Personal Injury Attorneyin Summerville, SC.

SUMMERVILLE — With Ricky Waring retiring, the mayoral seat in this growing community 20 miles north of Charleston is up for grabs.

The candidates: Dickie Miler, a Summerville native and real estate broker; Russ Touchberry, another Summerville native and current town councilman; and Vickie Fagan, who relocated from Staten Island more than a decade ago.

The Post and Courier spoke with the mayoral candidates about some of the big issues and concerns residents have in Summerville.

Fate of the old hospital

Miler said the property at 500 N. Main St., which has become a hot-button issue over the past few months, should be preserved. He has been a vocal opponent of the redevelopment of the property but said if there is redevelopment it should be strategic, sensible and promote enough economic vitality to warrant any changes made.

Touchberry hopes to preserve the old hospital as well, acknowledging it’s an important property. He also said its redevelopment can benefit the town and if done right could be a model for how other properties can be remade.

“We’ve lost the look and feel of Summerville on that side of the railroad tracks all the way to I-26,” Touchberry said. “This is an opportunity for us to have this reinvestment and reestablish our brand, which is what made us so special to begin with.”

Fagan also wants the property to be preserved but believes it can be repurposed as is. With all the available parking, the space could be used for emergency personnel, she said.

Growth and development

Miler said he supports a strategic approach to Summerville’s growth and would want to annex all he could on the periphery to protect the town’s border from neighboring cities like North Charleston and Goose Creek, which are also growing quickly.

“If we annex things on the outside, then we can control how we develop on the inside,” Miler said. “When and if we have to move and grow, we do it the way we want to do it, bringing the developer we want to bring in, have the neighborhood designed the way we want it.”

Touchberry pointed out that Summerville’s municipal boundaries are irregular but could be fixed by aligning the town’s comprehensive plan with the plans of Berkeley and Dorchester counties, and making sure all zoning standards line up as well. He added that if the town doesn’t have a strategic annexation plan, Summerville could easily be encircled by other municipalities.

Fagan said she’d like to assemble a task force for growth management and include voices from elected officials, civic groups and businesses. She said she values input from everyone and paying attention to how growth is affecting people in different areas can help the town come up with a plan as a united front.

Traffic and transport

Miler said he would want to incorporate more public transportation and improve sidewalks and bike paths so people can get around without a car.

“Building more roads is not always the answer,” Miler said.

He added he would be willing to reduce the median for some roads and even remove parking spots — like the parallel parking spots on Main Street at Hutchinson Square — so traffic isn’t as backed up.

Touchberry has been advocating for infrastructure improvements, such as sidewalk repairs, but one of his biggest priorities is finding a way to connect the Berlin G. Myers Parkway to Interstate 26 without the need to use, or cross, Main Street. He said he’s working with the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments, as well as Berkeley County and the town, to study that corridor and identify solutions.

Touchberry added that the town missed an opportunity in having the Lowcountry Rapid Transit stop in Summerville; the furthest it is planned to go for now is Ladson. He said he’s ready to fight to make sure the second phase is completed, so the workforce in Summerville can use it to get to Charleston and reduce commute time.

Lowes Foods, a Carolinas-based grocer, is opening a fifth store in the Charleston market in Summerville, while the company plans to close other locations.

The Summerville store will be 50,887 square feet and will anchor a new retail center between two large Berkeley County residential developments, according to a news release. The new Lowes Foods store, scheduled to open in 2025, is on the northeast side of the 5,000-acre Nexton community.

In addition, Lowes Foods has acquired Foothills IGA Market in Marble Hill, Ga., the release stated This will be the brand’s first store in Georgia. The store will continue to operate as an IGA for the next few months and will become a Lowes Foods store sometime in early 2024.

Related content: Construction begins on 278-unit community in Summerville

Related content: North Charleston apartments sell for more than $5.4M

Related content: Restaurant, entertainment venue opens in downtown Charleston

Along with the expansion, Lowes Foods will be making the decision to close two stores, the release stated. Food Country purchased the location in Stuart, Va., at the end of September. The store in Yadkinville, N.C., will be closing at the end of this month. Employees in the Yadkinville store are being given opportunities in other Lowes Foods.

