Full meeting transcript - November 9, 2022

» Hey, Sammy. Can you hear me? Hi, can you hear me? Hey, Sammy, can you hear us? Yes, I can. Can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you. Okay. I heard you the first time, but you couldn't hear me, evidently. Oh, okay. No problem. We just wanted to make sure. All right. Okay. I'm going to mute my phone, so if you won't hear any background noise, I might. That works. Yeah, you can just stay muted, and we'll just keep you on, and then you can just unmute yourself whenever we start. Sounds good. Thank you. Yes, I can hear you. Let's bring up the microphones. We've got live, and we've got Mr. Tucker. I am told Mr. Jones is on the way. We have a quorum.

» It's a great day in Kershaw County, the all-American county, and we've just had an election, that great exercise in democracy, and I congratulate the winners, and we thank those who participated and lost but never left, offered themselves to public service. This is a great part of our democracy, and we always count on our volunteers in this county to make it a great place. Volunteers such as poll workers. There's Mr. Jones. There's Mr. Jones. There's Mr. Jones. There's Mr. Jones. And let it be recorded. We've got all seven present. And those this weekend who helped clean the clean community fall cleanup. Mr. Chairman, point of order. I hear some feedback. Yeah. Pretty loud. Yeah. Okay. Good job.

» I also wanted to commend the clean community fall cleanup and the volunteers also that serve on the Kershaw Health Services Board. Their hard work is paying off as we speak right now as the Karish Wing has ceremonies tonight at Beachwood, and this week celebrates volunteers of a different sort on Veterans Day, on Thursday and Friday, and of course the Marine Corps birthday tomorrow, with events in schools in the American Legion and VFW. And on Veterans Day, I am keen to draw your attention that there will be a public announcement of a major nature for our county and indeed for the state. So mark your calendars for the announcement on Friday. I think the newspapers may already have it. And this county will have big things to celebrate on the 21st of April right here.

» And more good news, new jobs and jobs saved within Vista broke ground this afternoon. I thank Mr. Connell for being there with us, saving 40 jobs and several tens of millions of dollars of investment that will return to us in phyllo. And Prestige Farms moves finally to full operation very soon, securing for us some 300 jobs. Good jobs even in these times of inflation. And Roy's Cabinet Shop has broken ground, I'm told, from Mr. Brazel, and I congratulate our own Brazel family for much success. I see a mother and daughter here today. Good to see you. Great things are happening and cause for optimism in the county. Nevertheless, I need to open up tonight with a short statement because it is no news to most of you that we had a major disruption at the last meeting.

» Regrettable, but professionally handled by our attorney, administrator, and our sheriff who is also here tonight. Sometimes these meetings have been disrupted where disagreements unnecessarily become disrespectful. I can't say it better than Susan Jones nor Sammy Tucker that good will should temper all our deliberations. That is not always the case, of course, from the floor and even sometimes from up here on the dais. And no amount of rules will suffice when folks are determined to make a fuss. My grandmother would have called it bad manners. My dad would have called it dignity and respect. And Paul Harvey would have said self-discipline is the soul of a successful democracy.

» Failing which, in this council, it falls to the chairman to keep good order and where that fails to use the gavel, or as I had to do last time, recess. And finally, expulsion. Thankfully, expulsions have happened, I think, only twice in my years as chairman, but I do need to say a few things. Let's go through them real quick. This is a people's house and a place for the conduct of the people's business. Secondly, we are keen to hear from citizens and we respect the rights of citizens under the First Amendment to speak. But we have rules as to allow both open comments and equally so that business can proceed. Those rules can be intention and the chairman must strike a balance. It is often a judgment call, and I hope I've been correct, but many of you have told me where I might improve.

» The real issue is when to make the call to gavel and other amendments that can happen to correct the situation. And at any rate, the rights of the First Amendment under our Constitution have to be honored. Thirdly, sometimes our dialogue is heated, but as I said before, disagreement need not be disrespect. And I recite our council rules at each meeting, but some in the last four months have asked me to waive those rules and let people speak longer. No one is happy about these disruptions and that much is clear. But I repeat, council can't have it both ways. Asking me as chairman to enforce or at other times not to enforce the rules given me by council creates unnecessary tension up here. I return to the start point that attitude matters up here among council and in the audience.

» As our own newly reelected Senator Tim Scott said yesterday, divisive voices are fraying the fabric of America, but with focus on schools and children and jobs and safer communities, we can unite again. I close with a sad note and a good example. A frequent speaker in here over the years at that very podium up there was Sidney Butler. He passed away recently. Many of you will remember him and how he came here and challenged us as a council, gently, but sometimes very firmly. And we did not always agree with him, but he loved this county and came in here with good ideas and sometimes not. And we mourn his passing and his positive example. Tonight, an example that kids in this room tonight and kids watching will respect at home and learn from.

» So with that, I ask you to please stand for the invocation and the Pledge of Allegiance by Mr. Braswell. Thank you for that lengthy opening. Let's bow our heads. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for today. Thank you for democracy, Lord. Thank you for the right to get out and vote. We exercised our right yesterday, Lord. Thank you for this body and for everyone in this room that's here to express their feelings and their grievances in a free country. We thank you for that freedom, Lord. Please let this be a positive meeting and one in which we can hash out our problems and move forward in a positive direction. In your name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you very much indeed, Mr. Braswell. With that, we move to the agenda items. I think you've got them up on the screen and we have them here.

» We will begin with public comments. Mr. DuBose, can you help us out? Mr. Chairman, members of the council, 11 people have signed up for public comments. And as the chairman says, under the rules, the maximum amount of time allowed for public comments, rules adopted by county council is 30 minutes. So if you divide 11 into 30, it's a little bit less than three minutes per person. Very good. And if you can keep the time for us, I'll first read these rules. The public comments is an opportunity for members of the public to share information with council. It is not a time for debate with or questions and answers from council. It is a time for council to receive input. It is not a time for council to respond.

