Full meeting transcript - April 21, 2021

» all right it's a great day in kershaw county welcome to this called meeting on the health services district legislation it was called for exigent circumstances relating to legislation in which we are to forward documents to our delegation at the very outset i want to thank sally harrell and uh daryl ogburn and the delegation and the attorneys of both organizations and working collaboratively and expeditiously to allow us to get to this point. Before we proceed, first of all, we have a quorum. Mr. Jones regrets his absence and sends his support, but that's not admissible because you have to be here. There he is, Mr. Jones. Thank you. We'll hold up. We're just saying you are going to be able to make it. Thank you. So we have now all members present.

» At the outset, I wish you all a happy Easter. it's a triumphant session uh a triumphant season however we continue to have deaths from the covert disease that's still among us so i ask at the outset just a moment of silence amen so with that we're called to order uh i'd like to ask for adoption of the agenda that you have on the board make a motion without the agenda uh mr tucker a second second second for mr gardner any discussion as i said it's estrogen circumstances a single item we have no public session no public comments and we'll move quickly to the new business so all those in favor signify the raising your hand and it's unanimous the agenda is adapted uh we move now to a new business a resolution by cursory county council approving the proposal of legislation for the general ASSEMB

» LY'S CONSIDERATION AND ENACTMENT THAT AMENDS AND REVISES THE ENABLING STATUTE FOR THE HEALTH SERVICES DISTRICT. IT'S IN YOUR HANDS, GENTLEMEN. IT WAS SENT OUT TO YOU IN ADVANCE. MR. TUCKER, JUST AS A POINT OF HOW TO RUN THIS, I READ THIS FIRST AND THEN PUT IT INTO A MOTION OR WHAT? MR. WHICHEVER YOU CHOOSE, MR. CHAIR. I'M FINE. LET ME READ IT SO EVERYBODY UNDERSTANDS AT THE OUTSET. MR. CHAIRMAN. YES.

» copy because he wasn't here when we went over that yeah did you get the copy passed down from mr connell okay good thank you perfect so i'll read it for the public two of them i passed down yeah yeah they were they looked the same yeah a resolution by kershaw county council approving the proposal of legislation for the general assembly's consideration and enactment that amends and revises the enabling statute for the health services district of this county Whereas the Kershaw County Hospital Board was created in 1952 by an act of the General Assembly, and whereas in 1954 the Assembly passed Act 6868 that provided the Kershaw County delegation would appoint members to the Kershaw County Hospital Board, and whereas in 1969 the assembly passed act 725 that established the current composition o

» f the kershaw county hospital board and for appointment of its members by this council kershaw county council whereas in 2009 the assembly passed act 107 that changed the name of the kershaw county medical center to kershaw health that is doing business as the health services district of kershaw county end quote and is also known as quotations the health service the health district end quote and whereas kershaw county council and the health district recognize and agree that the health district's above-cited enabling statute is in need of amendment and revision now therefore be it resolved by kershaw county council the council will propose general legislation to amend and revise the state enabling statute of the health district for submission to the legislature for consideration and enactmen

» t. Particularly, council will propose first bullet the scope and duties and authority of the health district of Kershaw County is to provide medical care and medical services to the citizens of Kershaw County. The health district of Kershaw County's mission and authority is facilitating access to health care in Kershaw County to continue the existence of a local hospital and operating the care issuing and also administering grants within the county promote access to health care and healthy living. Second bullet, the retention of a non-member board to be appointed by the Kershaw County Council.

» Third bullet all board members must be Kershaw County residents next bullet that upon passage of the legislation reconstituting the board Kershaw County Council will appoint nine board members with the initial appointments to be effective July 1 2021 and staggered as follows three shall be appointed for a two-year term three shall be appointed for a four-year term and three shall be appointed for a six-year term. Each member of county council shall nominate a board member based upon his or her representative seat or district, and two members of the board shall be nominated at large and appointed by council as a whole. No council district shall have more than three resident members. Next bullet.

