authority chairman, that the future of Charleston’s waterfront is every bit as important as new berths at Leatherman.

Thirty years from now, no one will remember the Ports Authority’s big pay day. Union Pier will still be with us, for better or for worse.

Steve Bailey can be reached at sjbailey1060@yahoo.com.

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PARIS — Emma Navarro’s second attempt at a comeback at the French Open fell short on Thursday.

The Ashley Hall graduate and Charleston resident, who rallied in the third set for a first-round victory earlier in the week, bounced back from a first-set loss to take a 4-2 lead in the second set against 42nd-ranked Bianca Andreescu of Canada.

But Andreescu, the 2019 U.S. Open champion, was too much for No. 75 Navarro, a former NCAA singles champ who turned pro last year and was playing just her third match at a Grand Slam tennis event, and second on the red clay of Roland Garros.

Andreescu won the final four games to close out a 6-1, 6-4 victory in a second-round match.

Navarro, 22, broke serve in the fifth game of the second set on the way to a 4-2 lead. But Andreescu broke back in the eighth game for 4-4, then broke serve again to take the match when Navarro hit a backhand wide.

Navarro is not done at the French Open, however. She will team with another former Virginia player, Danielle Collins, in the doubles draw. Collins won two NCAA titles at Virginia.

Meanwhile, teen sensation Mirra Andreeva , a 16-year-old Russian who is the youngest player to win a match in the women’s main draw at the French Open since 2005, is still on a roll.

The 143rd-ranked Andreeva made her way through qualifying rounds last week without dropping a set to earn her debut berth in the women’s bracket at a Grand Slam tournament — and she still is making things look easy so far.

A 6-1, 6-2 victory over Diane Perry of France in 77 minutes on Thursday put her in the third round; that followed a 6-2, 6-1 victory over Alison Riske-Amritraj of the U.S. that lasted 56 minutes.

Next up will be a contest against 2022 French Open runner-up Coco Gauff, who beat Julia Grabher 6-2, 6-3. Gauff, a 19-year-old American, is seeded No. 6 and made her initial breakthrough by beating Venus Williams en route to the fourth round at Wimbledon at age 14.

Another women’s qualifier made it to the third round when Kayla Day, a Californian ranked 138th, knocked out No. 20 Madison Keys 6-2, 4-6, 6-4. Keys, the runner-up at the 2017 U.S. Open and a semifinalist at the 2018 French Open, made 74 unforced errors, 51 more than Day.

The series of losses by seeded women continued with Bernarda Pera defeating No. 22 Donna Vekic 3-6, 6-4, 6-3, although No. 1 Iga Swiatek, No. 4 Elena Rybakina and No. 7 Ons Jabeur all advanced in straight sets.

The men’s bracket saw the departure of No. 8 Jannik Sinner with a wild 6-7 (0), 7-6 (7), 1-6, 7-6 (4), 7-5 loss across nearly 5 1/2 hours against 79th-ranked Daniel Altmaier, and No. 18 Alex de Minaur was eliminated by Tomas Martin Etcheverry 6-3, 7-6 (2), 6-3.

No. 4 Casper Ruud, No. 12 Frances Tiafoe and No. 15 Borna Coric all won.

The second half of this year’s Piccolo Spoleto Festival is stronger than ever with lots of fun, innovative programs and art experiences, according to Scott Watson, director of the City of Charleston Office of Cultural Affairs.

The 45th season of the festival, a city-backed companion to Spoleto Festival USA, connects friends and neighbors to artists and friends across the Lowcountry. It’s all about “what’s made us special through those past decades and also brings in some new twists.”

While this year’s festival will again feature several last-minute neighborhood “pop-up events,” here are five things you can count on to make memories that will last for years:

Tickets: $0 to $50. 2 p.m. and 7 p.m., June 3. West Ashley Theatre Center, 1401 Sam Rittenberg Blvd.

Discover dance in a show that brings together artists from acrossthe state of South Carolina featuring hip-hop, contemporary, krump, tap and more.

Free. 3 p.m., June 3. Emanuel AME Church, 110 Calhoun St.

As part of the annual L’Organo performances exploring the range of Charleston’s pipe organs in nine churches, you are invited to attend this concert with Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg and organist Wesley Hall.

Tickets are $25. 6 p.m., June 4, Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim, 90 Hasell St.

Experience an unforgettable evening of intimate chamber music by prominent Jewish composers at the magnificent KKBE synagogue, featuring Charleston’s own critically acclaimed violinist Yuriy Bekker. He will be joined by renowned violinist/violist Michael Klotz, award-winning cellist Julian Schwarz and pianist Marika Bournaki, with works by Mendelssohn, Krein, Korngold, Katz and Schonfield

Free. 4:30 p.m., June 8. Enston Homes, 900 King St.

The Housing Authority of the City of Charleston will present“All That Jazz!,” a show by Grammy-Award winning musicianCharlton Singleton and Contemporary Flow with performancesby Bill Wilson and Devone Barry.

Free. 5 p.m. to 10 p.m., June 10, Hampton Park, 30 Mary Murray Blvd.

In honor of the 50th anniversary of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album, the 45th Piccolo Spoleto Finale will honor the legendary band after beginning with some area roots music. Columbia-based folk duo Admiral Radio will open at 5:30 p.m. on the Rose Pavilion Stage, followed by all-star tribute band Comfortably PInk at 7:45 p.m. on the venue’s main stage.

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