Full meeting transcript - July 9, 2019

» it's a great day in kershaw county it's a great day in south carolina we've got this all-america county now convened today and we have the team here many of the team here who went to denver a year ago and won for our county all-american and so thanks for being here tonight we'll hear from you all a little bit later on you all sit down i don't want to hear any noise out of y'all you always yell and cheer and do cartwheels but it's great to have you here we're now called to the order. We have a quorum, but Mr. Snodgrass is on travel, and I regret to say Mr. Tucker is temporarily ill, and so we have a quorum with five out of seven. I see that Mr.

» Snodgrass was to have led us, but tonight I'm feeling spiritual, and I ask you all to stand and join me with the invocation and the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. Join me in prayer. We remember the words in the good book in the Psalm 33 where it says, blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. Indeed, we recognize our full dependence on you, our Lord and our God, and we hope that you will join us today and tonight and every day and keep us safe and secure and guide us in the paths of wisdom. We especially ask that these men and women here today be inspired by your holy word and do this all into the honor and glory of your holy name. We ask through our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you, everyone.

» And we'll move now to the first item here, which is a public comments. We'll ask Mr. DuBose to do the honors. How many do we have signed up tonight? Mr. Chairman, four people have signed up. First person is Jim Steele. As Mr. Steele comes forward, I'll remind all of you that this is a period of about five minutes per person. Mr. DuBose will keep the time. It's not a time for Q&A and back and forth with this body, but it's time for us to be informed, ask you to keep your remarks respectful, and the decorum of this body kept moving forward in the spirit of its legislative functions. Mr. Steele, good to see you. Please, sir. Thank you.

» Last time at the regular scheduled meeting, I asked y'all to consider doing something to volunteer firemen, okay, making a call a call, doing away with a 30-minute wait time requirement and making medical calls equal to a fire call. I hope you've given that due consideration. I think these guys deserve it. Thank you. Thank you very much, Jim. Good to see you. Mr. DuBose. Second person signed up is, and I'm having a hard time reading the first name, either Stephen or Stephan Edwards. Mr. Edwards, is that correct? Yes, sir. You can call me Stephan or Stephen or Steve. I was calling, I guess, about, put my name on there, about the ordinance for the planning and zoning. I don't know if this is the proper time. Yeah, this is the proper time. Go right ahead.

» I just, Planning and Zoning made it a low-density mobile home park or something I didn't know about. And then so I requested a high-density to keep it so I can keep the mobile homes I have on the property. I have four or five vacant lots. And I think Planning and Zoning denied my request, of course. And I'm just here to offer that y'all may change it. The place only holds 38 mobile homes, so it's only four more slots, but I felt I needed to at least fight for my right to keep what I had because I didn't realize that they had changed the zoning. Thank you, Mr. Edwards. Mr. DuBose. The third person signed up is Fielding Pringle. Ms. Pringle, and she is the public defender, I believe, please, ma'am. And bring the microphone over. Thank you. Good evening. Can you hear me? I don't know.

» Is that good enough, loud enough, St. Danny? Okay. Go for it. Okay. I can talk louder. Hello and thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of council. My name is Fielding Pringle. I addressed you as a body a few months ago in the spring during the budget process and I'm pleased to be here tonight. I am here to speak about the issue of the jail transfer of authority. I'm the circuit defender for Richland County and Kershaw County. I took over from Mr. Strickler about a year ago. Just to tell you just a little bit about my perspective, I am going to tell you that my opinion on this is that I am opposed to it. I think it's just a bad idea. I want to talk about sort of the simple and the sublime and why I'm opposed to it and sort of who I am and where I come from on this issue.

» I've been a public defender most of my career. I've been practicing for 24 years. I have spent a handful of those years in private practice, most of it as a public defender. I spent a tremendous amount of time at the Kershaw County Detention Center dealing with various defendants, but one case in particular was one of the most difficult cases this community has encountered, and it was a death penalty case, and I spent a great deal of time at the Kershaw County Detention Center. I have lawyers here, four attorneys who currently are public defenders here, who of course also spend a tremendous amount of time at the detention center.

» I tell you all of that because I want you to know the reputation that the Kershaw County detention center has, both in my personal experience and what I know of, what people think of the facility as it is run. And I'm not here to tell you that it has never had any issues in the 30 years since it has been transferred to the county to run it. I'm aware of the issues that have arisen, but those issues have been tackled, conquered, and dealt with. And Herschel County Detention Center enjoys a really outstanding reputation. It is a gold standard in terms of how it is run. That is from my personal perspective. But that is an opinion that is held by public defenders, private attorneys, attorneys that are local, attorneys that come from across the state. And it's not just a personal experience.

» My personal experience has been very good. And what that reputation is, is a reputation for a facility that treats people in a humane way, that treats people with respect and dignity and courtesy. All of the values that I know that this body holds dear and values. That is from defendant's perspective, attorney's perspectives, family members' perspectives, and so on. And so I just think it's very important for you to know that. But aside from that, the safety and security of the facility is equally high.

» And I, you know, it's funny, I think, as a defense attorney to stand here and talk to you about safety and security, because that's usually a law enforcement topic, right? But I think I'm equally situated to talk about that and to address that, because not only am I spending time in there, but my clients are there, my lawyers are there, we spend a tremendous amount of time there. And the bottom line is, you've run a facility for these many years and decades now that is a facility to be proud of, that you should be proud of, and that is being run well, that is safe and secure. And when I have family members that are panicked and worried and nervous, and defendants or lawyers, it's just, it's a different situation with this detention center and I'm proud of it and you should be as well.

» To the more sublime, as a defense attorney, you know, my job is to ensure that the constitutional rights of my defendants are protected and this is a hard thing to talk about as I think about it because when I think about why I'm opposed to this, I'm thinking about sort of the potential for things to go bad, right, and for what I would be afraid of or guarding against and, you know, I've met the sheriff. My lawyers speak very highly of the sheriff. And so this has nothing to do with him. It is not personal to him whatsoever. But I think that you have to be careful in how you think about this and guard against sort of the potential for things to go not how they've been going and how you would want them to go.

» And there is an inherent conflict of interest that arises when you have the individuals who are vested with responsibility for arresting, charging, investigating crimes, gathering evidence against defendants, and bringing those defendants to court, seeing through to the end, to conviction, but you take those same individuals and you have them housing the very defendants that they're investigating, gathering evidence against, etc. Those are two just very, very different jobs. I've worked in the system a long, long time, and what correctional officers do and what law enforcement officers do, I think there's no overlap. Of course there is, and there's not, it's not that there's no overlap in training. Of course there is.

» But keeping defendants safe, housing, keeping them safe and secure, versus prosecuting are just two very different jobs. And it concerns me and worries me to think of mixing those two things together. Another thing Kershaw County has done really, really well is the Kershaw Sheriff's Department now records almost all of the interrogations that we receive, questions, questioning interrogations. That's progressive. That's something that you should be proud of. That's something that not every county in the state is doing, but should be. And it worries me, because you can't just leave your law enforcement gathering evidence role at the door when you go to work. Your loyalty as a law enforcement officer is to the sheriff.

» So if you go to work as a correctional officer, but you're working for the sheriff, I think that it's very difficult to ask individuals to keep those two things separate. And I think you would see evidence arising in questionable manners it's not because anybody has any bad intentions I just think it's inevitable finally I did bring my phone up to track my time but then it closed out on me so I don't know where I am but I tend to get long-winded so I'm gonna wrap up but I do want you to know that anytime you have any questions or concerns please contact me I'm happy to speak with any of you come see you whatever I can you know I know that's a familiar tenant to everyone that we... Is that my time? Go ahead and complete your statement, please. Thank you.

» That a community is judged by how we treat the least among us, and the county has done a really, really good job in how you have treated the least among us, and those are certainly the individuals that are imprisoned in your jail. It is a job to be proud of, and I just implore you to continue doing what you're doing. Thank you, Mrs. Kendall. Thank you very much indeed. Mr. DeVos. The last person signed up is Laurie Carpenter. Mrs. Carpenter. She wants to say thank you. Good evening everybody. Bring the mic down. Good evening Councilman Burns and council and staff.

