Criminal Defense Attorney inPacolet Mills, SC

For decades, abandoned textile mills have stood as proud but derelict reminders of South Carolina’s manufacturing history; however, recent redevelopment trends are bringing new life to communities whose vitality had waned with the closing of those mills.

What’s happening in two such communities – Drayton in Spartanburg County and Piedmont in Greenville County – demonstrates how, increasingly, such communities are being reimagined, reinvigorated and renewed.

History as prelude

Drayton Mills contributed significant horsepower to the engine that powered Spartanburg’s economic health for decades and served as the beating heart of a thriving textile community scarcely a stone’s throw from downtown.

Like many textile plants across the state, the mill and its surrounding community suffered a long decline through the latter half of the 20th century. And like many other plants, Drayton Mill sat vacant for years before redevelopment took place.

Unlike many other such sites, the mill was owned by a company, Pacolet Milliken, that served as a caretaker with the goal of bringing new life and purpose to the property. The family-owned investment company was spun out of Milliken and Co. in 2007 and inherited a portfolio of assets and more than 30,000 acres of property across the region.

That connection to the Milliken family’s textile history and vested interest in the economic health and wellbeing of the community help drive Pacolet Milliken’s investment priorities, according to Jennifer Calabria, director of land development for the firm.

Calabria explains the vision behind the various aspects of Drayton’s redevelopment is equal parts honoring the rich heritage of the community and providing a welcoming, attractive home for the new residents and businesses flocking to the region in record numbers.

The early phase of Drayton’s revival saw the mill, which was built in 1905, converted into luxury loft apartments. The 16-acre site has also welcomed the Drayton Mills Marketplace, home to restaurants, shops and offices. Across Drayton Road from the mill complex is a project developed by Orange Capital, an apartment complex called The Lively Drayton Mills.

Calabria says one of the ongoing goals for the project is to develop more single-family housing options to the area. That effort is being spearheaded by Dan Ryan Builders, whose Trailside at Drayton Mills project is mid-way to completion of phase one involving construction of 51 townhomes, more than 30 of which have already been sold.

The project adjoins the new Drayton Mills Elementary School and is traversed by Spartanburg’s popular Daniel Morgan Trail. Those two amenities are key elements attracting new residents to the area, according to Marv McDaris, division president for Dan Ryan Builders.

“Our vision is to create a great-looking community that’s a great place to live,” McDaris says.

The townhomes average about 1,500-1,600 square feet and are priced under $250,000. This type of home with its proximity to trails, schools and retail options are increasingly popular with young professionals starting families and empty nesters who embrace what McDaris describes as a “lock-and-leave” lifestyle. This attitude sees home as a place where you “keep your stuff” but where people spend much of their time enjoying nearby amenities.

Location, location, location

Understanding such generational shifts in where people want to live and how they want to spend their time led Larry Webb to have a eureka moment while looking at a building in Piedmont in Greenville County.

Webb is a senior advisor for investments and development at KDS Commercial Properties and was looking at the old Piedmont Mercantile Building in the community’s downtown in 2019 when a car full of young people helped him see the building’s potential. The group told Webb that they’d been eyeing the area as a place to set down roots, given its lower cost of living compared to downtown Greenville, but they wanted amenities like coffee shops, restaurants, cafes and so on.

That encounter prompted Webb to buy the building and embark on a years-long project to restore the building that is expected to get underway in the coming months.

Undaunted by the delays brought on by the pandemic or the time-consuming procedural delays in getting the building listed as a historic structure or in obtaining state and federal tax credits for the project, Webb is confident that his efforts will pay dividends for the community.

Slated to return the building to its original 1905 condition, the project is already serving as something of a springboard for others to bring their own development projects to Piedmont.

The adjacent 12-acre site of the historic mill Piedmont Number One, which sat vacant until it burned down in 1982, will be the site of up to 60 new townhomes planned by Brad Skelton of Red Oak Developers.

Skelton says the site’s picturesque setting beside the Saluda River and location just a 15-minute drive from downtown Greenville make it an attractive prospect for the thousands of new residents flocking to the Upstate.

“Piedmont is a hidden gem,” Skeleton says. “Piedmont in five or six years will be a destination for people to live.”

