$4.3M Beaufort park beautification barely begins before critic cries foul over funding

Beaufort is plowing ahead with $4.3 million in improvements at one of its largest recreation areas — Southside Park. The major improvement, which includes a new pavilion and playground equipment, is proceeding despite a challenge from a frequent city critic who filed a lawsuit just two days after the city broke ground on the work, arguing state law forbids the city from using hospitality and accommodations taxes as a funding source.

The city disagrees and is confident it will prevail in court.

In January, the City Council OK’d a $7.1 hospitality and accommodation tax bond issue for improvements at Southside and Washginton Street parks. The city plans to repay the $7.1 million, 15-year bond using funds from the 2% local hospitality tax it collects from restaurants and a 3% accommodations tax on hotels and motels and bed and breakfast establishments. Most of the $7.1 million will go toward improvements at Southside, which fronts Battery Creek Road and Southside Boulevard in the Mossy Oaks neighborhood. The cost of the first phase of the Southside work is $4.3 million.

Graham Trask, a property owner and developer who does business under West Street Farms LLC and Mix Farms LLC, is trying to stop the city from spending the $7.1 million on the parks. Trask filed a lawsuit Wednesday in Beaufort’s Court of Common Pleas.

At the crux of the dispute is how the city may spend sales taxes collected on hotels and motels and restaurants. South Carolina law allows counties and municipalities to use a portion of those taxes for tourism-related purposes such as athletic and historic facilities, beach access, roads and the like.

The city and Trask, however, disagree on what qualifies as a legitimate tourism-related project.

Trask argues the city is illegally diverting the taxes to finance what he considers non-tourism-related neighborhood park improvements. He calls the expenditures at Southside Park “outrageous and extravagant.”

“Spending these monies on the Project will inevitably come at the expense of other worthy projects that would properly be paid for with accommodations tax revenue,” the lawsuit says.

The city issued the bonds shortly after the January approval, and City Manager Scott Marshall pointed out there is 20-day statue of limitations on filing a complaint, which Trask missed.

“We are confident that the complaint filed by West Street Farms LLC and Mix Farms LLC will be dismissed,” Marshall said.

In an interview Thursday, Trask acknowledged that he missed the 20-day deadline. However, Trask said he plans to push on with the lawsuit in hopes that a judge will issue a ruling preventing the city from spending hospitality and accommodation taxes in a similar fashion in the future.

“The only way the city will stop,” Trask says, “is if a judge forces them to.”

The lawsuit was filed two days after the city broke ground on $4.3 million in improvements at the 34-acre Southside Park. That work will add more family-friendly amenities to the bucolic park that already features a popular dog park and walking trail. The additions will include a playground, picnic area, event pavilion and parking lot improvements that the city has said will be enjoyed by local residents and visitors alike.

“The park will finally begin to realize its potential — a place to gather, celebrate, play, exercise, and enjoy nature for all the residents of Beaufort, and for our visitors as well,” Councilman Neil Lipsitz, who represents the Southside area, said in news release, adding that the improvements were two decades in the making.

Phase 1 should be completed in the fall of 2024, said Downtown Operations Director Linda Roper. Its estimated cost is $4.28 million, funded through the Capital Projects Fund and Parks & Tourism Revenue Bond.

For almost three years, Trask has been in a legal joust with the city over its OK of large apartment, parking garage and hotel projects in the city’s historic downtown. The city has won the initial rounds in those cases, but appeals still are pending.

This story was originally published February 29, 2024 at 12:29 PM.

Karl Puckett

The Island Packet

843-256-3420

Karl Puckett covers the city of Beaufort, town of Port Royal and other communities north of the Broad River for The Beaufort Gazette and Island Packet. The Minnesota native also has worked at newspapers in his home state, Alaska, Wisconsin and Montana.