» I just want to say thank you because I work in Richland County and when I come home on Monday I noticed a new sign off of exit 98 that stated that we were an all-America city and that the signs are going up on the county entrances and as someone that spearheaded that and with a lot of our delegation in the audience I just wanted to take the time to thank you and honest I was not here for that but I'm also glad to see number two on new business and I just would like to make my public comments that I would like to thank publicly Al Bozard for that and I would strongly encourage a vote of yes that we need that logo on the water tower but thank you because the signs are coming up and we love them thanks thank you lauren that concludes the uh sign up list and that concludes public comments and w

» e move now to the next item which be the adoption of the agenda and we have a motion to approve the agenda the move uh mr gardner first second second second from mr bozard uh discussion mr chairman if i may yeah mr i'd like to make an amendment to the agenda yes sir on the item to where we have under new business item one the sheriff's request regarding the detention center i want to have that deleted right and possibly reinstated at the next regularly scheduled county council meeting very good all right uh do we the motion is to uh delete that do i need to have a a second from that yes mr chairman may i finish it i just have a couple of things i spoke with the sheriff today and of course i've talked with a couple of council members and normally we would take the second jimmy oh i'm sorry w

» e don't have it i'm sorry go ahead i got ahead of myself i do apologize no worries uh mary that was mr bozart on second okay anyway uh what i was going to say is that i had spoke with the sheriff today and of course sheriff's talked a couple of county council members they indicated they needed more time and the sheriff wants to make sure that if there's a vote on this that there there's an informed vote so i commend you for that sheriff so anyway that's my reason for requesting the uh change in this agenda thank you other discussion all right we have an amendment to the uh agenda can we vote on that and then we'll vote on the agenda as amended all those in favor of mr jones uh amendment signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and now we move to the agenda as amended noting as mr jon

» es said he would like this place this on the agenda next month st jimmy i get it right the next regularly scheduled okay the next the next regular schedule you made okay with that uh can we move to a vote all those in favor the agenda has amended so signify and it's unanimous mary and the agenda is amended under new business item number one is deleted okay we move now to public presentations our first presentation is is by Live Well Kershaw by Ms. Katherine Johnson. Katherine. - Good evening, council and everyone in the audience and those that are watching live from home tonight. I'm excited to share with you the first ever community health improvement plan that was spearheaded by Live Well Kershaw Coalition. Again, it's very timely.

» South Carolina just put out their first ever community health improvement plan and we're following suit of our needs assessment was put out in 2017 so again i'm here on behalf of the coalition a lot of great folks that participated in all america city also participated in this community health improvement plan and i am honored to just be the voice of the work that they have done and put forth so much effort on since i believe we started march this year and we've gotten this out running off the ground um here in may so a little bit of background about the coalition we receive our funding through healthy people healthy carolinas which is an initiative from the duke endowment kershaw county was actually one of the first five south carolina communities to receive this funding so again way to go

» kershaw county on securing this funding when we work together organizations funders understand that we work collaboratively so we're able to take their money further and one more point I want to make before I get into the health improvement plan the Live Well Kershaw coalition is not its own nonprofit our backbone organization is the community medical clinic the free clinic that's serving our community so who is Live Well Kershaw coalition again it's these folks behind me it's those people that already have full-time jobs that are dedicating putting in volunteer hours because they see the value of this in our community and understand that having a shared vision of health and wellness for our community is so incredibly important so before I move forward into the health improvement plan I rea

» lly want to set the stage for the rest of our conversation this evening on what is health a lot of times when you think about health we think about being able to receive medical care from a doctor going to a hospital but for the purpose of this conversation health is in a much broader sense we're thinking mental physical social and spiritual well-being just a quote that sums it all up pretty in a pretty nice package is health is not the absence of disease but the addition of confidence skills knowledge and connection but most importantly it is simply a means to an end which is a joyful meaningful life so i think we can all get behind that definition of what we're talking about when we're referring to health in our community so when we look at what makes a healthy community again it's not si

» mply just eating a salad every day that's not what it's all about and that's not what our goal is here when we look at this county health rankings model that's put out by the robert wood johnson foundation we're looking at health behaviors and those social and economic factors at the forefront which means that we have to get creative in our solutions to addressing health because it's much more than just urgent cares popping up and creating additional access points it's about addressing education employment income family and social support law enforcement with community safety in addition to those common health behaviors that we see in our community so for the health improvement plan I'm to cover a little bit about our why the process that we went through i think it's really important that y

» ou understand the level of depth that we went through in looking at data that was local to our community it wasn't sources that we pulled from state and national averages it came from kershaw county residents themselves and then also touch on the value that this adds to our community so again we're working towards creating a shared vision of health and well-being in our community and just to hit home a few points here on our why um some things we saw from folks involved in this process is i also want to see i want to improve our community so that this is a place that my children want to return to to live and raise their families i want to see our county that works as a whole and not divided and i want to improve the quality of life in kershaw county that's what those folks sitting behind me

» all said as their why and to drive this home a little further this is a life expectancy map for kershaw county and as you see on this map from one end of our county to the other there is a difference of 10 years of life expectancy and i don't know about you but we put out a plan in about three months so imagine what we could do if we have a 10 additional years of our life added if we start addressing health in our community now. All right, so a health improvement plan is really to gather all of the great things that are occurring in our community, take a look at that needs assessment that's been conducted, where it pinpoints all the chronic disease burden in our community, and figure out how that we can strategically move forward in addressing these issues.

» Here is just some of the data sources that we pulled through. Again, this was all local data. And we also capitalized on the fact that our county has put forth Vision Kershaw 2030, where we have health outlined as an objective. From those areas, guys, we initially started out with about seven different areas that we could potentially work on to address health in our community. And those all arose out of our local data. So here we have some photos from that data walk that we put on back in March, where folks were going through all that stuff, information about hypertension, substance abuse, obesity, diabetes, and really taking stock of where we could first really have some really great effort at movement. And of course, we had a little fun too.

» So all of these great folks showed up to our kickoff event and doing that data walk and really diving in. And really from that voted to select what are our three priorities that are going to be outlined? What strategies are we going to select for these areas over the next three years to make movement? So we came up with access to care, mental health, which we renamed to emotional health, and obesity, which was renamed to healthy eating, active living, or our HEAL team. So those our three priorities moving forward. After that, the most key piece when it comes to looking at data, which a lot of folks miss, is moving into action. What are we going to do with this? So we initially started with our signups for action teams, which I outlined previously.

» We've got some incredible leads for each of these. Representative Lori Funderburk is heading up Healthy Eating, Active Living, Mike Conley with Access to Care, and Lori Carpenter with Emotional Health. So these action teams met three times each during the month of April to really solidify those, the goal, objectives, strategies, success metrics, process metrics, what are the outcomes that we want to see at the end of three years, presented them for feedback at a feedback session to the other work groups that are involved. And that gave us our first ever community health improvement plan. So from there, these teams, you know, the work is not over at this point. We're just getting started on this three-year plan.

» So I just want to share a few highlights of items that are going on at this point. For our HEAL team, because it's so time sensitive, we're really trying to push out the message that Eat Smart, Move More, Kershaw County is actually hosting and bringing forth FAN which is faith activity and nutrition which is a program offered to Kershaw County churches and faith-based organizations to receive training on healthy behaviors and different policies that can be made and put into place into their churches that training is on July 27th for our access to care team we are revisiting a gap analysis map that was set forth by the community medical clinic about two years ago and need some updating to provide information to residents as well as providers and decision makers on where the gaps exist in our

» community regarding medical care and social services so we're really able to pinpoint areas in our community as well as address where the gaps exist and how to direct folks to where care is in our community outside of that we are bringing a poverty simulation in January 2020 to our community for folks individuals organizational leads to really dive into implicit bias issues gatekeeper issues and creating image shift in organizations so that people can access care appropriately and address those issues in organizations. For our emotional health team, right now we're really pushing a mental health first aid training that is now available to Kershaw County residents and those that are serving Kershaw County residents. And that is available on September 19th.

» It's going to be held at the United Way. And last time I checked, there's under 20 spots left for this training. So again, it's free and it's available to Kershaw County residents. So again, that is a brief highlight of the main activities that are currently going on right now. There's a lot of meetings and conversations about different activities that we could move forward with.

» The next step, because there is so much depth to the work that we're about to embark on, a journey that we haven't been on yet as a county we want to be sure that along all along the way that we're able to track and measure our progress we don't want to get to the end of three years and say oh shoot we didn't we didn't change anything we missed the mark so we want to be able to track progress over time as well as make pivots when needed if something is not working accordingly so right now we're in the process of uploading everything you see in that document into a data system called clear impact scorecard where we're able to input this information as well as track and pair that quantitative data with the qualitative data that tells us the story behind the curve on each point as well as who

» are the partners that are involved because this is not left up to to one entity one entity cannot do this work as well as creating an action plan for who is responsible for each of these activities so now I get to the good stuff what is Kershaw County's role in all of this so bottom line when I showed you that life expectancy map I think we can all agree that we want residents to live that joyful meaningful life to their full potential and if we address these issues now we have the we have the capacity to get there and when it comes to kershaw county we would so appreciate the continued gift of in-kind support of space to meet for our action teams continue that work you've also allowed us to have our health ambassadors who are crafting plans for their schools to allow them to be in this spa

» ce throughout the summer and we so appreciate that then we would also like to address vision 2030 because we are actually operationalizing the health objective portion and can get that information into this data system to track progress and how we're able to impact and move the county's mission forward as well. So a few of those objectives from Vision 2030 are outlined here. And when I was taking some time to review this back when we started this process, we are either on track to make movement on all of these health objectives that are outlined here, or we are already currently addressing them.