He says work on the site is expected to begin by the fourth quarter of this year and expects demand to be strong.

Webb says his project is 70% pre-leased with offices, a tap house and coffee shop among the future tenants.

Skelton says between his project and the mercantile building and another project across the river on the Anderson County side, which will eventually be connected by a planned pedestrian bridge, Piedmont is poised to experience a renaissance.

“We’ve got a lot of runway in front of us,” he says.

Some pros and cons of textile projects

Pros

Cons

The redevelopment of Drayton Mills and the surrounding neighborhood continues to take shape and points to how developers are reimagining this historic Spartanburg community.

The prospect of bringing new life and vitality to an area that has played such an important role in Spartanburg’s cultural and economic history is exciting, according to Jennifer Calabria, director of land development for Pacolet Milliken.

The company manages a portfolio of land holdings across the region totaling more than 26,000 acres. Among those holdings are properties centered on Drayton, and the company is working with CBRE senior associate Brian Scurlock to develop projects that will further develop and redefine Drayton and Spartanburg’s east side.

So far, the mill and the 16 acres on which it sits have been redeveloped into luxury loft apartments and a thriving community of retail shops, offices and restaurants. The redeveloped mill, according to Calabria and Scurlock, is envisioned to be the central hub of a new, modern Drayton community with its own distinct identity, rather like Atlanta’s Buckhead.

As part of that strategic vision, Pacolet Milliken donated property near Mary Black Hospital to Spartanburg School District Seven, which subsequently built a new Drayton Mills Elementary School there. Dan Ryan Builders is developing the Trailside at Drayton Mills neighborhood centered on Dalmatian Drive behind the school, and Calabria says this is an important part of bringing new life and identity back to Drayton.

“We knew it was a special community … and we wanted to do something to help it, revitalize the area and figure out who it wants to be and what it wants to be,” Calabria says.

So far those efforts amount to between $150 million and $200 million in investments by Pacolet Milliken and others to bring new life to Drayton. The next phases will involve bringing more retail options to a 6-acre parcel across Drayton Road from the mill and developing more housing options along Floyd Street behind the mill where Pacolet Milliken owns about 170 acres of undeveloped land.

“We’re trying to create a critical mass,” Scurlock says. “We want Drayton to become less of a pass-through and more of a community destination.”

Drayton Mill historic facts

PACOLET, S.C. (FOX Carolina) - Carolina Poodle Rescue, in Pacolet, received 10 beagles from the rescue of 4,000.

Those were the dogs removed from the Envigo mass breeding facility. Read about it here.

The beagles been in their care for about a week. Karen Martin says the pups are doing just fine, but they were shy, at first. Some are still nervous around new faces.

“The beagles, fortunately, were young enough so that there are not lasting consequences on them,” Martin said.

Martin says they’re much more comfortable around humans and dogs now. They started by working with the dogs, two at a time.

“Then, they figured out, ‘Hey, there’s treats! There’s toys! We can play!’ So, they quickly got much more social,” said Martin.

Two have already been adopted. One went to Katelyn Mills and Jacob Fisher, who live in North Carolina. His name is now Randy.

“He has done fantastic, actually. We’ve been very surprised,” Mills said.

“He hasn’t been scared, or skittish, or fearful, like you would think that a dog that came from a messed-up environment would be,” said Fisher.

The couple has another dog. They believe the dogs will be best friends, though they’re still learning to get used to each other.

Mills is a vet tech. When she’d heard about what the beagles have been through, she wanted to help.

“I’ve wanted a beagle forever,” Mills said, “And I know that I have the skills, and the abilities, and the support to take on a problem beagle.”

When the dogs arrived at Carolina Poodle Rescue, caretakers noticed they had a blue code of numbers and letters, to identify them, engraved on their ears.

It’s time for new homes to give them a real name.

Martin says each dog has had their check-ups and shots, and they’re ready to be adopted.

“We are really looking for people who have experience with that beagle breed, because that’s where they’re going to thrive the most--is with people who understand their little, breed quirks,” Martin said.

There are eight more rescued beagles left. You can reach out to Carolina Poodle Rescue here.

Copyright 2022 WHNS. All rights reserved.

