Insults, expletives and anger: Beaufort Co Council emails reveal behind-the-scenes turmoil

As Beaufort County Council prepares to hire a permanent administrator for the third time in 18 months, deeply divided relationships among council members could influence the finalist’s decision to choose them as their boss.

This weekend, the council narrowed its list to three candidates — Marc Orlando, Bluffton’s Town Manager; Ashley Jacobs, assistant county administrator for Aiken County; and Eric Larson, Beaufort County’s director of engineering and land management.

Whoever is chosen will be the first permanent administrator to serve the county since September 2017, when Gary Kubic retired after more than a decade in the position. Since then, Josh Gruber, Tom Keaveny and now John Weaver have all stepped in and served as interim administrators.

The council has attempted to hire a permanent replacement twice before, costing taxpayers thousands.

Although council members remained fairly civil in public throughout the previous searches, emails show just how heated things got behind the scenes when they discovered that Gruber, who no longer worked for the county, had been awarded a lucrative consulting contract without their knowledge.

The emails, sent in July through September 2018, were obtained by The Island Packet and The Beaufort Gazette through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Concerns about Gruber’s contract, as well as an unauthorized purchase of property he made during his tenure, not only caused significant problems on council, they played a major role in then-interim county administrator Tom Keaveny’s decision to step down after just two months.

Keaveny, formerly on Gruber’s staff as county attorney, took over for Gruber as interim county administrator July 20, 2018, and then worked behind-the-scenes with him to draw up a $24,000 consulting contract right as Gruber was preparing to leave for a position with the Town of Hilton Head Island.

Council members said they never knew about the contract and were only alerted to it by a private citizen two months later.

While Keaveny insists he went through the “normal process of contract approval” — because no committee or council approval is needed for expenditures less than $50,000 — Gruber’s detractors on council were dubious.

In a Sept. 9, 2018, email to Tabor Vaux, then-councilman Rick Caporale called the contract “a scam,” saying that “no Question (then-Council Chair) Paul (Sommerville) must have arranged it.”

In the days that followed, Caporale was joined by about half the board in his outrage over Gruber’s contract and property purchase.

In a Sept. 26, 2018, text to Councilman Tabor Vaux, council Councilman Mike Covert called the creation of the contract a “shit show.”

“(Keaveny) got played by someone on council and Josh (Gruber), as it is becoming very apparent. It’s as simple as that,” he texted.

In mid-September, Keaveny sent an email to then-Chairman Sommerville and Councilman Jerry Stewart, citing “a steady decline in the level of civility” between council members and himself as a reason he was considering stepping down.

Keaveny attached recent emails from four other councilmen and called them “disturbing, troubling and personally offensive.”

“The issues which the emails raise can (and will) be addressed and resolved. But what cannot be resolved is the attitude which is implicit in the emails,” he wrote. “They are condescending; they are abusive; they demonstrate a lack of respect.”

When asked what led to this decline in civility, Keaveny said in a recent interview that he believes Gruber was “a polarizing figure for council.”

As to why he thought Gruber was polarizing, Keaveny said, “You’ll have to ask the haters.”

Reached on Friday, Gruber declined to comment.

“I’m with the town (of Hilton Head Island) now,” he said.

‘Resentment started to build’

During the council’s first administrator search in 2017, council conducted a nationwide search.

Despite that decision, Kubic and Sommerville spent months of executive sessions — away from public view and scrutiny — lobbying for Gruber to take the role, according to Caporale.

“People began to find it very abrasive and unprofessional, and that’s when I think that a certain amount of resentment started to build,” he said in a recent interview.

Council members quickly split into two factions over Gruber’s candidacy. Five members — including then-Chairman Sommerville — supported Gruber, while the other six remained strongly opposed.

Covert — on the opposing side — called his reasons for resistance “close and personal.”

“He’s a super nice guy, but he’s just not ready to be county administrator of Beaufort County,” Covert said.

The disdain for Gruber only increased when council found out about the consulting contract he had received on his way out the door.

Their questions and concerns about the incident, which is under investigation by an outside attorney, began to mount:

• Why did Keaveny keep the contract a secret for nearly two months?

