The best and brightest of northern Beaufort County’s business leaders earned recognition with Civitas Awards Friday night at the Beaufort Regional Chamber of Commerce’s 10th annual event.
Held at the Dataw Island Clubhouse, the annual meeting and Civitas Awards included Chairman Jon Rembold handing the gavel to new chair Frankie Denmark of Hargray, and an overview of 2011’s accomplishments and 2012’s goals by President Blakely Williams.

[caption id="attachment_7339" align="alignleft" width="150"]<a href="http://www.yourislandnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/News-Civitas-bw.jpg"><img class="size-thumbnail wp-image-7339" title="News-Civitas bw" src="http://www.yourislandnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/News-Civitas-bw-150x150.jpg" alt="" width="150" height="150" /></a> From left, Rep. Shannon Erickson; winner of the Lowcountry Young Professional award, Stephen Murray; Jeff Kidd; and Kendall Erickson.[/caption]

There were 34 nominees for 12 Civitas Awards this year.
The highest honor, the Lifetime of Leadership Award, went to Robert DeLoach. Other nominees included Bernie Kole and Larry Mark. The award recognizes an individual who has made great contributions to his/her community with their lives through various avenues of service. Service may come in the form of business growth and development, setting higher standards and/or demonstrating great leadership skills.
DeLoach has lived in Beaufort all his life with the exception of his college years and his World War II service in the Navy.  He has positively impacted the lives of Beaufort residents over the last six decades with his invaluable engineering experience, beginning at Parris Island where he worked for 37 years as a mechanical engineer and at BES, Inc. where he has completed countless projects, introduced groundbreaking technologies in the field of engineering and mentored five generations of young engineers for the past 36 years.
Among DeLoach’s numerous volunteer hours include: the Beaufort Academy Board of Directors; Lady’s Island Business Professionals Association (LIBPAS) Board of Directors; South Carolina Social Services Board of Directors; and the Boy Scouts of America as District Commissioner.
The Beaufort Regional Chamber of Commerce’s Ambassador of the Year was Valerie Althoff.
Other Civitas winners included:
• Regional Economic Impact: Technical College of the Lowcountry.
• Excellence in Free Enterprise: Greenbug.
• Community Stewardship: Robinson Grant.
• Outstanding Nonprofit: HELP of Beaufort.
• Outstanding Leadership Beaufort Alumni: Terry Bennett.
• Tourism Leadership: Beaufort Water Festival.
• Outstanding Employee: Androula Weiland, Main Street Beaufort USA.
• Military Citizenship Award: Bill Severns.
• Lowcountry Young Professional: Stephen Murray, Kazoobies Inc.
• Junior Enlisted Service Member of the Year: HM2 Samuel Woodson
• Non-commissioned Officer of the Year: Sgt. Ashley Mohr.
Judges for this year’s event included Kevin Cuppia, John Perrill, Jeff Evans, Bill Bootle, Jeff Kidd and Sallie Stone.