Richland School District 1 will terminate its contracts to build a $31 million early learning center slated for the Lower Richland community after a 4-3 vote of the school board Tuesday.
More than a year after Richland County issued the district a stop work order, the construction site remains untouched, with a concrete shell of a building standing on a swathe of land once forested, now clear-cut.
The South Carolina Department of Education refused to issue a permit for the early learning center on Caughman Road in Lower Richland in December 2023. Because the center was initially intended to serve children as young as infants, it could not be considered a school, the education department said.
The project was already in motion, however, and when Richland County officials caught on, they issued a stop work order in January 2024.
“The district is bleeding this money everyday,” said Richard Moore, the school board member who made the motion to pull the plug. “I just don’t think that’s an appropriate way to use funds.”
Issues with the project prompted state Education Superintendent Ellen Weaver to ask the state Inspector General to investigate the project.
The department denied the district a permit again in February 2024 when the district attempted to shift the age range to preschoolers through second grade, citing the ongoing investigation.
A July 2024 report by the Inspector General found Richland 1 broke state law and wasted more than $350,000 in taxpayer dollars when it began construction on the early learning center without proper permits. The district also had trouble with unauthorized or illegal procurement.
Two active lawsuits in Richland County court further say that the district’s early learning center project is to blame for new, routine flooding that has damaged at least two homes in the Creekside neighborhood in Lower Richland. Homeowners say it is a result of the district’s inadequate stormwater management plan for the construction site.
The Richland 1 school board moved quickly to regroup in August 2024, and Superintendent Craig Witherspoon told The State that it would restart the permitting process for the early learning center. Instead, the efforts were met with further criticism from Weaver, who escalated concern about the district’s financial practices and urged leaders to abandon the project, which she said already cost taxpayers $6 million.
Weaver’s office ordered another audit of Richland 1 in October 2024, and rejected the district’s financial recovery plan for being “deficient” and “incomplete.”
“Some of the District’s seemingly cursory responses have amplified the Department’s concern regarding the District’s apparent failure to grasp the gravity and full implications of the SIG’s findings,” wrote Kendra Hunt, the department’s chief financial officer.
The State
Alexa Jurado reports on the University of South Carolina for The State. She is from the Chicago suburbs and recently graduated from Marquette University. Alexa previously wrote for publications in Illinois and Wisconsin.