A change is coming to Folly Beach.
Soon you will see something new to the beach: Street Parking Meters
As you can see from the image provided, Folly Beach is introducing street parking meters.
The first will be introduced on Arctic Avenue.
It appears it will be credit card supported.
More to come.
By Mark A. Leon
When a sea turtle egg hatches, the baby sea turtles make a migration from the protected nesting area to their ocean home. This natural phenomenon happens in the middle of the night as the moon lights the pathway. By morning, there is no sign of the migration. Yes on this morning, one got left behind. Whether born with a limp limb or a predatory attack, this baby sea turtle saw the light of day trying desperately to get to the ocean with three working fins.
As we stumbled on this brave young thing trying to enter safely into the ocean and meet his family, we felt nothing but sympathy and quickly became fans of his plight. As he tried using his three strong limbs and one limp one, he kept getting pushed back ashore by the incoming waves. It was at this moment, we put our heads together and called the Folly Beach patrol for guidance. After two phone calls and several discussions, it was deemed best, we go as deep as we could into the ocean and place him in. They felt this was his best chance of survival.
As each of us said goodbye to Nelson (Yes, we named him Nelson. He looked like a Nelson), we felt a bond and a very special moment shared.
Thus, our morning was highlighted by our own sea turtle release, reinforcing that there is never a dull moment on the beaches of Charleston.
We wish you well Nelson and hope you are with your family now.
Nelson, the Sea Turtle from Mark A. Leon on Vimeo.
Here is a one stop shop to all the major companies hiring in the Lowcountry
Top Employers in Charleston, SC
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CHARLESTON, S.C., July 27, 2017 /PRNewswire/ — Blackbaud (NASDAQ: BLKB), the world’s leading cloud software company powering social good, today reported that new AI-enabled analytics offerings are available to serve healthcare institutions, higher education institutions and nonprofits. This announcement comes just months after the company announced Intelligence for Good™, its unique approach to optimized intelligence for the social good community.
“As we continue to rapidly innovate, it’s exciting to see customers take advantage of our advanced, AI-enabled analytics to make smarter decisions,” said Richard Becker, president of Blackbaud Target Analytics™. “Organizations are leveraging our intelligent solutions to transform data into high-impact predictive and prescriptive insight that turn their fundraising, advocacy and other interactions into more powerful outcomes.”
Blackbaud Extends Analytics Capabilities within Industry-Leading Healthcare Solution
Blackbaud has enhanced its industry-leading Patient Conversion Model™, which leverages proprietary donor data for advanced insight, to include new capabilities for population health management and patient marketing. The solution leverages a universal patient identifier for identity management resolution and offers a new suite of personal wellness and financial insight that enables both geographic-based prospecting and patient remarketing campaigns.
For the healthcare and hospital market, identifying opportunities to positively affect the population health needs of the community is a primary objective of many hospitals. AI-enabled insight assure cost-effective outreach and audience-specific communication that improves both the population health and addresses the budget concerns of healthcare customers.
“Our latest upgrade came with comprehensive data services wrapped in, allowing us to segment and identify potential donors based on demographics and predictive information like household income and whether they had children–information that helped us make smart decisions as we prepare for a capital campaign.” — Lauren Short, Annual Giving Manager at Riverside Healthcare
Blackbaud Introduces New Campus-Wide Solutions for Higher Education Institutions
Blackbaud released a new Athletic Giving Model™ solution designed to help athletic departments raise more money through the expanded university community and athletic program supporters. “This is the first Target Analytics solution built specifically for athletic departments and booster clubs, expanding universities’ fundraising reach beyond alumni,” noted Becker.
Colleges and universities have many campus visitors including prospective students, ticket buyers, athletics supporters and event-goers. With a dynamic and diverse set of individuals engaging with universities on a regular basis, higher education institutions are looking for intelligence that identifies visiting VIPs in real time so they can build relationships with potential donors. Blackbaud’s Alumni Analytics Solution enables on-demand wealth screenings and provides actionable insight for every campus visitor, putting the power of AI in the university’s hands.
“Our major gift officers now believe that these predictive analytics can get them in the right living rooms, sitting with the right people who really want to make a difference by donating to the University.” —Margaret Williams, Director of Prospect Research for University of South Dakota Foundation
New Solution Allows Nonprofits to Understand and Use Affluence Data to Grow Donor Base
Blackbaud also recently introduced Affluence Insight™, a new donor segmentation and research tool, enabling the identification of annual, mid-level and major gift prospects. Designed for nonprofits, researchers and direct marketers, it provides detailed financial attributes and an affluence-driven segmentation system that combines giving behavior, demographics and financial information for high-value prospect identification.