» So we definitely as a coalition want to go ahead and get those up into our system and go ahead and track that information the other call to action I would give is that when groups are coming to you as an organization and an entity as a funding source I would take a look at this county health rankings and roadmaps model you are not all you're not only in the position to move for the county's mission but you're able to move for vision 2030 and to capitalize on this newly formed document that's going to improve health and wellness for residents so you're killing three birds with one stone so I would definitely recommend that you would prioritize support to those groups that are already on the right track and really think taking a hard long look with a with an in-depth plan and a process for me

» asuring their outcomes on moving these areas forward the chairman's been 15 minutes I think consensus we can keep going on this this is very important please thank you great perfect timing because I'm almost done oh no you're not so here available you know I'm sure everyone keeps hearing me reference this health improvement plan but doesn't have a copy of it online there's a PDF available at livewellkershaw.org for you to take a look at if you are interested in being involved in an action team that meets once monthly you can here's my contact information here on the screen you can get in touch with me via email or phone so at this time i know i gave you the 50 000 foot level view but if you have any questions um now is the time uh councilman please if i may mr jones please lead off this joh

» nson you work with the community clinic and i just want to say that i have all the respect in the world for that organization you guys do an outstanding job and i do not have that same feeling for a lot of agencies that are around that get federal money state money but you guys do an outstanding job and you obviously you folks have put a lot into this um live well and i appreciate you coming here tonight it's obvious excluding me there's a lot of subject matter up here and uh we appreciate it thank you so much for all you do uh other the comments? Maybe I'll lead off. First of all, I spent the better part of Sunday and today helping a man who lost both legs to diabetes because of simply bad choices in his life.

» And it's enough to say that the life expectancy chart would be a motivator, but a quality life is absolutely a part of our Christian calling and our calling as a government body, that it would be insufficient just to have a secure environment with good roads and jobs and not take care of the wellness of our population and have a better quality of life for everybody. It's just absolutely vital.

» I would say this presentation is so core to what we mean as a county and what we think of ourselves that i would like to see this presentation given to the kershaw health district who has some capability to provide money uh the city of camden elgin and bethune a school district and the chamber of commerce and anybody you can catch on the street this is a great presentation well done uh secondly um with the administrator here and since it's so core to our vision 2030 as you've pointed out and you never cease pointing that out uh that it may be we incorporate a piece of this in our survey system that we do every year that then leads to our budget cycle which starts in january when we have our retreat been a fabulous presentation well done um i see here that we have many of our of your team he

» re can you introduce your team real quick so again I simply led this process these are the folks that put in the work and the hours to be involved so I have Laurie Carpenter here Laurie Funderburg, Amy Kynard with the Thread Garrison, Bree Anderson, Mary Reams, George Gibson, Robin McAlpine, Susan Burrows and April Watt. Oh, how could I miss him? Caroline Coker in the back, who's also a health ambassador with our internship program.

» and as i've said before kershaw county is not perfect it's all-american because what's wrong with this county can be fixed by what's right with this county and the names you just named off are a small part of what's so great about this place and why we're an all-american county i thank you for that but with that i'd like to read a proclamation and maybe have the council vote on it. Proclamation honoring Live Well Kershaw Coalition. Whereas Live Well Kershaw County Coalition works to foster collaboration between citizens of all ages, working in partnership with public and private sector organizations and schools to increase community wellness awareness of health issues.

» Whereas the goal is to improve access to quality health care and encourage citizens of kershaw county to take ownership of the county's health acting together to reduce chronic disease and obesity among members of the community whereas kershaw county recognizes the value health plays in the future social and economic well-being of its citizens and neighbors towns and communities improving the health of the entire county is essential to enhancing one's quality of life. Recognizing the need for prioritization of health-related needs in the community, Live Well Kershaw has put together the trust of the first community health improvement plan, the CHIP, C-H-I-P, for Kershaw County.

» This community health improvement plan, or CHIP, built upon the energy and guidance provided by Vision Kershaw 2030 surrounding the objectives outlined for Health, along with South Carolina State Health Improvement Plan and the Rural Health Action Plan. Whereas we understand that to create a culture of wellness, we must lead together as a community that is grounded in health and wellness as a shared vision, we must serve as a force to build collaborative partnerships across all sectors to further align arrows for organizations in Kershaw County.

» Now, therefore, let it be known Live Well Kershaw Coalition is leading the charge to embed health as a shared value in all kershaw county organizations with that can we have a motion to approve this proclamation mr gardner a second from mr bozard any discussion from council nope i think i think we can get to the vote real quick all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and i thank you all very much could you all come up and we get a quick picture please thank you very much indeed the next item is a public presentation by the sheriff a request regarding the detention center sheriff lee bond come on up sheriff it's a pleasure to talk to my favorite county councilman i'm gonna make this real brief i doubt we'll be taking photos when it's over with but miss johnson real

» ly made it tough on my slideshow next time i got my three-year-old grandson to make mine um before we start talking about i kind of want to go a little bit into the background of our detention center here the best i know of it back in the 80s sometime our sheriff de brule gave the jail up he's passed away i can't talk to him now to find out his decisions on it but i have talked to some of his deputies that worked for him at the time try to find out why he gave it up the reason he gave it up what the deputies are telling me that worked for him at the time was he was getting crunched on his numbers when his budget to run both departments he wouldn't fund it enough money is his mic on it is your mic on yes lean over a little bit way i understand it is his budget from both departments wasn't fu

» nded enough to run them both. He was getting pinched pretty tough, but he made the decision to just stick with one and get the jail up. Again, I don't know whether there's any truth to it or not, but that's the best I can figure out, and that's clearly not an option right now because we are well-funded, well-taken care of, and I don't mind everybody knowing our council takes care of us. When the discussion first came up, when Peggy put in her retirement notice that she was getting ready to leave, and I forget who brought it up. Somebody brought, you know, would you take the jail if it was offered? And my first answer was no, I don't want the jail. I've heard too many horror stories about the jail and, you know, I got enough stuff on my plate as it is.

» I don't, I'm not interested unless the county needs me to take the jail. I'm not going to turn my back if the county needs me, I'll step up and take the jail. Well, after I left that discussion, I started thinking, well, you know, have I put my neck on a chopping block? What did I just commit to? So I started doing my research. Again, going into it, not wanting a jail, I started doing my research, open-minded, And I started seeing a lot of benefits in the sheriff's office having a jail. A lot of things that we can do to benefit the citizens of Kershaw County. Nothing I'm going to personally gain out of the jail. I wanted to bring that up and then to go into this here. I always tell people when they're discussing it is that this is not a fight. I'm not bringing a fight to you.

» I'm not demanding you give me the jail or none of that kind of stuff. This is just, I'm simply requesting, because the timing is perfect now, that you consider what's in the best interest of Kershaw County when it comes to running the detention center. Of course, I feel it's the best thing for Kershaw County, and here's some of the reasons that I can see up front. Recruiting and retention, we always have issues with fully staffing the jail. We've had the same problems with the sheriff's office before January 1st. We're fully staffed now at the sheriff's office. We actually have a waiting list of people wanting to come to work for us. We fully staffed the department. I feel we can do the same at the detention center.

» One of the things I plan to do is the non-certified applicants I have at the sheriff's office, I plan on putting them to work at the jail. Most sheriffs that run their jails, this is the way they do it. They'll put them there, gives them a time to prove yourself, it gives me a time to make a good assessment on them before committing county dollars to their academy time. This is one of the benefits. The salary there, I think our salary is pretty competitive. I'm not going to lie to you and tell you we're underpaid or anything. I think it's pretty competitive with the bordering counties. I think we can do better. Me, recruiting is not as important as retention. I want to keep the guys we've got over there. As our public defender said earlier, the jail is being ran great.

» I agree with her 100%. The jail is being ran great. I intend to keep the same staff there and keep running it the same way. If you see the news, you'll see where often we get a correctional officer that gets attacked, cut, stabbed, hurt. These guys have tough jobs. They shouldn't have to come to us and ask for additional money. Just by cutting to one slot, the administration slot of the jail, that's going to give us enough money to split with everybody over there. And on average, you're probably looking at about a $2,000 pay raise right off the bat without increasing the budget, staying there. As I've done with the sheriff's office, I'm not going to walk in the door firing people to make slots and to create money. I have no intentions on firing anybody.

» Through attrition, as people retire, as people quit and go somewhere else, we'll look at then the opportunity of combining slots and consolidating and cutting some corners when we get a chance. Merging both departments will help out by having future opportunities for employees from both departments. They can go back and forth. You're looking at a department currently at the sheriff's office. We're at 78. The jail's at 32. You combine two departments together. now you've got over 100 people in a department and 100 positions that people can move from place to place. They can have a future. It's not, it's no longer a small department. Consolidation of resources. Command staff. Again, no intentions on going over and firing anybody, but we do have a command staff position.

