Ophthalmologist near North Charleston, SC

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - The South Carolina Education Association held a teacher signing day event in North Charleston Friday to call for changes educators would like to see made in teacher contracts.

With May 10 being the last day for teachers in South Carolina to sign their contracts, members of the SCEA met at Wannamaker Park to help teachers understand what they are actually signing.

“We are promoting teachers having the opportunity to read, understand, and ask good questions about their contracts,” Berkeley County Education Association President Kathleen Low says. “We watch our kids do their signing day as, you know, student-athletes to go to college, and we want to celebrate our teachers too. They do an important thing, and we sign a contract, and I think that it’s important that we all understand our contract when we sign them.”

Low says teachers do not know what their exact salary will be once they sign their contracts. She says if there are any changes that happen after they sign, they cannot do anything about it and that they are locked in for good.

“It’s an enormous amount of trust that teachers put in their districts when they sign on this day because they do not know how much they will be paid for the upcoming year,” Low says.

She claims that if teachers try to break their contracts, school districts have the right to take their names to the Department of Education and have their teaching license suspended.

“It has happened in the past. There are teachers right now that have their licenses suspended for just such an action,” Low says. “We should have a contract that is professional and currently this contract is just simply something else.”

Low says with the school districts in the area experiencing teacher shortages that retaining the ones they have is important. She claims that there was a bill that ended up not getting passed this year that would’ve allowed teachers a 10-day window after hearing what their salary was for them to be able to get out of their contracts without penalty.

She hopes to continue this fight for teachers to be able to have that right.

“People need to start seeing this as a crisis because we are not moving this in the other direction. We’re not slowing it down and so we need to make moves to do that and this contract is a part of those solutions that teachers are trying to make to get schools to be better,” Low says.

The Charleston County School District says they have just over 200 teacher vacancies for the 2024-2025 school year. Dorchester School District 2 officials say they have 122 teacher openings. Berkeley County Schools, Dorchester School District 4, and Colleton County Schools have not responded to requests for the number of teacher vacancies in their respective districts.

The event was co-hosted by the Charleston County Education Association, Berkeley County Education Association, Summerville Education Association, Colleton County Education Association, and Dorchester Education Association.

Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.

Charleston Tops the Latest Metro Area Employment Statistics for Growth

By Taylor Hendrix, Workforce Insights Analyst

What is the Current Employment Statistics Program?

The Current Employment Statistics (CES) program produces detailed industry estimates of employment, hours, and earnings of workers for all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and about 450 metropolitan areas and divisions. Each month, the CES surveys approximately 122,000 businesses and government agencies, representing 666,000 individual worksites.[i] Let’s look at the latest numbers for October 2023.

Current Data

Charleston-North Charleston, South Carolina, which includes Berkeley, Charleston, and Dorchester counties, had the largest percentage gain in nonfarm[ii] employment from October 2022 to October 2023. Employment in 2022 was at 402,300 and rose to 426,800 in 2023, reflecting a total change of 24,500, or 6.1 percent. Midland, Texas, followed with a 5.1 percent change over the year, then Boise City, Idaho, with a 4.5 percent change, and Durham-Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and Salinas, California, both with a 4.4 percent change rounding out the top five metro areas.

Although Charleston was the only South Carolina location to appear in the top 10, every metropolitan area in the state exhibited growth year-over-year, suggesting a strong economy and a motivated labor force.

For more information on these data, the two tables below depict the top 10 metro areas nationwide for growth and the South Carolina metro areas, specifically, for the latest CES data.

[i] U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, TED: The Economics Daily, Employment in Charleston metro area up 6.1 percent for the year ended in October 2023, https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2023/employment-in-charleston-metro-area-up-6-1-percent-for-year-ended-in-october-2023.htm

[ii] Nonfarm employment comprises goods, construction, and manufacturing companies.

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - Investigators with the Federal Aviation Administration are looking into whether Boeing employees failed to perform some quality inspections on its 787 jets, the FAA confirmed on Monday.

The 787 planes are built at Boeing South Carolina, located in North Charleston.

Live 5 News obtained a copy of the internal memo from Scott Stocker, who leads the 787 program, which was sent to Boeing South Carolina employees last week. He acknowledged a violation of policies by several people who had not performed a written test but recorded the work as having been completed.

Stocker applauded a teammate who saw something in the factory that he believed was not being done right and spoke up about it.

“We will use this moment to celebrate him, and to remind us all about the kind of behavior we will and will not accept as a team,” Stocker stated in the email.

“The teammate saw what appeared to be an irregularity in a required conformance test in wing body join,” Stocker said. “He raised it with his manager, who brought it to the attention of executive leadership. I wanted to personally thank and commend that teammate for doing the right thing. It’s critical that every one of us speak up when we see something that may not look right, or that needs attention.”

Stocker stated that Boeing has zero tolerance for not following processes designed to ensure quality and safety.

He added the regulator was informed and Boeing South Carolina is taking “swift and serious corrective action with multiple teammates.”

Stocker added that the engineering team has assessed this misconduct did not create an immediate safety of flight issue, however, it is going to impact Boeing’s customers and factory teammates because the test now needs to be conducted out of sequence on airplanes in the build process.