Affluence Insight offers the ability to use AI-powered analytics to identify high-value donor prospects and predict a prospect’s likelihood to give with unparalleled accuracy.
“It’s important for us to show our leadership that the technology we have is helping us drive the mission and program further, such as allowing us to confidently reach every individual through their preferred channels. As we continue to ask what is possible within our organization, we are really relying on Blackbaud to help us determine what’s next, and I think the sky is the limit.” — Andy Schroeder, Director of Development for the Sisters of Charity
For organizations driven to make smarter decisions faster, Blackbaud’s Intelligence for Good offers the market’s only set of fully social-good optimized intelligence capabilities, bringing together the power of AI, analytics, big data and expertise built on the world’s most robust industry-specific data set.
For more information about Blackbaud’s latest Target Analytics solutions visit www.blackbaud.com/target-analytics. For more information about Intelligence for Good, visit www.blackbaud.com/IntelligenceForGood.
About Blackbaud
Blackbaud (NASDAQ: BLKB) is the world’s leading cloud software company powering social good. Serving the entire social good community—nonprofits, foundations, corporations, education institutions, and individual change agents—Blackbaud connects and empowers organizations to increase their impact through software, services, expertise, and data intelligence. The Blackbaud portfolio is tailored to the unique needs of vertical markets, with solutions for fundraising and relationship management, digital marketing, advocacy, accounting, payments, analytics, school management, grant management, corporate social responsibility, and volunteerism. Serving the industry for more than three decades, Blackbaud is headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina and has operations in the United States, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom. For more information, visit www.blackbaud.com.
Media Contact
Nicole McGougan
Public Relations
843-654-3307
media@blackbaud.com
Forward-looking Statements
Except for historical information, all of the statements, expectations, and assumptions contained in this news release are forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Although Blackbaud attempts to be accurate in making these forward-looking statements, it is possible that future circumstances might differ from the assumptions on which such statements are based. In addition, other important factors that could cause results to differ materially include the following: general economic risks; uncertainty regarding increased business and renewals from existing customers; continued success in sales growth; management of integration of acquired companies and other risks associated with acquisitions; risks associated with successful implementation of multiple integrated software products; the ability to attract and retain key personnel; risks associated with management of growth; lengthy sales and implementation cycles, particularly in larger organization; technological changes that make our products and services less competitive; and the other risk factors set forth from time to time in the SEC filings for Blackbaud, copies of which are available free of charge at the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov or upon request from Blackbaud’s investor relations department. All Blackbaud product names appearing herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of Blackbaud, Inc.
By Mark A. Leon
You really want to know what to say to put Charlestonian’s in a mood; make us mad; crank our gears; light the flare of fury? You get the point. Not much makes us upset or fuels our loins, but here are a few things folks can say to locals to get them going.
Things You Can Say to a Charlestonian to Make Them Mad
weekends). The number of meters in relation to the activities (SC Aquarium, College of Charleston, TCF Bank Arena, Theater District, Restaurants, Market, Art Galleries, etc.) is not proportionate. Also, the rates in parking garages have increased comparatively to the cost of living adjustments .There you have it. What you can say to a local Charleston resident to get them mad. Please don’t.
The USBG “Make It Exotico” Cocktail Competition
Crowns Grand Prize Winner at Tales of the Cocktail
Mixologist Megan Deschaine wins all-expense paid trip
to Exotico Tequila’s distillery in Jalisco, Mexico
NEW ORLEANS, L.A. (July 27, 2017) – The USBG “Make It Exotico” Cocktail Competition has named its inaugural grand prize winner. At the competition’s final round, held July 19 at Tales of the Cocktail in New Orleans, a four-person judging panel crowned Charleston, S.C., mixologist Megan Deschaine the overall winner with her cocktail, “The Napoleonic Complex.”
Along with the trophy, Deschaine receives an all-expense paid trip to Exotico Tequila’s distillery – Destiladora González González – in Jalisco, Mexico. While there, Deschaine will visit the agave fields in the highlands of Jalisco and tour the distillery, which is located in the heart of Guadalajara.
“I think the partnership Exotico Tequila has created with the USBG is so enriching to the whole bartending community, giving us bartenders a platform to meet one another,” Deschaine said. “I am so excited to go to Mexico, because I actually paid for college with bartending, to be a Spanish high school teacher.”