» Being the jail director's position is open right now. We don't need to replace it. The number two person at the jail is fully capable of running the jail. We can go forward where we're at that salary can go into the uh the current employees there as well as some other ones that we've we've been discussing i'm not prepared to say it now because i don't want to say something if i don't know 100 i'm good with it so but we do have other plans transportation both departments can transport jail or the sheriff's office can transport whether we're going to pick up a prisoner from another state or whether we're doing something local either or can transport transport it usually kind of comes down to whose job is it well if both departments are under the sheriff, it's all of our jobs.

» It's a shared job. We don't have to kick the can back and forth. We can, whichever one is better available to go on a call to do a transport, we can do it like anything else. Court, government center security, these are one of the things we can also switch people back and forth. Our guys who work at the jail, they got a lot of talent. We're not utilizing it to their fullest capability, in my opinion.

» When someone's to jail they're a jailer as soon as they leave with a bus full of inmates to come over to uh court they become a transport officer when they arrive at court come security in the courtroom that's that's that's being 100 efficient with them it's not a matter of them bringing them to jail turning them over to our security staff and running with it i think chairman and i we were in a meeting earlier about this uh yesterday and a lot of things were brought up i think can be solved by consolidating departments training that's another thing that you know one training officer can handle the training for both departments currently our jail doesn't have a full-time training slot we do it could be consolidated that's taking a little bit off of their lieutenant that's handling the traini

» ng and put him to work something else I did come across a lot of questions and concerns that people ask me these are citizens and these are uh some of the deputies asked me these questions so I want to kind of bring up some of the ones before they're asked and kind of give you my take on them. Will the sheriff be responsible for a large portion of the entire county's budget? It's a fair question. I've heard numbers as high as, you know, the sheriff's office and the jail accounts for 40% of the total budget. Well, is there a total budget for the county is $48.8 million. Currently, the sheriff's office is $5.8 million, and the jail is $2.4 million. That's $8.2 million combined. That's not a large portion of that $48 million. But to me, that's a lot of money.

» I'm going to take care of that money. I think both departments, as far as the money getting spent, should be spent by and should be in control of the chief law enforcement officer elected by the citizens of Kershaw County. Will the sheriff be able to fire jail employees without county approval? Yes. Like any other elected position, you can fire. You don't need approval or grievance board. But I can tell you, I didn't walk into the sheriff's office firing anybody, and I don't plan on walking into the jail firing anybody. Matter of fact, the jail has fired more people this year than I have, and I'm a brand-new sheriff. Would the sheriff be more likely to get arrested if he runs to jail? This has been asked by a lot of people, and there's been a lot of stuff in the news over this.

» I can tell you now, and if I need to tell you under oath, I have no intentions on being arrested or in prison. Even if it's my own jail, I don't want to go to it. Sheriffs don't get arrested for running jails. Sheriffs get arrested for breaking the law. I think that's something that, I think it's a good direction we're going in. Sheriffs, just like anybody else, are accountable for their actions. I think we're in a good direction with that. Jail administrators can get indicted. Sheriffs can get indicted. It has nothing to do with running the jail. It's got something to do with breaking the law. What if we trust a current sheriff but not a future sheriff? Well, my take on that is we have to trust the voters in making the right decisions.

» Every one of us is here because the voters put us here. To say that the voters are going to mess up on the next sheriff, how can we say they didn't mess up on the current sheriff or any current council members? We don't know that. I feel they made the right decision. I think everybody's here for the right reason. I think the people put them here for the right reason. I think we can trust our voters from here on out to make the right decisions. Before I wrap it up on my last slide, I want to bring up Sheriff Anthony Dennis from Sumter County. Sumter County just recently had their jail about a year and a half ago, and he's been running it since then.

» I think they had some issues where the timing was right then, a little separate from the timing where we've got here in Kershaw County, thankfully. But I want to let him speak just briefly here about some of the things he's seen within his first year and a half. Good afternoon. Welcome, Sheriff. Good to have you. I certainly don't want to be redundant on what Sheriff Bowen has done. It won't prolong, but what he's said about the detention center, the jail, and the sheriffs assuming control of the jail. I must say, and I want to put on the record as that, I became part of the jail association when I became control of our jail September 2017.

» And Kershaw County Detention Center, under the direction of Administrator Pivey, has one of the highest recommendations of any detention center in the state. I must say that she runs well and is highly respected within the state detention center. But I do feel that at the time, you may say that I kind of received my detention center by default somewhat. But the positives, the pros, and the cons that Sheriff Bowen has brought to our attention, certainly the consolidation of the resources I was able to do, the training certainly was one of the positive costs effective, but it did.

» My officers not only train, I'm training my detention officers now, be not only law enforcement detention officers but law enforcement officers as well i know you do remember the flood on the thousand year floods a few years ago but now i only not only will have 130 deputies i would have access to 200 deputies that are being trained through the detention center as well and now we're able to do that as well uh i say it's been cost effective uh we consolidated many of our training our transportation we found ourselves transporting uh inmates from our county detention center, and also our deputies, we were actually passing each other on I-20, transporting to the State Department of Corrections. Now we've consolidated that, and a lot of that had to do with lack of communication at that time.

» But our county council, and as well as Lee County Council, because Sumter is Sumter-Lee detention center, now I assume control of. They had some skepticism about Sheriff having control of the jail. I'll challenge each of you, if you contact any of the county administrators or the county council at those different counties, question them about since the sheriff has been in control of the jail and the positive effect that it has had, not only for the council, the citizens, as well as the budget. They're going to say that he's not terminating anyone. I did not terminate anyone in control of our correction center. We built on it. We built a relationship between the deputies and the detention officers. We, as one, works for the sheriff.

» Positive thing that the sheriff, the sheriff is the chief law enforcement officer in the county. I do believe, along with many other sheriffs, because now 75% of the sheriffs have control of the detention center within the state, that law enforcement should be under the chief law enforcement officer. Detention center is a law enforcement entity. Deputies are a law enforcement entity. They should be under the chief law enforcement officer in the county, the sheriff. I'm Sheriff Bowen. He's done a great job. I know he will do a great job. Again, I ask you to reconsider giving Sheriff Bowen full of his attention. Thank you, Sheriff, and watch the speed limit on 521 going back to Sumter. Well, since I have both deputies out there, we try to make sure that it's 60, 65 miles an hour.

» Good to have you here, Sheriff. Thank you so much. for being here and uh going for allowing me to speak before you and back to you sheriff sheriff this was uh this was the first man i called when i made that decision that uh that i well when i started the process of doing my research i called up sheriff dennis and i started asking him you know what about this jail thing you know i know you just got yours a little over a year ago and what do you think about he interrupted me while i was talking i said it's in the best interest of kershaw county for you to be running the jail i think that's a pretty relevant opinion when Somebody just got there, just had his jail for a year and a half, although I know he's not county council.

» So I would definitely suggest, you know, talking to his council and getting all the story in there, but I do appreciate it. Thank you, Sheriff. To our conclusion here, like Sheriff Dennis said, 75% of sheriffs in South Carolina run their county jails. All that 75% has the ability to turn them over to the county. I feel that shows, right, that's a pretty strong number. That shows that they feel it benefits their county to have the jail. Sheriff's have always run their jails unless they chose to give them up. We talked earlier, Sheriff DeBruy gave our jail up back in the 80s, which it was probably a good thing to do then under the circumstances he was looking at. I've never had our jail. I've never given our jail up. I won't get a vote on whether or not I can get the jail back.

» Citizens of Kershaw County won't get a vote on it. We will trust our county council to make an informed decision on what's in the best interest of Kershaw County. I want to commend Councilman Jones for putting off a vote because we did have some council members who needed more time, which I think is a good thing. I think it's good that the council members are looking into what's in the best interest of Kershaw County, taking their time to do the research and decide what's best. At the end of the day, if you don't get me to jail, I'm not going to stick my lip out and cry about it. I trust you guys will make the best decision. Thank you for your time. Maybe the sheriff will consent to a few questions if there are any. Questions here, please.

» Comments? Maybe we can defer those until the next time we meet. Sheriff, thank you very much, and it was great having Sheriff Dennis here. You ought to stay in our county a little longer. Good to have you here, Sheriff, and thank you again, Sheriff. With that, that ends the public presentations. We move to approval of minutes. We have two sets of minutes. We'll do them separately. The first is at tab B. It's the budget meeting that we had on the 11th of June, and the minutes are also on the board. Can we have a motion to approve? Move to approve the minutes June 11th. Thank you, Mr. Gardner. And a second from you, Mr. Bozar. Was that you? Yep. All right. Discussion. Seeing there is no discussion, we move to a vote.

