Full meeting transcript - January 25, 2022

» ready it's a great day in kershaw county i will point out to members on the council you have a draft resolution here jimmy is that the one you want everybody to look at that's correct that resolution there's a wrestle i make the following motion i'll do that when you get to it good i just pointed out to everybody uh and other than that i think you've got some stuff from the rec department it's a great day in kershaw county all-american county we've been through snow and ice and earthquakes and pandemics number three or whatever i can lose count and then we've had a tornado two years ago what a great team we continue to move forward as a county and in spite of that we had our own governor recognize kershaw county three times last week in the state of the state first of all the valor and prof

» essionalism that stems from our students and our local high schools this one in particular new golf elgin high school mr connell would be quick to point out he was a wrestler but he was a sergeant sergeant major that won the medal of honor and he was asked to stand by the governor secondly uh prestige farms with the help of jeff burgess back there and vic carpenter leading us with investments in uh industrial parks brought in 139 million dollars in investment 300 jobs and prestige farms was asked to stand and lastly our own school district of which we are enormously proud 10 000 students wonderful teachers recognized for laboring on in a way that was exemplary which means a big worry which means was really great uh that demonstrated to the rest of the state how it's done that's kershaw coun

» ty uh with that uh we've had a rough week a lot of great leaders in our county have passed away and uh in particular our own administrator has lost a family member so with that i would ask you to stand with me and and have a moment of silence thank you amen i ask you to remain standing for the invocation and the pledge of allegiance and i'll lead the invocation uh remembering the words in the good book that blessed is the nation whose god is the lord and with that i pray to the heavenly father that we do adore you and worship you and we invoke your holy name today and every day and leading our lives and our deliberations so that all that we say do and think all that we embrace all that we lift up is to your honor and glory and this we ask in the holy name of your son our savior and let all

» the people say amen amen and with that join me in the pledge of allegiance to our great country i pledge allegiance thank you please be seated with that uh mr devos can you do the honors do we have people signed up for public comments i'm mr chairman no one signed up okay very good and so we'll move to the adoption of the agenda it's a tab you know let's see it's up on the board and it's the first chart in your electronic books and we have a motion so move mr gardener a second second second for mr connell any discussion i would have one piece of discussion i've at the request of our wonderful sheriff's department we're going to move his agenda item from a new business and move that up very much i'm going to ask that it be installed and be amended so that we'll do it immediately after approv

» al of the minutes can we have a motion to amend the agenda i think most of them in the agenda mr chairman and a second second any discussion uh just as i said the sheriff's has got business and we're delighted that you're able to get out of there and go do the work that we need you to do for our great county sir with that uh second was mr connell and with that we moved to a vote it was all right and with that we moved to vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and the agenda is amended and with that we ask the sheriff to come up the item and i'll introduce is uh the acceptance of a state grant for our wonderful sros sheriff please sir well i can get uh this is going to take a motion come up so this is going to take a motion uh so can we have a motion to appro

» ve these state grant for sros so move mr chair uh mrs snodgrass the second second all right i'll give that to mr connell if you don't mind all right good now okay sheriff go right ahead that was kind of easy right into the budget now uh this is uh two additional sros that will complete all of our sros for you know have one in every school This is a goal that was set out by these ladies here over three years ago when they started our Kershaw County Coalition for Safer Schools. They came here and spoke before this council or the majority of this council on trying to get an SR in every school. Then it was kind of a dream, kind of a push forward.

» We didn't know whether it'd ever be able to be achieved or not, but here we are three years later and we've just completed it with the approval of council on these these two positions that are 100% funded by the state would understand well this is going to be two vehicles also they're going all out with it and this is the first time and in history we've had SRO in every school so it's a real goal where we're glad to be there and we definitely appreciate these ladies here we're gonna let them speak to council also right now and identify yourself everybody in the Facebook land is sure my name is Leanne Torres a few years back I started the Kershaw County Coalition for safer schools later renamed the South Carolina Coalition for safer schools and I came in after having just moved here I grew u

» p here but I moved back here because this was the school district I wanted my student my kids in and I'm a career changer I went from pastor's wife and mama only to um doing an alternative certification because i wanted to be in our schools too when i moved back here i thought man this there's no other school district i want my kids in and i would love to work in here because i want to help change from the inside out um and our school district was already great i just wanted to be a part of that and so i knew that we had some um my mom's gonna make me cry here some pretty high ambitions when we started this i knew that that how something like this could be funded could also be very challenging um and i know that i came in with a um a little bark to me as well um but i first of all thank you

» thank you um for everything that you've done i'm honored to be able to come and talk to you guys about this on this end of things as well and thank you all for everything that you've done jimmy um especially your aggressive support of it from day one you have a big mark say again big bark thank you um but uh i just really appreciate everything that everybody has done to work together to make this happen and this is a big testament to um why i love this county so much so thank you all very much i appreciate it can you introduce the other ladies yes so these were my um my biggest helpers when we started this thing um this is shelly fox and my mother donnell powers and um they i can't even tell you the work they put in and the dedication they put in to um our small part in making this happen s

» o thank you both so much for that thank you can you just hold for a second uh comments uh gentlemen i have a question mr tucker um how long is the grant for And we all know that grants eventually run out. So I'm just curious on how long this is going to last. So we'll know what we're looking at in a few years on what we have to do. There's been no limit on this grant. Each year we put in for them, and we've already put in for next year's. So this will be the year-to-year that Doug puts in for them for the school district. School district has to put in for the money. Cuz these are two positions of six we have total coming from the state.

» then we've worked things out with the school district where they're paying toward sro funding so we've uh we've been able to get more through several different means but this this state program has given us six all together and uh we look to keep applying each year for those and please do other comments mr snodgrass sure sheriff so is this is this from a program like a new program or just a grant that's always been there that's new okay is it a result of maybe some some covid funding or arpa or before that okay yeah this come before that this was all from a push from a lot of citizens that wanted sros in every school pushed to the uh and made it to the governor's office the state funding that's coming out uh when they first come out it's been about i think two years ago when they first come

» out they told each county how many they were eligible to apply for it it was four for us so we applied for the four we got them some counties wasn't misfortune at us is they couldn't um they couldn't feel the slots that they were available so once the money was not spent it kind of started getting spread out to other counties and and now it's i think dps is running the funding now so we just we applied for two more that would have completed us out and we we just got them so excellent and i'll finish that with this ladies thank you so much for pushing this i mean this is i mean this is really a beautiful picture of how like government like like uh functional government uh good thing efficient government i should say gets things done is citizens get behind something uh you pushed it uh and yo

» u stayed with it and uh you guys didn't come in like pointing fingers or whatever but it was just this aggressive hey this is a issue that we need to tackle and i remember this was a hot issue when three years ago when we were running and and the answer was all about bringing together a team like the school board alone wasn't going to solve it the county alone wasn't going to solve it the sheriff wasn't alone going to solve it but it was all about like coming together and so i would say thank you so much because you guys were the glue uh i think you got you guys were the glue that kind of brought this all together so that all these government entities could work together to make this happen so i thank y'all so much thank you other comments uh mr jones listen leah and shelley y'all burnt my

» phone up i can remember those years those you know a few years back when they were going they were trying to do away with the sros you were not the sheriff at that time well these moms miss powers they hit the roof and uh excuse me i never thought i would see the day even though i supported that we would have an sro in every school i was scared to death that we were going to lose yeah i remember sammy tom we all stood firm on making sure those sros were were going to stay there but there was the threat back then of trying to remove some out uh but not after you guys got on board there's no doubt in my mind that this would not have happened if you moms have not gotten in it and if we had not had the right sheriff at the right time as well and so i want to thank you first you guys made we get

» the easy part we get to vote on it you know you guys went out and made this happen with the sheriff and thank you so much for what you've done for our children and this is this is easy tonight an easy yes thank you so much other comments you forgot the part about it not an extra penny to the taxpayers of kershaw there is not an extra penny to the taxpayers that's opm other people's money uh mr carnell ladies great work thank you very much i think this goes to show that whenever citizens get involved you can sometimes get even more done because you've heard us and the sheriff say years ago and now that we apply every year for everything that we can get and here you've gotten involved and we're able to get a little bit more which is great i had one follow-up question on the vehicles that's re

» ally interesting doug that they have a vehicle that associated with this grant are there any renewable funds each year with the application or is the vehicle one time and then we just working into our fleet maintenance program yeah it's just a one-time deal as far as we know now i mean the funds could change from year to year. We could get a different governor. A lot of things could change, but as of right now, we're looking at funding two vehicles. We asked for the other four also, but we're going to take what we can get, and we'll find a vehicle. We'll take it, and we'll put them in the fleet maintenance. Thanks. Good job. Other comments? Well, this has been a pleasure to see you all again. Thank you for your advocacy for our county, your county. I'd like to make a comment. Yeah, Mr.