The FAA released the following statement on the investigation:

The FAA has opened an investigation into Boeing after the company voluntarily informed us in April that it may not have completed required inspections to confirm adequate bonding and grounding where the wings join the fuselage on certain 787 Dreamliner airplanes.

The FAA is investigating whether Boeing completed the inspections and whether company employees may have falsified aircraft records. At the same time, Boeing is reinspecting all 787 airplanes still within the production system and must also create a plan to address the in-service fleet.

As the investigation continues, the FAA will take any necessary action – as always – to ensure the safety of the flying public.

Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCBD) – South Carolina’s emergency management leaders are refreshing the state’s coastal evacuation zones ahead of hurricane season.

State and local emergency management officials joined Governor Henry McMaster and law enforcement in North Charleston on Thursday morning to unveil the new evacuation zones. It’s the first major change to the zones in roughly 10 years.

Officials said the update better reflects the “evolving landscape of potential hazards” and population distribution across the region. Storm surge risk, flooding susceptibility, and best routes to ensure an effective evacuation effort were top factors in planning the new zones.

“With the new zones, we’ve actually shrunk the entire evacuation area by about 250 square miles. Main thing that we want to do is we want to ensure that people are out of harm’s way, that we’re not putting them at risk, but at the same time, we want to make sure that we don’t evacuate people that don’t need to be evacuated,” explained Kim Stenson, the director of the South Carolina Emergency Management Division.

Evacuation zones are categorized ‘A’ through ‘F’ with areas in red designated as the highest risk.

Areas along the immediate coast, including the barrier islands, are listed in Zone A. West Ashley, the peninsula, Mount Pleasant and Daniel Island are in Zone B. Portions of North Charleston and areas of Wando and the Francis Marion National Forest along US 17 are in Zone C.

State and local officials will announce evacuations by the designated zone based on the severity of approaching storms.

“You have to have a plan on what you ‘gon do if it happens. Because the time to plan is now. The time to plan is not when it’s coming ‘cause it is too late,” Governor McMaster said.

Officials with the South Carolina Department of Transportation said they’ve recently reviewed all 35 evacuation routes which included checking cameras and message boards. A lane reversal exercise will take place on June 5 along I-26.

“We’re going to be prepared for hurricane season, we encourage residents to be ready for hurricane season. That means having a plan, knowing your evacuation routes, which way you would go if an evacuation order comes,” SCDOT Secretary of Transportation Justin Powell said during the news conference.

Know your zone, prepare your home, and remember your route are the three points leaders in the Palmetto State want residents and visitors to keep in mind as we approach what they said is expected to be a very active hurricane season. Hard copies of the 2024 South Carolina Hurricane Guide can be found at Walgreens, welcome centers across the interstate, and coastal DMV offices.

Hurricane season begins on June 1 and runs through November 30.

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCIV) — The South Carolina Ports Authority plans to buy a 280-acre industrial waterfront property next to the North Charleston Terminal to expand port capacity at the Port of Charleston.

A unanimous vote from the S.C. Ports Board of Directors Tuesday pushed the purchase of the former WestRock paper mill site forward, and S.C. Ports officials believe the deal will close as soon as it is "practical."

“The tremendous backing from our state and an excellent partnership with WestRock allows us to make investments today that will support our state’s economy and create opportunities for future generations of South Carolinians,” said Barbara Melvin, S.C. Ports' president and chief executive officer. “We are adding significant port capacity to support growth in South Carolina and throughout the Southeast.”

READ MORE: "South Carolina's USS Yorktown enters phase two of toxic pollutant removal project."

With the estimated 280-acre property, S.C. Ports officials said it will be able to handle more cargo for port-dependent businesses in the area. The additional land will also expand the terminal's capacity, with hopes of handling 5 million containers.

S.C. Ports also has plans to modernize the North Charleston Terminal with upgraded cargo-handling equipment and increased container capacity.

Wrapped within the modernization process is the South Carolina Department of Transportation's commitment to expanding Interstate 526 and replacing the Don Holt Bridge, removing the height constraints for larger vessels.

“South Carolina Ports is widely known as a top driver of our state’s booming economy, but that success doesn’t come by accident — it takes timely, strategic investments like this one," Gov. Henry McMaster said. "Every time we invest in port infrastructure, we see significant success at port-dependent businesses and new, good-paying jobs for our people. Our state’s investment in the expansion of North Charleston Terminal will yield dividends and create opportunities for future generations.”

READ MORE: "SC Ports shares 2023 Economic Impact Study."

There are also plans to deepen the North Charleston Terminal, intending to reach 52 feet. The United States Army Corps of Engineers, Charleston District, plans to undertake a feasibility study for the project, which, if approved, will add 5 feet to the Cooper River.

The goal is to have the biggest container ships that reside in the Port of Charleston to have seamless access to the North Charleston Terminal.

“The paper mill site has been in the fabric of our community for decades, helping support many generations of North Charleston families, including my own," said Reggie Burgess, the North Charleston mayor. "As it transitions into a port terminal, we are eager to collaborate closely with South Carolina Ports to guarantee this site continues to be a cornerstone of economic vitality, all the while seamlessly integrating into the community.”