» All those in favor of the 11 June minutes is written at tab B, signified by raising your hand. And it's unanimous. And we move to the next group at tab C, June 18th, which was a motion to cancel the 25 June meeting. It was a short meeting. Can we have a motion to approve those minutes? It's made. Mr. Connell, thank you. Ben, a second. Second. Second from Mr. Bozard. Discussion? And with no discussion, we move to a vote. All those in favor, signify by raising your hand. I was not at that meeting. And it's unanimous with Mr. Gardner, abstaining. We move now to ordinances. And maybe Mr. Jones, too. You were not at that meeting, were you? I was not at that meeting. The meeting on the 18th of June. Okay, then I abstain. Okay, so he abstained as well.

» two abstains do you have that mary thank you very much thank you tom i missed that all together we move now to the next item which is an ordinance on the board we heard from mr edwards earlier it's the first reading of an ordinance of county council to amend the county council's official zoning map and as i'm understanding it i'm going to ask mr gardner mr carpenter to lead us on this it was it was a motion that was denied by the zoning committee over to you mr carpenter mr chairman members of council you have in front in front of you tonight for first reading an ordinance to amend the county zoning ordinance to change the approximately 5.1 acres of land located on ridgeway road highway 34 up from this current r15 to an r6 classification that has previously been in front of the planning com

» mission and the planning commission recommends denial of the request on a vote of seven to nothing very good do we have a motion to approve on first reading the denial by the planning committee of this request do we have a first a motion we have no motion oh very good mr devose give us some instruction what to do with this well it comes to county council upon a recommendation recommendation is negative so the council can do nothing which apparently they're doing or they could vote down the ordinance um they could do one of the other right now i think you asked if anybody the motion was i believe to uphold the denial is that not correct that would be in the form of a motion to deny the ordinance to not pass the ordinance is that correct mr chairman what the motion is to not pass the ordinanc

» e that's correct you didn't get a motion you didn't get a motion so it's not on the floor that's right so it's not on the floor so what does that mean for the planning committee it means you've denied the request very good all right and that is motion dies and there was no motion so we move on to the next item which is i love these double negatives uh we move on to new business and recall item number one uh on tab e was removed from the agenda for the next regularly scheduled meeting item number two is placing the all-american city logo on county water towers an item introduced by mr bozar do you wish to make a motion or is it for discussion yes i made the motion to open this up for discussion all right and so we'll have a discussion no vote as it presently stands do we have a second to hea

» r this uh discussion second that uh mr connell so mr bozar would you lead off thank you uh myself and mr carpenter have been trying to get the water districts to put this on their towers camden has agreed to firm theirs and as soon as they get their tower painted they're going to put the logo on their tower and caset water has agreed to do it and it was waiting on blue golf water to make a decision well lube off water made a decision there can't do it their funds are too low to do it at this time i would like to see the county uh in talking with mr um mike hancock he uh says that it's gonna take ten thousand dollars to put that logo on their tower and i understand we just finished spending some money on different things but i would like to recommend that we come up with half the money five

» thousand dollars i have talked with the mayor of elgin and she would not give me a firm commitment as to amount of money but she says they would try to do what they could in in uh funding as much as they could and that's basically where we stand right now so i guess what i'm asking for is if in theory we come up with half of it we can find the rest of it i have a question yeah yes tom go ahead what's the red what's the total cost what are you talking about total cost i mean there's nothing i don't have any information to say you know what's it going to cost us total cost of ten thousand dollars for all the towers no just elgin tower is that the only one we've got to pay for yeah everybody else is going to pay for their own yeah camden's paying for theirs now cassette water i have not talked

» with them in quite a while they were waiting on elgin to make a decision they'd already agreed to do it theory is that right mr carpenter cassette water had agreed to do it i didn't get specific they would do it they were favorable to considering it oh okay i'm wrong i'm just asking you know i don't want to vote on something to say yeah we're going to do this and not know what it's going to cost us i don't want it to come back and all of a sudden be four hundred thousand dollars i think we need ten thousand dollars i'm in favor of it don't get me wrong but i think we need to know a little bit more from a dollar and cent standpoint personally mr chair uh mr john i thought the motion was discussion only of course then i guess under new year we're presently in discussion we're not in a vote i

» think you're just discussing it now we're discussing it mr jones yeah exactly correct mr chairman i have a question yeah please go ahead um mr carpenter is this kind of thing where if we did it you would just allot the funds to the authority that would put it up the golf element in water or would you put it up for bid um no so we would just give them the funds and they would be responsible for everything else okay and then we didn't do we know how long the sign lasts from any source at all i don't know that yet because like i say i've talked to uh uh elgin excuse me and i'm planning on talking to bethune see if that city council could come up with any money also i'm looking for money for many ways if the crowd out there can congregate can tell us uh talk to these people and try to enforce i

» t congregation yeah what's the prayer morning but anyway uh any help could be appreciated Mr. Chairman, I'm just going to say, listen, I support this effort. I personally donated and participated in the trip that you took out there, and I was very grateful for the result, but I just don't have enough information right now to make an informed decision. Perhaps with my own money I could, but I just don't know enough to use taxpayers' money at this point. I have a number of questions, so let's not force the issue prematurely. How much did Camden pay for theirs would be a good indicator.

» uh secondly we need to hear back from melissa emmons mayor emmons is a great supporter of the play foundation right and uh we should hear back from elgin to see how much they're willing to put in uh and perhaps uh get some definition on casso water those are the top three or four items that i'd like to know before we vote on this thing to answer one of your questions mel pearson told me that that put theirs on their towers they got to paint the tower first it's costing twenty thousand dollars okay now mr hancock tells me put it on his water tower it's going to cost ten thousand dollars but at this time they cannot afford any money toward you yeah that's why i'm out uh pounding the street trying to get some money well perhaps we could get the same person to put it on all of them and get a be

» tter rate yeah if they do it that's what we've got five or whatever what would you do five for so i think there's i think there's a lot more to be discussed before we i understand that's why i didn't call for a vote tonight just discussion but i'd like to ask mr carpenter if we could put out a letter to elgin to lugoff and to cassett and tell them what we're up against and see what they can come up with i didn't ask for a vote tonight just yeah just discussion okay all right very good is that we exhausted this item very good bring it up at another time absolutely i i think it'd be great uh we move now to the next item on the agenda which is extending water lines to doby mill fire department and up highway five two different directions uh there is no enclosure it's tab it's item number three

» and what are we seeing on the screen here danny of doby mill all right well we turn to mr bozard are we looking at a discussion here do you want to make a motion yes i make a motion we enter into discussion on this and we'll vote on it at another time but tonight i want to try to explain what's going on very good and we have a second for discussion second that yeah mr connell all right uh al open it up in talking with i found out that my district from my house right above where i live pine grove road from there going to the county line up highway 5 there's no water when you hit chavis green road and turn left or right there's no water i was not aware of this in talking with mike hancock again over to lugoff water district he said hell that's not the only district don't have water he said yo

» u got a fire department up there there's no don't have water joey mills that whole area does not have water we just recently voted to fund fire service and we got areas that don't have water trucks has got to get water so my issue here is this what you see on the map there is two options that mike's uh lugoff uh district water district options that the engineers give us the upper district line you see up there is going up one way and the lower line you see is going another and asking mr carpenter to tell me how many people is on this the upper line there was 35 and the bottom line was 12 there's 35 houses and 15 houses 15 on the bottom line okay the bottom line has more pressure it's coming off a 12-inch line down by that new truck stop going down and hitting 12 and coming back up kennedy r

» oad and back and so forth there you go thank you and uh it's in the neighborhood of about one million dollars either way you go at it give would take a little bit what concerned me more than anything was that we had a fire department that did not have water that concerned me more than anything else residents has got drinking water because they got well but if we can get water up in that area to that fire department and those other people along that line can get water from it and I guess what I'm asking is that we look at this I've talked to mr.

