The medical university responded that its budget was tight.
“We have responsibilities at the university that are greater than just preservation of historic property, as important as that is,” stated John Sutusky, then the interim vice president for finance and administration. “We have needs that are critical for people and students . . . and we can’t meet them.”
Nonetheless, the medical university’s president at the time, Ray Greenberg, said change was on the horizon. “You have my promise we will attempt to address these concerns in a timely and responsive manner,” he wrote to one concerned preservationist, Katherine Hammersley.
She died 15 years later, before any promised improvements were made.
The interior of the Medical University of South Carolina’s Edward Sebring House in 1994.
In the early 2000s, recalls former city preservation officer and city architect Eddie Bello, the house’s porches were nearly falling off and posed a safety risk. He said he remembers the entire home was in such disrepair that the property was developing into a case of “demolition by neglect.”
In 2014, a new leader of the Preservation Society, Kris King, also griped about the continual neglect. “I recognize that their (MUSC’s) mission is not preserving old houses,” said King, “but we also recognize that they operate in the middle of a historic neighborhood.”
Eleven years later, the staff of the Preservation Society feels similarly that it is time for meaningful repairs to be made to the Sebring House, even if building restorations are not the medical university’s top priority.
“In Charleston, we find ways to make it work,” said Anna-Catherine Alexander, the society’s director of advocacy initiatives.
Calls for action
These days Bello works as an architect, teaches at the Clemson Architecture Center and serves as a trustee of Historic Charleston Foundation. Any neglected home can suffer water damage, he said, which can lead to rotting wood and termite infestation that can weaken framing timbers. Masonry can crumble without proper care.
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