» O'Brien, go ahead. Hey, you know, it's more to an SRO than just being a police officer. I've talked with a few of them at length about how they've counseled students, been a friend, been a mentor, you know, as many teachers as well. So I want to thank you for all the work that you put in. It's a big deal when people stop what they're doing, forget about their jobs, and focus on something. This was not easy to do.

» didn't follow it but as i know things are just hard to push through all the red tape and and all the different folks that you have to get on board i applaud you for what y'all have done and lee thank you for all your support with with this as well it's a job well done thank you thank you sheriff thanks for having you over here and we want to get you back out but thanks for coming in and terrific to have you here what a joy and with that i call the question and we can go to a vote all those in favor signify and it's unanimous well done thank you sheriff thank you ladies all right let's go back to the agenda it's up on the board the next item on the agenda is approval of minutes tab a page four in your electronic books can we have a motion to approve make a motion to approve mr mr tucker seco

» nd second mr gardner any discussion on the minutes uh seeing there are none we move to a vote all those in favor signify and it's unanimous and approved and now that we move on to public presentation by the kershaw county recreation department shane duncan please come on up sir we're looking forward to this well i appreciate you guys having us here tonight um what i want to do first i'm not going to be actually be given a presentation one of my um full-time uh employees will be doing it because uh he and uh gunner Kato and Amy Peebles have been very instrumental in all of our special events and we're gonna basically give you guys an update on what we did in this past year with one being a really big one this past December with the tinsel trail the first thing I want to do is um if I could g

» et everybody from Parks and Recreation to come on up just come right up here on the side for me please we have to do this just so the people in a Facebook land can see what's going on. Now, I have such a big group with me today because I've brought most of my maintenance crew with me. And the reason for that is these guys don't often look for recognition. They're the front line who's always out there getting their hands dirty and doing all these things, keeping these parks look nice and actually getting those light displays and all that stuff ready for the tensile trail.

» And I just felt like it was fitting to go ahead and recognize these guys we have uh from my right to my left we have scott holly he is our maintenance uh super superintendent paul witt he's part of the maintenance staff james davis is part of the maintenance staff willie peebles is our crew chief we have uh glenn cobb who was actually our park ranger and jacob neal who works on the maintenance staff so all these guys had a part in all those special events and the uh getting that uh that tensile trail prepared now some had different parts because some spent more time than others out there. But mainly our park ranger, Glenn, he spends a lot of time out there.

» He was the one who went out there and turned those lights on and off and getting fussed at by the community for turning them off too early. So he talked to a lot of people during the month of December. All right? But just, like I said, I just want to recognize these guys and I appreciate what they do. And I think that the rest of the county should feel the same way because they put a lot of hard, you know, sweat and tears into that stuff. And we have some very, very, very talented people on our maintenance staff. Those gas pits that you see out at the River Park, these guys built them. Those fence, the wooden fencing around the parking areas, these guys built it. Okay. And we'll have more to come in the future. And it's great to have a staff on hand who can do those type of things.

» um to where we don't have to bid it out to someone else so appreciate you guys and i turn around so facebook land can see you you often face the camera wherever that is it's up there it's up there up there right up there so what i'll do is i'll let these guys go because a couple of them have something to do glenn is actually on his way back out to the river to uh start shutting that down so uh i'll let these guys leave and uh we'll have gunner cato come up at the uh presentation thank you very much let me move this down since i'm a little bit vertically challenged compared to shane um so as shane mentioned i'm gonna go over the 2021 special events this is kind of an overview of what what fall consisted for us at the watery river veterans park so our first event that we had october 2nd it wa

» s our touch a truck event um this was actually the same day that we had opening day jamborees for soccer and football. So it was very busy for Parks and Rec on October 2nd. So these are some pictures. Every event, you're going to have some pictures that you can see. But we had 1,200 attendees for the Touch a Truck event. We had 18 vendors, which totaled 45 vehicles. And we partnered with the Camden Junior Welfare League. They helped with parking. They helped with the logistics coming in and out of the park.

» Because with 1,200 people attending, it was pretty hectic at times so going to the next event we have our jack-o'-lantern jamboree which was our halloween event last year they did a halloween movie when i came in i kind of wanted to make this more of an event like our halloween trail like let's put all of it together so we had our trigger treat trail we had a costume contest a drive-in movie and we also had food trucks there this was october 30th so october was a very busy month for us we go from october 2nd to our touch a truck event to the 30th with our halloween event so at the with the 1200 attendees at the touch a truck we're like that's that's max that's that's a really good number for kershaw county our halloween event we had 1400 we had 17 vendors um and i can confidently say that a

» ll 17 vendors ran out of candy so that's something that we'll have to do better next year more vendors more candy and this was sponsored by mid carolina credit union as you see on this slide we have some pictures it was it was a real fun event family event family oriented we spaced everyone out so you're able to social distance as uh Mr. Burns said we're on part three of the pandemic so we're trying to do everything that we can to make it safe and fun family oriented for everyone in the county so then going to the next event this was the culminating event of 2021 um our Tencel Trail. This is a drone shot of the trail. And this is near and dear to my heart because I started this job January 11th of 2021. So I've been there just over a year.

» But in my interview with Shane and Jeremy, they kind of brought up, what would you do different if you got hired at this job? And the first thing that came to my mind was I saw this event in Huntsville, Alabama. They've been doing it for 13 years, and I was like, I love Christmas, I love lights, and I love Kershaw County. Let's do a tinsel trail. Next thing I know, Shane gives me a call next week, and he's like, hey, you got the job. You start January 11th. Cool, okay? Now we have to start doing this. It sounded really good in the interview, but I had no idea how hard this would be. For example, the whole premise of the tinsel trail is getting Christmas trees and having people sponsor this Christmas tree with a company. So we had F.J.

» Rabin and they put toilet paper and poop emojis all over the Christmas tree. All right. We had we had a lot of fun designs out there. But little did I know that there's a five year waiting list for Christmas trees. Five years. If you want real Christmas trees in bulk, you got to wait five years. So once I got that phone call, was like hey shane uh tinsel trail might be happening in 2026.

» um but we i there there's this woman her name is kat she's up in tennessee and i she probably gave me trees because i was very annoying to her every day every day hey hey kat how are you doing good morning any trees available i'm put on the waiting list put on the waiting list got a call in july saying hey gunner we have 50 trees for you okay problem is we can't ship it to you you got to come and pick them up road trip i went with amy people's one day road trip we left off at seven o'clock and got back at about seven o'clock right 12 hours we loaded them ourselves um it was great we might have we might have to do it again um but this time we'll make it a two-day event so as i was saying i got this idea from Huntsville and whenever I got in office January 11th of this year how do I how do I

» do this how do I go about making a tinsel trail Huntsville like I said they're they're they're the pinnacle they're they're what you want to be in a tinsel trail they have about 350 trees uh they have a lot of people it's it's America's event a lot of people go there it's real big tourism for Huntsville so I reach out to Chad Emerson as you see CEO and president of downtown Huntsville who puts on this event no don't hear anything from him no phone calls no text messages no email he said this at their tree lighting ceremony he said we have a lot of people calling asking questions and trying to imitate us but no one can do it like Huntsville so I'm a very very competitive person and just hearing how he's gonna ghost us at little Kershaw County so this is I want Chad to know this is our first

» year but we're coming we're coming for chat spot okay so that that's just a little motive that's just a little motivation so to kind of see how big the tinsel trail was for us we go to community engagement I consider this a soft opening for year one because we didn't we didn't market it we didn't put it we didn't have a website or anything like that the only way was word-of-mouth and Facebook our social media page so in order to realize how big December was for us, you have to look at the previous months. So from August to November, four months, we did 30 posts on our Kershaw County Parks and Rec Facebook page. We had 44,582 page reach. That's your views on your posts. That is an average of 1,486 views per post. Cool. That's pretty good. I like it.