» Terms apart from the initial term would be for a definite term of six years and whenever board members term ends appointment and service on the board would end if a vacancy on the board occurs due to the board members term ending and the nomination and appointment of a new board member is not made by the representative county council member who nominated the predecessor board member within 90 days then the nomination of a new board member may be made at large an appointment by council as a whole next bullet vacancies filled due to resignation or death or ineligibility to serve shall be for the remainder of the unexpired term by nomination and appointment by council as appointment as appropriate excuse me and last bullet upon appointment to a six-year term a may member may not then be reappo

» inted to the board FOR A SUCCESSIVE TERM WITHOUT FIRST NOT SERVING ON THE BOARD FOR A PERIOD OF AT LEAST ONE YEAR AND RESOLVED AND SO ON SO FORTH SO WITH THAT CAN WE HAVE A MOTION TO APPROVE MR TUCKER MR CHAIRMAN I'D LIKE TO MAKE A MOTION TO APPROVE THIS RESOLUTION IN SUPPORT OF THE KERSHAW COUNTY APPROVING THE PROPOSED LEGISLATION TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY AND CAN WE HAVE A SECOND SECOND A SECOND from mr gardner uh with that mr tucker would you lead the discussion yes sir thank you mr chairman and council members um i just want to say um what we tried to do is uh cover um the what ifs in this resolution uh the main thing that i want to point out is that the health service district we have been in contact with their attorney and also with chairman um auburn and they are in agreement in suppor

» t of this resolution and i think it covers everything that we had a discussion on earlier and um i didn't hear any additional information from any of you so i um look at as if you were you were okay with what we were moving forward on so that's my discussion uh as far as uh this resolution is and i'm looking forward to getting this in the hopper and moving forward thank you Mr. Chairman. Mr. Gardner. I think due to the changes in our hospital and the changes of the times that it's time to update, how that is regulated and governed, so I think this is a good thing. Very good. Other comments? Mr. Chairman, I'd like to make a motion to amend. Yeah, go ahead, sir.

» I move to amend the motion and proposed resolution presented by adding there shall not, there shall be at least one resident board member from each council district in striking upon up upon appointment to a six-year term a member may not then be reappointed to the board for a successive term without first not serving on the board for a period of at least one year and adding in its place no board member is eligible to serve on the board and may be appointed to serve on the board for more than 10 years in a total service time on the board my proposed resolution is before you do you have a copy for everybody uh pass that out and uh yes sir they're red lined at the bottom okay here we go all right uh we've got it can we have a second is there a second hold on a second i think we need to take a

» moment to read and understand it i would second it for discussion but not approval at this time if that would be appropriate that's the second that's what we do well mr jones just for discussion though i would make the second not to take a vote to approve the amendment yet well it's it's on for a vote but we can just discuss so it's it's a second to put it on the table you want to put it on the table jimmy no i don't know anything about it okay i don't i don't either i'll discuss when we get to some discussion i'll be glad to discuss my concerns okay seeing there is not a second at this time i will move on further discussion um no second um any further discussion on i'll wait for you to finish russell so we can move on i mean i'll give it a second for discussion okay we have a second for di

» scussion all right mr brazel your your amendment is on the table go ahead okay so there shall be at least one resident board member from each council district that will give us representation throughout the county and it it will keep from bunching a bunch of people into you know one or two districts i think that's fair to the county itself um and i think that have some sort of term limits reasonable um we put in here 10 years for a total of service on the board the way it's written you could serve six years you could roll off for a year serve six more years roll off for a year serve six more years roll off for a year serve six more years roll off for a year you know it's it's open-ended okay uh please mr snodgrass uh mr brazel so what's the difference between 0.5 and the point and and the b

» ullet point that you've added uh each member of county council shall nominate a board member based upon his or her representative seat or district and two members at large so the way that reads to me it you could appoint somebody in somebody else's district what i'm proposing is that you would appoint some everybody's district gets representation on the board all six districts and then you've got three more that can you know you can have two from one district up to three in any one single district but it would prevent us from having three in maybe three districts and then a couple of districts without representation and i guess i see what you're saying but i guess in my mind it's going to self-regulate like i'm not when it's not for my appointment i'm going to look within district 5 to make

