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COVERING BEAUFORT COUNTY
Filing closes for Beaufort City Council, school board races
Four candidates seek two Beaufort council seats; Several northern Beaufort County school board races take shape
Elizabeth Foster, Photo courtesy of the ACLU.
Beaufort’s Elizabeth Foster honored by ACLU
By Delayna Earley The Island News The fields are set for several local races that will appear on ballots this November after filing closed at noon Monday, Aug. 17, for Beaufort City Council and seats on the Beaufort County Board of Education. Four candidates filed to run for two at-large seats on Beaufort
City Council, while voters across Beaufort County will decide seven school board races in the Nov. 3 general election. Four seek two Beaufort City Council seats Incumbent Josh Scallate will seek another term on Beaufort City Council and will face three challengers: Thad Lane, Jared Madison and Grady Woods. Councilman Mike McFee, whose seat is also up for election this year, did not file for another term. McFee said his decision to leave City Council was a positive one
and that he felt it was time to make room for new perspectives. “Very positively, I just felt it was time to afford fresh insights and thoughts,” McFee said. “I have enjoyed my time immensely, but want to spend more energy with other charitable organizations I serve and my real estate business.” With McFee not seeking reelection, at least one new member will join the five-member Beaufort City Council following the November election. Madison said his decision to run grew out of more than a year spent advocating for downtown employees and researching city
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Loving her like a sister Beaufort’s Rotary clubs again reach out to help sister city of Ostroh — this time with water tower
Beaufort Academy grad receives inaugural Next Generation Leader award for work that began during county's 2022 book challenges By Delayna Earley The Island News Sitting among some of the country's most recognizable civil rights advocates, scholars and public figures, Elizabeth Foster was having a hard time believing she belonged there. Bruce Springsteen and Colin Kaepernick were among those being honored, along with former U.S. Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta and constitutional law scholar Erwin Chemerinsky. And then there was Elizabeth, 21, whose path to the same stage began nearly four years earlier in Beaufort County, S.C., when she was a high school senior fighting the removal of 97 books from school library shelves. "It was a really, really crazy surreal feeling to be sitting alongside them," Elizabeth said. The American Civil Liberties Union named Elizabeth its inaugural Next Generation Leader in Civil Rights and Civil Liberties during its biennial awards ceremony July 24 in Washington, D.C. The ACLU credited her with gaining national recognition for defending the freedom to read in South Carolina, helping restore challenged books and mobilizing students around free speech and other civil liberties issues. Elizabeth did not even know who the other honorees were until they were announced about a week before the ceremony. "I saw that headline with Bruce Springsteen and Colin Kaepernick ... and I was just completely blown away," she said. But one of the moments that stayed with her came later, when high school students attending the
issues, including housing, parking, financial oversight, civic engagement, public safety and growth. “The more involved I became, the more I saw how many people felt unheard or disconnected from the decisions affecting them,” Madison said. “I’m running because I want to turn that work into action and make sure people know their voices matter. Ultimately I want to make sure people feel like they matter.” Scallate said he decided to seek a second term after considering the commitment involved and
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Special to The Island News hen Beaufort Rotarians met by Zoom with municipal leaders and engineers in Ostroh, Ukraine, during the summer of 2025, they asked one simple question: "What is your greatest need?" The answer was immediate: replace the failing water tower. Beaufort's three Rotary clubs have launched a campaign to raise $20,000 to replace a failing water tower that provides clean drinking water to approximately 15,000 residents of Beaufort's sister city of Ostroh. Through Rotary's matching grant program, local donations could ultimately generate approximately $72,000 to complete the project. "When we asked the leaders of our sister city what they needed most, they didn't ask for something extraordinary," said Rotary project leader Baxter McLendon. "They asked for something every family deserves — clean, safe drinking water. That's a need the people of Beaufort can understand, and it's one we can help meet. Every donation brings us one step closer to giving thousands of Ukrainians a dependable source of safe water."
Pictured in front of the failing water tower that serves Ostroh, Beaufort’s sister city in Ukraine, are (from left) Anatolii Nahulko, Ostroh City Engineer of Municipal Utilities; Andrii Koshynskyi, Ostroh Director of Municipal Enterprise “Ostroh Vodokanal”; Ludmyla Kozak, Ostroh Director of International Relations; and Robert McAllister, Global Catalyst for Reliant Mission, Lexington, S.C. Submitted photo
Sister-city partnership The sister-city partnership was established by the City of Beaufort and Ostroh in March 2022, just weeks after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Since then, Beaufort residents, the City of Beaufort, and the area’s three Rotary clubs — Rotary Club of Beaufort, Sea Island Rotary Club, and the Rotary Club of the Lowcountry — have worked together to provide emergency medical supplies, ambulances, generators, heating equipment, and other humanitarian assistance. Together, they have delivered more than $135,000 in aid
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Beaufort Digital Corridor to celebrate a milestone.
Burton firefighters helped battle a large industrial fire in Winnesboro, S.C.
'Canvas & Clay' brings together to local artists using different mediums.
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News Arts Sports Voices Military Directory
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