Tuesday, November 19, 2024
The S.C. General Assembly will be hearing proposals for new taxes in January and they won’t be coming from Democrats.
It looks like Grover Norquist and his pledge will be forgotten when the S.C. General Assembly convenes in January looking for more money for the state’s crumbling roads and inadequate schools.
Need more funding for road maintenance and repair? Raise the gas tax.
Need more money for schools? Pass a new property tax.
The process for bidding for work at the Horry County Solid Waste Authority (HCSWA) appears to have serious flaws with respect to how public dollars are spent.
The flaws became apparent during a workshop held Thursday November 20, 2014 to discuss why approval of a change order in the amount of $395,000 was justified for current work on the East Hill Fill Closure Project.
When an RFQ for a project at the HCSWA is publicized requesting bids, authority contract engineer Vance Moore told the board, the specifications in the RFQ for scope of work and material needed are only estimates.
A S.C. House Ethics and Freedom of Information Act Study Committee will recommend legislation that could make government information more open to request.
The committee is proposing to put a time limit on the production of public documents of between 30-35 days after an FOIA request is agreed to.
However, like everything regarding public information in South Carolina, there is a hitch. After two free hours of work on producing the documents, a public agency would be able to charge the citizen requesting the documents up to $100 per hour for the time needed to fulfill the FOIA request.
The message seems to have finally gotten through to Columbia that South Carolina roads are in generally poor condition.
However, how to fix the problem, or more specifically how to fund the fix, elicits differing solutions but no consensus to date.
Gov. Nikki Haley has promised to unveil her “magic” road maintenance funding plan in January. So far, she has promised to not raise the gas tax and to veto any legislation doing so.
Horry County Council Chairman Mark Lazarus was absolutely correct recently when he said the proposed I-73 should not be included with RIDE III projects.
Lazarus was responding to comments made by local state Rep. Alan Clemmons (R-107) who is trying to keep I-73 in the discussion about what road projects will be paid for with local sales tax.
Clemmons continues to push the myth that I-73 will be a huge job creator for the local area, a myth based on a “faulty” study commissioned by the Northeast Strategic Alliance (NESA) several years ago. The myth was debunked by several other independent studies.
In a split 3-2 decision, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled the state was not providing necessary resources for a “minimally adequate” education in poorer school districts.
The ruling, filed November 12, 2014, ended a 21 year odyssey in a lawsuit initially brought November 2, 1993.
However, in ruling the state failed in meeting its constitutional duty to provide a “minimally adequate” education for all public school students, the court left remedies up to the parties of the lawsuit.
Horry County Council will look at a possible cutback in employee benefits at its fall budget retreat Friday.
That sounds drastic on the surface, but a closer look says it is past time for this type of action.
Specifically, council will be considering a reduction in paid time off per year for county employees.
A good first step toward ethics reform in South Carolina would be to fire S.C. Ethics Commission Executive Director Herb Hayden.
Last month, Richland County Circuit Judge Alison Lee approved a consent order ruling Hayden propagated a “falsehood” to a state ethics watchdog agency and in responding with a falsehood violated the Freedom of Information Act.
As part of the settlement, Hayden and the ethics commission maintained the falsehood was inadvertent and unintentional.
Horry County Council will begin deliberations for its FY 2016 Horry County budget next Friday at a workshop and specially called council meeting.
Now that elections are over and several new council members are poised to join the governing body in the new year, we will see just how “conservative” our heavily Republican contingent on council really is.
My guess is the cronyism that has justified what I consider wasteful council spending in certain areas will continue to manifest itself.
It’s a great day in South Carolina!
It has to be.
Gov. Nikki Haley was reelected to a 2nd term in office by a 57% to 40% margin and incumbents around the state were swept back into office.
Many of the incumbents didn’t even have opponents to worry about in the general election.
Speak Up…