» The major events during this four-month span, touch a truck. As I mentioned, 1200 and attendees halloween event 1400 attendees we had our bark bark grand opening and we had the start of basketball registration which is pretty hectic for us so now we go to december one month versus four months we had 18 posts in december 83 126 page reach views on posts an average of 4,618. Our major events during this one month span, Central Trail. That's it. No more. So obviously, let's compare them. So if you look at August, November, what you see in red is the greater than. August, November, four months, obviously, you're going to have more posts. But then you look at December, we almost two times the total amount of views on our posts.

» We three times the views per post, and we gained 271 followers in that 30-day span, which is a 243% increase on our average of only gaining 79 followers per month. This is some pictures of the Tinsel Trail. And like I said, this event spanned from November 30th to January 2nd, and it couldn't have been possible without everyone that you saw up here and more. From all of our full-time staff, even Jeremy Murphy, Mandy Gilbert, our receptionist and Tina Eddings, our finance specialist, to everyone on our maintenance department. Everyone played a role in making this great for Kershaw County. And like I said, I love lights. I love Christmas. I love Kershaw County and I love smiles. And that's what we're in the business of recreation doing.

» We want to make our county smile and we want to make, we want to bring stuff to the community that they haven't had before. So moving forward, this is the military in me, sustains and improves. Our priority list moving forward to make it even better in 2022 more trees um if i had to take two trucks up there to tennessee i'm gonna go get more trees i'll go with you i like it i like it thank you i got you uh we we only have about one third of the track uh wired with electricity we want to do the two thirds we we want the whole trail to be as much lights as possible but that's not only for our tensile trail event electricity and all these things priority list it helps with the park's well-being overall the touch of trucks the halloween events christmas events easter events that we're going to

» put on this year summer events drive-in movies everything that we do at that park it's all benefited from this priority list which is a restroom facility a mobile restroom facility there's one in kershaw county right now and it's the city of camden with these events we had the restroom facility for our halloween event which was awesome touch a truck 1200 people we had port-a-potties two december port-a-potties for the entire tinsel trail two um another exit and entrance logistics we had no idea how big of a hit this park and these events would be so it gets pretty hectic out there on highway one um traffic backed up so we need to work with the sheriff's department get some stuff out there but another exit and entrance to make it light years beyond what it is right now lighting the parks ver

» y dark so I'd like to light it up light poles it allows us to extend our hours because currently six o'clock parks closed right now but we have to lock up the park and the people in the community can't utilize the park so we get the lighting more people can use it people are just coming home right now from Columbia because that's where a lot of people live so lighting is huge for us seasonal workers and obviously more displays more lights more happiness more smiles more pictures so that's kind of that's kind of it that's why I wanted to go over if y'all have anything any questions comments or concerns we're here to take them yeah mr.

» Connell how old are you now I'm 23 years old yeah so so I what's funny about this is when I was a young kid and coming up through high school your mom was slapped me around trying to teach me the right lessons and keep me in the right way she's still slapping me around yeah well then hopefully you'll turn out okay because her lessons hopefully work well with me one of the concerns I've had since I graduated high school was brain drain y'all heard me talk about it many times in Kershaw County that we don't have jobs locally enough to attract talent and super educated and people who have great moral compasses back to the area it's so refreshing to see that theory I have just the bubble pop tonight that you know we haven't experienced brain drain we have somebody great who's working here at th

» e county and i'm so happy that you're here uh one of the things that i wanted to mention is thank you council for your support a few years ago whenever we purchased this park it turns out i think it's one of the best ideas we ever made in recreation um and i appreciate your support whenever we made that motion initially something else that stuck out to me is that this particular tinsel trail event incidentally or not is the longest running christmas and thus christ focused for me event that the county's ever put on and i think that really says something about our community um i appreciate y'all's effort the ingenuity uh dialing in in a modern age to social media and maximizing that it's just great and i think this is a really not only is it centrally located in the county which is great but

» um but now people have a reason to go and enjoy themselves and participate thank you yes sir thank you other comments uh mr jones when did you grow up You know, it just seems like yesterday you were... I haven't hit the growth spurt yet. How is your mom and dad? Everyone's doing well. Listen, you know that I am your mom's favorite, not Sammy Tucker. She said I can't tell anybody that, so don't tell anybody. We're going to fight. Well, first off, Gunnar, I just want to tell you I'm very proud of you. Very proud of you. I've watched you grow up. We did a little karate together when you were smaller, and you called me Batman. You've probably called me a few other things lately.

» But listen, thank you for all you've done, and I love your enthusiasm, and I think you're going to do well with Kershaw County. Hope we don't lose you. Thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you. Russell, please. You know, obviously everybody's known you since you were like six. I've never met you until tonight that I can recall. I love your enthusiasm. It makes me so happy. You've absolutely put a smile on my face. You care. You're into your job. You care about your job. And obviously you're good at your job. I HOPE THAT YOU'RE ABLE TO DO THINGS MORE IN DEPTH WITH THE RECREATION DEPARTMENT, AND WE REALLY LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU GROW IN YOUR POSITION, AND CONGRATULATIONS ON THE TENCIL TRAIL.

» EVERYBODY I TALKED TO ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT, NOT A NEGATIVE WORD, SO CONGRATULATIONS, AND THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING YOU'VE DONE. YES, SIR. THANK YOU. MR. TUCKER, I SAW YOUR HAND. THANK YOU, SIR, MR. CHAIRMAN. I WANT TO SAY, FIRST OF ALL, THANK YOU, SHANE AND AMY, FOR YOUR LEADERSHIP AND RUNNING THE the recreation department and bringing on good people. I can remember running into Shane and asking him how his interviews were going for this position gunner. And he said, "Man, I think I got the right one. "You just gonna have to wait and see. "He's young and he's energetic." You never lied, man. You have your mother's spirit, you are full of it. And it's a good thing, and it is a good thing.

» So stay energetic, stay energized, and continue to bring thought-provoking and innovative things back to Kershaw County that's what we need as folks like me and the one to my left here old farts need younger people to step up and and bring in today ideas so thank all of you thank the rec department as a whole and I just want to say keep up the good work yes sir thank you mr.

» Snodgrass or gunner do you enjoy working for Kershaw County I love it that's awesome that's awesome thank you so much for just having just a contagious spirit and a work ethic Shane thank you so much for just letting him loose and having at it this was a great event my family we were able to enjoy the trail and I mean I was super impressed with the design with the flow how it looked I loved your innovation you just didn't have lights out there but I'm a part of the Kiwanis Club and you reached out to us and we did a story walk out there like even that showed your ambition so we kind of went into it thinking okay we'll do a story walk and then he emails and says I need five story walks all right all right we'll keep up with you yeah yeah we got you and so love that I love that picture I don'

» t know if Danny can go back to it but that drone picture of the of the park oh yeah you got their mood man that you guys see that mm-hmm like I think a couple years ago when we were having this even before I got on council we were having this great debate about this piece of property you know I think you know I appreciate the ones who saw that vision you know who saw that property that had just sat there for so many years but there was there people who saw they envision that and when I saw that drone footage I mean it just it just gives me excitement because not everyone agrees with this and it's okay they can be wrong but recreation like recreation is a part of the circle that adds to a thriving community and even adds, is a part of what Jeff's job is.

» So when Shane does his job and does it well, and you do your job well, it makes Jeff's job a whole lot easier when it comes to attracting economic development because they see community life like this. I was out there at the Tencent Trail. Man, people were smiling. It was just this great spirit. It's Christmas.