“Lowes Foods is deeply committed to providing an exceptional shopping experience for our guests at all our store locations,” Tim Lowe, head of Retail, and Alex Lee, president, Lowes Foods said in the release. “Our coming stores in Summerville and Georgia will be important areas of growth for our company, and we’re excited about our continuing expansion in those markets. We also are pleased that Food Country has agreed to work to retain our employees in Stuart as our store there becomes part of the Food Country brand.”

In addition to Summerville and Marble Hill, Lowes has previously announced new stores in Aiken, and Kannapolis, Concord, Indian Land, and Winterville, N.C. A new store in Pittsboro, N.C., opened in June of this year.

Founded in 1954, Lowes Foods employs nearly 9,000 people and operates 82 full-service supermarkets in the Carolinas.

Six years after a prominent grocery chain in the Charleston area bought land for a new store, the supermarket appears to be closer to taking shape on the edge of a planned 8,000-home community.

Bidding documents show construction could begin in March 2025 on a 51,454-square-foot new Publix grocery store near Summerville.

Supermarket spokesman Jared Glover said the Florida-based company has not set a definite timeframe for the new store to be built “at this time.”

The food chain paid $3.05 million for 10 acres in 2017 at Beech Hill Road and Summers Drive across from the developing Summers Corner community southwest of Summerville.

Summers Corner, on S.C. Highway 61 and near U.S. Highway 17A, is a 7,200-acre tract that’s permitted for about 8,000 homes.

In addition to schools and shops, it has about 1,200 homes sold and another 250 under construction, according to Jason Byham, division president at Lennar, the homebuilder that bought the tract for more than $26 million in 2018.

Byham said he’s not surprised the long-planned Publix might be “more imminent” than in the past few years.

“We are selling about 50 homes per month on average in Summers Corner,” Byham said. “We expect to sell between 600 and 700 next year.”

Lennar also plans to develop a multi-million-dollar amenity center with a pool, restaurants and other attractions over the next two to three years on a 15-acre site off Summers Drive near Clayfield Trail.

A historic Broad Street property that’s housed banks, law firms and a publicly traded real estate company over the past 134 years or so is back under local ownership in a deal totaling $6.2 million.

An affiliate of EP Group purchased the 15,500-square-foot, three-and-a-half story building at 39 Broad St. for $5.58 million last week, according to public land records. The deal included an adjacent 16-space parking lot at 28 Elliott St., which sold for $620,000.

The seller was Healthcare Realty Trust of Tennessee.

The vacant commercial building is between East Bay and Church streets. It underwent a top-to-bottom renovation about eight years ago.

EP Group, which said it invests in middle-market, U.S. based businesses and is based on Meeting Street, plans to take part of the newly acquired property. A spokesman said the privately held company is reviewing “a range of possible plans” for the rest of the space.

“We look forward to being the stewards of this building and remaining part of the vibrant downtown community,” EP Group CEO Terry Hurley said in a written statement.

The new owner and The Post and Courier were owned by the same parent company until September 2021, when both were spun off as standalone businesses.

According to Historic Charleston Foundation, 39 Broad dates to the late 1800s — with the “marked verticality” of its arched windows among its most distinctive architectural features. The builder was Charles Otto Witte, a wealthy German-born businessman and consul for various European nations who once lived at what’s now the Ashley Hall school campus.

The structure later became known as the Exchange Bank and Trust Co. building, named for an early tenant was established in 1891. Local archives show a law firm and Merchants’ and Miners’ Bank were operating at the same address a few years earlier.

SUMMERVILLE, S.C. (WCSC) - Newly obtained documents show dozens of complaints have been filed in recent years against a Summerville youth treatment facility, alleging there are bugs, abuse, dangerously low staffing levels, violent fights and blood and vomit smeared throughout the building.

Mary Wilcox’s grandson spent time in that facility, Palmetto Summerville Behavioral Health, earlier this year.

“Terror” is how she describes her feelings about the residential facility, which is for children and teens ages 7-18 with emotional and behavioral issues.