» my appointment uh but whoever succeeds you may not i just i guess i just i read it a little bit differently as far as the six the um succession now if it's staggered now the language says they gotta be off for one year but naturally it'll be two years because it's staggered every two years right so it's two four six so that means if someone does roll off they're eligible within one year yes but it'll be another year before they even have a chance to be reappointed so technically when you get off your when you get off that board with the way the terms work on the current language it's going to be two years before they even have a chance to get back on the board anyway unless there's a removal or someone leaves is am i reading that mr chairman is correct yeah let's just yeah if i might on tha

» t particular point i understand it a little bit differently okay to get it started you got to get it started that way with different year staggered terms but if you look at the bottom bowling point on the first page terms apart from the initial term would be for a definite term of six years but it'd be another six years uh after that one year gap before someone else could be reappointed that makes sense that's not that's not the way i understood it but maybe yeah so terms apart from the initial term so the initial term uh and i understand that mr dubose you're gonna have to hold our hand if we need it terms apart from the initial term which would be the two four or six year term that's the initial term um that's starting this thing off assuming the legislation passes would be for a definite

» term of six years so everybody after that that gets appointed by county council would be serving for six years that's correct so it's not like you could serve six years take one year off and then serve for another six years because in that one year gap somebody else got appointed that's going to serve for six years correct that makes sense but it's it's but that even though they become six years after that it's all it's like the senator system it's it's in classes i mean every yeah there'll be a there'll be a rotation in thirds a rotation of thirds so are we i think we're agreeing so i think we're agreeing that we're reading it the same way yeah except for i'm trying to emphasize the language here says that after these initial terms and again mr dubose tell me if i'm wrong everybody's going

» to have six-year terms so instead of and under that hypothetical i could understand your concern if it was six years for one person a and then one year and then the same person a could go back on it doesn't work that way for that district as i understand it it'd be six years and then someone else gets appointed in that period of time and they're going to be serving six years unless they resign die or something else happens or we would kick them off for cause you couldn't reappoint that same person that you got person b in there for six years does that make sense mr dubose is my understanding accurate yeah the caveat though of course is the vacancies on the board by resignation death or you know ineligibility and ineligibility being somebody moved outside the county yeah well i just i just m

» entioned that um and then you could you would be reappointed somebody in that circumstance and if they were off for a year they could be reappointed to a vacancy yes somebody could somebody could could theoretically roll off after six years or take a year off roll back on in a different maybe not the same seat but a different seat the way it's written uh i think we're addressing to keep it focused uh are these two i'm gonna get mr jones right now are these two changes stand alone or do they go together well everything works together but they do stand alone as two separate amendments okay uh mr jones go ahead thank you i'd have your attention uh not being to be rude by this one here's where i'm at um i like the work that you've done mr tucker uh has AS THE CURRENT CHAIRMAN OF THE HEALTH RESO

» URCES DISTRICT, HAVE THEY SEEN THESE AMENDMENTS? YES, SIR. WHAT ARE THEIR THOUGHTS ON THE AMENDMENTS? THEY MADE THE AMENDMENTS THAT -- THE AMENDMENTS THAT -- THAT COUNCILMAN BRAZIL -- NO, NO, NO, NO. WE HAVEN'T SEEN THAT. OKAY. WELL, THEN, I CAN'T SUPPORT IT BASED ON THAT. I APPRECIATE COUNCILMAN BRAZIL'S INTENT, BUT BOTTOM LINE IS LET ME TELL YOU WHERE I'M AT ON THIS WITH THE DISTRICTS. I REPRESENT ALL OF KERSHAW COUNTY.

» it's as simple as that i don't like to minimize myself with a district and the people in my district know that i work for them and i'm there for them as hard as i am the people in bethune and antioch and every place else that calls me they know i'm there for them bottom line is i will always i like the fact that initially i'm going to look in my district to make an appointment but i may have someone there may be someone a whole lot better right outside my district that i want to appoint which i have done on occasions you know and it's turned out pretty good so i don't like being hamstringed or handicapped into that let me just say this too i do like the fact that we all make an appointment because it engages all the county council and i think the six years with the one year gap the stars wo