» and so thank you so much and shane tell your maintenance guys great job i know a lot of that work they did um the parking they did the things they built uh that was a lot of in-house and so a lot of talent out there i'm looking forward to to where you take this and uh and let's let's get your guy like a wi-fi or a timer switch so he didn't have to go turn the lights off on his own and uh so i think we can we can work that out we can work that out good job gunner this is awesome yes sir thank you other comments uh mr gardner gunner you know i've told you a great job this was uh we made several trips out there and you know it was it was just uh such an awesome sight especially an awesome sight from the bridge when you drive by it was just unbelievable what it looked like and uh just heard so

» many comments and uh i look forward to the next idea that you borrow from somebody else and that's perfectly okay because uh i mean that's what we do you know we We don't have to reinvent the wheel. We just take somebody else's wheel. Borrow and do it better. And, you know, that's what we do. But, you know, you go back and you look at touch truck and all the other things that the rec department does. I mean, those are, and I don't know if we stole that somewhere, but it's okay if we did. But, you know, it's a great event. It's a great event for the community, for the county, for the kids, just like this was right here. And, again, I look forward to the next one that we put together. but just a great job and look forward to the Easter and all the other things you've got coming along.

» Yes, sir, and a special thank you to you for the T-shirts and making them. Thank you. Thank you for the hard work that you do. Yeah, I just want to point out that I've watched, since your arrival, the gray hair accumulate in Shane Duncan's hair. Welcome. I'm going to cut it short because we're a little over time, but, boy, this has been fun. Let's not forget the 50 sponsors that came from all over the county to sponsor those trees. And also, now you get on to winter sports, Shane. Let's see you win your next accolade. With that, thank you, gentlemen. Let's have a round of applause. Thank y'all. Sorry, I just wanted to let you guys know there were three maintenance guys that were not able to come tonight. I just want to mention their names. William Campbell. Who else was it? Blank Stevens.

» And... There was one more. I'm sorry, his name is slipping. Jody Mims, okay? Those three guys were not able to come, but they had a huge part in it, too. And the last thing I'll point out is there's a little background history with Gunner. We originally hired him as an athletics guy. Well, we lost another athletics guy. When we lost him, we quickly decided that we needed to create a program superintendent position just for him. Okay. And he's already killing it. So, I think right now, best hire I've made so far. Amen. You can see. They just do a great job of making the recreation department look good, and it kind of makes me look good as well, but I have to make sure they get all the credit, okay? Amen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Shane. Mr.

» Chairman, just for the record, there might be a little bit more gray there, but he's looking real good because he's still got his hair. I'm envious. yeah army strong kershaw strong thank you very much everybody that was just great uh we move now to the next item on the agenda if you'll bring that up and it's uh a proclamation for black history month we've just completed martin luther king now birthday it's at tab b page six in your electronic books i propose to read and then take a motion a proclamation honoring national black History Month, whereas Kershaw County celebrates February as National Black History Month to recognize the vast contributions of black African-Americans in our nation's history and identity, and whereas Black History Month grew out of the establishment in 1926 during

» the second week of February of Negro History Week by Carter G. Woodson and the Association for the Study of African-American life and history. This week was chosen because it coincides with the birthday of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. And whereas Black History Month and the United States was first proposed by black educators and the black United Students at Kent State University in February of 1969, six years later it was being celebrated all across the country. President Gerald Ford recognized Black History Month in 1976 during the celebration of the U.S. Bicentennial. He urged Americans to seize the opportunity to honor the too often neglected accomplishments of black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.

» And whereas 2022 national theme for the observance of black history, health and wellness, and whereas Kershaw County Council is deeply committed to equity and inclusion. This stance includes the cultural and racial affirmation of all our citizens and community members who identify as black African-American and whereas Kershaw County Council strives to close the equity and outcome gaps for black African-American citizens throughout policies and practices that reflect the experiences of black african-american citizens ensure greater access and opportunity and honor history heritage and contributions and whereas kershaw county council has committed division 2030 to make the county the great place to live work worship play and raise our families and where our growing vibrant and historic commun

» ities nourish our culture and our vitality now therefore be it resolved that kershaw county council hereby proclaims the month of february as black history month with that let's take a motion mr chairman i'd like to make a motion that we approve the proclamation for black history month mr tucker gives a first a second second mr gardner second uh any discussion mr tucker mr chairman and council members i would just like to say because i happen to see them they've been here the last couple three meetings but um i don't think they thought i saw them you actually have two members from the naacp executive committee and one of them is an officer that i like to recognize miss hessie b peterkin is sitting back there will you stand please ma'am that's the county's chair and then miss martha robinson

» who is on the executive committee and miss um bracy is a member of the naacp uh taken sharon i'm sorry uh as well so i would like to recognize those ladies who are here tonight thank you for coming all right uh mr mr jones over here as i did last year excuse me tonight i'm going to dedicate my vote for this for my brother george and evelyn gibson in honor of them and i just wanted to say that publicly thank you and other comments miss gibson was my ninth grade uh science teacher i thought i claimed her she's awesome it has impacted my life in every way great anything else okay no further discussion thank you ladies for coming it's great to see you again and it was a great celebration at the birthday with that we move to a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimo

» us thank you mary that was well done i appreciate your work on that with that we move to the next item a series of ordinances uh we have danny here and a place of vic and i'll try to get through the ordinance uh headlines and then we'll take a motion uh the first item is item one under ordinances it's at tab c page seven in your electronic books i'll read a bit of the headlines and then take the motion second reading of an ordinance authorizing the execution and delivery of a fee and lieu of tax by and between kershaw county council and project panel with respect to certain economic development property in the county whereby such property will be subject to payments in lieu of taxes uh with that headline can we have a motion to approve mr tucker a second second second for mr snodgrass uh an

» y further discussion needed by you jeff do you want to talk about that jeff burgess come on up because you may have a question or two good evening chairman members of council uh project panel is proposing to invest uh 7.9 million uh and create 80 new jobs in the county for kershaw and that will have an average hourly wage of 20 dollars an hour good gosh um uh other questions please uh starting with mr snodgrass go ahead no you know did this company are they do they have any vendors or connections with other companies like as far as serve or providing their their product well they actually work in residential commercial and industrial with their products so they're pretty broad they have a broad spectrum that they work on uh they're locating here it's a good location based on the growth to b

» e perfectly honest not just along 20 but along 77. so this puts them in a prime position to take advantage of that excellent thank you yeah other questions mr jones i have a comment i've been here 16 years and i'm going to tell you something mr jeff you're a shaker and a mover do you ever slow down i don't have time because since you've been here a lot of things that started happening and i want to thank you very much thank you i appreciate it other comments the good news keeps keep coming thank you jeff we got a lot of work to do and we can keep doing it i look forward to hearing from you on that other project uh with that we move to a series of votes unless you have other comments seeing none let me move to a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it moves on to a third

» reading unanimously and mary thank you very much jeff item number two is a second reading of an ordinance of the county council of kershaw county to amend the zoning map it's at tab d it's up on the screen and for your reference it's in page 38 electronic book and thereafter i'll read the whole thing we read it last time second reading of an ordinance of the county council of kershaw county to amend the official zoning map designation for 86 acres of land and the tax parcel is given in some detail one acre future utility parcel remaining for an existing cell tower on the same land um with that and oh yeah and from rd2 to rd15 uh say again r15 yeah r15 thank you uh mr conley is here if we need it can we have a motion to approve make a motion to approve for discussion and do we have a second

» second second to approve to discuss and that's from mr snodgrass ben do you want to lead off sure so uh typically on first reading unless there's absolute clear uh opposition from the community for valid reasons um you usually have it go through so it's gone through on first reading and in part i think that's because there were a few loose ends that need to be tied up like there was whether or not the survey had completed been completed on the cell tower do we know if that's been done that has been done and forgive me if i just didn't see it in the packet um i don't see it in the package but at any rate sounds like it has been completed we i would like to see it if this ends up making it to a third reading and then between now uh and last time there's been a lot of discussion in the communi

» ty about growth perhaps too much growth people's feelings about traffic in the area this area is near another large development i'll call it kind of down from pelican snowballs they're proximate at any rate and so the school district was another question that i had last time and was interested in hearing back from them did we get any direction or contact from the school district about thresholds or reaching for elementary schools or anything like that i know vic's not here god bless him his brother just passed away so right i can speak to that when i get to my comments okay well those are the questions that i had uh and some of the concerns that have been voiced to me with several calls since last meeting thank you mr chairman and i'll reserve my comments to the end go ahead other comments

