Chiropractic Care in Moncks Corner, SC

Bender says if a majority of board members met outside of the public view, it would have been in violation of the Freedom of Information Act.

MONCKS CORNER, S.C. (WCSC) - A media law attorney, Jay Bender, is weighing in on the decision by the majority of the Berkeley County School board voting to have new leadership on Tuesday night, saying it was done illegally.

Deon Jackson was fired after a 6-3 vote. Board members Yvonne Bradley, Crystal Wigfall and David Barrow voted against his termination.

“If you want to destroy all credibility as a board member and start a new superintendent under a cloud, do what the majority did last night,” Jay Bender says. “What that tells me is the people who voted to fire the incumbent and the people who voted to hire a new superintendent met outside of public view to come to the decisions that were announced at last night’s meeting.”

Bender says if a majority of board members met outside of the public view, it would have been in violation of the Freedom of Information Act. He says a majority of the board is a quorum and under the law a quorum cannot meet to discuss public business or act upon a matter within their discretion without giving public notice of the meeting. He adds the law exists to prevent public business from being conducted in secret.

Barrow, who previously served as chairman of the school board and represents District 5, called the board’s move to fire Jackson a “political witch hunt.”

The board voted 6-1 to have Dr. Anthony Dixon serve in the role. The Charleston County School District had named Dixon to serve as its chief of schools back in August.

Bender adds if there was a search for superintendent, the public is entitled to see material collected in the search for not fewer than three people who comprised the group from which the selection was made.

“My guess is this district will come back and say ‘we had no applicants, we just decided on this guy,’” Bender says. “Now, how is it that this guy suddenly surfaced at a meeting where there had been no previous discussion of needing a superintendent. So this new majority apparently has no understanding of the law or if they understand the law they seem to be willfully disregarding it.”

Bender believes there was some kind of new search because the majority of the board had a candidate already with no indication that there was a vacancy.

“I think this school board is acting with supreme arrogance and ignorance,” Bender says. “I’ll give them credit for being ignorant of the law but my guess is it was a willful violation.”

Bender goes on to say the description of what was to be discussed in executive session was also in violation of the law because it did not state with specificity that there was going to be a discussion of the superintendent.

Bender says there are two ways to proceed in this scenario. One is the traditional way and a citizen could file suit under the Freedom of Information Act against the board to seek a determination that the law was in fact violated and get an injunction against future violation of the law. Bender explains the second is under the Inspector General law in South Carolina where the governor can request the Inspector General to look into school districts.

When asked the reason for terminating, Mac McQuillan, the board’s new chairman, sent the following statement Wednesday night.

“There was no meeting prior to Tuesday’s Board meeting. Four Board members were re-elected incumbents. On Thursday of last week, in accordance with Board policy, those Board members requested that then Chair of the Board, Dave Barrow, add the personnel items to the agenda’s executive session. Prior to the meeting, Mr. Jackson, Ms. Richardson, and Dr. Dixon were notified of the agenda items. On Tuesday, the Board met as a whole, for the first time, to discuss the matters in executive session and returned to regular session to vote on the matters.”

Live 5 has reached out to all the other board members but have yet to hear back.

Copyright 2022 WCSC. All rights reserved.

Sixty-four years in the game and Moncks Corner’s Customs Four and Friends music band still keeps the crowds flocking to their shows — and dancing in the aisles.

While many of the components of the entertainment combo have changed since 1958, drummer Gene Cribb and saxophonist/vocalist Truman Metts have been rocking the stage since day one.

Another aspect of the band that’s remained status quo, according to Cribb, is the ensemble’s dedication to Carolina beach music, which to the uninitiated has nothing in common with anything ever released by The Beach Boys. Instead, in describing the “shaggin’” beats of the Carolina beach genre, the longtime drum master defined it as an upbeat mix of rock, R&B and pop that features similarities to the Carolina Shag, which has its own rhythmic step/shuffle dance that complements the sound.

Other past and present practitioners of the Carolina beach melody include: The Tams, The Drifters and The Catalinas.

In the early days, when the Customs Four were strictly a quartet with no friends, the group featured the drums, piano, sax and guitar. But as more performers began joining the fray, the music team eventually grew to eight members, including a female led singer (Kristina Gaskins), along with additional pieces (sax, keyboards, drums, trumpet, trombone and bass).