CONVERSE — Work continues on redeveloping the former Converse Mill on Highway 29 along the Pacolet River into 173 loft apartments.

The project, just east of the Spartanburg city limit, was first announced in 2017 but was delayed when the general contractor pulled out in 2019. The move required developer Britt Weaver to resubmit the project’s application to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. With final approval granted, site work began in late May on the $50 million redevelopment project. Converse Mill Lofts will be completed by December 2022.

“Right now we are doing a heavy cleanup of the building, and lead paint remediation and removal of paint from the brick,” Weaver said. “There’s been exterior building demolition on the building’s southside. The buildings demolished were not historical. There’s been no change in terms of timeline on the project.”

The main mill building was constructed in 1903 with additional buildings added to the site in the 1940s. At its peak, the mill employed 1,300 workers and had 34,944 spindles. It is on the National Register of Historical Places. In 1896, Clifton Mill No. 3 was built at the site and operated by Dexter Edgar Converse. After the mill was destroyed by a flood in 1903, the mill was rebuilt at the site the same year.

Weaver said artifacts from the mill’s interior will be saved and later displayed in industrial art presentations on the inside and outside of the building. Some of the artifacts include signs and equipment once used at the mill, including a chalkboard from 1965 that kept track of workers’ utilization rates. The five-story building’s floorplan will be designed to allow more light inside the structure and provide wider hallways for tenants. A leasing campaign is likely to begin in fall 2022.

“Some of the amenities will include a fitness center, pool area with lounge chairs and pool benches on the sides of the pool, an outdoor grilling area, dog washing station,” Weaver said. “The grilling area will have space for games like cornhole, and chess, and things of that nature. It’s going to be more of a nicer area to hang out.”

Work will begin soon on replacing the current windows with more authentic windows reflecting the original time period. Weaver said the new windows will be energy-efficient and sized to meet historical standards. The building’s floors will be stabilized over the next few months and a new roof will be installed. Parking spaces will be located around the building with 208 spaces for residents, 25 spaces for access to the river and 35 spaces for visitors.

The project received historic tax credits.

“I am glad to hear things are moving forward on that project,” Spartanburg County Council Chairman Manning Lynch said. “It’s going to breathe life into a distressed area of the county. I think it’s a benefit to the community.”

Manning noted while some former textile mills have been demolished in Spartanburg County, others have been successfully redeveloped for residential and mixed-use. He believes it could help jumpstart further economic development in the area on Highway 29 between Spartanburg and Cowpens.

PACOLET — Next door to Pacolet Town Hall sits a historic mill building that once was the center of the small Upstate town’s industry, but now languishes in disrepair.

The town had a vision to reclaim the Pacolet Mill Cloth Room and Warehouse’s former glory by renovating it into a senior center.

But nearly a decade later and more than $500,000 in public funds gone, the building rots and the contractor entrusted to fix it has been convicted of fraud.

The money amounts to roughly half the annual budget for the town of 2,300, town manager Patrick Kay told The Post and Courier.

Earlier this week, Spartanburg contractor Callis J. Anderson Jr. pleaded guilty to felony embezzlement, breach of trust and obtaining money under false pretenses.

The South Carolina Attorney General’s Office said it weighed whether it was better to take the 68-year-old to trial where he faced as much as two decades in prison or strike a deal that would have the town get back at least a portion of the money.

In 2019, the State Law Enforcement Division accused Anderson of stealing $568,360 from the town between the time he was awarded the renovation contract in 2014 to 2017.

In the Aug. 14 deal, Anderson was sentenced to five years probation on the condition that he pays back $115,000 of the money he was paid.

The town had hoped for much more.

“He stole a dream,” Kay said. “He stole a portion of the community’s future. The $100,000, the town appreciates giving something back, but it pales in comparison to what he actually stole.”

Anderson’s attorney, Rick Vieth, didn’t respond to The Post and Courier’s request to comment.

The Attorney General’s office said that while the restitution is not all of the money that was taken, Anderson wouldn’t agree to a deal that required him to pay more.

“It was best for the town to get the $115,000 rather than zero,” Robert Kittle, spokesman for the Attorney General’s office, told The Post and Courier. “It’s a sure thing with the plea, but not necessarily for the trial.”