» mr snodgrass thank you uh this question probably for mr conley so is it is it for sure that they will have there will be septic uh system or is there still them room to get on this the sewer system excuse me sure uh at this point of time there's not a sewer line anywhere in reasonable length to this location and the reason i ask is because uh what why this is favorable to me at this point is because they're going to be if there's a septic situation that means they got to be half acre lots uh which you know it's to me helps me lean towards uh supporting this as well as according to the memo that you would you'd send out to council uh looks like home values are estimated to be 350 000 or higher so that tells me uh that this isn't uh you know just kind of your run-of-the-mill uh type of type o

» f structure but it's going to be some quality to that as well is that your understanding i mean that's my understanding but i mean home prices right now are fairly higher than they have historically been um i i mean the developers here um you're more than welcome to ask some questions and i can answer any questions on the zoning or the land development side but yeah pacific zoning or specific questions i would reference it to them um but and i always were hesitant to remember that when you rezone a parcel they can do anything that is permitted within that zoning district right um they're not tied to the memo they sent us they're not tied to what the suggestion was so usually we that's why we don't really traditionally add that in there it could change hands tomorrow it could be in their han

» ds for 10 or 20 years um you know there's a lot of of speculation involved in that until they start bringing actual development plans to us to go through the review process what the development plan so at the next step would be for them to submit an actual development plan or not because this is existing if it gets well whether it was rezoning or not and they wanted to put together a development they would have to start interacting with us for a development plan which that would include would that would that that include traffic study or is that already been done no well we've gotten from from years of working with the Planning Commission we traditionally do not allow any large development to go to Planning Commission without some sort of traffic I'm study done now full traffic management p

» lan usually our traffic improvement plan usually comes from DOT if it goes on to a state road we usually if we get in the higher subdivisions we ask for a traffic management plan but we usually don't let it go to planning commission without any sort of traffic indication or studies done so that's that's that's been done or that will be the next that would be the next logical step if if they submit a development plan so when they come through and they start giving us a set sketch plan and start doing sketch plan review that's when all the impacts assessments are sent out to all the utilities the providers the Sheriff's Department the EMS, school district, all those get letters notifying them of whether development is coming up and if they have any comments.

» They have 10 to 15 days to submit comments back to us, and all of that is a part of the packet that goes to Planning Commission, including a traffic study, anything from DOT that needs to be done, anything from DHEC, any of those things are all part of the Planning Commission packet that goes. - Thank you, sir. - Very thorough, thank you, Mike. Other comments? Two of you had questions, and I said I would answer what I knew. Ben, you'd asked about schools, and of course you did too, Russell, when we met earlier the day. And secondly, roads, in addition to crowding, in addition to sewer, in addition to strained services, anybody who's been out any day to the Elgin solid waste point knows that the growth is exceeding the capability there.

» everybody has been out there to see the density out there knows that our fire department which we have now gone fortunately uh to more full-time employees at a hub at blaney and so on so forth shows that there is a growing pressure in that part of the county i with that preamble let me answer your questions first of all uh vision 2030 which was approved unanimously by this body uh back in december and approved unanimously by every elected body in the county to include all three municipalities and approved also by every appointed body in the county has forced us to deal with the census and for those of you who have copies of vision 23 2030 go to page six and there is a graphic of the growth that we as a county can can begin to expect and express in terms of resources so to answer your questi

» ons yes vision 2030 forces us to think about what do we do now and what do we do later and and that's a difficult judgment when when you take apart the numbers that the census and the growth and the tremendous workload that Mike is enduring approving houses, commercial areas, and housing areas. To Ben's answer, yes, I've talked to the school and talked to Shane and to his chairman at the school board. I've talked to a number of school board members, and growth is very much on their mind.

» uh there is a sentence in the education goals inside of vision 2030 that the school board asked us to put in there that's in there to address what future facilities they will need so i ask us to pay attention to that secondly on roads to uh russell's point and to the point that mr snodgrass raised we have all been frustrated with the roads in west watery and uh with ben's help and that of mayor emmons we did a study over there that landed flat as a pancake because we got no resources out of out of richland county and columbia i will pass out to you again a copy of the west watery road study and our various efforts to try to get resources but let me just summarize that by saying and and this will be my last comment is uh we got a lot of work to do and i we're in just in the nick of time to g

» et after growth if not in some cases maybe a little late but we have been working these issues steadfastly and I think it's time for another focus on growth mr. Tucker was our chairman of a ad hoc committee that mr. Dubose said I was authorized as a chairman to set up and I propose that the next time we meet we have a short strategic discussion on a memo that i would like to publish to set up another ad hoc group i do that at the request of the school district who asked that we do that ben to your question that's a tough question it's a 64 000 question how do we take care of our kids but then eventually we need to address everything else that's associated with the growth in the western part of the county so with that i will soon give you all a draft to look at and we'll chat about it and th

» en i've got to coordinate it with the school uh any further discussion yeah mr jones go ahead thank you mr chairman members of council just uh some clarification last year i did not vote for 2030 this year i reluctantly voted for 2030 and 2030 is not the reason i'm going to vote the way i vote tonight i've gone out and done my own research and looked at some things and so my vote will be coming from from that not from 2030.

» thank you thank you uh mr brazel please so i'm reading this memo that we received um about the developers intention the intention is to develop these in the bigger lots as a residential subdivision i think everybody has a copy right bro brussel yeah i'm gonna read it just yeah go ahead for the record if that's okay yeah sure we are partnering with a local builder on this project um can we can we hear more about this while you guys are here would you mind can we have them speak speak who are they can you identify them i can't see behind the mask okay come on up please yeah you can leave the mask on if you want and identify yourself please sir you're fine either way you're fine with it off if you call if we won't run okay my name is chris seby so thank you for having me yes sir thank you whic

» h questions can i answer for you mary did you get his name and contact number yeah thank you go ahead so um your intention is to work with the the local builder what what local builders are you planning on working with Stanley Martin will partner with us on this project now where is Stanley Martin from their offices in Lexington Columbia area so that's their home office yes sir okay I just wasn't familiar with them and I saw that there was a Stanley Martin in Virginia are they a national home builder I think they're a southeastern based I believe but they used to be Essex oh okay used to be Essex I got you so I think they originated out of Greenville and then got bought out okay perfect perfect okay I'm just trying to figure out who's doing what and we have so here's the concern we have I t

» hink it's four major subdivisions and in the heart of Lugov and we've had a lot of people reach out to us regarding growth and overwhelming growth in coming too fast too hard I've been around home building all my life it's you know it creates jobs a very important part of a community but looking at it from a community standpoint it is concerning it seems like Kershaw County's targeted and my fear is that we're gonna turn into Lexington and nothing against Lexington but with growth comes issues and how do we how do we mitigate this how do we how do we work through this I don't know that we're gonna keep everyone happy and I don't know that that's my job but I just want to make sure that what we're doing is sensible density I just want to make sure it's the right fit for Kershaw County so if

» anybody else has any questions for the gentleman I'll yield my time thank you other comments thank you very much for coming all this way uh mr snodgrass sure do you have are you able to speak on the style of house that would be built i mean as far as raised slab crawl space hardy plank or are you not there yet to be able to say what that's it would be a bit speculative but uh we're fairly confident i can tell you this it's most likely going to be slab uh it's going to have hardy plank and it's going to have brick and they'll be uh so not raised slab just slab just a slab okay okay all right the intention is for the larger lots uh the intention in in looking at the county's growth plan is it would be congruent with with uh what's nearby and so you guys have already approved the change in zon

» ing in a in a area just adjacent to that and so we we thought that we were helping accomplish the county's vision for that area in particular thank you is obviously a nice feature it'll give us bigger lots and give us some pond view lots which are pretty appealing to folks moving to your area cool thank you thank you other comments mr gardner nothing specific here but you know my problem and our problem i think is the fact that the decisions we make today affects us this year next year two years five years and so on so i think it's hard for us uh looking at all situations and i won't be supporting this because of the the service issue the school issue the you know and i said two or three years ago that i would not support any rezoning that would allow more housing and i said that several ye

» ars ago and i'm going to stand by that but that's nothing personal that's just the way i look at it but it's going to affect our school district building more schools you know you build a school now for 50 million dollars 100 million dollars and guess who gets to pay for it our taxpayers do uh and and i just don't think right now that we have enough information and i think it's one reason the chairman's going to do an ad hoc committee is that that we're we're going to have to look at this long and hard and not only this one but others that come after this one so that we've got better answers for our highways uh our schools and all the things that are affecting kershaw county and i'm not prepared to make that decision and move this forward based on what i don't know i have no crystal ball he

