Politics

Coast RTA Special Committee Second Meeting

The second meeting of the Special Committee on Coast RTA confirmed there is fault to be shared among several agencies when investigating why the bus sign and shelter project was not completed.

When Coast RTA received a $1 million grant through the Waccamaw Council of Governments, the Federal Highway Administration provided the funds. However, SCDOT administered the grant as if the funds came from the Federal Transportation Administration. FHWA and FTA have different requirements for how grant funds are administered.

Despite submitting 13 invoices for reimbursement from the FHWA, through the first few years of the project, SCDOT continued to administer by FTA regulations.

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Jeff Johnson in House District 58 Race

A native of Conway and longtime attorney in the local area, Jeff Johnson is a candidate for the S.C. House District 58 seat.

Johnson has deep roots in District 58, having graduated from Conway High School and Coastal Carolina University before establishing his law practice in Conway after graduating from Mississippi College Law School in Jackson, Mississippi.

“I grew up in the district, have a lot of family and friends in the district and believe I understand the needs of the residents of the district,” Johnson said. “Helping people has been my life’s work and I want to continue to help the people of my community as the representative for House District 58.”

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Helping Our Combat Veterans

The events at Ft. Hood yesterday only serve to highlight what a terrible job we are doing as a nation to help our veterans deal with the trauma of combat.

The killings at Ft. Hood will draw several days of headlines, many dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder, then, be forgotten as the news cycle changes.

But the problem remains and the numbers are startling.

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Gingrich, Myrtle Beach, Oil and Interstates

Beach Tent Ban Passes Second Reading

An ordinance establishing a year around ban on beach tents on the unincorporated beaches of Horry County easily passed second reading last night.

By a 10-1 vote, Horry County has come to within final reading of banning all sun shielding devices except beach umbrellas with a maximum diameter of seven and one-half feet.

When final reading passes, Horry County will join Myrtle Beach and North Myrtle Beach in making Grand Strand beaches generally free of beach tents. Only Surfside Beach, Atlantic Beach and the state park have yet to join their larger neighbors in a beach tent ban.

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Bureaucracy to prevail at expense of the taxpayer

Local Governments Asking General Assembly to Obey the Law

Counties and municipalities throughout South Carolina are again asking the General Assembly to obey state law with respect to the local government fund in the state’s general fund budget.

State law Section 6-27-30 requires the General Assembly to put 4.5% of the previous year’s base general fund revenue into the local government fund in the upcoming fiscal year budget.

But, the General Assembly has not fully funded the local government fund since 2008 – in violation of state law.

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Horry County Candidate Filings

It will be an active primary season in Horry County as 11 contested Republican nominations, within the county, will keep voters occupied throughout the spring.

That’s even before you begin to consider statewide primaries where only Attorney General Alan Wilson and Secretary of State Mark Hammond are without primary opponents.

There are no contested Democratic primaries for countywide candidates in the June primaries. Republican candidates not listed below do not have opposition.

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Coast RTA Board Member Asked to Resign

Coast RTA board member Katharine D’Angelo reported via email Thursday night to the other seven members of the board that she was asked to resign her position as a board member.

According to D’Angelo’s email, the request came out of a meeting between board members Ivory Wilson and Joseph Lazzara and unnamed members of the Coast RTA senior staff.

D’Angelo reported in her email that she had no intention of resigning from the board, a position she has held for 14 years through appointment by the North Myrtle Beach City Council.

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New Developments for Coast RTA Special Committee

Several developments over the last 48 hours have ‘stirred the pot’ regarding deliberations of the Special Committee on Coast RTA formed recently by Horry County Council chairman Mark Lazarus.

The committee, chaired by council member Marion Foxworth, held its first meeting March 17, 2014 with a second meeting scheduled for April 7, 2014.

According to stipulations of fact adopted by committee members at the first meeting, the committee has no oversight of Coast RTA or its management and is limiting its scope to attempting to make a determination of what went wrong with two projects cancelled by SCDOT – a bus sign and shelter project that began in 2007 and a study for an intermodal transportation center begun in 2013.

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Plot to Stop Lindsey Graham Faltering

What does it tell you that the Tea Party’s best candidate to challenge Sen. Lindsey Graham is a former Democratic operative who ran the Michael Dukakis campaign in South Carolina?

Det Bowers officially filed yesterday to challenge Graham. While he is now talking about right wing issues such as illegal immigration, Obamacare, term limits and balanced federal budgets, it is Bowers’ former Democratic associations that reportedly bring hope to stopping Graham.

The thought process is that Bowers will attract at least some of the crossover Democrat vote in the June open Republican Primary that was expected to fully support Graham. It is hoped that this will bring Graham’s vote in the first round of the primary to under 50% forcing a runoff.

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Obamacare Nullification Fails, the Revenge of James L. Petigru

Somewhere James L. Petigru has a little smile on his face today as South Carolina’s latest attempt at nullification of a federal law went down in the S.C. Senate earlier this week.

Petigru, a 19th Century lawyer, legislator, S.C. attorney general and judge, was a leader of anti-nullification forces in South Carolina before the Civil War and critic of secession, yet a well-respected Charleston resident both before and after the war.

When South Carolina voted to secede from the Union in December 1860, Petigru uttered his most famous quote, calling the state “too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum.”

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