• Who knew about the contract at the time of its creation?

• Why didn’t the contract include any parameters to verify the funds were earned? For instance, keeping track of time spent, amount of phone calls made, conversations transpired.

‘Tainted investigation to begin with’

In May 2018, Gruber accepted a $152,000 job as assistant town manager for Hilton Head, which he began Aug. 6.

He continued to receive his $150,000 interim administrator salary until Aug. 3, 2018, according to documents obtained by a private citizen under the Freedom for Information Act.

At a June 25, 2018, meeting, council chose Keaveny to replace Gruber starting July 20, 2018.

In the meantime, Gruber drafted his own consulting contract., according to an email he sent Keaveny on July 17, 2018.

Gruber and Keaveny signed the contract July 24, 2018.

Then, in an Aug. 1, 2018, email. Gruber instructed the county’s chief finance officer — still his subordinate — to cut him a check for the $24,000 he was to be paid for the next two months.

When some council members became angry after the contract’s discovery two months later, councilman Stu Rodman — a vocal Gruber supporter — quickly volunteered to investigate the matter, an offer Keaveny commended.

“The more I think about Stu (Rodman)’s offer the more I like it,” Keaveny wrote in an email to Sommerville on Sept. 14, 2018.

Rodman said last week that he had offered to lead the investigation because he “understood some of the circumstances” and “figured he might be a logical person” for the task.

He denied a conflict of interest because “whatever I was going to do was going to be done in the public,” he said.

Covert said last week that having Rodman lead the investigation into Gruber was like “letting the fox guard the hen house.”

Rodman and others have said the demands that were being made of Keaveny, who was asked to step into the interim role, justified the need for Gruber to stay on as a consultant.

Namely they touted Gruber’s experience leading the county through 2016’s Hurricane Matthew and 2017’s Tropical Storm Irma.

In an email to Rodman, Keaveny defended his reasons for signing the contract, saying that he felt it was a “great investment.”

“It was, and is, in my opinion that it was in the best interest of the citizens of residents or Beaufort County to retain Mr. Gruber to assist in the transfer of knowledge,” Keaveny wrote. “... In regard to guiding the administrator through a hurricane, it is akin to insurance.”

Less than a week after Rodman began his investigation and before sending his report to the full board, he shared his findings with Gruber and asked for his comments.

Gruber commended Rodman for looking at the contract and property purchase in a “very logical and analytical way.”

“However, as you and I both know, since the outcomes you have proposed don’t involve me being drawn and quartered in a public square, they are likely to be met with opposition from the usual suspects,” he wrote to Rodman.

‘Not sweep it under the rug’

When Keaveny first indicated to then-Chairman Sommerville and then-Councilman Stewart that he was considering stepping down, he told them in an email that at times it felt like “some members of council and the Interim were locked in a duel to the finish.”

“I don’t see it getting any better after the election. I think it will be even more of the same,” he wrote.

In November, four new members joined council, replacing two Gruber supporters and two detractors.

When asked if his sentiments had changed since then, Keaveny said he was “optimistic” because he felt that the election was “therapeutic.”



“I think there is a dedication among the councilmen to work together for the benefit of council and the county,” he said.

Other sitting members expressed similar sentiments.

“I don’t sense any dissension among council members,” Rodman, now chairman, said recently. “Time will tell, but my hope is that we will have a strong consensus this time around.”

In a Jan. 12, 2019 email to Flewelling, Covert and Sommerville, Chairman Rodman floated the idea of temporarily suspending the search for an independent attorney to conduct further investigation of Gruber’s contract, despite council’s previously approved motion on Nov. 5 to fund of up to $10,000 for an independent investigation.

About two weeks later, at a Jan. 28 council meeting, Vice Chairman Sommerville made a motion to abandon the investigation. However, it was defeated 7-4.

However, the independent investigation, which took months to bring to fruition, is finally underway by Chester County Attorney Joan Winters.

Covert, who says he still has many unanswered questions, sees it as the first step in moving council away from conflict.

“To move forward and progress for the citizens of Beaufort County, we have to finish what we started — not sweep it under the rug.”

This story was originally published February 26, 2019 at 5:15 PM.