The covers heard at a Customs Four and Friends outing might include a lot of the same 60s, 70s and 80s toe-tappers played by several other town and bar bands, but unlike so many other performers, the spectators at any one of the local band’s concerts can often be seen on their feet and grooving like nobody’s watching.

“It’s what we play. We look out to the audience, they’re the same age as we are, and I’m 76. We try to satisfy [the kids] as well,” said Cribb about his popular act whose following spans generations.

While Cribb and company normally travel throughout the South Carolina cities of Myrtle Beach, Greenville, Spartanburg and Clemson, they also once ventured outside the Palmetto State decades ago.

Cribb recalls his music crew entering a 4-H contest and winning county and state competitions and earning a trip to Chicago to compete on a national stage ... until that is they found out they were too young to vie for the big prize.

“So, they paid us $20 a day to entertain a bit. We played a bit at different hotels there too,” he mentioned.

Recently, the Customs Four and Friends have been a Monday night staple in Downtown Moncks Corner, where they’ll set up shop on Main Street and play for hours to a crowd of adoring locals sitting back, bobbing their heads and clapping their hands in their individual lawn chairs.

The self-effacing Cribb attributes the hometown popularity to the fact that “there’s not a whole lot to do in Moncks Corner,” but remains staunchly supportive of his hometown and neighbors when it comes to youngsters who flash potential. In terms of musical talent, in fact, the happily married father and grandfather assures that his Berkeley County town is a hotbed for skilled entertainers.

The kind of advice he’ll typically dispense to young musicians on the rise — including fellow drummers — is to maintain a high level of consistency in honing their craft.

“To be a top-notch drummer, and this is my opinion, you really need to learn the drum rudiments — that’s one of the most important things — and just keep practicing,” added Crib, who counts Cozy Cole and Buddy Rich as a couple of legendary drummers he admired coming up through the ranks.

The now retired Cribb worked in a variety of roles in his adult life, such as operating a burial company in Summerville and also working for Berkeley Electric. But despite his hard work, the local son always found time to get together with his music buddies, whether that meant playing weddings or performing for local organizations in town.

In his 64 years as a professional, he and his bandmates have always made time for rehearsal, which has been one of many elements that have allowed Customs 4 and Friends to produce a flawless sound to the layman listener, while also creating a festive atmosphere that helps folks forget about real-world problems for a while.

Since calling it a career at Berkeley Electric, Cribb and wife, Esther, have opened the Music Man BBQ restaurant, which has keeps the septuagenarian active and on his toes as he continues to keep Carolina beach music alive and well — with the help of his friends of course.

After an 18-year run in Goose Creek and unforeseen challenges presented by COVID-19, Dreamalot Books has gradually – but decidedly – gained a steady foothold in the Moncks Corner community as a welcoming haven of second-hand books for both area bibliophiles and those traveling in from Myrtle Beach and beyond to peruse the shop’s vast inventory at 1013 Old Highway 52.

The woman behind the retail shop’s success and inevitable twists and turns over the past 23 years is Cherry Collins, a self-described “book addict,” who would often resort to reading the backs of cereal boxes as a child in the absence of a paperback she could lose herself in.

“I skipped kindergarten, back then it wasn’t required because by the time I went to the first grade, I was reading on a fourth-grade level,” began the Lenoir, North Carolina native. “My dad said that I picked up a book and I never put one down. Needless to say, he was not surprised I opened a bookstore.”

What sets Dreamalot Books apart from other major book shops in the Lowcountry is the sense of familiarity regular clientele shares with Collins — commonly referred to as Miss Cherry — whose large indoor reservoir of more than 100,000 publications has maintained a quaintness that’s usually only found in much smaller shopping venues.

Dreamalot’s maze-like layout allows patrons to set off on their own personal journeys during which they may spend upwards of an hour combing through assorted categories of children’s books, romance novels, biographies and collector’s items that most adults haven’t read since they were carrying a lunchbox to elementary school.

Those who run out of time while scouring the seemingly boundless inventory will usually rush back the next day or later that same week to complete their quest for published treasures that typically go for anywhere from one to five dollars.

Miss Cherry’s ample hodgepodge of books are the result of numerous donations and trade-ins that keeps the in-store supply constantly circulating.

