‘A bad contract’: Beaufort Co. Council upholds inquiry of controversial consulting deal

Despite an effort to kill it, an investigation of a former Beaufort County employee’s controversial consulting contract will proceed.

Beaufort County Council voted down a motion Monday night to rescind the inquiry into the $24,000 contract the county awarded in July to then-outgoing interim county administrator Josh Gruber, just a couple of weeks before he became Hilton Head Island’s assistant town manager.

The contract has long been a touchy subject with council.

Proponents say it was issued in good faith and with an eye toward public safety — an insurance policy, in essence, as hurricane season approached and storm-veteran Gruber’s experience might prove valuable.

But critics said the contract was struck in secret and kept taxpayers in the dark, The Island Packet and The Beaufort Gazette reported in September. Moreover, they said the contract was nebulous and that its two-month window — from August to October, with options for extensions — allowed Gruber to double-dip, drawing pay from both the county and his new employer on Hilton Head.

Now, some on council want to know if the document was legally and ethically sound.

On Monday, as a council with new faces and old factions grappled with lingering issues, the body voted soundly to find out. Its freshmen members were critical in that decision. But questions remain about the timeline for the inquiry and when its findings will be made public.

Only one new council member — Mark Lawson — voted to rescind the inquiry, joining Alice Howard, chairman Stu Rodman and vice chairman Paul Sommerville, who made the motion to abandon the investigation.

But the rest of council’s fresh faces — Chris Hervochon, Larry McElynn and Joe Passiment — opposed that effort, representing a critical block of votes that defeated Sommerville’s motion 7-4.

Prior to voting, Hervochon called the agreement between Gruber and the county “a bad contract,” worrying that it left open the door for indefinite monthly extensions.

McElynn asked if there was an itemized bill of services rendered. County attorney Tom Keaveny — who authorized and co-signed the contract in July, after he had assumed the role of interim county administrator — said there was not.

Councilman Mike Covert worried the body would be “quickly sliding down the credibility slope” if it abandoned the investigation.

Councilman York Glover agreed, and said council needed more check-and-balance mechanisms — namely its own legal counsel to prevent potential conflicts of interest for the county attorney who, in instances such as this, would be in an awkward position.

Sommerville and Rodman pointed out that council had, after criticizing the contract, later voted to extend it (in the face of a storm threat) which, in essence, legitimized the agreement.

Nevertheless, council voted in November to spend up to $10,000 on an outside attorney to investigate the matter.

Reached Tuesday morning, Gruber declined to comment and said he’d not been aware of the previous night’s vote.

“I expect that (current Interim Beaufort County Administrator John Weaver) will retain (an investigator) relatively quickly,” Rodman said Tuesday morning. “I would be surprised if it took more than a couple of weeks.”

He said council had not given Weaver a timeline, but that Weaver “is very good at handling things in a timely manner.”

When asked how and when the investigation’s findings would be made public, Rodman said: “We’ll certainly make it available to the public.

“Whether we have a private meeting ahead of time, that remains to be seen,” he said.