» carpenter he's give me four options with the fifth one four options was a different place we get grants from out of those four the one option that we have that's more likely to get it it's only a five hundred thousand dollar grant which means that if we do this the county is going to have to come up with approximately another five hundred thousand the other option is talk with our representatives in washington and see if the federal government can come up with the total amount which according to what mr carpenter tells me might not be a bad option it might be a good option but again my main concern is is getting fire i'm getting water to these places and i'm gonna shut up there for a minute and let y'all look at what's on the board because this is some of what my engineer brought over to us

» it's uh about a 1.1 one way going down highway 12 and back that serves 35 people if you don't have to use the contingency it would be right at a million dollars if you go the other way i'm gonna call it southern route option two it'd run around 800 some thousand dollars if we did not have to use the contingency we got a 15 tendency in this thing so that's where we stand i'm trying to get water to doby mills fire department let's see if we can structure this a little bit this is if you go back to the chart that showed different types of grants um i've had woeful experience this is a difficult thing cdbga ria and so on those all take time there are four different types up there so we're not talking about getting it done in the next six months this is a long-term grant process and we're not ta

» lking about doing it during this coming this present budget year not if it gets done no yeah so this this bespeaks an effort just to ask the staff to work this and come in deliberately with a proposal up or down and then we can address it okay is that what you're looking for now mr carpenter you want to address how that might be best done well those are the the grand options that are available to us as mr yeah if you can go to the mic please and mr bozard also mentioned uh your other the really three other directions you could go if you don't go the direction of those programs one is you go to columbia and you ask them to include it in the state budget two is you go to washington and ask them to do a near mark or three county pays for it itself so those are really your your options in front

» of you what the amount of time and effort that goes into any of those four is more than just due diligence so if council wants me to pursue one of those or all of them then i need more than just a would you please check into it and get back to us with some information a significant amount of staff time would have to go into doing proposal that may or may not even even work so council is interested in this then that direction to me that you want me to pursue this then i'll pursue it if you want me to do the basic research it's right there yeah my point here is that none of us have had a chance to study it and we don't have a full body of seven here today so you've made my point i'd like to to review it uh ben over to you yeah i had a few comments on this um mr carpenter as i understand it wo

» uld the county uh apply for the grant for and in behalf of blue golf elgin water authority they have to be tied into the grant correct that's correct because it would be their water flow their water right but the county would be the entity that would actually receive the grant in most of those cases okay but still we'd have to partner with them on some level and we haven't fully explored that relationship yet that's correct okay um next up i spoke with captain hughes who uh worked for Lugolf Fire but is also the captain for the Dobies Mill Fire Department down Porter Cross Road and he said it's a huge need for the district I think we're undershooting the folks that would be served when we say it's 35 or 17 because it actually covers the entire district for which that they don't just respond

» to fire calls that happen on that road it's everyone that's in the entire district that area received its first hydrant at the end of White Pond Road and 12 whenever loves came in they extended it down so they do have some water access but the area is growing as you know so i support this but i don't think we should have to spend all county money on it lugoff elgin water authority is the primary entity that will be selling the water and have it be a revenue source for them absolutely so i think we need to explore the the grant writing process the application process see how much of uh other people's money we can get to to make something like this happen and just understand that it's going to be a real need just like um we've got full-time firemen going to be working at the blaney location i

» t's going to be growing down highway 12 you've got the loves truck stop coming in there'll be other development in the area and i think it's a real concern it's not one that we can address in the short term but i will i do think it'll take a little while and if i could the um the residences were just those people who would be able to receive potable water obviously a significantly greater percentage would be covered by fire than that so those were the houses that would be directly able to receive drinking water yeah until we start getting rezoning requests for water on the road yes sir yeah yeah mr.

» Gardner please well it's not that you couldn't is that each one of them serves a different purpose and if you see DBG there their focus is more in your low to moderate income communities of which this may or may not qualify if you're under the EDA, their primary focus is economic development. Well, there's no industry that's committed to coming to this area. Rural infrastructure, they're the ones that we'd have the greatest likelihood because they will consider fire and things like that. And then the fourth one is a loan program. It's very permissive terms. It's a great program, but it's still a loan. So those are the differences in them. So we could go after the loan if you didn't get the grant. You can get the grant.

» You could try to get a second grant, but we're going to be less likely to get one than the other mr chairman yeah mr another comment i had is while i represent the elgin area i'd be remiss if i didn't focus on the complete dearth of hydrants and piping in the eastern portion of the county um whenever we started talking about fire service years ago iso ratings and everything the biggest hit on access to water came in the eastern portion of the county so i mean that's on on a complete lack of hydrants and and infrastructure for water the eastern portion of the county is hurting the most you do have the western portion of the county that's looking at the most population growth but perhaps by looking at it a little bit deeper we might be able to combine need and be more eligible or worthy for s

» ome of these grants by demonstrating what's going on in the eastern portion of the county than also what's going on in the western go ahead tom's have another question too does uh and i don't know this cassid through rural water do they have hydrants and they do in particular in certain areas or yes are they available to for the fire departments to fill tanks or that's theoretically some of them are in positions that we can't know i've seen some out there i just didn't know how you know if they're sporadic which they probably are in certain places cassid's relationship with the fire is maybe less than it needs to be as far as access to fire hydrants but is that not something that we could yes sir look at and and work with them to put more hydrants in and possibly when water lines in the gro

» und it's it's simple right when you already have a water line and this issue is there's no water lines right so it's hydrants are kind of a byproduct of having the water line cassid has a decent network of water lines in the grounds and they didn't necessarily put hydrants in so for us we could work with them to put hydrants in places that there aren't any that was just kind of a different really a different thing but since men brought it the conversation seems to be broadening to our reliance on pumpers and sucking water out of ponds and how do we operate a rural fire department over a vast expanse of acreage 700 square miles and but the the motion here is to discuss doby mill but what i see is an appetite to discuss uh the reliance we put on pumpers so you guys want to stay on doby or you

» want to talk across the posture of our county and reliance on pumpers versus hydrants. Where is this thing going? Well, I think we can get on the other. Yeah, I mean, I think the discussion begs all those questions, but we've got to learn a little bit more about who we can partner with and what grants we might be eligible for based on need. Yeah, well, Vic, Mr. Carpenter is appealing to not waste staff time when he doesn't have policy guidance from us. But we can further refine this a little bit and bring it back in next time we meet. How about that, Al? Yes. All right, Al. Mr. Jones, go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to make sure I sort of listened and heard everything everybody was talking about and the comments that were made.

» I'm truly mystified while water availability was not fully addressed during the fire district legislation that we just passed. As we can see, providing water for fire protection is not cheap. It costs over $986,000 to run lines along Kennedy Road and nearly $1.25 million to route it along Porter Crossroads. You know, either way, that's a lot of money. It comes up to the question, how are we going to fund this project? What purses have suddenly opened up? And what about the rest of the county, which you just brought up, Mr. Chairman, I think needs to be discussed as well as far as that are currently without water as well. I don't think Cassette Water provides fire protection. have we looked at their areas and needs as well? That's a concerning question I have.

» Will we have enough money to fund the fire protection and still cover council's real priorities? And I say council's real priorities. I'm talking about the splash pad and underwater real estate. Once again, I'm going to bring a solution to this dilemma without going to the taxpayer's pocketbook by utilizing resources on hand.

» I'm going to propose as part of the discussion that we look at selling our riverfront property and taking the proceeds from that and apply them to the water line project the city of camden by the way is building an identical park on the other side of the river so why compete against them i think one riverfront property or park is enough in kershaw county so that's kind of where i'm at in it it's kind of just looking at our resources and and taking care of it in that manner because it has been said how valuable that property is uh at the riverfront so we said it should easily be able to sell and get enough money to take care of this issue so i look at it as you know fire protection river park but those those are just my thoughts mr chairman thank you for the time members of county council th

» ank you very much other comments uh well we need to frame this al you've agreed that we'll need to restructure the discussion and bring it back in very much uh and not uh eat up much staff time because clearly we're well short of a policy statement how we're going to do this but once we get to that point we can then turn to staff to do the hard work but boy i can tell you this is already very fine work i'd like to have time to study these charts none of us have seen these before we came in here at least i have not other discussion we can close this and move on to the next agenda item i went before we go yeah go ahead um mr carpenter we're going to look at uh grant money see what we can do yes all right i'm gonna make it a point to talk with ralph norman and see if we can't get some money ou

» t of the federal government okay thank you uh and that's uh that the next item is item number four and i believe it's at tab f uh if bring that up there it is i believe it includes minutes from i guess 2009. uh with that we'll move to Mr. Jones. Is this for a discussion or a vote? Well, I'm not sure, Mr. Chairman. I think I may end up making a motion here. Okay, very good. Why don't you make a motion to open the discussion, and then we'll get a second, and then we'll go into it.

» Well, let me just go ahead and make a motion that we direct staff to present to county council at our next county council meeting a revised policy regarding retiree health insurance that would result in all current retirees and eligible employees hired prior to july 1 2011 be covered by the terms of the policy that was in effect prior to that um that would be my motion all right do we have a second on that motion second second for mr gardner now with that we can open discussion please mr jones thank you mr chairman members of county council back in 2010 uh county council started discussing through the county ministry at that time clay young that there was going to be a change a pretty drastic change in the insurance coverage but clay young and i had many many conversations that he assured m

» e that july 1 2011 would only affect employees hired from there forward that it would not that the other employees would be grandfathered in and uh and keep their current insurance coverage that they had well as we've had some recent retirees that's not the case and one even had a policy manual that stated what they were hired in what they were supposed to get so I call this broken promises and what I would like to do is as I said in my motion as the administrator requested administrator his staff to go to the table and bring back to us a fix on this at the next regularly scheduled County Council meeting Thank You mr.