But while Miss Cherry has her hands full with paying the bills (rent, general overhead, etc.) and keeping her stock organized, she also serves the greater purpose of assisting customers by informing them of what’s available and even matching her store items with the literary tastes of a certain individual.

“It’s not always about the money, it’s more about getting the book where it needs to go, the person it needs to go to. That one was meant to go to her,” she says while checking out a happy consumer who had just purchased an old, hard-to-find copy of “Dick and Jane.”

Her personal, heartfelt relationship with books permeates the entire showroom, which attracts all types, including young, old, homeless folks and autistic individuals who’ve cultivated a special liking to Dreamalot.

“You get that used-bookstore feel, the home feel. You can’t get that in a new store. Everybody feels really comfortable in here. We have a lot of autistic children who come in. Autistic children, you know, are hard to take shopping. They don’t do well in stores. In here, the only problem I’ve ever had with autistic children is getting them to leave,” she quips.

“They like it; they like that there’s a maze through the shelves [and] that’s it’s closer and you can’t get a crowd of people around you. There are treasures to find. You can come in and be here all day and not see all of the treasures that are hiding in the nooks and crannies — and it constantly changes. You never know what you’re going to find.”

The fact that the Lowcountry’s baroness of fine books deals exclusively with low-priced used copy doesn’t compel her to announce sales and/or specials, which in this economy, she observes, has become essential for those struggling with car dues, home/education expenses and sundry forms of debt.

However, the real value presented by her treasure trove of books, according to Miss Cherry, is the “sanity” they offer to folks saddled with real-world problems who sometimes need an escape from the mundane.

Dreamalot also has a mini cafe’ rest area where people can sit and stay awhile while thumbing through their selected books or magazines of interest.

Recently, Collins has begun partnering with neighborhood “food fairies,” who regularly drop in and drop off boxes of edibles and other items for the homeless.

Yet all the hospitality and benevolence in the world doesn’t pay the light bill, and so to counter the rising costs of rent, utilities and other related expenses, the 23-year businesswoman has opted to carry goods other than books, such as toys, holiday decorations, DVDs, board games and a wide array of figurines.

What has truly caught fire at Dreamalot since moving to Moncks Corner is a growing allotment of puzzles, which has brought in new customers.

Financial demands aren’t the only hurdle Collins has had to grapple with in keeping the doors open, though, as she’s also negotiated her share of health concerns over the years, some of which have landed her in the hospital. Those physical issues prompted the longtime store owner to recruit Danielle Cutler Nabors as a business partner. The Pennsylvania-born mother of six, in fact, chips in with a lot of the heavy lifting.

Nabors, herself a voracious reader, enjoys listening to Collins dispense her encyclopedic knowledge as it pertains to authors and their literature.

When rattling off a list of writers she holds in high regard, Miss Cherry spoke glowingly of French novelist Jules Verne of “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” fame, as she deemed him “the last author who wrote anything original.”

Similarly, she lauded Simon Winchester — who counts “The Professor and the Madman” as his most heralded work — as an “awesome” writer with a unique style.

Conversely, Collins had no qualms critiquing Stephen King’s more recent literary productions, including “Under the Dome,” since the science-fiction master will sometimes regurgitate old scripts he previoulsy submitted for “The Twilight Zone” to generate content for his books — with the end result of having a fizzling effect.

Miss Cherry’s unfiltered insight on books and the people who write them is worth the price of admission for her legions of recurring customers, including “Penny,” who paid the bookstore a visit toward the end of The Berkeley Independent’s in-person interview.

“This is my happy place,” said the enthusiastic book connoisseur. “I love books, I love looking for them and finding things here that I’ve been looking for for a long time — it’s quite exciting. This is just a great, great place.”

MONCKS CORNER, S.C. – Berkeley County, Town of Moncks Corner leaders and public safety officials recently celebrated the unveiling of the new MUSC Children’s Health Pediatrics facility in Moncks Corner with Dr. Joseph West and Dr. Luke Emmanuel Edmondson.

Dr. West and his pediatric primary care practice of more than 40 years, Moncks Corner Pediatrics, officially joined MUSC as MUSC Children’s Health Pediatrics – Moncks Corner on August 1.