» re to tell us where we're going to be if i did you know i could give you a better answer but because of what we don't know i can't support this comments uh once again back to my one of my key issues which is roads um and the issue in vision 2030 is whether you like it or not we've got it we've got to plan ahead and we've got to plan for what we need to do now and what we do later and much of the strain on this council on all the systems we've just heard about from ben and the schools from david snodgrass and russell on roads and all those other things are a result of strain on a system and when you don't react to strain you break and we as a council have strain and that's known as growth it's on page six of vision 2030 look at it the numbers are there uh and i just went out and did a reconn

» aissance i'm a cavalry officer i like to walk in muddy places and i did the whole place and western watts hill road is very unsuitable to any traffic even right now before you put in additional houses it will not be unsuitable okay i've been out there walked it so with that i want the people of the county but i also want our contractors to know that we're listening to them and given you a construct where you can be successful as citizens and as contractors as well and there's a list of things that need to be done now and done in the future and i don't know what they are but we need to meet as a group and take the construct of what we voted on in december and act like grown-ups and address this problem without emotion in a dispassionate objective way that we've all been trained since first g

» rade to look at a tough problem and work it together we hear you school district and we hear you the people of westwater uh with that i think we're ready to vote all those in favor of emotion i'm sorry mr tucker yes go ahead and raise my hand here maybe not high enough um i just want this is actually directed to my colleagues up here um we spoke last year in the budget cycle about impact fees and how this can help us i know I know that's a touchy situation with some of you, and I'm just gonna be real political with this. I'm the only Democrat sitting up here, so everybody thinks I'm the only one likes to raise taxes. I don't like to raise taxes, but I like to do responsible things.

» And the only way you gonna be able to answer these questions in a responsible way, as far as I'm concerned, your schools, your law enforcement, your public works, your hospital, your EMS, and your fire, is you bring that new development in with impact fees so they can share the cost of the growth. If not, you're gonna kill your local taxpayers trying to keep up. Other counties and other municipalities does it because of a reason of them not getting behind the eight ball when it comes down to the citizens that are already there that lack the quality of life that they live and do not want to have all the burden put back on them. So I say that because I am ready to address that, this budget cycle, so we can make a decision on whether we are interested or not. But Mr.

» Gardner said something that's very important. What we do today was not only gonna affect us tomorrow, but when I'm long gone and dead and in heaven years ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. - All right, with that, I'm ready to call the question. Ben, you have one last comment. - Yeah, just one last thing. Mr. Gardner's point was really interesting about perhaps needing more information. I did hear that the school district's gonna do a study in the spring based on the last census on where they're gonna need elementary schools. So far, they're thinking in between Blaney and Watery, which this would definitely impact that area. So it might be useful to have that information. Yeah, well, that's the idea.

» The school district asked us to chair it and co-chair it like we did the last time, Ben, so the school district will be a part of that. The other part of the comment was I asked what the cost of the elementary school is, and it's about $25 million right now. And so school districts don't save up those amounts to pay for it in cash. they'd be coming for this council for millage to support a bond typically and so you're looking at tax increase if the growth continues the way it's going and we shall see that's why we have to do this collaborative effort and that's why mr. Robbins dr. Robbins excuse me and dr.

» Smith asked us to do that together and we will get back to that calling the question now we're ready to vote on the motion all those in favor signify by raising your hand and those opposed so signify and it's unanimous thank you sir for coming that distance and the motion fails and with that we move to the next item which is new business we've already covered the state grant of the SROs and very favorably and secondly I turn now to an appointment to the Zoning Board of Appeals it said tab F page 56 attorney mr.

» Brazel make a motion yes sir I'd like to make a motion to appoint cook young to the zoning board of appeals so we have a second from was that who's that ben uh no it's jimmy uh discussion question no that's okay uh cook's a great guy um it's unfortunate right now he's he's at home sick i think he's dealing with covid um great guy knowledgeable loves his community um wants to do the right thing wants to help um wants to help people work through problems and solve problems and i know him well enough to know he's a problem solver and um an all-around great guy so um i hope that hope that i can gain my colleagues support in appointing him to this board and if anybody has any questions i'm happy to speak as to what i know about him and what he's capable of doing and we can put you in touch as we

» ll okay other comments jimmy i think you had thank you mr chairman i second everything uh my colleague just said about crook young i haven't known him as long as as russell has but i tell you he's a fine fine man and i'm proud to cast my vote for him tonight russell thank you thank you for putting him on there uh mr tucker over here yes sir thank you mr chairman uh my colleagues uh i just uh want to say that um cook is not only a good fine man but he's he's a great team player uh i've been knowing cook all his life um because we grew up together and played a lot of ball together and um cook he puts his heart in everything he's a local homegrown young man from these parts of the counties and um i know he would bring value and a lot of hard work to that board thank you other comments yeah he

» is a great guy and he lives in a great house right russell yes with that i call the question and ready to vote all those in favor so signify and let him sleep tonight but please tell him mary he was unanimously approved thank you very much cook and thank you russell for bringing his name forward yes sir i remind you all we still have more yet to do and mary is working diligently to line up a slate for us mary we couldn't do it without you we had moved to the i think the third item of the new business uh an inquiry regarding planning and zoning uh there is no attachment but i believe jimmy we can presume this handout is what we're going to talk about mr chairman thank you members of county council actually i handed you a copy of the motion i'm going to make i make the following motion that t

» he county council direct the administrator to inquire as to and prepare for consideration an amendment to the unified code of zoning and land development regulations zoning orders for County Council to refer to the Planning Commission for official letter action by this County Council he proposed amendment to unify the code of zoning and land development regulations WHICH WOULD PROVIDE FOR CLEAR AND SIMPLIFIED ADMINISTRATIVE REVIEW OF AND DETERMINATIONS AS TO THE ZONING ORDINANCE. WOULD ALSO PROVIDE MORE FLEXIBILITY AS TO THE GRANTING OF VACANCES FROM THE ZONING ORDINANCE TO PREVENT UNDUE HARDSHIP ON OUR CITIZENS. ALSO WOULD PROVIDE FOR A COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW OF THE ZONING ORDINANCE AND PROPOSED ADOPTION OF A NEW, MORE CITIZEN-FRIENDLY ZONING ORDINANCE.

» administrator would propose a timeline to counsel for adoption accomplishing these objectives by counsel at the next meeting the timeline for adoption and proposed procedures would be in accordance with the state law County ordinances County rules and required procedures that is my motion I can we have a second second Russell any discussion Jimmy go ahead yes if I may please the zoning code was last looked at comprehensively by County Council in 2010 it is overly complicated and cumbersome the zoning process and permitting is unduly complicated and way too bureaucratic it is not user-friendly needs more flexibility to be simple and reasonable there are way too many complaints by citizens and way too many zoning and permit complaints as to planning and zoning process and permitting folks som

» ething has to be done and i intend to do something about it now that's why i brought it forward as county council i have heard complaint after complaint for years i feel like we've dropped the ball on this by not comprehensively looking at the zoning code for almost 12 years and addressing citizen issues and when i say we means this county council staff and jimmy jones and myself we all dropped the ball two stages that that i'm looking at here uh first is clarify simplify administrative review of the planning and zoning process or the zoning process and provide more flexibility as to variances more citizen friendly and then the second would be which would come later adopt a new more citizen friendly reasonable zoning code can i ask a question jimmy ken uh i think we all agree uh not presumi

» ng a vote but i that's where i am what what is the timelines you're looking at jimmy i mean it's do now do later stuff you know well the motion would allow us to go ahead and immediately do something that would take maybe three months to accomplish this three or four months yeah but to go back and and look at the entire process you're looking at a year or two i agree no question about it but what this does mr chairman members of council this gives us and it gives the county administrator it gives the planning zone employees a little bit of relief because we have set them up to fail with with the the codes the ordinances they have on the books right now they i mean because they have to buy by that and let me tell you something um it just makes no sense the way it goes thank you jimmy that lo

» oks like a very well thought out idea other comments who was the second please yeah russell let you go ahead sir so yeah i'm i've experienced some of the some of the frustrations from from citizens that are building homes and um these rules are in depth and i don't know who wrote them uh i think that's been some years ago um mr conley is is charged with uh following the rules and implementing the rules correctly but i think when we handcuff ourselves to i hate to say i hate to say it so bluntly but to so much bureaucracy that we can't make just good old-fashioned common sense decisions to help people. When I decided to run for the seat, I wanted to be able to help people. And by and large, I've been able to help people. We want to follow good, solid rules. We want to support our staff.