» It is in short, during public comments, council will listen to public comment but not comment on public comments. Offensive and inappropriate comments will not be tolerated and comments should be limited to statements and rhetorical questions. If a group would like to speak to council, we request that a spokesperson be selected and that this person indicate the group he or she is representing on the sign-up sheet. Public comment is a time to discuss issues, not individuals. Other avenues exist for personal complaints. Lastly, public comment period is limited to 30 minutes and we've already covered that. With that, I go to you, Mr. DuBose, and let's start. Mr. Chairman, the first person that signed up is Carson Brazel. Oh, wonderful. If you could bring the microphone down there. Thank you.

» My name is Carson Brazel and I'm here to talk about recreation. Number one, why do we need a new recreation facility in Kershaw County? It will attract tourism in Kershaw County and let children be able to play the sports they love. Statement, as a child, I would like kids to be able to play as many sports as they desire, such as basketball, lacrosse, soccer, baseball, softball, skateboarding and flag football. Number two, is the investment worth the outcome? It would provide some things for kids to be able to enjoy as well as adults. Number three, how will this help children connect with adults? Being on a sports team not only lets them enjoy sports but as well shows teamwork.

» Teamwork is an important trait kids need to learn so in the future they will be flexible in a good sport about work or sports teams in the future. Thank you. Thank you very much indeed, Mr. DuBose. The second person that signed up is Mary Brandenberger. I have a couple of things and I'll try and make it quick. One thing that I presented at the city council meeting today was that the utilities, you know, there are a lot of us that have utilities that are Camden City, but we're outside the city. We don't have a say in who's elected to the city council. We don't have any say in the utilities.

» I presented today that it would be good for like other counties have or other cities have is a board of directors to cover everybody everybody that has Camden City utilities would be able to vote for the board of directors and that way people in the county which you guys are all supposed to be supporting would have a say in what goes on with the Camden City utilities. There's a lot going on. I have a group we're going to be doing some looking at some legal things to do with that. The other thing I wanted to say is that I still have some heartburn over the tax issue and I think that some people on this board have a case of what's called affluenza. A lot of people are having a real hard time because of the Camden City utilities being so high.

» My daughter's bill went from $400 a month to $800 a month and that's just for a family, three children, a husband and wife, army husband. People are really hurting and that adding that extra tax really hurt a lot of people. And I think it was a case of, as Mr. Connell said, it was expedience and expedience is an excuse. It doesn't help the pocketbook at all for those people that are already suffering. Some people have already lost their homes, other people are in danger of losing their homes and that just added an extra burden upon the people that are really hurting now. So I think it would be good, especially Mr. Connell, congratulations on your win to the State House. I hope you'll take it with you that people are hurting. Don't do anything in the name of expedience.

» Take into consideration the people that you're representing. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. DuBose. The third person that signed up is Melody Dowden. I wanted to start out by making a correction to something I said at the last meeting. In my haste to keep it in three minutes, I made a mistake. It was regarding the voting to increase taxes, the millage, actually, and sewer fees. I had misspoke and said that Mr. Tomlinson voted yes, but he certainly did not. He wasn't even part of the vote. So I wanted to apologize for that. It was actually Mr. Gardner. First thing I want to talk about as far as this portion, the public comment portion. While it allows us to voice concerns, we are left with no response and no follow-up. Hence, I think, a lot of the frustration by the people you see.

» In fact, time is so limited as it is now. And according to the Chronicle, I read where Katie Nguyen, who's going to be our new chair, had said she'd like to see more public participation and revisions to this public comment section. And to Katie, I'd like to say we're here, but limited in discussion and get no feedback. So I do applaud her for wanting to change things as far as the public comment section. On to the taxes, of course, as it's already been said, it is quite a burden. Back in October of 2021, $13 million was given to the county under the American Rescue Plan. According to what I've read, a portion of that was supposed to go to sewer. Also, at this meeting, we're talking about the $2.7 million loan for sewer upgrades.

» The loan that will cost $2.7 million will actually address phase one of the needed improvements. I'd like to have it explained to me why there is a need to take out a loan. When the budget's been increased by $42 million, with full knowledge, we need sewer expansion, not to mention the $13 million from the American Rescue Plan. And I'm just asking where our fiscal responsibility is. Additionally, you're going to be presenting the recreation master plan. I was always involved in recreation and with the school and with exercise, and I'm all for it. And according to the plan, you're looking at about $14.5 million.

» And I ask you, how can you justify that when you're going to take out a loan for sewer, and we haven't upgraded our sewer system? I just don't understand the priorities that you have. And I'd ask you to really look at that. And I'd ask that you vote no. I know I'm limited. So I do want to say to Mr. Jones, thank you for speaking up, voting no on that loan. I don't really see where we should need it with all the money we're getting. Also, I guess really that's it. I'll have to stop there. Thank you very much, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, Melody. Mr. DuBose, please. The next person that signed up is William Howland. Mr. Howland. Good evening. William Howland, 2021 Forest Drive in Camden, Kirchover Hills. The dogs are still barking, gentlemen.

» 29 dogs imported from Columbia, the final victory animal shelter, and they're still barking. I understand the zoning process is in motion. You know, the notice of violation was sent out. The courtesy summons was sent out. And there's a court date of December 19th, which will be 110 days from when this all started. 110 days of barking dogs. And December 19th, who knows what the judge is going to say. The judge may say, oh, this woman is doing wonderful things. We're going to give her another 30 days. We're going to give her another 60 days or 90 days. So, it could go on and on. Last month, Mr. Jones said that there are ordinances about the noise. And he's correct. There's two. There's one about noise. And there's one about animals. But none of those are being enforced.

» We aren't writing citations right now because they're commingled with the zoning. They want to get one bird. I think I have the expression wrong. Two birds with one stone is what they want to do. So, they take care of the zoning issue. The barking issue will go away. But right now, the dogs are still barking. Barking, barking, barking. We need some action. Last month, we saw action up here. There was a gentleman. Mr. Burns just spoke about it. The gentleman had three minutes and 20 seconds to speak. He went over. He went over. Finally, Sheriff Ohm came over. Another deputy came over after Mr. Templar stood up and said, "Enough." And they literally dragged him across the floor and out into the hallway and arrested him for disorderly conduct. But that's after he dropped the F-bomb.

