By Bill Rauch
The weird details of Bill Prokop’s departure for retirement continue to come to light.
The Pintail Point development at 2233 Boundary Street that slammed the brakes on the city’s “Parallel Road” wasn’t the only Christmas present then-Beaufort City Manager Prokop bestowed upon the city’s developers as he prepared to make his year-end 2022 exit.
The Pintail Point development’s final approval, granted on December 8, 2022, readers will recall, not only benefitted its developer, but it also served the interests of neighboring 303 Associates, which had long objected to the alignment of the parallel road as it was proposed in the city’s 2006 Boundary Street Master Plan.
Here’s another weird one.
In 2022, at 1003 Congress Street right off Charles Street, there was a circa 1900 two story non-contributing frame house upon which the Historic Beaufort Foundation had a standing offer to buy with the intention of restoration. But it turned out Beaufort’s former Mayor Billy Keyserling, a real estate developer, wanted it, as well, for an in-fill residential development.
The tug-of-war began in the Summer of 2022 when the city staff saw this was going to be a hot one, and decided that the demolition of 1003 Congress Street ought not be granted at the city staff level.
Instead, city staff determined because “there is still some historic fabric remaining and despite the alterations, the form follows a traditional Beaufort-style house,” the demolition decision should be kicked to the city’s Historic Review Board (HRB),” according to an email that was sent on June 8, 2023 by the City’s Architect, Maria Short, to its newly-appointed Community Planning Director, Curt Freese, to bring him up to speed on the 1003 Congress Street situation.
City Community Development staff recommendations are customarily provided for all matters that come before the HRB. And in this instance the staff, with HBF’s support, for in general the reasons stated in Short’s email, recommended against the building’s demolition.
When the matter came before the HRB at their August 2022 meeting, the board split 2-2 because one member of the five-member panel had a conflict of interest, and appropriately recused himself.
Readers will recall that Robert’s Rules of Order, the meeting rules under which the Beaufort City Council and all the city’s boards operate, states that when there is a tie vote, the motion fails. But that’s not what happened here.
Here, according to Short’s summary email to Freese, City Manager Prokop huddled with City Attorney Bill Harvey and the city’s interim Community Development Director, Riccardo Giani, to find a way to accommodate the former mayor. And, on Aug. 16, 2022, Giani, whose staff report had recommended against the demolition, quietly issued a Certificate of Appropriateness in favor of the demolition.
But the story doesn’t end there.
The decision was appealed on September 15, 2022 by a nonprofit group called The Beautiful Beaufort Alliance. Although details are thin here, according to Short’s email, the appeal was soon dropped. And under Manager Prokop’s watchful eye, the city issued the final demolition permit for 1003 Congress Street.
The building has been razed. It is one of many such losses.
“The City of Beaufort has not commissioned an updated Above Ground Survey since 2001,” Cynthia Jenkins, Executive Director of the Historic Beaufort Foundation, told me last week. “Since then, 26 contributing buildings have been demolished and another half dozen buildings that should have been considered contributing are also gone. It doesn’t stop! Two more contributing buildings, 1607 and 1609 Duke Street, were on the HRB’s agenda for demolition this week.”
But those weren’t all the presents Bill Prokop placed under developers’ trees that holiday season. There were two more big ones.
On Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2022, with the long holiday break in sight, the city inked the building permits for both a four-story parking garage and for a 70-unit hotel, in the heart of Beaufort’s historic district, at 918 Craven Street and at 800 Port Republic Street respectively.
The permits for these controversial projects were sought by Beaufort Inn, LLC and 303 Associates respectively. Both projects had been in the works since 2017, according to city records. And both are currently the subject of lawsuits.
We will see what the lawyers turn up.
Bill Prokop declined to be interviewed for this column, according to Beaufort City Manager Scott Marshall.
Bill Rauch was the Mayor of Beaufort from 1999 to 2008 and has twice won awards from the S.C. Press Association for his Island News columns. He can be reached at The RauchReport@gmail.com.