» uld have to be aligned for someone to take another six years after a one-year gap which is a remote possibility based on what i've witnessed over the last 15 years on county council council brother i appreciate your effort and your work on this but i just cannot support the amendment at this time based on those reasons and the fact too that IT IS IMPORTANT TO ME THAT THE HEALTH RESOURCE DISTRICT SEES IT AND THAT THEY'RE COMFORTABLE WITH WHAT WE'RE DOING AND I THINK WITH THIS COUNCIL KIND OF AGREED THAT SAMMY TUCKER WAS GOING TO TAKE THE LEAD AND MEET WITH BOTH ALL THE PARTIES TO BRING IT BACK TOGETHER SO ON BECAUSE OF THAT I WOULD NOT BE SUPPORTING THE AMENDMENT UH MR TUCKER YOU HAD YOUR HAND UP GO AHEAD SIR UM I WAS JUST TRYING TO MAKE CLARITY BECAUSE MR CONNOR IS CORRECT UM ON THE UH IT W

» OULD WILL PROBABLY BE A SIX-YEAR DEAL BEFORE THAT PERSON GETS REAPPOINTED FOR THAT SAME DISTRICT. UNLESS, MR. BROWSER, THEY HAPPEN TO MOVE OUT OF THEIR DISTRICT INTO ANOTHER DISTRICT AND THAT SEAT COMES OPEN FOR WHATEVER REASONS. THE SAFEGUARDS THAT'S IN HERE IS TO KEEP FROM -- AND DO KNOW THAT IT KEEPS FOR THE COUNCILMEMBER WHERE THEY CAN GET BEST CANDIDATES FOR THE HEALTH DISTRICT BOARD, WHICH I THINK IS VERY IMPORTANT, REPRESENT THEIR DISTRICT.

» IF THEY CHOOSE NOT TO PUT ONE SOMEONE IN THEIR DISTRICT, THEY to deal with their constituents who vote for them and i think that's the most uh uh or best uh what's the word i'm trying to say um oversight that you can have is back to the people the other is we want everybody to appoint as soon as possible that's why we put the 90 days in there because the health district also agreed that they don't want vacancies to go on the health service district because they need the board to be filled so they can do their business so we've gone over this PRETTY THOROUGHLY THE CHAIRMAN AND I FROM THE SELF-HELP SERVICE DISTRICT AND TRYING TO MAKE SURE THAT WE DON'T BE CHAIRMAN AUGBURN THAT'S CORRECT TO TRY TO MAKE SURE THAT WE WE CATCH EVERY LITTLE POSSIBILITY NOTHING'S BULLET-PROOF OR 100 PERCENT BUT I T

» HINK WE'VE COVERED THAT AND YOU KNOW THINGS HAPPEN THIS IS A REVOLVING DOCUMENT SO IT MAY NEED TO BE TWEAKED YEARS FROM NOW OR SOME TIME FROM NOW I'M NOT TELLING YOU IT'S BULLET-PROOF OKAY MR. JONES VERY QUICKLY IN respect i'll get you next time i mean of course now i will say this if if you want to postpone this and let's take it back and let the chairman auburn look at i i don't mind that either but i just will not support this without the health we don't have time being involved yeah yeah we got crossover coming up didn't say i was gonna make the motion mr connell please ben connell please go mr chairman i can see i can see russell's uh or mr brazel's concern i mean this this uh document does influence legislation so as mr tucker said you know we can edit it but once the legislation's pa

» ssed who knows when the next session will pop up and all that so we kind of be fairly certain so i i satisfied myself on the first point that i think it's taking care of um generally and that mr jones is right sometimes you might want to appoint somebody outside of your district if they have a very high competency in it competency in a particular area and then it's capped at three resident members for no more than three in a particular district right so you've got some protections there the second thing i just want to make sure i'm clear on and understanding uh no board member is eligible to serve essentially the term limits on it one year one problem i see with the 10-year restriction mr brazel helped me understand is you've got it set up in thirds like we're talking about before so if som

» eone served a six-year term had a no one-year gap and somehow got reappointed and they served another four-year term that can misalign the classes so that instead of having the third staggered you might we might actually misalign the classes and have like you'd have more people serving in one term and then have more i call it intellectual value on the board falling off that makes sense so for that reason i probably couldn't support that one but i get the idea i think we have some protections in here that would push against or let us control uh people getting reappointed in inappropriate ways um i don't want to go into another topic if we still have questions on well actually no this is still on the table are we ready uh this one's still on the table so uh are we ready to vote on russell do