» So, I don't know why he was pulled out. But anyway, we need some action. Action. So, what am I asking you to do? I'm asking you to do something. I'm asking you to enforce the noise ordinance. I'm asking you to enforce the animal control ordinance. I'm asking you to look at the nuisance ordinance and see if there's a way that we can seek a temporary or an emergency injunction to get these dogs stopped. I'm asking you, if that doesn't happen, to make sure you have a plan when we go to court with the judge that the judge doesn't give, Katie Cowan, 90 days to get rid of these dogs. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Howland. Mr. DuBose. The next person that signed up is Jack Carrington. Mr. Carrington. Thank you all very much. Hope you all are doing well.

» First and foremost, thank you all for what you do and serving this county. I'm Jack Carrington. Three boys. Married a girl from Camden. She's a teacher at Camden Elementary. Been up here before, earlier this year. I work with the CARE organization, Kershaw Families, advocating for recreational activists. We represent probably, I don't know, 100 different families throughout the county. We brought a plan where we had some concerns of the overall state of the recreational facilities. Just wanted to come back up here and say we're here. We really, really encourage y'all to do, as Ms. Carson said, we need some new facilities. She really said it better than I could, so thank you very much. You put it up for me. Perfect. Whatever questions y'all have, whatever concerns you have, let us know.

» I'm here supporting Shane. Shane's going to speak in new business about the Wilbur plan that we've been working on for every year. Ben has been extremely instrumental in it. This is a win-win-win for everybody. We have got access to public-private relationships that we do not have access for forever. We need to take advantage of it. We need to utilize these private funds to build a world-class facility that will host tournaments in Kershaw County. My standpoint, I'm like Carson, I think my boys deserve it living in Kershaw County. But I understand how it works. The economic development impact that a new facility would have in Kershaw County is insurmountable. To be able to host tournaments. To be able to fill hotels. To be able to fill restaurants. To bring new businesses here.

» Corporations that are looking to come to Kershaw County want to make sure that their employees are taken care of and have access to good recreational facilities. Right now, we are woefully lacking. We've got an opportunity as a county to take advantage of private funds mixed with public funds. Not raise taxes. Not raise millage. I understand your point perfectly. But we don't have to impact the citizens of Kershaw County from a fiscal standpoint whatsoever. But if we don't take positive action, then it's going to go away and we'll have missed a great opportunity. Again, can't thank y'all enough. Can't thank Shane enough for putting this together. He's put together a great plan for Woodward Park that is going to serve this entire county very well. I wear a second hat.

» I also serve on the Recreation Commission. I've been there this past year. It's been a great experience. I encourage y'all as city councilmen and members, however you identify, to please reach out to us. If you have concerns for your district, if there are parks that need addressing, let us know. Let Shane know. We can put that together to make a plan. Thank y'all so much for what you do. I appreciate it. Thanks, Jack. Okay, Mr. DuBose. Thank you. The next person that signed up is Dale Vanderbilt. Mr. Vanderbilt. First of all, to hear it talk about recreation. Young lady right here. She's going to ask about half my complaint. We need more. If you're going to read pictures, I'm going to pass around to you. I coach baseball. I've coached baseball for 15 years. Probably not here.

» I've never, ever seen a place where you try and teach the kids with a field with no batting cages, no bullpens. That's where you learn the pitchers. A bullpen is where you learn pitchers and be pitchers. We have all these fields. Speaking to Mike. Mr. Diff, speak in the mic, please. Can I just bring it up? We have all these fields, new ones. Larry Doby and Kershaw West. They're not one of them. They have the pitching mounds for the kids to learn on on the side of the fields. But we got the pens for it. What's the sense of doing that? We're not going to do stuff for the kids. I've heard. I went to the meetings. I'll be meeting with him again. You'll learn to hate me. Trust me. But we have been called unskilled kids.

» If you're in the Dixie League, Sandlot kids, that's the reason you haven't. You've got to be able to train kids. You cannot teach a kid without facilities. Not just a baseball field. Let's get these things, mounds and stuff, done for the kids. Okay? That's the first thing. Now the second thing. It's always about money. We spent $425,000 on a floodplain. It wasn't worth $10,000. I used to own farmland, so I didn't know what floodplain is worth. Nothing. But we spend money on that. But we can't get this done. Why not? Let's do something for the kids. Right? Let's do it for the kids. And I know what we just heard the gentleman talk about. And I know what he's talking about. $10,000,000. We're talking $10,000,000 and we can't even get the fields for the kids now.

» And you want to spend $10,000,000 on a complex. You want the kids to leave this county or come back? Let's do something for the kids and start with this. And start with reorganizing the Dixie League. We have been cheated out of fair innings, all kinds of stuff. But that will be adjusted or spoken with eventually. Not tonight. Let's try and get some stuff for the kids so they can be trained to be good ballplayers. Be competitive. Not being called unskilled. Anyway. He's always said most for me, so I'll leave it in her hands. Thank you, sir. Mr. Dubose. Very smart young lady. I'm passing pictures around. Yeah, yeah. Just give them to Mary and she'll pass them around. Thank you, Mr. Vanderbilt. Mr. Dubose. The next person signed up is Jeff Maddox. Mr. Maddox.

» Unfortunately, gentlemen, I'm still hobbling. I'm getting well, though. Raise your hand if you want to congratulate Ben and his win last night. Uh, raise your hand for all the people that have won. Lee, congratulations. Katie, congratulations. Brent, congratulations. Uh, raise your hand if you knew that this recent budget included $15,000 pay increase for the Kershaw Sheriff. I didn't know about it. Raise your hand if you think this was not appropriate while people struggle in this economy. Raise your hand if you know the state gave the sheriff another $15,000 pay increase on top of yours. Raise your hand if you are outraged at this clear breach of public trust. Raise your hand if you consider free speech the foundation of free society.