Deschaine’s “The Napoleonic Complex” cocktail recipe:
Ingredients:
1.5 oz. Exotico Blanco Tequila
.75 oz. lime juice
.5 oz. agave syrup
4 dashes Bittermen’s Hellfire Bitters
2 dashes Scrappy’s Celery Bitters
1 ripe roma tomato, quartered
8-10 basil leaves
Instructions:
Rim half of a rocks glass with salt and pepper. Muddle tomato quarters and basil in a mixing tin, then add remaining ingredients and shake vigorously with ice. Double strain cocktail into dressed rocks glass over one large ice cube. Garnish with a skewered mozzarella ball and basil leaf.
The USBG “Make It Exotico” cocktail competition invited mixologists from across the country to submit their best cocktail recipe using Exotico Blanco or Exotico Reposado 100% agave tequila as the base spirit. The six finalists competed against 47 other contestants in semifinal events in Nashville, Tenn; Philadelphia, Pa.; Denver, Colo.; Portland, Ore.; Seattle, Wash.; and Charleston, S.C.
As with the semifinal events, at the final round, finalists had a maximum of seven minutes to make their cocktails live for a panel of judges, who judged the cocktails on appearance, aroma, creativity, taste and overall impression. Judges included USBG professionals, tequila and cocktail experts, and local media personalities.
Earning second place was Elizabeth Powell with “Play in the Sunshine,” and in third place was Brandon Paul Weaver with “Piñata Punch.” The other finalists and their cocktails included Ryan Williams with “Bigly,” Katie Loeb with “Javelina,” and Nate Maston with “Beber Esta.”
The USBG “Make It Exotico” Cocktail Competition is organized by the United States Bartenders’ Guild and sponsored by Exotico Tequila. This is the competition’s inaugural year.
About Exotico Tequila
Handcrafted with tradition by the Gonzalez Family, one of Mexico’s most respected makers of tequila, the award-winning Exotico Tequila is made from premium 100% Blue Weber agave grown in the Highlands of Jalisco. Available in Blanco and Reposado, each bottle of Exotico Tequila is crafted with care as a way to honor all spirits unbound. Follow Exotico on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/exoticotequila and on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/exoticotequila or visit http://exoticotequila.com.
Release Date: July 26, 2017
CHARLESTON, S.C. –U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Office of Field Operations, at Charleston seaport seized $121,442 worth of counterfeit children’s toys that arrived into the port. The cargo arrived in late June from China and was destined for a North Carolina based importer.
The shipment was found to contain multiple items bearing trademarks and copyrights registered to The Cartoon Network, Apple Inc., Saban Brands, and Danjaq, LLC. Saban Brands holds the copyrights to the Power Rangers brand and Danjaq holds the rights to “James Bond 007” characters and materials.
“Counterfeiting robs lawful rights holders of their unique ideas and the ability to make a profit from them,” said Robert Fencel, CBP Charleston Area Port Director. “It damages legitimate manufacturers, and can harm consumers because manufacturers of counterfeit items have little motivation to use safe, high quality materials in their products. In essence, they’re trying to make a ‘quick buck’ off of another party’s reputation and ideas.”
CBP contacted the lawful rights holders and it was determined that of the 284 cartons of toys in the shipment, 27 cartons containing 34,690 individual items were counterfeit – meaning the manufacturer used images and branding without the permission of the entities that developed and/or hold legal rights to those images.
Stopping the flow of illicit goods is a priority trade issue for CBP. The importation of counterfeit merchandise can damage the U.S. economy and threaten the health and safety of the American people. For more information on CBP’s Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) priority trade issue, visit: CBP Trade and IPR.
With the growth of foreign trade, unscrupulous companies have profited billions of dollars from the sale of counterfeit and pirated goods.
To combat the illicit trade of merchandise violating laws relating to IPR, trademark and copyright holders may register with CBP through an online system. Such registration assists CBP officers and import specialists in identifying merchandise that violates U.S. law.
CBP’s IPR enforcement strategy is multi-layered and includes seizing illegal merchandise at our borders, pushing the border “outward” through audits of suspect importers, cooperating with our international trading partners, and collaborating with industry and governmental agencies to enhance these efforts.
View CBP Snapshot to learn some of what CBP achieves “On a Typical Day.”
Folly Beach is recognized for its sense of community, neighborhood partnerships, festivals, endless sandy beaches, picturesque sunrises and sunsets and of course, its silliness. So many visitors drive down Center Street, park their cars and haul their beach chairs and coolers for a day of sun, sport and water. Afterward, they indulge at Surf Bar, The Drop In, Rita’s or Taco Boy. What is so often missed are the uniquely peculiar landmarks all around this beach community.