» you want to say anything further well on the amendment on the amendment yeah regarding the amendment um that says there shall be at least one resident board member from each council district mr jones i don't think that handcuffs you to having to vote for someone in your district specifically although you could or you couldn't um but i think could i get a legal opinion on that from the attorney yes sure yeah it doesn't say you have to nominate somebody from your district but does say you have to have one person from each district so if you got in a situation where there was no one from that district then the next nomination would have to be from that district because you would be out of compliance with the statute kind of same situation we have now a little bit yeah it's ties your hands well

» it just means you got to have one person in each district well now it's townships so that's different but it's going to district yes yeah thank you um other comments on russell um that's pretty cut and dry i think yeah i want to say this and uh several of you have touched on it mr jones and mr tucker have uh this has been a joint effort by both this body and by the health district and i started out with congratulations to the uh vic carpenter and and mr dubose to sally harrell and mr ogburn this has been a joint effort um this is more than close enough to me this is 99.9 and i thank mr tucker for your hard work on all this has already been recognized i don't i don't want to have to go back and slow down as i mentioned exigent circumstances we're trying to make this legislative cycle uh and

» that's why we need to do it today i don't want to and I have to go back into a committee and review these things. I think the fundamentals of a great, continued great health services district are in this document. If there are no further comments, I'm ready to move the amendment to a vote and we'll run to a discussion of the base document. Any further comments? - Mr. Chairman. - Yeah, Mr. Russell, go right ahead. - I will support it, although I would like to see a term limit added. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like that's possible, but I do not want to hold up moving forward in this legislation. Very good. All right. With that, we're now going to vote on Mr. Brazel's amendment. All those in favor, signify by raising. Jimmy, go ahead. I do think there is term limits in this. There are.

» Because if you only do six years, then you have to get off a year. So there is a term limit. I just want to make that clear. Term limits of a different sort. Thank you, Jimmy. That's a good clarification. with that let's move to a vote all those in favor of the amendment signify by raising your hand that's mr brazel and all those opposed signify by raising your hand and it's mr jones mr connell mr burns mr gardner mr tucker and mrs snodgrass so the amendment fails we move now to the base document and ben i believe you had uh order of priority please sir yeah i'm sorry i was absent last meeting and also related to executive session but i do want one point of clarification here mr So third bullet point up from the bottom on the second page where it talks about filling a vacancy if it occurs,

» let's see, term ending. So when it says the representative county council member who nominated the predecessor has 90 days, if something happens and there's a special election or that county council member that appointed, we're not talking about the individual who actually nominated because it uses who. but do we mean, or is the interpretation there, the representative seat for that county council district? It means if you have a vacancy. On the board, on the health district. On the health district board, yes. Nothing to do with the seat. I said county. Hypothetically, something happens, and there's a vacancy on the health services district board, and then I die, or two days after that occurs, I die, or I get sick.

» The way this reads to me, you could go either way, and I just want to make sure we have the interpretation the right way, is it says I would have to be the one within 90 days to do it. Otherwise, the rights within my district default to the council to appoint it. So I just want to make sure when we say representative county council member who nominated the predecessor, we actually mean the seat. We mean the person that nominated in the other one. Each council member makes a nomination. So, Mr.

» Connell, you nominate for seat, and person you nominate then either dies resigns or moves outside the county those would be the three situations so that seat is vacant then you have 90 days a person that made that seat has 90 days but you're correct if that seat is vacant because you resigned from county council or for whatever reason or you just don't make it or you're incapacitated physically incapacitated or mentally incapacitated and not able to make it, then it defaults to the entire council as a whole for somebody, anybody, to fill that seat. Of course, then it goes back to you when it's done again or the seat, I put it that way. So thanks for that clarification. This is my thought. I feel like that should be reserved to the district seat as opposed to the individual.