» chairman members of council other discussion i would go ahead mr gardener and then i'll have this this is not going to be retroactive it would be effective as of july 1 2019 it would not be retroactive that we would pay change it so the last nine years would be changed and compensated for it would change as effective of this year so it would not that cost would not be heard too is that right mr jones the way we're looking at it i think the county administrator came up i think there's what 26 retirees yes sir they're 26 current retirees and then of course i don't know what the number of employees that are working here now that are eligible that were here prior to july 1 2011 but but what it boils down to is and mr garden with all due respect without trying to figure this out in this meeting

» because we can't it's very complicated is that as my motion said that we have staff give staff direction to go back and research this and come up with a fix that will be fair to these employees who were promised one thing and ended up getting another and and i will say this too um to mr carpenter's credit he has been working very hard on this trying to get the information correct uh he was in another county at the time he had nothing to do this he came here on july 1 2011.

» but let me say this mr carpenter said his county was going through the same thing at that time and they made the changes as well because money was getting very tight and i said what did you do with your employees that were hired on early he said we grandfathered them in so i commend y'all for that and that's what i'm asking that we do now is what we said we were going to do then and what i was told by administration at that time and it was my understanding uh mr mozart yes mr carpent to help me out with something i was under the impression that every employee back at that time when this was changed signed a paper acknowledging this is that right that's correct so they was well aware that that was going to be reduced right based on what they signed they should have been yes sir okay thank yo

» u mr chairman if i'm not let me add to that um there we've all begun to to look at this and i was not here but mr jones and mr gardner and mr tucker were so we're relying on the minutes from that meeting and the meeting of three readings of that budget in that year and there is no mentioning of grandfathering and then the resolution which also passed unanimously and that includes uh the three men i just mentioned voted in favor of it so we want to make sure that we've got the facts correct but if we want to do this retroactively i would also let you know that the city of camden removed all those benefits many of the counties in kershaw in the state of south carolina in 2009 in those desperate years along with the changes in the medical system which still haven't settled out since 2008 also

» drove many of the considerations so all these facts make it more complex i'm not saying i disagree i agree with with what Mr. Jones said, but there is no record for me coming in as a student of this to say that was grandfathered. Number two, there were cogent reasons. And when you talk to the previous CFOs and those in the employees, all of them, but except for the one that apparently Mr. Jones is talking about, say that they were somehow broken promises.

» If that is the case, then I'd say we urgently need to address it but i need to tell you i find no evidence based on the record of the minutes that were unanimously approved by this council to include those three gentlemen no grandfathering now the next point is as mr jones said this is very complex and i'm not disagreeing with you jimmy but i'm just saying this is what the evidence is in front of me having consulted with legal counsel we're not the only county or the only city in this state that has this problem i would tell you that that this could cost a lot of money and it would require us looking at the budget a second time um i'm sorry jimmy go ahead you had your hand thank you so much mr chairman thank you for those comments um don't agree with them however let me just say that um you

» 're right a lot of cities a lot of counties have changed but the majority of them have honored their word to the employees that they hired uh before their change date you know mr bozar talked about and i i know we got that from mr carpenter but he talked about the fact that employees had signed something you know i'm going to tell you something as being a former employee when you go into hr my question is obviously hr and staff did not make sure employees understood what they were signing and when you're asking an employee to sign something that's changing their entire life with their benefits and they don't and they don't realize and they have said they didn't realize they were signing that i think we failed them we failed them in some way so bottom line is they weren't fully aware of what

» they were signing and i think that staff had the obligation to make sure these employees understood that if they were signing something that they were absolutely changing and losing the benefit package that they were promised when they were hired on and i think we owe it to the staff and you know i hear a lot about caring about employees you know i voted against some raises because i am not going to go into taxpayers pocketbook when a lot of taxpayers are suffering didn't get raises and give county employees or government employees are raised but I'll tell you one thing nobody cares about the employees more than me nobody will fight for him harder than me this is the right thing to do mr.

» chairman it's the right thing to do to ask this man to go back this gentleman and to bring us a fix and live up to the commitment you got employees here now sitting out here in this audience right now they were here prior to July 1 2011 and I can assure you they didn't know their insurance policies were changing they're shaking their heads no they didn't know so we have failed them they were under the impression that they were grandfathered in as I was told by the administrative staff at that time that we were and I even called the former County Administrator and I said this is what we're facing he said no no no Jimmy that was supposed to be a grandfather in well and I understand you say you see no evidence you hear no evidence the bottom line is that was an issue that was a really stuck wi

» th me back then and yes I did vote for the resolution because I was told that these folks would be grandfathered in well obviously they weren't and i'm asking that we just go back and it won't break the bank it'll probably be less the way we're looking at now maybe less than what sixty thousand dollars mr carpenter just as a rough guess maybe less maybe a little more you know you spend money you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars you sit you spend millions of dollars on things that are just to me pork and yet you we want to sit up here we want to debate and and go by saying we have no record and that you got employees sitting out here now and I guarantee if you go to any employee that's here now that is working that is eligible for what we're talking about they will tell you they did no

» t know that their policies were changed so we have a problem somewhere in HR or we have a problem somewhere else but once again I'm asking you just to accept this let's ask the administrator to go forward and bring back at the next regularly scheduled council meeting a fix to live up to the commitment that this County Council or this county made that these folks have been here so many years thank you mr. chairman very good to me you've not established that there's an obligation mr. mr. DuBose on the legal side what is what's your view on this well two points mr. chairman first the fact that an employee signed they got a copy is irrelevant. They weren't consenting to it. When they signed they got a copy, they weren't saying they agreed to it. They were only saying they got the policy.

» Had they not signed it, it wouldn't have made any difference. If you'd come in and said, I'm not going to sign that you gave me a copy, an employee, the fix is very simple. A person just hands them a copy and writes on there, employee Ken DuBose, I was an employee incidentally. Employee Ken DeVoe's got a copy of this. It's only saying they got a copy, not that they agreed to it. The policy had already been passed at that time. That was the policy. Consent is irrelevant. They weren't consenting to it, incidentally. You said they got a copy. The second point, though, is for health insurance, and this is an important contractual matter. If you look at the policy on page 10, it has important, underlined in bold print, it says important.

» These insurance benefits may be altered or eliminated by the county at any time and are subject to budgetary constraints. That statement is a truism. Nobody was agreeing to that. That is still a truism. Medical benefits are not contractually required to be provided. So, as a matter of law, county can alter or eliminate these insurance benefits at any time. That's a truism. Still can't.

» And I would suggest that governmental entities to my knowledge do not enter into contractual obligations to provide insurance benefits to current or future employees other than what's budgeted that's what that says so you can change it i mean mr jones is correct the county can change it and pay for it it's a matter of paying for insurance benefits it's through people public employee benefit association and they don't care who pays the benefits as long as they're paid so the county can pay them yes they can the county can change it yes they can but i would suggest that the county needs to have the full knowledge that the statement and employees need to have full knowledge that the statement these insurance benefits may be altered or eliminated by the county at any time is applicable as a mat

» ter of law thank you um other discussion yeah mr connell i have to do a more research on this issue to get educated on it but as a matter of law just a couple of questions so as you said it's totally irrelevant that someone signed a form that says i received a copy of the policy it didn't matter if they said i like it or not or i accept it or not they could say i don't accept it and it would still apply if county council as a body voted on it it was it was a matter of law they were just saying they got a copy they were notified so what's significant then is that in 2009 when many of us weren't here the council voted on language that didn't have well on the uh on the real property side we call it non-conforming uses but that basically means your grandfathered in and can continue with your no

» n-conforming use but there wasn't that type of language on the hr side that was voted on at that time that would entitle these folks to a retention of those benefits well it all goes back to getting a little far afield here but to your point i i think if my memory serves me correct actually the city of camden was sued over changing employee benefits health insurance benefits i believe they were and i believe that case went to south korea supreme court just from my knowledge and the south korea supreme court ruled with the city of camden that they could change employee benefits and i think mr carver has been in other jurisdictions he'll tell you that is the law isn't it the law is that that statement is a statement of law so you can provide the benefits certainly you can do it mr jones is co

» rrect if If this council votes to change the benefits you provide current employees or retirees health insurance, you can certainly do that. But it's grandfathered in that there is not a concept in this because it's a current budgetary matter that the council can change at any time. Is that not your understanding, Mr. Carpenter? You can do it, but you need to understand that it's not giving anybody any right going forward. Well, the other thing is, it strikes me as we do our budget, we always tell Mr. Carpenter, bring it in balanced and in the black, and he's done that. And prior to him, that was a requirement for the administrator at the time that this was done 10 years ago or nine years ago.

» But it was also a recession, and I would say that governmental bodies like the school district and the city of Camden took drastic cuts during that period, and it was wise to do so. Teachers pay, as you know, we had a moratorium on employee pay rises until 2015, until we got out of that hole. So this is kind of driving by the rearview mirror, but governmental bodies and businesses need to have the authority to make changes where they can to survive. And I remember long discussions with Dr. Frank Morgan about it. what happened to Donnie Wilson, his CFO, when he had to go and make the cuts they did over there. So it's a prudent thing to have the flexibility to do that.