Her 13-year-old grandson was admitted to the youth residential treatment facility earlier this year.

For weeks, he stayed locked behind the doors of the facility; for weeks he recounted the horror and violence to his grandmother; and for weeks, Wilcox said she fought to get him out.

“[He] was abused in ways that most parents would say would be the worst thing to happen to their child,” Wilcox says.

During phone calls with his grandmother and an in-person visit, he detailed vicious fights, sexual assaults and abuse.

“He was struggling to deal with what was going on, and he attempted to escape,” Wilcox said. “He was handled by a staff member who slammed his head into a chain link fence causing a gash, causing blood to drop down his face.”

Her grandson’s story is not the first troubling one that has been shared. Nearly 200 pages of documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request for complaints against the facility in the past few years detail allegations of what some say erupts in the hallways and common areas and what hides, tucked away in patients’ rooms.

The dozens of complaints filed describe alleged bug infestations, inadequate staffing, filthy conditions, overmedicating and a prison-like environment.

One complaint says a staff member attacked a patient.

“On the video, it was observed that a staff member placing [redacted] into a choke hold and then it is observed on camera that same staff member punching [redacted] six times once [redacted] is taken down to the ground,” the complaint states.

Another states a patient was so heavily medicated they fainted. In a different complaint, an employee is accused of grabbing a patient by the shirt, pulling them down and kneeing them in the face.

“It does not surprise me at all,” Wilcox says. “My grandson communicated similar conditions to me. It is very alarming that this happened to my grandson; it’s alarming that children are in the facility still.”

One complaint alleges the facility frequently only has one nurse on duty with 60 patients and was so short-staffed they couldn’t provide proper treatment.

Another states there have been “numerous human rights violations” and claims patients are refused medical treatment and prescriptions.

“Supervisors explicitly tell staff to ‘treat them like prisoners because they are here for punishment’ rather than treating the patients with compassion as they go through treatment,” the complaint states.

Another complaint describes cockroaches and ants crawling around and blood and vomit smeared inside.

“[Palmetto Summerville] should be investigated,” Wilcox says. “They need to be checked out. They need to be monitored, and they need to be held accountable.”

The State Department of Health and Environmental Control is the agency responsible for investigating complaints against health facilities like Palmetto Summerville. It can also penalize them.

“When there is noncompliance with the licensing standards, the facility must submit an acceptable written plan of correction to DHEC that must be signed by the administrator and returned by the date specified on the report of inspection/investigation,” an email from DHEC states. “When DHEC determines that a facility is in violation of any statutory provision, rule, or regulation relating to the operation or maintenance of such facility, DHEC, upon proper notice to the licensee, may impose a monetary penalty, and deny, suspend, or revoke licenses.”

Last month, DHEC investigated two complaints against Palmetto Summerville, but no violations were cited, according to officials. In August, however, the facility was fined $19,000 for nine violations.

“DHEC executed a consent order with the facility in August after it was determined that it was appropriate to impose a civil monetary penalty for violations of Regulation 61-103,” the email from DHEC states.

Some of those violations, documents show, include failing to have a registered nurse immediately accessible by phone and available within 30 minutes, failing to notify DHEC of a serious accident or incident within 24 hours, failing to make sure residents were free from harm and failing to make sure medications were available for administration.

“[Patients] are further traumatized,” Wilcox says. “They are further placed into a downward spiral by being in these facilities.”

That downward spiral and that trauma, she says, prevent any effective treatment for the children who spend time at Palmetto Summerville and similar facilities.

Some studies show that could be right.

One study shows there’s not enough research to know if the interventions — therapy, activities and treatments — inside these facilities are effective or an effective use of money.

“We also don’t know a lot about what the, what treatments they’re actually getting because we don’t necessarily see the day-to-day life of these kids in these facilities,” Roderick Rose, an associate professor at the University of Maryland Baltimore and researcher in the study, says.

A common trend in the facilities: Medication. One study shows about 90 percent of stays at facilities analyzed included an antipsychotic medication, even though only 3 percent of patients were diagnosed with a psychotic disorder.