» That's not my job. But we've had issues that I think could have been avoided. And this inquiry into planning and zoning i wanted to have positive outcomes right i'm not here to to put anybody down i'm not here to to say someone's not doing something they should do but i will say this certain people have certain strengths and certain weaknesses and danny it's it's up to you and and vick's not here tonight so i'll i'll just have to place this on your shoulders i apologize but but i'll direct this to you um we need to to write policy and and we need to have dialogue that helps us correct policy that enables administration department heads to help people i get frustrated just because i have a helpful heart when we're not able to solve a problem easily my phone has rang one too many times and i'

» m i'm with mr jones on this completely uh there's some things that need to change there's some things that need to be improved upon and i don't know exactly what those things are but i charge you with that task and and i say that in the most polite manner i can i'm here to solve problems i'm here to help you solve problems if if i can i'm here to make things happen in a positive manner manner for the citizens of Kershaw County and if we can do that together you know I think it's a win-win right I think I think we enable people by putting them in the in the correct position using their strengths to to grow in their in their jobs so I look forward to seeing what the next 90 days brings and if I can be a help please allow me to help sometimes biggest helpless for me to get out of the way so i'

» ll i'll now do that thank you so very much other comments mr gardner yeah let me say i'm sorry i don't disagree with anything you said i agree with everything i think we need to look at it we need to do that but uh just to to make a point is in conversations with other council members from other counties planning and zoning seems to be the one that gets the most complaints everywhere so you know we're not alone in that because simply because they probably deal with the public more than any other department we've got uh you know so uh because of you know you're dealing with property and all this other stuff you got to deal with them so in their defense they're not the only one but we do need to address that and i i do agree with that but uh i do want to say that that is that is a problem in

» all 46 counties in south carolina thank you and municipalities too ben i i went right by you sir no problem thank you mr chairman mr dubose are we completely done on our codification project yet i need to check on that mary where do we stand on it okay so just for talking to the microphone so um for context and for folks watching just like uh moving full-time fire service took like multiple years of of studying understanding the data and then making the moves to do it the right way codification uh and improving the zoning ordinance has many steps as well and one of them has been codification first to try and make the information as easily accessible online and um more user friendly so that you don't have to show up in person and look through a giant book to try to figure out what you can or

» can't do or how you would appeal something regarding your land the second thing that we've done in moving in this direction which i think it's great that we're talking about this tonight mr brazel and i were just talking about recently didn't we have a vote recently that agreed on looking at the quality of construction in kershaw county and trying to evaluate or direct staff in some way to tell us a little bit more about that in the uh zoning ordinance i think so and that's that's news that you know i looking forward to hearing from you know um yeah so i think we're going to be doing update on that soon because we are concerned about quality of construction and not having just track homes come in that's low quality construction that won't last a long time and leads to results for uh bad res

» ults for crystal county citizens and issues down the road and so it seems with that context appropriate to talk about well how do we update the zoning code pretty soon we heard we're on the the cusp of having the codification project uh done now people are going to have access to all the information do we have the right information there i have to say that prior to serving on county council i actually appeared adverse to the county in multiple instances to to help people with issues where there were inconsistencies or definitions that didn't make sense sometimes in planning and zoning and I've seen a few instances where you know people probably would have benefited by having counsel and may have been successful in their appeals or other issues that they had but the definitions uh might be i

» nconsistent or the wrong words there there's a typo or something and we talked about that over the years so it's something we need to look at I agree with that terrific other comments uh question I guess for Mr. Jones this is your your motion so in this wording do use do you envision this so this is a study just a study that is that a simple way to explain it a study of a department well as my motion said this council will direct the administrator to inquire as to and prepare for consideration and amendment to the Unified Code of zoning and land development regulations and the zoning orders for council to refer to the Planning Commission or their official later action by County Council you know This proposed amendment as I said here is about the unified code of zoning and land development r

» egulations And it's to simplify it and I've I've also talked with the County Administrator He thinks temporarily as a band-aid this would give him some relief while we're working on the other part Right, so we're studying the apartment to see If there are some best practices that were missing Do you envision that this would this study would include like looking at staffing and seeing if if if that is an issue I suggest that we stick to my motion as I said the minister I just know you have a conversation questions talk about it but you're asking questions right and and that's good but I'm just trying to say it says the motion the motion says I'm just no but I'm telling you if you just listen for a second and be quiet here's what I'm trying to tell you is that the administrator we're gonna gi

» ve him the authority we're not requiring him to go to the planning zoning and then to come back to us in two weeks give them a timeline so that we're not stuck wondering when or something will come back to us the council has somebody to do I want to make sure we have a timeline in here and that they get back with us in two weeks so what I would suggest is that we move we move this forward we let the administrator do his job and come back with us and it gives them it'll give some oversight and some review on some of these decisions that were made I don't want to get into the weeds I could name quite a few instances where the zoning regulations was absolutely out of control and I can name businesses that is affected I can name residences that is affected but I don't want to get into the weeds

» yeah I could choose I'm not against it I just yeah I want to have a conversation beyond the paper and just try to get an idea of just an overall context of what we're looking at because I think I mean I think to some degree the department is probably overwhelmed we're growing County and we set them up to fail with this piece of with this the ordinances we have now we've said the planning is only able to fail we haven't looked at it David we have not even looked at it for two years and and that's my fault as well too right so that's what we're doing now we're looking at it we're we're directing the administrator to go in well I just I just so what's your point here we want to yeah I think the - Motion is what it is. - This is a public meeting.

» I'm just having a conversation about like, I think you just love to talk. - I just, he has the floor. Mr. Snodgrass, go ahead, please. - No, I mean, I think to a degree, I agree with you. I was just trying to get an understanding of kind of what the end goal is here. And if the end goal is to help the citizens navigate that, do a study and help them navigate the system, and if there are any hangups in the system that are any lids on the system that we need to discover, i think that's a good thing um and i would add uh jimmy i would add that we probably need to look at like even on the commercial side of things um because maybe there's lids in our process that that that put lids on commercial growth because i know there are obstacles um as well yeah so you know i'm i'm in favor of this i jus

» t just trying to have a conversation about it um i get calls about planning zoning too but i do want to just stop and recognize you know i get calls about planning zoning and i will say every time i've had to contact mike or his staff they have been more more than willing to help me out help my constituents out and just want you know i appreciate that but yeah i think we can take a look at this okay jimmy you know what i said in the motion and it stands as written and i gave you a copy of it in advance you know is to prevent hardship undue hardship on citizens and what we have in place now does cause a hardship on citizens. You know, we've had somebody look at it and say, my gosh, this is one of the most complicated piece of works they've ever seen.

» I know that a member of this county council spoke to somebody in Charlotte and said, boy, if Charlotte handled their zoning the way we handle it in Kershaw County, they'd never get anything done. And I tell you what I appreciate, and I really respect Mr. Browser for bringing this up and getting this back on the table.