» Something happens in that 90 days that it should be reserved to the county council member that holds that seat that appointed the immediate predecessor does that make sense makes a lot of sense is that your interpretation though canada my interpretation is that seat has to be filled within 90 days the only thing mr connell is correct if that seat is vacant uh-huh wait a minute let's be clear if the person of this on this board that seat is vacant correct then it falls to who it defaults to the council okay if if we at 45 days council member x leaves office and somebody else comes in then that new person would pick up their responsibility correct it says representative the county council member doesn't say the county council member it says the member for that seat okay so that's what i'm try

» ing to that's what ben's trying to get you to say that's correct for that thing so by representation you mean the person that is legally sitting in that district seat at the time yes that's all i need to hear thank you all right excuse me i'm sorry mr connell that's full of tea look if i if i can i i really appreciate the dialogue here because this is a very important document and just kind of thank you so much for clarifying that and mr president really appreciated your amendment as well too just not being blindsided yeah other comments uh mr snoggrass real quick i would say mr tucker thank you for your work on on this um and it moves us forward and uh with with our board and most importantly to me uh it it uh it holds true to the home rule act of 1975 which is which is most important beca

» use it ensures that the individuals that are going to sit on this board that have this great responsibility are going to be are going to be accountable to to council which are accountable to the citizens of kershaw county and so the fact that it keeps it keeps a home rule line is very important to me and so thank you so much for working this out and uh and also ben i don't like to talk about you dying let's talk about if you get like the president or something like that i'm going to be more optimistic no no you may get like the president or something like that okay mr chairman if i might mr dubose and i live in this world where we go through hypotheticals all the time some of them are more but some are not but you got to figure out different ways to apply the law and just while i have the f

» loor mr chairman i was going to say i support this overall because it leads to a more balanced representation throughout the county right now we're uh we're our health services districts based on townships that don't exist and and provinces and antiquated uh designations in kershaw county just aren't there anymore and it gives for my concern it gives the west watery area a more fair representation and that's where the population is growing and thus that's where you're going to have a lot of health care needs coming in the future. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Other comments? I do want to say that what I appreciate more than anything about where we're at here today is that 15 years ago, Councilman Tucker and myself went through a horrendous battle with the hospital, hospital board.

» Everything got changed over and totally reappointed. And the folks that are on there now have put blood and sweat and time and equity into where we're at. And they were very instrumental in working with this council on the document. it sits before us here today so i thank everybody for that and with that i will read the names of that board that this council appointed nick moore katie candy darryl ogburn his chair walter long john kumis eric bolin eric gunter wayne tidwell and shannon west and i think everyone here would join me in appreciating their service as particularly as they have negotiated through several changes of hands in the hospital retaining quality care a small pandemic called covid assistance to us in in vision 2030 by taking authority to provide grants to important health ca

» re notions that are contained in the vision 2030 and so on and then let's not forget the carish wing which we're all very proud of and the possibility of a move across town across dusty bend to beechwood so all those things should be remembered i also want to just point out maybe there are further comments but we've spent most of our time talking about what we as a team will do and sustaining such quality people as the names i just read off but i would ask you just to remember that the important paragraph is the scope and duties and authority that mr tucker and mr dubose and sally harrell and mr ogburn and the attorneys for the health district spent time on that first paragraph talks about their authority and mission so dwell on that a little bit and see how profoundly fortunate we are in k

» ershaw county with the leadership that's been given to us by health services board and by the maintenance of a viable modernized statute that allows our county to have a hospital and health care of a larger sense as is envisioned 2030 because of that wonderful health services board i just want to thank you all for coming in on monday thursday it shows the people of this county how this county council is devoted to them and the maintenance and sustenance of a quality health care any other comments before we move to a vote i think we're ready to move a vote all those in favor of mr tucker's uh proposal signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous thank you and with that i will take a motion to adjourn let's make a motion second ben first uh mr tucker you're a little slow today yes uh any d

» iscussion i'll just say just some housekeeping thanks again to the health services district and to you six gentlemen and to our staff that made this happen it's been a fantastic move forward i will tell you that mr dubose is going to provide me a letter as i walk out here that will go to the delegation and to the media and uh to the health services district to make it clear what we have done today i also want to remind you the county is going to be closed on good friday on passover tomorrow and that our next time we meet will be on the 6th of april for a budget meeting at 10 o'clock right vic all right and can we make sure media gets copies of this uh uh danny if you would please as as miss mary's uh substitute and lastly uh i wish you all a happy easter let's move to a vote all those in favor signify happy easter and uh we are dismissed happy easter everybody