“You also see just a lot of medicating children,” Rose says.

For her grandson, Wilcox believes the best treatment has been being back home. He’s in school and playing basketball and is doing better. The trauma from the facility still lingers, however, and Wilcox says she prays other children can get the help they need outside of the gates of Palmetto Summerville.

“I am so very grateful that he is one child that escaped being in the situation he was in long,” she says. “Other children, as well, to be rescued, which is a most appropriate word. They need to be rescued from these facilities.”

Norman Bradley, the director of risk management and performance improvement for Palmetto Summerville Behavioral Health released this statement:

Due to HIPAA patient privacy laws, we cannot offer comment on specific patients or their care.

Palmetto Summerville Behavioral Health takes all allegations of abuse seriously and completes full investigations as warranted. Any and all allegations required to be reported to the Department of Health and Environmental Control have been done, and necessary action plans have been implemented to address the issues raised. Recent site visits by DHEC have been positive and have resulted in no findings.

Palmetto Summerville Behavioral Health is a residential treatment facility for girls and boys ages 7 to 18, in need of a highly structured, therapeutic environment. Our patient satisfaction scores reflect the care that is delivered by our compassionate and dedicated team.

Copyright 2023 WCSC. All rights reserved.

Robert Pratt of Re/Max Pro Realty represented the seller, Jurisprudence LLC, in the sale of 7,022 square feet of office space at 112 W. 4th North St. in Summerville to Ellie Holdings LLC for $1.5 million. Zach Hines of Spencer Hines Properties represented the buyer.

Other commercial real estate deals in recent days in the Lowcountry include the lease of a retail space on Camp Road. Trey Lucy and Kevin Shields of Belk Lucy represented the landlord in the lease of 4,255 square feet in Suite B at 1234-1238 Camp Road on James Island to Tidewater Carts. Christi Copenhaver of Palmetto Commercial Properties represented the tenant.

Hot Properties highlights recently sold or leased commercial properties in the Charleston region. Send in your transactions using our online form.

Robert Pratt of Re/Max Pro Realty represented the buyer, RLP LLC, in the purchase of 1.16 acres of triple-net ground lease space at 3878 Ladson Road in Ladson from 3878 Ladson Road LLC for $1,472,125. Britt Raymond of SRS Real Estate Partners represented the seller.

Jenna Philipp of Palmetto Commercial Properties represented the landlord, RCB Development, in the lease of 2,704 square feet square of warehouse space at 1750 Signal Point Road.

Jenna Philipp of Palmetto Commercial Properties represented the tenant, Sanders Inc., in the lease of 10,103 square feet of industrial space at 7635 Sandlapper Pkwy, Suite 200, from Sandlapper One Associates LLC. Robert Pratt of Re/Max Pro Realty represented the landlord.

Jing “Julia” Donovan of Coldwell Banker Commercial Atlantic represented the tenant, James Pugh, in the lease of 900 square feet of retail space at 1286 Yeamans Hall Road in Hanahan. The landlord, 1268 Yeamans Hall LLC, was represented by Brent Case of Coldwell Banker Commercial Atlantic. The retail business will be a liquor store.

Christi Copenhaver of Palmetto Commercial Properties LLC represented the tenant, Tidewater Carts, in the lease of 4255 square feet of retail space in Suite B at 1238 Camp Road in Charleston from Christi Copenhaver. Kevin Shields and Trey Lucy of Belk Lucy represented the landlord.

David Newman of Harbor Commercial Partners represented the tenant, Formula Automatic Door Co. Inc., in the lease of 2,755 square feet of office space at 2671 Spruill Ave., Unit C, in North Charleston from 2681 Spruill LLC. Clarke Attaway of Lee & Associates represented the landlord.

Jing “Julia” Donovan of Coldwell Banker Commercial Atlantic represented the tenant Vape FX LLC in the lease of 900 square feet of retail space at 1288 Yeamans Hall Road in Hanahan. The landlord, 1268 Yeamans Hall LLC, was represented by Brent Case of Coldwell Banker Commercial Atlantic. The retail business will be a vape shop.