Duct Cleaning in Georgetown, SC

GEORGETOWN COUNTY, SC (WMBF) - A school nurse in Georgetown County is out on bond after being accused of being drunk at work.

The Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office charged Pamela Mcdill, 66, with disorderly conduct Friday.

The principal of Waccamaw Middle School on Wildcat Way off Willbrook Boulevard told the school resource officer around 8:06 a.m. that an employee may have come to work drunk, according to an incident report from the Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office.

The SRO met with the suspect, Mcdill, the Pawleys Island-area school’s nurse, the report said.

The SRO noted in the report that Mcdill’s eyes were bloodshot, that she was slurring her words and that a strong odor of alcohol was coming from Mcdill.

According to the report, Mcdill admitted to drinking alcohol the night before and driving to work that morning.

“During our interview, the offender became angry and belligerent stating that it was no one business what she does at home on her off time,” the SRO wrote. “The offender stated that she drinks several times a week.”

The arguing continued as Mcdill started to curse at the principal, saying she could not understand why she was being sent home and that she was fine to work, the report said.

The SRO arrested Mcdill for disorderly conduct “because of the offender’s current condition, offensive language and location of the incident,” the report reads.

The Georgetown County School District said it placed Mcdill on administrative leave pending the outcome of the district’s investigation.

Jail records show Mcdill was released from the Georgetown County Detention Center Friday afternoon.

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GEORGETOWN — Joseph McGill has been sleeping in former slave dwellings for 15 years.

His work is inspired, not by what he learned in school, but what he didn’t.

"When I graduated from Kingstree High School, I was under the impression that my enslaved ancestors were happy to be enslaved and the enslavers were benevolent," he said. "None of that was true, but it took additional research for me to figure that out."

McGill began The Slave Dwelling Project to educate the public about the lives and legacy of enslaved people in the United States. He’s now slept in more than 250 former slave quarters and holds living history events and campfire conversations to share what he’s learned.

On Nov. 15, McGill and other members of The Slave Dwelling Project attended Georgetown County’s inaugural Sweet Potato Festival to share other aspects of Black history that aren’t always taught, including the role of Black people in the Revolutionary War.

As attendees milled about the grounds of Hobcaw Barony, they passed former slave cabins and Friendfield Church, which was attended by enslaved people and rebuilt in 1890. Reenactors in period clothing stood by a fire. Sharp, savory cooking aromas drifted over vendor booths and a table where visitors sampled sweet potato pie.

The festival was held to honor the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, South Carolina’s role in the American Revolution and the contributions of Black and Indigenous people.

McGill took the stage as a living historian to tell the story of Oscar Marion, an enslaved man who lived and fought at the side of famed American military officer Francis Marion. McGill said he hopes to use the story as an avenue to explore the broader experience of Black people during the revolution.

Many fought on the sides of both the Patriots and the Loyalists, he said. And there were other enslaved people who assisted military officers like Oscar Marion did.

"We're going to use the nucleus of the story to radiate out from there, so that we can tell other stories," McGill said. "Because there are other Oscars out there."

Ken Baeszler, chairman of the Georgetown County 250 Executive Committee, said although there were more than 400 battles and skirmishes fought on South Carolina soil during the Revolutionary War, it’s important to highlight the state’s lesser-known contributions and what life was like during that time.

"There was other people involved during this period, and it’s important to get this front and center, to make sure everybody understands that it wasn’t just about the battles," he said.

Corey Alston, a fifth-generation sweetgrass basket maker from Mount Pleasant, helped provide historical and cultural context for the time period. He stood in front of a booth displaying intricate baskets and woven flowers while curious festival-goers browsed the items. The collection was partly his work and partly the work of his wife, Karen Alston.

Corey Alston described how sweetgrass baskets were an instrumental tool in shaping the Lowcountry, as they were used by enslaved people to clean raw rice.

"Rice was the staple of our community that made us who we are today,” he said. "The Carolinas became the wealthiest states for years on the back of the enslaved. I’m a descendent of them. So we couldn’t have a festival without having sweetgrass.”

Alston makes sweetgrass baskets to preserve his Gullah heritage. He said speaking about and displaying his work helps to keep the tradition alive.

The festival also celebrated the sweet potato, another unsung hero of the revolution. The crop was used to sustain soldiers and the public during the war. A sweet potato pie baking contest was held and information was shared about sweet potato water and tea.

GEORGETOWN, S.C. (WPDE) — An innovative living shoreline project is underway along the South Carolina coast, aiming to restore natural habitats and combat erosion.

Elizabeth Fly, who leads The Nature Conservancy's resilience team, has been overseeing the project at Morgan Park, where the Sampit River meets Winyah Bay in Georgetown.

"It's really important to me that this one works. And every time I come out here, I'm a little bit nervous. A little relief and excitement," Fly said. "You spend so much time working on something like this, and then when you see it happening in real time and working in real time, it's just so rewarding."

Over the past five months, Fly has witnessed significant changes at the site, which was previously eroding into a beach.

"We were seeing a shoreline that was obviously eroding. It looks very sandy, it looks very beach-like, but it's not supposed to be that way," Fly said. "This is naturally a vegetated shoreline, and we worked with the city of Georgetown and realized that if nothing's done, Morgan Park would eventually go away. So that's where we worked together to try to come up with a plan."

The project, supported by community volunteers and private donors from the Boyd Foundation, involved constructing a wood-based living shoreline with breakwater pilings, fencing, and crates.