» Raise your hand if you think obeying laws is important. Raise your hand if you are aware of the ordinance regulating council to release their agenda on Friday before the meeting at 1:00 p.m. According to the ordinance, the county administrator and clerk to the county shall prepare a proposed agenda which shall be compiled compiled compiled with supporting documentation by 1 p.m. on Wednesday preceding the next regular scheduled session. The agenda shall be published by 1 p.m. on Friday. Well, that didn't happen. It came out around, I don't know, 2 o'clock. And then it was revised at 5 o'clock. What was that? Rules for thee and not for me. Raise your hand if you are not involved in this illegal act.

» Raise your hand if you think this is wrong to arrest people for speaking in this public forum and protesting your rules. And finally, raise your hands if you think it is wrong for council to break the law to benefit a single councilman who dreams of a YMCA. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Maddox. Mr. DuBose. The next person signed up is Matthew Hutchinson. Mr. Hutchinson, please. Thank you. I was going to speak on the waste of money on the rec department, but I see it's been taken off the agenda tonight, so I'm not going to speak on it. Hopefully the next council can, we can deal with that. I want to speak about the atrocious behavior at the last meeting.

» It was actually sickening for me to sit at home and watch as a citizen of the United States was dragged from these chambers, a disabled veteran, have his arm twisted painfully behind his back just for exercising his first amendment rights. If I'm not mistaken, the chairman is the only one who has the power to remove people from these chambers or to hold order. Is that correct? But on the order of the county administrator, who I'm a buddy with, this man standing right here dragged a free citizen out of here and arrested him for exercising his first amendment right. It's disgusting. The comments from Mr. Scott after his reelection, I would say disrespect for our constitution is fraying the fabric of our republic. We're not a democracy, gentlemen. This is a republic.

» You are all up there to represent us, the citizens. You were voted out, a couple of you, some leaving. The others are going to be held to account on the next council for representing the people of this county. I moved to this county because it's a rural area, low taxes, and now it's turning into Northeast Columbia, right under our noses, without our approval. Drive down 521 towards I-20, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. Drive down through Lugoff, you'll see what I'm talking about. Next thing I want to talk about is the sheriff's salary, actually. Through a FOIA request, I found out the sheriff gave himself this pay raise. His budget was approved by this county council, but I talked to several council members and the county administrator.

» Nobody had any discussion about the sheriff's salary. It was never held in public. I did see Mr. Burns' name on one email, but that was it, no other council members. So the budget's approved, the money's given to the sheriff, and then he spends it as he sees fit. So I guess he saw fit to give his chief deputy a $15,000 pay increase and to give himself over $35,000 pay increase. That's a 40% increase, gentlemen. What elected official do you know who would ever give themselves that kind of a pay raise? Would any of you do it? I doubt it. Our sheriff has pretty much unlimited power in this county, and it's because nobody holds them accountable. I would push the next council, you gentlemen who are going to be on the next council, we need an appointed sheriff, not an elected sheriff.

» We don't need partisan politics in our law enforcement. We the people should appoint you and elect you to appoint our sheriff, or maybe have a police commission to do it. I think that would make a lot more sense. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Hutchinson. Mr. DePose. Next person signed up is Tom Webb III. Mr. Webb, please, sir. I can't please all of the people all of the time. Somebody famous said that. I'm singing it to them on the way to being famous, I guess. I went to one football game when I was in high school, watching a bunch of old boys running into each other out on the field. I was bored, just bored to death. I don't care a thing about sports. I understand it's very important to a lot of people, but I think it's a distraction. I don't care a thing about it.

» This thing about spending so much money on a sports complex, there's probably some better things to spend it on. It would be jumping ahead of myself. There's a Veterans Day parade in Columbia, supposed to be Friday, one of the biggest in the nation. It's going to get rained out, almost certainly rained out Friday. I'd have liked to have been there. A lot of people marched off to war, you know, what the purpose was, so they could come home to civilian life. But it seems like more and more rules and regulations and even international codes to live by now.

» The question might be, will civilians not be civilians anymore at some point? Are we going to have to have our hair to cut to certain lengths and wear polished shoes? Will there be a uniform? That's going a bit far, but nobody thought things would happen that have happened in the past couple of years. My parents would have been appalled. My grandparents would have been appalled at how far we have slipped. They wouldn't have believed it. They would have said I was crazy if I could get back and tell them what has actually happened. So there are plans. There are always plans behind the curtain, so to speak. The World Economic Forum says no private property by 2030. Nobody here probably knows what the World Economic Forum is. It's been in the news just about that much here, there, and yonder.

» If you listen to the right news, it's out there a lot. World Economic Forum. Big Shots, industry, politics, banking. They want to rule the world. They're telling us now that by 2030 there will be no private property. And they're also saying, along with the other very far left-leaning people, that cattle are going to ruin the atmosphere. Because when they eat grass and digest it, they do a little something they call farting. And they give off methane. They give off methane. So we're going to have to get rid of cattle. That's in the works now. And we're going to have to eat more bugs. That's what they're saying. The World Economic Forum is saying we've got to eat more bugs. And as far as methane goes, swamps.

» You know what happens to the leaves that fall into a swamp? It settles to the bottom. It goes through anaerobic decomposition and gives off methane. So I guess if they're going to get rid of cattle, they're going to have to get rid of all the swamps. Master recreation plan. Five-year plans. Ten-year plans. Comprehensive plan. Sounds a little Soviet Union to me. Worries me when so many... Tom, can you just ramp it up, please? Worries me when there's so many plans being done for us. Of course, it might be something that's going to be done to us. Daniel Webster said something like, "It's not too much to say. The Constitution was made to protect the people from men who in all ages would be masters." They promised to be good masters, but they mean to be masters.

» And I'll add, they'll have a master plan. You just watch. Federal government is trying to spend us into poverty. And you will join them with this master plan to spend $14.5 million on another part. Inflation now is going to get worse. Hard times coming. Thank you. Thank you, Tom. The next person that signed up is Amanda Steven. I think somebody already said it, but rules for thee, but not for me. Literally, one meeting ago, this body arrested a man for ignoring the rules set up by this council in order for meetings to run smoothly. He had to follow the rules. When he failed to do so, he was arrested. He said we, the public, have to follow the rules, but you do not since you're not on the council, or since you are on the council. No. That is not right.