» He's let me take the lead on it for a simple fact that i've been on it i've been talking about this for a much longer period of time than than he has because he just i think he's in first year county council but mr browns i do appreciate that but the administrator would propose a timeline david to council for adoption of accomplishing uh these objectives by council at the next meeting so let's push this forward let's let the county administrator do his job and come back uh mr brasil no i don't want to really get in between the the debate here but i think i think david what what i see and what i hear from from mr jones and what i hear from you is how do we solve the problem almost and and i'm bad about wanting to solve the problem right that's that's just in me and i think it's probably in y

» ou too how do we fix this and i think what i hear from mr jones is that's not our job it's our job to direct administrators we want to place an inquiry we want to let them do their job then bring us a plan of action once we hear their plan of action then we can support that plan of action um my goal and you're right when my phone rings we usually sit down and have good conversations but i've had to have too many conversations my goal would be for that department to um to handle its own business and and my phone stopped ringing as much right for them to come up with solutions to problems good common sense solutions i've had a few instances lately that were very frustrating for me personally because i wanted to help the situation but sometimes the law restricted that so this this motion is go

» ing to give our administration a little more latitude in the ways that they can help legally and um i think at this point we just need to stand back and let them do their job well thank you mr brazel we had a conversation and it was able to give context to uh to an amendment i appreciate it thank you yes sir i'm ready to call the question if you are jimmy i got a question yeah go ahead comment the motion had context mr uh mr snog one or more context you got it thank you the same thing i said this is a public meeting i think we're allowed to have i'm not mad just we're here to have a conversation to make sure we're thorough i understand thank you okay thank you gentlemen i'm ready to call the question thank you very much mr jones you're quite welcome mr chairman uh with that i'm ready to cal

» l the question all those in favor so signify and it's unanimous and uh mary kindly pass on this little homework for mr carpenter and with that we are now at the end and we're ready to move into council briefs starting with mr jones mr chairman members of the county council i think all of us in here got an anonymous letter from somebody within the um yeah well i was going a little reluctant to even mention that the department when someone writes anonymous letter i have problems with that and also have problems whoever wrote the nominous the anonymous letter i want to say this to you you talk about a supervisor in anonymous letter if there's something wrong with supervisor you should be woman or man enough to stand up and come to the deputy administrator we have a fair staff Danny Templer wil

» l absolutely look at both sides nobody's job is going to be in jeopardy if they've got some issues going on and they go above their supervisor but to do an anonymous letter and knock a department head bothers me because I have been a department head that's no way to do business so therefore on the anonymous letter I will give no consideration however I will say this we do need to take care of our 9-1-1 operators they are overworked they are understaffed and we definitely need to be thinking about them in the upcoming year and uh i also like to say thank you to my colleagues for the support of the planning and zoning motion that i made um it's time for something to be done as i said you know it's been 12 years since we've even looked at it and and of course i put myself in that as well i'm t

» o blame as well but uh thank you for your support on that and the conversation as well and mr chairman having said that i have no further comments uh mr snodgrass mr chair members of uh council uh i will try to keep this brief because this is certainly not the end but you may or may not have heard but i've got some ministry and professional transitions that are uh coming in the future uh for me and for my family and so i've let everyone aware that i will not be seeking re-election in this 2022 election cycle. Again, this is not the end, so I'm not here to dwell on this or say goodbyes because we still have a lot of work to do to move this county forward, to build upon the great work that we have done together as a team. And it's been a great honor to be able to be a part of this.

» And a lot of respect for each and every one of you behind this desk and for county staff as well this county this isn't the citizens of this county may or may not know but there are some incredible men and women who work for this county a lot of times we just see them as bureaucrats or we see them as just staff or we just see them as nameless people but they are dedicated employees who get up every morning whether it's in solid waste whether it's an economic development whether it's in our public safety they get up every morning and are dedicated to this county and I just want to say it's it's been an honor to have the opportunity to get to know to get to know this side of the county so just wanted to share that with you again no goodbyes because we still have a lot of work to do but just w

» anted to to give you guys make you aware of some things that are coming ahead for my family and myself. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Mr. Tucker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. A couple of few things. Let me say, I know Councilman Snodgrass, this is not your farewell speech, but it's definitely some news that I was not looking forward to hearing, but I'm happy for you and your family and wish you well as you move on to bigger and better endeavors in your life. And you're a young man and you need to attack those now because one day, as I said to my left, you'll be like these folks to my left. But I just want to say that I'm looking forward to getting all the squeeze and the juice out of you between now and the budget year. There's a lot left. We're ready to work. Ms.

» Mary, can you do me a dear favor and a copy of that proclamation? Can you make sure that we get it to the Camden-Crescent County branch of the NAACP, please, ma'am? Thank you. I just want to send my condolence to the Carpenter family. My prayers and my love with Vic and his family as they go through this tragic time of laying a loved one to rest and I hope that all of you who are listening and who are here have the same prayers and love.

» I also want to inform you that as of January the 31st, which will be next Monday, we will be, and I say we, I'm talking about the Santee Lynch's Regional Council of Government where I'm first vice chair there on the COG, will be in the process of formulating procedures to look for a new director of the car very unfortunate but that's all i'm going to elaborate right now so we will be in the process of doing that so we can get ourselves settled back in and continue to do good work in the region that concludes my report mr chairman thank you sir mr god no no report mr brasil i'd also like to offer my condolences to uh mr carpenter's family regarding the loss of his brother um but our thoughts and prayers are with you uh david regarding you and and moving moving up and moving on to the upstate

» um it's been a good year or a little more that i've gotten to know you and really enjoyed getting to know you look forward to finishing the year with you and we won't say goodbye but best wishes and i know you'll do well in the upstate man thank you mr chairman david i love you it's been great working with you and uh we've got a lot more work to do before you take off and with that said you know you'll have to forgive me if my heart gets a little tender thinking about vick and his brother but i love all you guys here on council um i'm the oldest of six i've got uh many brothers and i can't imagine the pain or loss that um that vick our beloved administrator is feeling this has just been sticking with me recently but uh someone told me that that grief is the love that you didn't didn't get t

» o express yet and maybe you've heard that saying before i've only heard it within the last month or so but it that hit me really hard and we know that vic loves his brother and misses him but as i understand it he's not suffering anymore i want to thank the folks who stayed to the end of the meeting i try to remember to do that sometimes usually it's just the boy scouts or girl scouts if they're getting their citizenship in the community or nation badge that stay to the end of meetings but it's so good to have visitors that uh that stay through and see the political process in these in the form of these public meetings to the end so i appreciate y'all being here and thank you very much for that that's all ahead mr chairman all right and i'll close it out first of all david thank you i like

» the word you use we because that's where it is it's it's a it's a team effort but when the lord calls here i am send me i appreciate your example and words and deeds thank you very much i remind you all we have a retreat on the 5th of february that's the next time we meet there will be no uh supper beforehand on friday it'll just be on on saturday correct and the details will be out uh next council meeting is on the 8th after that uh i would like for you all to remember our first responders the men and women up in those buckets and the 9-1-1 and all the team that got us through two successive snow and ice storms well done i want to give a shout out right now to a group that's watching us uh high school students from cma look off elgin camden and north central hello they've all been required

» to watch us tonight and they have been and they're going to be here tomorrow and mr snodgrass and i will give them a class on why counties matter and then they're going to sit up here and try to run this place i don't know who's going to be married tomorrow who's going to be mr de bose but they will be a class in here at 1300 one o'clock you guys and uh mrs nodgrass thanks for giving up on your time on that danny thanks for doing it you're orchestrating the whole thing um also i would remind you tonight is robert burns birthday the famous bard of scotland i'm going home to one of the most awful meals you've ever had in your life not because my wife cooked it, but because it's haggis. And lastly, again, thank you, gentlemen, for your sympathy and condolences for Vic.

» I learned more about you in these trials than you would know. And I appreciate each and every one of you for what you said. How good an organization is, is often judged by how it performs when it's under stress. and in the army we take a lot of effort to train for that and you lose people and how good that organization is shown by how well it performs in the absence of mr carpenter danny thanks for leading the team so well appreciate it with that danny words go to you please um i just would like to first also say and send my condolences out to vic um mary vic and i are very tight this is my my work family that's my work mom and he has been vic has been a a mentor to me and uh i knew his brother and he was a credible individual good man so i'm very sorry to hear this news but um so i just wa

» nted vic to know that also um on the 9-1-1 issue i i just i can't let that rest um that letter came to me as well um just given my law enforcement background and my association with dispatch some of those dispatchers still there now dispatch me as a rookie so i i have a vested interest in that organization i say they are never seen but always hurt amen so um that that is on my front burner and has been it will be in this this budget process coming up so thank you sir and that is my report mr dubose i'm mr chairman and council i have nothing you've done enough damage tonight and with that uh take a motion to adjourn uh who is that was that you mr tucker by any chance second mr snodgrass any discussion thank you gentlemen ladies let's go to a vote all those in favor and it's unanimous mary thank you