Mark Scheurer, M.D., Children’s and Women’s Services chief, says it’s an absolute pleasure to see his initial conversation with West come to fruition.

“Several years ago, when Dr. West and I walked through the new children’s hospital together, I learned about his decades-long dedication to the kids and families of Moncks Corner and beyond,” Scheurer said. “We discussed our hopes for the new children’s hospital and the need to connect it to folks where they live, to serve them where they are. It was just a conversation, but it was clear to both of us that there was an opportunity to make it more substantive to help directly connect this community to the children’s hospital and serve them better.”

MUSC Health leaders, the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce, the Town of Moncks Corner, and the Moncks Corner pediatric team gathered on Wednesday, October 12, for a ribbon-cutting event to honor the partnership and recognize West’s contributions to the community and the care he has provided over the years.

West has been in practice for 43 years and says he is excited to have the partner he never had but now does, Dr. Luke Edmondson.

“What a testimony to Dr. West in terms of so much time here in practice and wanting to do what’s right for the community and partnering with MUSC to continue his legacy in Moncks Corner,” said Terrence E. Steyer, M.D., College of Medicine interim dean.

The practice, located at 5000 Epson Plantation Drive, Suite B in Moncks Corner, is a recognized Patient-Centered Medical Home (PCMH) by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) and provides convenient primary care for children from birth through 18 years of age.

Ranked as the #1 children’s hospital in South Carolina by U.S. News & World Report, patients and families have direct access to nationally-ranked, dedicated pediatric experts in multiple specialties – from yearly physicals to referrals to specialty clinics, plus children-only labs, imaging, and more.

For more information, visit MUSCkids.org/PrimaryCare. To schedule an appointment, call 843-876-0444.

MONCKS CORNER, S.C. – Advancing its strategic debt management plan, the Santee Cooper Board of Directors today approved approximately $622 million in a multi-part bond sale, which will refinance approximately $175 million in bonds due in 2023, and provide another $450 million for capital improvements for Santee Cooper’s system. The transaction was approved by the South Carolina Joint Bond Review Committee on Oct. 18, 2022.

Specifically, the Board approved:

$36.6 million of 2022 Tax-Exempt Refunding Series C

$134.9 million of 2022 Taxable Refunding Series D

$390 million of 2022 Tax-Exempt Improvement Series E

$60 million of 2022 Taxable Improvement Series F

The all-in true interest cost is 5.55%. The transaction is compliant with the parameters approved by the South Carolina Joint Bond Review Committee.

Demand for the offering was strong, with investor orders totaling just over $1.2 billion, which allowed Santee Cooper to reduce interest rates on several bond maturities and increase the par amount sold to fully fund expected new money capital needs for the next 18 to 24 months.

The transaction was led by J.P. Morgan Securities. Other senior managers were Bank of America Securities and Barclays Capital Inc. Co-managers included Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC, Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, TD Securities (USA) LLC, Wells Fargo, and American Veterans Group, which is a certified Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business that reinvests a portion of their earnings into military veteran causes.

“This transaction is a key component of our overall financial strategy. The refunding portion allows us to continue to proactively manage our cash and liquidity needs during the rate freeze, while the capital improvement bonds are a very cost-effective way to invest in the Santee Cooper system as we continue to provide the high-level of reliability and service that our customers expect and, quite frankly, that they deserve,” said Santee Cooper President and CEO Jimmy Staton. “The smooth execution of this transaction is a testament to the transparency and trust that has been built between Santee Cooper and the Joint Bond Review Committee, and we certainly appreciate their guidance and the support they’ve demonstrated.”

PFM Managing Director Mike Mace added, “This was quite a success. We were able to sell more bonds and longer bonds than we what we were thinking at the outset. It’s an excellent transaction for the Authority.”

The Final Official Statement for these bonds will be available by contacting Santee Cooper Bondholder Relations at 1-877-246-3338. It will also be posted at santeecooper.com on the Investors page.

Santee Cooper is South Carolina’s largest power provider, the ultimate source of electricity for 2 million people across the state, and one of America’s Best Midsize Employers as named by Forbes. Through its low-cost, reliable, and environmentally responsible electricity and water services, and through innovative partnerships and initiatives that attract and retain industry and jobs, Santee Cooper helps power South Carolina. To learn more, visit www.santeecooper.com and follow #PoweringSC on social media.