Personal Injury Attorney in Conway, SC.

Conway leaders received legal advice in private Monday, June 16, after being blindsided by Horry County Council’s plans for a multi-county business park in Carolina Forest.

Conway Administrator Adam Emrick explained the issue in the public portion of Monday’s council meeting before the council went into executive session to receive advice from counsel and discuss legal strategies in private. By law, councils may discuss certain matters in private.

Horry County leaders were set to take a final vote on the roughly 998-acre multi-county business park agreement with Georgetown County on Tuesday night, a move that would require a fee in lieu of taxes by businesses within the special district. The county may then use those fees how it wishes. However, county leaders voted to defer the decision as the county and Conway are in discussions over the plan.

Horry County Councilman Dennis DiSabato has said the money collected would be used to invest in infrastructure and cover first-responder and governmental services needed for growth along Postal Way.

Emrick on Monday called the plan weaponizing.

“All the taxes that are collected — the county’s, the schools’, what might be the city’s in the future — are a part of that fee but the county gets to dictate where it goes,” Emrick said. “The city has no say-so at all in how those property taxes that would be owed to the city otherwise, upon annexation, are allocated. The taxes again are converted to a fee and the county gets to decide how they’re used.

“The city was intentionally left out of the process and is left out of the decision making on how the fees are spent.”

Conway leaders did not learn about the county’s plans until a MyHorryNews article was published June 3 following Horry County Council’s second reading of the business park plans.

The city seeks legal advice as city staff has been working with property owners within that proposed business park in the Postal Way area in hopes of annexing properties into city limits.

Emrick said the county’s proposal would jeopardize the possibility of the properties being annexed into the city, because the city would not be able to collect property taxes from those parcels if they’re ever annexed.

If the county had included any parcels from the city within the special district, Emrick said the city would have to give consent to the creation of the district.

“Which meant we would have a seat at the table on how the monies collected are spent in the future,” Emrick said.

In 2017, he added, the county did something similar behind Lowe’s Home Improvement off U.S. 501.

“It was done specifically as a weapon to stop the city from annexing the property behind Lowe’s into the city,” Emrick said, adding the city supplies utilities to that area and those properties were part of a long-range annexation plan. “This is known as weaponizing a multi-county business park.”

City council came out of executive session Monday and took no action regarding the multi-county business park.

If the agreement is approved by the county, Georgetown County leaders must also OK the agreement.

Conway’s discussion on Monday came after the city council took a first vote on the annexation and rezoning of 22.88 acres at Postal Way and Gardner Lacy Road. The property is within the county's planned special tax district.

If the rezoning is passed by city council, the property would be rezoned from Horry County Office/Professional/Institutional to the city’s Low Density Residential district, which allows a minimum of 10,000-square-foot lots.

City council must take one more favorable vote on the matter before the property is annexed into city limits.

Health Care Partners of South Carolina’s new Conway facility is just what the doctor ordered for a healthy population, and a healthy downtown business district.

The new $18 million health center will consolidate HCPSC’s scattered Horry County operations and bring more than 100 employees under one roof on a 5-acre tract at 1500 Fourth Avenue in Conway.

Officials have already demolished the abandoned strip mall that occupied the site, and broke ground for the two-story, 5,500-square-foot health center at a ceremony on Friday, May 16.

The health center “will be a hub for whole-person care,” HCPSC CEO Santina Mayo told a crowd of about 75 that gathered on the asphalt parking lot, where a pile of dirt had been dumped for the ceremonial shoveling.

Mayo said HCPSC will be able to expand services in the spacious new building, adding about 10 additional providers plus their support staff. Existing services like primary care, behavioral health, pediatrics, diabetes care, and substance abuse disorder, dental and pharmaceutical services will be augmented by new services including women’s health.

HCPSC is a nonprofit health care organization that provides high-quality care to all persons regardless of their ability to pay.

“Their legacy of service to the underserved and under-insured speaks volumes about their commitment to health equity and community well-being,” said State Sen. Kent Williams (D-Marion), who represents state Senate District 30, which includes Conway. HCPSC serves residents of Horry, Florence and Marion counties.

Conway City Administrator Adam Emrick said the new health center will be a catalyst for growth and economic activity by bringing a large workforce and thousands of patients to the downtown.

It could also lead to further development by encouraging property owners and developers to extend the downtown business core west on fourth and fifth avenues.

“We are out of space in our downtown buildings,” Emrick said, referring to the downtown core branching off Main Street.

“If we’re going to continue to prosper, we must be able to grow our downtown; this is crucial to our success,” Emrick said. “We need more groups like Health Care Partners to take a look at their operations and say 'it’s time, we’re ready to grow, because Conway is ready to grow with you.'"

HCPSC Board Chairman George Williams Jr. said the organization also hopes to partner with the city to install a small public park on a wooded area to the rear of the property.

Mashburn Construction of Myrtle Beach is the general contractor for the build — a two-story, red-brick building that will give the health organization room to grow. Completion is expected in the fall of 2026.

Mashburn company director Josh Kay told the crowd Friday that the company seeks out “projects that will meet our vision of building better communities. This project screams that from the top of the mountain.”

HCPSC has been providing health care services since 1978, said Dr. Jeanne Halyard, who said she has watched the organization grow “from a small clinic with 10 employees … to a regional health-care provider with over 150 employees.”

Mayo said the new facility should serve as a springboard for additional growth. She said HCPSC currently has about 16,000 patients, but aspires to nearly double that number to about 30,000.

HCPSC also has offices is Marion and Johnsonville, and serves rural areas with mobile units offering medical, dental and eye-care services.

Mayo said they also have small buses that provide transportation for patients.

The new Conway complex will also be accessible via public transportation. It’s located just steps away from Coast RTA’s Conway bus terminal on Third Avenue.