"There are horizontal branches along the bottom of that, and that is trapping the sediment and the sand as it's passing through. And then as you get further on shore, we have these, what we call manufactured water reefs. They're also doing a great job of trapping the sand and the sediment, and then further up on shore, you have another wooden feature called a wattle fence, and that's up on shore. And again, just traps sediment as the water washes through."

Although limited in geographic scope, it is designed to influence broader conservation strategies across the state, according to those involved in the project.

"The whole point is to let nature grow into itself, and so it increases its efficiency and effectiveness over time," Fly said. "Nature is resilient, and nature has these solutions that we can really utilize. Projects like these, you know, help educate people about that and bring awareness."

Last week, The Nature Conservancy was awarded grant funding through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Transformational Habitat and Coastal Resilience grant program to increase the scale and accessibility of living shorelines and nature-based solutions across coastal South Carolina. SCOR announced the funding will be for a multi-year grant program. TNC plans to offer private landowners and communities the opportunity to protect their properties and community spaces from shoreline erosion through the implementation of living shorelines.

You can learn more about the application process here.

A dispute over a land conservation agreement that protects a historic South Carolina rice plantation from development has been quietly settled after three years of litigation.

But the financial compromise didn't address, at least not publicly, the questions the case originally raised about state and federal tax breaks.

The lawsuit was brought in 2022 by the owners of Weehaw Plantation off U.S. Highway 701 in Georgetown County, near the confluence of the Pee Dee and Black rivers.

About 744 acres of the property were protected by a previous owner in late 1995 under a conservation easement that provided, as a financial incentive, tax deductions. The legally binding agreement restricted development on most of the coastal recreational retreat that totals more than 1,000 acres.

A copy of the original document filed with Georgetown County stated that the goal was to protect scenic views that are visible from public roads and ensure an "ecologically stable environment" for native plants and local wildlife. The endangered red-cockaded woodpecker is among the species on the property.

It was in 2008 when Georgetown Memorial Hospital bought about 65 acres from Weehaw's then-owners, eyeing it as a possible future expansion site up the road from its main medical campus. As part of the deal, the land easement was revised to exclude that portion from the development restrictions.

The changes came under scrutiny years later, after Weehaw was recombined and sold in two transactions in 2010 and 2013 to a family business owned in part by Nevada resident Jim Murren, who once ran MGM Resorts International. He’s now interim CEO of the United Arab Emirates’ General Commercial Gaming Regulatory Authority as well as co-chairman of Cirque de Soleil Entertainment Group.

The Las Vegas casino mogul's MST LLC paid $6.4 million for the Lowcountry getaway and quietly went about its business — until March 2022. The family company sued Georgetown Memorial to reinstate the original easement after the hospital tried to sell its land to an affordable-housing developer.

MST argued that the agreement called for the neighboring tract to "be encumbered in perpetuity."

It also stated that carving out the land from the 1995 easement violated state and federal laws because prior owners had already claimed the tax breaks.

Georgetown Memorial pushed back. It countered that Weehaw's owners didn't utter a peep until the housing project came to light. The hospital further alleged the underlying motive was to keep its parcel "from being used in a manner that MST and other neighboring landowners perceive will lower their own property values."

Georgetown Memorial also pointed out that MST explicitly agreed to the 2008 easement changes when it bought Weehaw.

The lawsuit lingered in U.S. District Court in downtown Charleston until late September, when a negotiated binding settlement was presented to Judge David Norton

In his order approving the deal, he wrote that "the parties have litigated this action for more than three years and have determined that their respective interests are best served by a compromise and settlement, without ... admitting liability or fault, to end years of litigation among them and avoid the risk of an uncertain outcome."

The financial terms were confidential, but cash is changing hands. The owners of Weehaw who sold the land in 2008 will pay an undisclosed sum to the hospital, which in turn will cut a check to MST. An out-of-state group that manages the conservation agreement also will receive some of the settlement funds.

Neither Georgetown Memorial parent Tidelands Health nor the attorneys who represented the hospital and MST responded to multiple requests for comment.

In the end, they ended up about where they started nearly four years ago. The status quo for the Georgetown Memorial tract is unchanged. It can be developed, with a limit of five homes per acre. It's listed for sale, with an asking price of $3.5 million.

GEORGETOWN, S.C. (WCSC) - Georgetown leaders answered community questions in the annual ‘State of our Community’ forum.

Leaders across the county, including members from the town of Pawsley’s Island and the Town of Andrews addressed infrastructure projects and economic developments on Thursday morning.

Many topics address the need for workforce housing, drainage improvements and balancing the area’s growing development.

County council chairman Clint Elliot says the opportunity lets the community know how governments are progressing on projects.

“We see it in parts, small parts, but when you go back and you look at it as a whole, you realize there’s a lot of things you’ve accomplished,” Elliot says. ”And this is sort of a way for us to realize what we’ve done and what we can do and where we need to be at.”

Updates on the future sites of two large mills were a topic of discussion. City of Georgetown Mayor Carol Jayroe says the is expected to be completed in early January.

Jayroe revealed the Liberty Steel Mill is currently under contract with a developer. She says industrial, green space and housing opportunities are to come for the site. The mayor says an official announcement of the development will be released in the future.

Elliot says leaders are working closely with developers of the sites to identify the county’s vision.

City councilmember Tamika Williams-Obeng was born and raised in the area. Williams-Obeng says she looks forward to seeing how the new development will add to the area. She hopes there will be a balance that works for everyone.

“As a native, I know that it can be hard to accept the newness that’s coming in. There’s something for everyone,” Williams-Obeng says. “Whether you are a native, whether you are just visiting or moving into town. I think this is a great opportunity for growth and just creativity. New ideas.”

Williams-Obeng urges the community to participate in informational events and share their voice.

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