Take a walk with us and enjoy some of the Folly Beach hidden and somewhat bizarre landmarks. Some will amaze, some will make you smile and some may even have you questioning the basic laws of physics. Trust us, pictures do not lie.
Keeping Folly Beach Weird
Say hello to Daryl the Dolphin, who is just hanging around with the fish waiting for you to hashtag him. Yes, under his name, he has an official hashtag: #DaryltheDolphin
On the side of Planet Follywood, the stars of yesteryear are forever there to greet us with a howdy cowboy or a Rat Pack song
Perhaps a little beach art to bring out our creative prowess.
Is this the Best Tree on Folly Beach? We don’t know, but the sign seems to think so.
Is there a place to park your horse. We found one.
Where can I go if I want a book and can’t make it to the library? How about a free pop up library. Take a book, leave a book. How communal.
Do you know about Pirate Cove Playground? Let us tell you a little bit more. Right under the Folly Beach water tower lies a skate park, basketball court, tennis court, play lighthouse, tug boat, wall art, a climb rope and swings. It is a pirates haven. They toss in a little educational history of pirates in the area. Oh my, what a treasure.
How about a front-less car? Yes a car with only a hatch back but not front.
A chair elevated from a tree. Talk about king of horticulture.
Finally, the Totem Pole House of Folly Beach at 506 East Ashley. A landmark since 1925. We just recently learned that this home is for sale. Any takers?
Have you seen the Wicked Witch of the West House right on the beach?
Watch out for crabs!!!!!
Enter at your own risk, the Cauldron of Taco Boy and experience mouth watering Mexican cuisine.
An Irish Crab at the St. James. Who would have thought.
Now that is a competition
A feel of Bourbon Street
Mermaid Clubhouse
Mermaid Clubhouse
Next time you are on Folly Beach, make your way off of your traditional path and explore the side streets. You may find your own unique landmarks to treasure for your own.
By Mark A. Leon
As you journey through the French Quarter and walk down Venue Range toward Waterfront Park, you are taken in by the elegance of Charleston from the Vendue Inn to the Venue Library and Rooftop Bar. The area is ordained with fine desserts, law offices and unique and pricey gifts. What has been a foundation for over 15 years and continues to excel with great food, amazing beer, fun and casual dining for intimate groups and a true old school dart board is the Griffon Pub located at 18 Vendue Range.
For those that have never stepped foot in this traditional Irish Pub, the title of the article may be a little misleading. From wall to wall, end to end ceiling and nooks all around, locals and tourists have left personalized dollar bills stapled all throughout the restaurant. When you arrive, you just need to go to the bar, ask for a stapler and sharpie and they will have you covered. They have created a tradition of memories from Europe to the United States.
The atmosphere is very casual with warm and friendly service all day and night. Whether you are coming in for a pint and or a meal, the staff treats all its guests as if you are family. No pub would be complete without a traditional cigarette dispenser by the rest rooms.
Some may argue the East Bay / Market Street area of Charleston may be a bit pricey at times. Well, the Griffon doesn’t feel that way. Entrees range from $7.00 to $12.00 for most items and they are mouth watering good.
Start with a cup of homemade chili. Even in the summer, this chili will pack you with a little spicy kick and savor you with rich meat and spices. If spicy is not your style, the fried pickles are a fixture here.
Sandwiches are a hard one. There are a number of amazing and memorable carbohydrate friendly treats to entice you. Take my word on this; though the food comes in a basket, it is plentiful and will leave you very full and fulfilled.
We wanted to make three specific recommendations to you: Reuben, Chicken Philly and the fish and chips / friend fish sandwich. I must take a step back first. There are three types Reuben sandwiches: Southern, Traditional and Turkey. We recommend, if you are in the South, do the Southern. This takes away the sauerkraut and replaces it with cole slaw. So good and a very healthy portion of corned beef. The Chicken Philly takes your traditional Philly cheese steak and replaces it with chicken and combines it nicely with melted provolone, peppers and onions. The fish and chips are lightly breaded and partnered with a very healthy portion of fries. Make sure you add vinegar to your fries to make the experience complete.
Make sure you wash that all down with a pint of one of the rotating local craft beers on tap.
One of the noted parts of our experience at the Griffon is the team work. Your server is your bartender and your busser. It is amazing how seamless they all work together to make sure you have a remarkable dining experience.
The Griffon is your hometown pub right in the heart of downtown Charleston. Whether it is lunch, dinner or a pint, stop in, say hello and share a few laughs while you are there. If it is your first time, make sure you leave a dollar behind for the wall.
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