BUSINESS: Shark Week Beaufort welcomes Sand Shark students, faculty, staff. PAGE A6
AUGUST 9 - 15, 2018 WWW.YOURISLANDNEWS.COM
COVERING BEAUFORT COUNTY
Afghanistan, 2006. As Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Middle East Field Office in Bahrain, Grebas was chosen to lead investigations into criminal and counter-terrorism operations throughout the Middle East.
J
im Grebas Jr. might be the most famous Beaufortonian you’ve never heard of. You’ve probably heard of “NCIS,” the CBS series starring Mark Harmon that remains TV’s most-watched drama. Perhaps you’ve also heard about the six-part “48 Hours: NCIS” series, which documented the true stories handled by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and inspired their wildly popular fictional counterparts. But what you probably haven’t heard of is the fact that one of the lead NCIS agents, the one who helped solve the organization’s coldest cases and inspire the hit TV series, Special Agent Jim A. Grebas Jr., is a Beaufort boy. “Jim Grebas and his partner Pete Hughes are very humble about what they do, but they are two of the best investigators I have ever met in my 17 years of documenting true crime stories,” says Jonathan Leach, a senior producer at CBS. “In fact, the two cases they worked on that we’ve documented for ’48 Hours’ were the inspiration for the TV drama NCIS, the most watched drama in the world. The work that Jim and Pete have done is remarkable.” Grebas’ bio reads like the backstory of a Hollywood hero. His 30-year career with NCIS took him all over the world — Iceland, Afghanistan, Iraq, the White House. Promoted to Supervisory Special Agent for the Cold Case Homicide Unit, Grebas and his team of agents resolved 17 previously unsolvable cases. Later, he was selected to be the Department of Defense’s Senior Advisor in Washington, D.C. Or as his father, Marine Capt. (Ret) Jim Grebas Sr., says, “Not that shabby of an accomplishment for a Beaufort-bred boy who worked for me as a mechanic and shop manager way back when.” What is equally remarkable is that Jim Jr. ever left town in the first place. “I’ll tell you, I never wanted to leave Beaufort,” he says. “But I’ll also tell you my success is largely attributed to the values I was taught by my parents and my southern upbringing in Beaufort.” Grebas says that his mother, Cleo Delgado, and Jim Sr. taught him the importance of respect, integrity and hard work early on.
You never know the places Beaufort can take you By Kat Walsh
“They told me, ‘Sometimes life will knock you to your knees, you will see. And when it does, you get up, wipe the dirt off your knees, and start all over again,’” he recalls. His dad had a saying for dealing with difficult challenges: “Keep it between the lines.” A reminder to keep things in perspective. And there were challenges. In the late 60s, Grebas was among some of the first Caucasian students to attend Robert Smalls Elementary School. There was turmoil, but the experience taught him a valuable lesson on how to get along with others. “Treating everyone equally and with respect goes long way in life,” he says. “Or, as I was constantly told by my parents, ‘You get more flies with honey than vinegar,’.” And then there was Beaufort’s champion baseball team. Grebas says that his drive to win definitely came out of being a member of the Battery Creek High School baseball team that beat the odds and won the Class 4A state championship in 1977. “We were the underdogs,” he recalls.“There were only 11 of us because our coach, Ken Dimmick, was a very tough disciplinarian. Some guys didn’t like that, so they quit.” Grebas, the team’s third baseman, says that the confidence he gained from the experience and his teammates helped shape him into the person he is today. “Though our numbers were small, we learned that if you have confidence, believe in yourself and others, you can succeed,” he said. “I’ve never forgotten that.” And he never did forget. Forty years later, on an episode of “48 Hours” dedicated to one of the “unsolvable” cold cases he helped crack, Grebas said, “So many people would tell us that we are wasting our time. Give up. Move on. We just don’t do it that way.” In 2015, Grebas officially retired from the NCIS. He now lives in Virginia with his wife, Kerri Ann, but still catches up with what’s going on in Beaufort in daily phone conversations with his dad. “Wherever I have traveled, from the U.S. to dangerous places overseas, I have taken these lessons of my life growing up Beaufort with me,” he said. “It’s hard to describe, but throughout the most difficult of times or facing the most challenging cases, all this kept me pushing forward.”
Jim Grebas Sr., Jimmy Grebas and Jim Grebas Jr. Jim's son Jimmy graduating from the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Brunswick, Ga., prior to reporting for law enforcement duty as a member of the Secret Service at the White House.
Jim's son Jimmy Grebas, wife Keri Ann with Jim in 2006, receiving the runner-up for John Walsh’s Top Cop Award for his work on an NCIS cold case investigation.
NCIS Cold Case Team, Special Agent Jim Grebas and his partner Special Agent Pete Hughes, on the set of "48 Hours."
County administrator search starting over
Support for Whitehall park growing
Beaufort County’s year-long search for a permanent county administrator is about to begin anew. The County Council voted at its most recent meeting to offer the position to Glynn County, Ga., administrator Alan Ours, who rejected the offer. The offer didn’t come without a splash of the drama that has marked the entire search. A majority of council members initially voted for former interim county administrator Josh Gruber, who recently took a new job as the Town of Hilton Head Island’s assistant town manager, only to retract the vote and instead agree to offer the position to Ours. But Ours rejected the offer, citing his family’s desire to stay in Brunswick, resetting the process that began nearly a year ago. Longtime administrator Gary Kubic
The groundswell of public support for a waterfront park on the controversial Whitehall property of Lady’s Island is gaining steam. At press time, a petition on Change.org had garnered more than 1,400 signatures of residents supporting the project. The petition was created by the “Friends of Whitehall Park” group, whose website and Facebook page include links to the petition, as well as information about how to donate to the project via the Beaufort County Open Land Trust and how to contact the Beaufort County and Beaufort City councils. According to the group’s Facebook page, the county has committed $300,000 to fund a walkway connecting the park to the Woods Memorial Bridge. Representatives from the Beaufort County Open Land Trust and Beaufort County are working with developer Sam Levin of Whitehall Point Holdings, LLC, in an attempt to purchase a portion of Whitehall for public open space before construction commences on the development plan approved in February. Levin agreed to consider the possibility of the sale of up to 10 acres — about half of the total size of the tract — on the western waterfront portion of Whitehall that overlooks the Beaufort River and Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park. A number of officials have stated their support for the project, including Lady’s Island Business and Professional Association President Mark Weeks, Beaufort County Council Chairman Paul Sommerville, and Beaufort Mayor Billy Keyserling.
Ours rejects council’s offer
retired in September, and Gruber was widely considered the favorite to take over after serving as deputy county administrator since Sept. 2014. Gruber took over the interim role following Kubic’s departure and was one of three finalists in the initial search for a full-time replacement in 2017 but did not have enough support among a split council to receive an offer. County attorney Tom Keaveny took over as interim county administrator after Gruber’s departure July 20, and now it looks as if his tenure will be extended indefinitely. Council Chairman Paul Sommerville said there are no immediate plans to take additional action. With tension among the existing board members, the process is likely to continue through the November election cycle, when four new council members will be elected.
THE NEXT GENERATION Beaufort Youth learn leadership and agriculture at SC Farm Bureau Conference. PAGE A4
AN INSPIRATIONAL START Paralympic gold medalist to speak at Beaufort Academy convocation. PAGE B1
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