» And that is exactly what this body just did. The agenda was changed last minute after the deadline that was set forth for this council and an ordinance. A deadline meant to ensure the public has adequate time to see the content and come up with comments to insist the council on their decision. The recreational master plan line item that is titled the Woodward Park master plan seems to be the line item that was important enough to break the rules for. This line item is to cost the public $14.5 million, $14.5 million to tear down a park and rebuild it. Why? Right now in this economy. With layoffs coming and the whole country on the brink of a depression, the likes of which haven't been seen in more than 40 years.

» With diesel fuel shortages looming in the southeast specifically, as stated in a November 1st article from Fox, this not only harms the holidays, but everything in between. Fuel prices affect everything. Fuel shortages affect everything. Things like the supplies needed to build such a park. But this council seems determined to ignore all the signs of the economy and the pain the taxpayers in this county are in just trying to figure out how to heat their homes or keep the electricity on. This funding is not only irresponsible, it's reckless. One more meeting and we will have a new quorum coming in. No more spending. The only action that needs to be taken today is to remove this line item from the agenda because you broke the rules to get it there.

» We do this the right way, which is no spending until we have three public readings, time to discuss specifics on where the funding comes from, what project is included in here, and then after three meetings, if it's approved, then it can come back on and be completed. That's all. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Dubose. I think the next one is Gina McLean. Mr. McLean, thank you. I think I read your name correctly. Good evening. If you recall, I spoke on the issue of Final Victory Animal Rescue at last month's meeting. I have to say thank you to Gerald Blanchard for listening to us, Kirk Overhill's neighbors, and responding and taking as much action as he could.

» But I am here tonight to speak about how incredibly disappointed I am on the correspondence of the council and with the attorney, Tommy Morgan. Last meeting, I was the first time I'd ever spoke at a meeting such as this, and I was very shocked to have zero correspondence afterwards with my concerns, especially since some of your faces were shocked at what I was telling you. Throughout this entire matter, I have called the attorney's office three times to speak with him. I've had zero response, not even a callback from a secretary. It's my understanding that he is the county attorney handling the matter for the citizens of the county.

» I have been an instrumental person in the entire case, being that I was the one who brought the issue to the county and the evidence they needed to investigate. This has been an extremely emotional struggle for us. As you've been told, the dogs are still barking. The well-being and the mental state of the neighbors is at risk. All of the residents, for all of the residents at Kirkover Hills. I am appalled that we don't even deserve a callback regarding this extreme situation. Wouldn't the county attorney want to hear from one of the most people involved in the situation prior to taking this case to court? As my neighbor said, when you go to court, we are really hoping that you have a case that is going to help us and not the person that is breaking the law.

» She has had far enough time to remove her business from this place, and she has done nothing to do so. Why haven't I received even a courtesy call? Thank you very much, Ms. McClain. Mr. DuBose. Mr. Chairman, that concludes the sign-up list. And that concludes our public comments. Thanks, everyone. Those were good. And especially our hero, Ms. Brazel, as she leaves. Thank you very much. Well done. With that, we now move to the next item on the agenda, which is a public hearing.

» Public hearing in regards to an ordinance approving the financing of the Southern Loop Sewer Improvement Phase I project through the borrowing of not exceeding dollars of $2,703,740 of general obligation debt from the State Water Pollution Control Revolving Fund, pursuant to Title 48 and various other laws providing for the agreement to make and to accept alone the execution and delivery of a loan agreement between Kershaw County and the South Carolina Water Quality Revolving Fund Authority, the execution and delivery of a promissory note from Kershaw County to the Water Quality Revolving Fund Authority, and other matters relating there, too. Mr. DuBose, do we have anybody signed up? Mr. Chairman, members of Council, three people signed up. All right.

» The first person signed up is Matthew Hutchinson. Mr. Very good. Before he, as he comes up, I'll read the public guidelines. This is the public hearing process. Persons wishing to speak should sign up immediately prior to the public hearing. It shall be announced that persons wishing to speak identify that they wish to speak. And when the public hearing is opened, that person or persons be notified as to how many people have signed up, identified and in what order persons will speak in that order in which they signed up and identified in the order they have identified themselves as wishing to speak. Each person can speak a maximum of 10 minutes. Comments at public hearings should be germane to the matters subject to the public hearing, which should be liberally construed.

» And we have three. All right. Mr. Hutchinson, please. I open the public hearing. Mr. DuBose, am I allowed to ask direct questions and get answers? No, it's not a question and answer period, Mr. Hutchinson. So they, but they can answer questions if they see fit. It's not public. It's not a public. Not that type of hearing. No, it's public hearing for you to give your comments, sir. Oh, okay. So the 2.7 plus million dollars that you're going to go into debt for, put us the people in debt for, is for a project that I found was already awarded to a company and paid for in cash by 1.8 some million dollars back in November of 2020. I did, I found this out by simply going on to the minutes from the county council from November and December of 2020.

» So my question is if we paid cash for this project already, why are we going into debt again for the same Southern Loop phase one project that's already done? So of course I asked around and come to find out that this money that you're about to put the citizens into debt for, and I have no doubt that you will move forward and put us in debt, is going to go to replenish the cash that we've already spent. Has any of you heard this before? I know you don't want to break your, your rules, but I would ask any of you, would you run your business that way? Would you run your household that way? Pay cash for something and then two years later go into debt, 2.7 something million dollars that we'll be paying 1.6% interest on quarterly until it's paid off.

» What are the sewer, what is this expansion going for? There's a huge neighborhood that's being built down there off of Fort Jackson Road. The plots are all out on the GIS, everybody can see it. 2.3 acre, or .23 acres, I'm sorry, per lot. I don't know, personally, I don't know how anybody can live that way so close to their neighbors, but to each their own. If they want to spend their money on that, that's fine. Again, I say I moved to this county 16 years ago because it's a rural county, and I'd like to see it kept that way. That's why I left Lugoff and went to Cassett. My concern is that we're going to take on this debt and no homes are going to be built.

