St. Francis Center on St. Helena Island won’t have to get a Beaufort County business license to operate and put up a sign after all, after the County Council overruled its own staff following an appeal by the charity heard this week.
The case has drawn scrutiny because of the center’s popularity — it feeds 10,000 people a year — and raised questions about local regulations of charitable organizations.
St. Francis had argued the business requirement for the Catholic-run charity might be the end of the nonprofit’s work in the area. Besides that, the sisters and their supporters found the idea of classifying what the charity does as a business abhorrent. They also said it could set a precedent that could hurt other Catholic charities…