SC school building abandoned 2 years after construction began. How we got here
The South Carolina Department of Education refused to issue a permit for the Richland 1 early learning center in December 2023 after more than a year of discussing plans for the facility.
The partially-built structure, which stood abandoned for 14 months, has finally been demolished. More than $8.6 million was spent in the process.
Deputy State Superintendent John Tyler told the district the building couldn’t be considered a school. The early learning center, envisioned as a state-of-the-art childcare and family services facility for children as young as infants. For that reason, Tyler wrote, it could not be considered a school.
But construction was already underway. It had been for months.
Richland County officials issued the stop work order. State Superintendent Ellen Weaver to ask the state Inspector General to investigate the project. Many community members offered scathing criticism of the school board’s approach to the project, while others spoke of the desperate need for childcare options in Lower Richland.
When Richland 1 attempted to change the scope of the early learning project in January 2024, shifting the focus to early elementary school students, the permit was again denied.
While the project was stalled, the site remained untouched. At one point, it cost the district $2,300 per day to maintain site security while it waited for the Inspector General report.
The state Inspector General determined 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, according to a July 2024 report. The district also had trouble with unauthorized or illegal procurement, the report said.
But the Inspector General’s report did not find any criminal conduct, so the Richland 1 school board moved quickly to relaunch the project in August 2024.
Former Superintendent Craig Witherspoon told The State the district 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 by August 2024. When the district submitted a financial recovery plan to remedy problems identified by the state department, it was rejected. Weaver’s office called the plan “deficient” and “incomplete.”
It ordered another forensic audit of the district in October 2024.
“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,” Kendra Hunt, the department’s chief financial officer, wrote in a letter to the district.
The Richland 1 school board voted to disband the project in March 2025. Richard Moore, the school board member who made the motion, told The State at the time that based on the options presented by the district’s lawyers, he felt it was the only foreseeable path forward.
“The district is bleeding this money every day,” Moore said. “I just don’t think that’s an appropriate way to use funds.”
Richland 1 is still waiting for the results of the audit. It maintains its “fiscal caution” status from the state department, the second-highest level of financial concern by the state department.
This story was originally published October 28, 2025 at 9:23 AM.