» No businesses will be finished because of the rising fuel cost, the raise inflation, perhaps a change in the county council and how they handle economic development in this county. But we'll be saddled with this debt. I came up here months ago after the primaries and warned the entire county that this council was going to try to do whatever they can until January when they leave, or December actually, when they leave office. And this is one of those cases among many that have happened so far. I would say, Mr. Connell, you know, congratulations on being elected. I did vote for you. Unfortunately, it's not for the reason you think. We need another fresh blood on the council, so we'll see you in two years. You'll probably come back and run for chairman when that seat goes away.

» I really can't make any sense of this. I would hope one of the councilmen can explain the reasoning behind going into debt for something that's already been paid cash for. Something else that I heard that was troubling, and I'm still trying to confirm this through documentation, was that the county has already begun collecting user fees to pay for this debt. That this was already decided two years ago to take on this debt, but now it needs to be revoted on since it's been so long since we received. I'm sorry, I'm boring you, Mr. Brazel. It's been so long and we haven't received the funds. So I ask again, what sense does this make? Nobody would run their household this way. I'm sure BAE Systems doesn't run their business this way. I'm sure Connell Law Firm doesn't.

» I'm sure Roy Wood Products doesn't, or any other businesses that are ran in this county. Nobody would pay cash for something, then turn around and go into debt for it. They might come to the county council and beg for tax relief or fee lots. I'm really sorry that you gentlemen don't want to answer any direct questions. I'm sure all the people back behind me would love to hear the answers to these questions that I have. Perhaps we can address them later on Facebook or YouTube or WIS is back there. Maybe you guys can give interviews and answer some of these questions. That would be great. Otherwise, I would ask that you do nothing until the new council comes on board.

» Do not put the citizens of this county into further debt as you walk out the door to your retirements or your massive multinational corporations you work for. You know, we have the cash on hand. We have the ARPA money. Why not use that? I guess we need new basketballs. Maybe that's more important that I should have to pay for. I don't have any children in recreation departments. But, you know, I guess you have no problem with taxing me to pay for that. You know, I know where there's a lot of money on a budget that's wasted that you could bring back and spend on recreation if you want to do that. So I look forward to hearing the third reading of this, to hear the debate.

» I asked somebody on the council to please think about what side of history you're going to be on moving into this next council session. Do you want to be known as the man who voted to put this debt on the citizens of Kershaw County? Or do you want to be the one who listened to the will of the people and stopped it? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hutchinson. Mr. DuBose. The second person that signed up is Jeff Maddox. Mr. Maddox, please. Yeah, we're going to talk about the sewer. But more than that, I want to talk about how we got here. According to your findings of fact, the Title 48 that you mentioned, Mr. Chair, the Code of Laws of South Carolina were amended pursuant to Clean Water Act.

» And it modified and amended to make an application for and to receive assistance from the South Carolina Water to Quality Revolving Fund Authority. In Article 10, Section 14 of the Constitution of South Carolina, it limits such debt must be incurred only for a purpose which is a public purpose or a corporate purpose for the county. That seems interesting. Public and corporate merging together. I think Tom said something about that being fascism or communism. Anyway, unless accepted therefrom, such debt may be issued in the amount not exceeding 8% of the assessed value of all taxable property of such county. In other words, how much is all the property in the county worth? I would like to know that.

» Given that property values have been skyrocketing due to the Federal Reserve pumping up with cheap interest and printing money out of thin air. June 12, 2007, County Council created the Kershaw County Sewer District. The district consists of the entire unincorporated area of the county. The county is authorized to provide for the operation and maintenance of the district through the levy and collection of an annual ad valorem taxes on all taxable property within the district. To finance improvements for the district. The construction or acquisition of facilities and acquisition of equipment of the necessary property through the issuance of general obligation bonds of the county. Now, the bonded limit, read that again, are not subject to the bonded debt limit.

» Improvements, in other words, once you guys got the bond to begin with, you're not subject to the 8% anymore. You can spend whatever you want. Pursuant this, a public hearing is given notice form and attached to this. After due investigation, the county council has determined to undertake the southern sewer loop improvement project. Improving, expanding and rehabilitating and equipping the county sewer system serving the district. In other words, it has nothing to do with the people voting on it or anything. The full faith and credit resources and taxing power of the county. She'll be irrevocably pledged to the payment and principle of an interest under this loan agreement and note to secure its obligations. The county shall cause the auditor to levy.

» In the event the tax levied in the district is insufficient for any reason to meet the obligation of the county to provide for payment under the loan agreement or note, there shall be levied by the county a tax without limit as to the rate or the amount on all taxable property in the county. In other words, if the economy goes to crap, house values fall, and the county can't steal any more from us, well, guess what? Everybody gets taxed, not just the people that are hooked up to the sewer. Authorization of the loan the county council authorizes. Acceptance of the loan from the state authority in the amount not exceeding 2.7 million dollars. Order of tax levy for payment of note. For the payment and the principle of the interest on the note.

» As it comes due, the creation of such a sinking fund. Don't know why y'all call that a sinking fund. It's a slush fund. As may be necessary thereof, the full faith credit and tax and power of the county are hereby pledged. In other words, you guys, they're pledging everything for you. Because they love you, don't you know? In the event of the tax in the district is insufficient, they will tax you again and again and again and again. There are a lot of things in here that government is able to do that free market is not. This blending of free market and government, it used to be called fascism. I think Mussolini or somebody coined that term. And it was the blending of corporations. It's this public-private partnership that we always hear.

» Oh, it's going to be public money and private money and they're going to get together and do all these things. People in this county are complaining like crazy about houses being built everywhere. Oh, look at how much growth, growth, growth. And we're not keeping up. We're not keeping up. And how are all these houses getting built on little tiny, tiny lots? Well, guess what? The government went in and used their power of monopoly to tax and put up sewer systems. And now everybody in Westwater is going, holy crap, look at these little vinyl boxes popping everywhere. Then the traffic's crazy and everything. And the county council says it's for economic development. And then we want to keep the county rural, but we're urbanizing everything.