» What I'm just saying is there's no record in any of the county minutes or in the law itself that grandfathering was to be done. And it seems to me that we're making a precedent here. Now, in full recognition, we still do have, I think some $300 in there per month per employee in retirement. And so that money, for anybody who gets to 10 years, to include our recent jail directors getting $300 a month towards health care insurance, then that is a substantial amount of money that the city of Camden doesn't presently provide.

» So on the good side, we as a county still provide in a compassionate way money for health insurance and it's on it's gone going right now it's in our budget and i would say that the sheriff's department the fire departments the administration finance auditor all of those when they retire 10 years on they get 300 a month for health care and no other municipality or county in this county and that would be the only county that's us does that beaufort county does zero. Camden does zero. This county cannot be portrayed as not having had compassion for its employees. Even in the worst of times, somehow Mr. Vic Carpenter managed to find $300 to keep health insurance alive for their employees. So what we're talking about is something more than the $300 that Mr. Jones would like to bring in.

» And frankly, I think I need a little more study on this i don't understand it but at this point i think i would be in opposition because we as a county have shown good faith by keeping three hundred dollars in there per month yeah jimmy go ahead mr chairman thank you let me just say too that it is gracious of us to give them three hundred dollars but she i know for a fact that there are two employees that are paying a thousand dollars they're getting three but they're paying a thousand dollars out of pocket bottom line is there was a commitment made to these employees and i'm asking i'm asking the motion said nothing about doing it except it said sending the administrator back to come up with a fix and bring it back before us that we would have to vote on at that time so if my motion is den

» ied you're we're denying him the opportunity to just go and bring us back a recommendation uh a language to change the language and that would change the budget too would it not no probably would not we don't know that mr chairman because we don't know how much money it is and And based on the research that he's already done, it wouldn't change the budget for this year much, would it? It would change line items within the budget. So it changes the budget. But minimal, minimal compared to what's been done in the past by this county council, Mr. Chairman. And in fact, opens the budget. And so that is a challenge for me to accept. Mr. Connell, please. Wait a minute, I hadn't finished. Yeah, go ahead. It may not change the budget.

» We don't know that because we don't know the specifics of what Mr. Carpenter would bring back. Yeah. Can I let Mr. Connell go now? Thank you, Mr. Jones. Van? I was just going to say, supporting you at this point, Mr. Jones, implies that a fix is needed. Now, you lived it. You were there. I wasn't there. A lot of this, I read through the packet, but a lot of the additional information you brought up, saying that various administrators told you this or that, I just don't know. I need to research the issue to be informed on it. So I'd ask that we put it off so that we can learn some more about it. Supporting you implies that I'm saying, yes, that there is liability there. And as a matter of law, I don't know that.

» mr chairman if i may yes i'm willing to put this off tonight and i will bring it back up at a later date and uh because i do want to respect mr carnell if he needs time i think he's being genuine about it he really needs some time to look at it and uh i just mr carpenter if you would though i would like to ask you to just continue looking into this and try to come up with some solution for us because i am going to bring this back at a later date and it probably will be at the next regularly scheduled council meeting let me ask mr.

» Gardner all right yeah all right that would be it I withdraw my motion to bring it back I want the employees to know I'm gonna bring this back at a later date very good I'm not gonna let it just drop and go away thank you thank you thank you very much useful discussion we go to the next item on the agenda which is item number six which is to cancel the next meeting on the 23rd of July and the August 27 meeting so you could get one item number five is a grievance committee appointments uh the county council it says will appoint a committee composed of seven employees to serve the terms of three years except that the members be appointed initially should be appointed so their terms will be staggered um with that mr carpenter can you open that up for us please mr chairman members of council i

» present to you tonight a slate of seven county employees uh representing various entities within the county itself elected officials public works parks and rec courthouse and the government center the terms they would serve would be between one and three years all the individuals have consented to serve uh presented to council tonight for your consideration very good can we have a motion to approve the list that the administrator recommends so moved second that we have a first from mr bozard and a second from mr connell and uh al thanks for catching me in my oversight there uh any discussion uh with that we move to a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and we move to item number six which is the cancellation of the 23 july and 27 august meetings uh at tab

» g i believe well it doesn't need to be up there it's pretty simple and we have a motion to do so so made mr bozart a second second for mr gardner any discussion uh as a matter of just notation uh we do have two items we want to bring forward it's brought forward by mr jones and maybe al you'll have some stuff ready but with that uh we move to a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's mr. Gardner mr. Bozard and mr. McConnell those opposed mr. Jones thank you and it passes so the next meeting then would be the 13th of August move now to council August 13 August with that we move to council briefings led by mr. Jones sir please mr.

» chairman thank you members of County Council thank you as well the next regularly least scheduled council meeting is what august 13th august 13th that's when i want to have this everything ready to bring back uh for the staff let me just say that a couple things here briefly mental health i think mental health is a crisis in our community i think mental health is certainly out of control to some point and uh issue but i would like to say to mr carpenter i'd like to get with you and see what we can't do to maybe work with some of the agencies that around to try to do what we can do to partner with them when it comes to the mental health in our community and a lot of folks are a lot of families are dealing with that also on the firefighters pay the on-call I had been asked I noticed one citiz

» en got spoke on it I had been asked to say something about that and I'm in favor of the firefighters when they get there to to get their pay and I had to sit around and wait but then it was brought to my attention by administration that the reason the policy was changed to 30 minutes is because some firefighters were coming there getting there kind of checking in then leaving so obviously there was a some checks and balances need to be done I think they should be paid as soon as they hit the station however I don't think they need to just turn around and leave and go home I think we'd all agree with that so I think there could be a balance here I'd like to see see some kind of policy come forward that we could maybe look at changing going back as mr still said going back and paying them as

» soon as they come to the station but they need to understand too they got to work with us and they just can't turn around go home and just come in to get the points and turn around go back but mr carpenter i would like you to look into that and maybe we can bring that up at a later date and i don't know what would be appropriate probably a budget time or we'll come back okay okay sounds good but uh having said that i'm not going to dwell on this but i'm very passionate and it doesn't affect me in any way whatsoever this retirement issue affects me in no way whatsoever but it affects a lot of folks that are out there right now i say a lot i know 26 currently retired folks and also some some eligible employees that have spent their life at kershaw county working dedicated and doing such a goo

» d job and uh i just hope this council will give it some serious thought and we'll make this it's a minimal minimal gesture and i hope we'll do the right thing when that time comes back before this county council thank you mr chairman thank you members county council for the time thank you sir mr gardner no report uh mr bozard thank you mr johnson i want to thank you for that briefing i was not aware of a lot of things you brought up and i appreciate that you did an outstanding job and i want to thank council for considering the water lines adobe mills and also the signage for our water towers and mr carpenter i want to thank you for finally getting our signage for the county up did we ever come across with a big one on the interstates coming and going and how are we doing this we're working

» on that one now we're working on this one good thank you very much there's more coming thank you ben mr chairman i would just thank miss johnson and the cohort many of whom had to go due to the hour of the meeting they do some great work in kershaw county and it shows thank you so much that's all i have uh i'll just close out great briefing by the sheriff thanks to the sheriff and uh in sumter county coming this distance i hope he gets arrested for speeding on the way home sheriff uh that was an excellent presentation by miss johnson i didn't expect anything less i think she did 15 minutes without taking a breath you ought to hear her sing and you ought to see her run um it's just an amazing talented young lady and we have a great county as i say often government ain't the answer to all our

» problems and she is a non-profit look what she and uh livewell kershaw and the play foundation and all these other organizations are doing for our county and our people i regret to say you know i'm a little bit of a health nut but our county is at the bottom in overweight statistics and our state is near the bottom in the nation level so we have got to do something we're in a crisis and it's not just an overweight it says mr jones said mental health but to give you some examples of what we can do together with or without government catherine and her team advocated and we have now mental health cash counselors that are interning from usc and the schools and that helps us address some of the problems if you work with mr ham out of sumter he has sent additional counselors over here and so on a

» nd so forth we have the alpha center again another non-governmental organization and on and on and on we are stronger when we work together and it's an amazing county and we have amazing people compassionate hard-working and very talented uh with that mr carpenter please mr chairman members council one item tonight as you know uh summer is in full swing summer camps are going on i just have a picture of one of our camps camp sunflower camp sun fun is running this week it's for our special needs exceptional kids in the community uh what you see are the camden clowns the fire department from the city of camden has a clown unit that comes out so there you see our kids in our camp taking part in that activity that's my report mr.

» chair all right without an entertain a motion to disband and we have such a motion yeah I made that one all right mr. bozars like a second for mr. Gardner any discussion very passionate discussion up here today great meeting all those in favor signify by raising your hand and we are unanimous and we are adjourned