» And then I get this thing about houses, little roofs, don't pay enough taxes. We need the corporations to come in. And then we give them fee in lieu. Something doesn't match here. And the monopoly on violence and people that are not in the free market like developers. Developers ought to get together and say, you know, if we built this little sewer system right here, we could put little lots on there. But if we can't, we got to have a three quarter acre lot and put a septic tank up. I'll tell you what, let's lobby the government. And they'll build it for us and we won't have to pay for it. Now I'm a, you know, I come from a long line of home builders. And you'd think I would be, yeah, I'm going to lobby the government to get it. But I'm not, I'm not.

» That is not the proper role and function of government. The proper role and function of government is the protection of individual liberty and private property. None of which we have anymore last month taught us that. Gentlemen, it's time for us to get back to the roots. The roots of that the nation was founded on individual liberty, private property. The government adjudicates conflicts, ensures that contracts are held. You know, I think we, when government really got going with all this kind of stuff and all the electricity plants and nuclear power plants and, and roads and it was roads. Of course then, you know, you had to have a marriage license and then you had to have a driver's license and then you had to have building permits and then you had to have permit for everything.

» And we're, we're just down a slippery slope. It's just cool idea of collectivism. It, it, it's, it eats and eats and it destroys individual liberty. We're in a bad case. We're, we're running right into a debt monster that is going to be a hurricane, a storm from, excuse my term, hell. Now is not the time to do anything except buckle down the hatches. Like I said, two or three years ago. Anybody that looks at alternative media and experts, economic experts will tell you, oh, good Lord, we got it coming. As Mr. Obama's preacher once said, the chickens is coming home to roost. What are we going to do? It's time to buckle the hatches, boys. I know, I know it's easy for us to go. Can you wrap it up, Mr. Manning? Yes, yes sir, I am. Thank you very much.

» I appreciate y'all listening and I hope that you do the right thing. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. DuBose. The third person signed up is Amanda Stevens. Ms. Stevens. I think you all know how I feel on the matter, given the last few comments in the last few meetings about spending money. However, I do have one point that I would like to make regarding the spending. I agree with Mr. Burns on something. The last meeting, you said what else is local government good for except for public safety. I agree. But I want to add two things. I think what else is local government good for except for public safety, infrastructure, and recreation. That's where our priorities should lie. Everything else is a nice-to-have that is not essential when the hard times come.

» And everyone in this county knows hard times are here. But what do we do about spending on our priority items and hard times? Do we take out a loan? No, we don't. We cut other things. We fund items we have to have with cash. Just like everyone else does in their own households. Anything else that's in the budget that's not affecting public safety, infrastructure, like sewer, or recreation. That is, existing parks are up to code. We're not tearing anything down right now. And sports do not deserve money right now. In a county that just this year approved a budget of all funds being 101 million dollars. If you remove the ARPA funds, that's 89 million dollars.

» You're telling me that in that 89 million dollars, we don't have 2.7 somewhere to fund this with cash? Instead of taking out a loan? Actually, perfectly, the American Rescue Plan has more than enough to cover this cost. Why are we taking out a loan? I want to be very clear about this. I'm not against the sewer system being upgraded. Although I do think the question that was asked before about how this was already funded with cash probably needs to be answered. I'm not against a sewer system upgrade. What I'm against is taking out a loan on something we should have the cash to cover.

» Why would we choose a bond that would have us pay over 3 million dollars, which is 1.6% interest on a 2.7 million dollar loan, rather than the original 2.7 million dollars? What alternatives do we have? Do we have grants? Why are we adding more debt to our county when we don't have assurances of a solid tax base in three to five years? Again, we don't have the money guys. It does not exist. We are a rural blue collar county. When your constituents are struggling to keep food on the table and electricity on in their homes, it's time to step up and say enough. Cut the spending. Check your grants that are available. It's time to go back to basics. Before you have a bigger problem on your hands and you place an even bigger burden on the incoming council that's going to have to fix this.

» We have to do the right thing. Vote no unless this upgrade is funded in cash. Do not wait until this economy crashes around us to start looking at ways to avoid adding to our debt and fund required projects with cash. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. DuBose. That concludes the three people that signed up. Let me just open to see if anyone else wishes to sign up and I think we can close the public hearing. Thank you very much, Mr. DuBose. Thank you, those who came to speak. With that, we move to the next item on the agenda. I remind you now we'll have Mr. Tucker calling in. Can we have a motion to approve the agenda? I'll move. And a second, please. I'll second it. Who is that? Mr. Brazel. All right, very good. First, any discussion, Mr. Jones? Mr.

» Chair, if I may, I have an amendment I want to offer. Very good, sir. The amendment I have here before me is I'd like to make a motion to amend the agenda to delete old business boat ramp, to delete new business. Number one, Woodward Park master plan. Number three, Motorola replacement, radio replacement for responders. Very good. I hope Mr. Tucker is up. Do we have a second? It was a second. I made the motion, I'm sorry. Yeah, yeah. Do we have a second? Mr. Tucker, are you there? No. Okay. Can you hear me? Yes. Do you wish to second or not? Yes, sir. Okay. That is a second. Okay. Very good. It is on the table. Mr.

» Jones, will you lead discussion? I'm going to yield to one of my colleagues, because he said he wanted to discuss this, that he was willing to not pursue it under the, excuse me, I'm sorry, under the new business, I guess, or the old business, and he wanted to discuss this. So I thought this would be a good time to let him discuss what he wants. Well, I do have a motion to amend. Mr. Connell, yes. Okay, so we have a, okay, first of all, just to review, the agenda is on the table. The second is we have a motion to delete three items. That would be the boat ramp, the radios, and Woodward Park. And now we have a further amendment. Mr. Connell. Yes, my motion would be to leave the boat ramp item in under old business as listed.

» Under new business, change the Woodward Park master plan for discussion only, and change the Motorola radio replacement for first responders as listed to discussion only. That's my amendment. Mr. Connell. Okay, so Motorola is, excuse me, I was writing and not listening. Mr. Connell, I can restate if you like. Sure, I can restate. My motion to amend would be, amend his existing motion would be to leave under old business, the boat ramp as currently stated, to amend the Woodward Park entry under item number one, master plan for discussion only, and under item number three under new business, amend that for discussion only. Otherwise, it would remain the same as listed. Okay, can we have a second? Second. Second from Mr. Brazel. And now it's on the table again. Mr.

» Connell, would you please leave us, lead us, excuse me. Sure, well, after the agenda was published, it became apparent that there's more people that want to address recreation needs, it'd be appropriate for the next council. This is an item, right now I'm speaking of the Woodward Park master plan that's been discussed with council for many months, but some other needs became apparent, which I think will come up either in December or in January. I anticipate that. And then the Molaroto radio replacement for first responders, we thought that we're going to have quotes in hand related to that item, but we don't have quotes in hand. And there might be some other orders that come up that give economies of scale. So it'd be more appropriate to discuss it another time. Very good.

» Other discussion, Mr. Brazel? No, I have no discussion. Deferring to Mr. May I? Well, can I go to Mr. Tucker? Do you want to go ahead? I'm sorry, yeah, go to Mr. Tucker. Yeah, Mr. Tucker, we have the motion on the table. Would you want to have contribute to discussion? No, I have nothing. I have nothing. Okay, Mr. Jones, please, sir. But the reason I won't support my colleague's amendment is that I believe, Ms. Templin, you correct me on this, I think the old business boat ramp, the Woodward Park master plan under new business and the new business Motorola replacement was all put on the agenda under new business about five o'clock Friday, wasn't it? When it was posted? It was after the deadline. It was after the deadline. It had been discussed prior to, but as far as the move.

» I've never known in the history of Kershaw County for us to ever miss the five o'clock, I mean, excuse me, the one o'clock deadline on Friday. Listen, folks, I'm going to tell you right now. I'm absolutely for recreation, and I'm excited about the first of the year, because that's going to be one of the first things we take up, and we're going to chair it. I mean, we're going to have a committee look at it and come back in 30 days, and we're going to make some decisions, and some things are going to be done for recreation. That's the way we need to do it. The Motorola radios, we're going to do the same thing with that. Now, I'm the only councilman in the last budget that brought up taking some of the COVID money, the Aqua funds, to use for the Motorola radios, but I didn't get a second.

» It was obviously voted down because I didn't even get a second. The fact that the Woodward Park master plan, I just saw it when I got the agenda, 14 and a half million dollars. Guys, we've got a new council coming in in six weeks, a new chair coming in six weeks. We all do respect, and I think we need to slow down. We need to do our due diligence. We need to let that council look at this, because I'm going to tell you right now, and you know this, Mr. Dale, that is a top priority, recreation. And I'm excited about what they're going to do with it, but bottom line is I've had no input with this. I can't tell you the details. My colleague tells me I do know the details, but I don't know the details.

» And I hesitated for a while to say publicly I was against this tonight, trying to find any reason I could in my head why I should support this. We have rules that we go by in these chambers. A citizen was arrested for not following the rules, but yet now we act like it's no big deal. And yet our rules were established when it comes to the deadline at one o'clock on Wednesday with information. When it comes to the deadline to be published to the people of Kershaw County on one o'clock Friday, and it's published by, and I'll go walking in and I'll say, "Well, where's my agenda on Friday?" And it was like two o'clock. And they said, "Well, I think the county minister was waiting to get some more information on what needed to go under." Well, that's just not the way it works, folks.

» But let me tell you, Jimmy Jones is for recreation. That's going to be a top priority, but we're going to do it the right way. We're not going to shoot from the hip. Come in here. There's nothing at all, Grant. There's nothing at all in this that justifies how we're going to pay for anything. And I want to commend Mr. Connell for actually wanting to move this for discussion only. I really do, and I appreciate that. That's where I stand. And the right thing to do is for this to be taken off the agenda tonight, pick back up at the first of the year. And I can tell you, well, I won't say that. I'll wait and see what happens. But I have some more information, a lot, lot more information if we want to get into the weeds on this tonight in this discussion. I can promise you folks that.

» I've got my documentation, and I'll get into the weeds, but I don't want to do that unless we have to. Thank you. - Other points? - Question. - Oh, yeah. Mr. Braswell, please, sir. - I know we can have a call meeting as long as it's published 24 hours prior to the agendas published 24 hours prior to the meeting. How does that differ from the situation that Mr. Jones is explaining? - Is you Ken DeBose, point legal? - You're asking me? - Yes, sir. - Yeah, this is a scheduled meeting. The rules talk about two kinds of meetings, actually. One is the scheduled meeting. I have to look. Let me look at the exact language. One is a scheduled meeting. The other one is a special meeting or a called meeting.

» And yes, a called meeting or a special meeting can be called by the chairman or four members of the council. A scheduled meeting is a scheduled meeting. It's my understanding that the last meeting you moved your scheduled meeting from Tuesday to Wednesday. So, as my understanding, this was a scheduled meeting versus a 24-hour called meeting, which would be called by the chairman or four members of the council. - So, what is the lead time on having an answer now? - Scheduled meeting, the rules say the agenda will be published by 1:00 p.m. on Fridays. But this agenda is FOIA compliant, but it's not compliant with the rules. The rules say 1:00 p.m. compliant. - Okay, thank you. - Talking your mic to Mr. DuBose, please. - Excuse me, I'm sorry. Thank you. Other comments? - Mr.

» Chairman, I would just say the items for discussion are truly to inform the public about what these issues are about. In particular, the Woodward Park item, I didn't anticipate that it would be controversial in any way, but after the agenda was published, it became apparent that other people had questions or people from other areas. One of the particular projects addressed that were not included in this agenda item. Projects that I would support. Unfortunately, I won't be on council, I won't have an opportunity to support them, but I think that maybe it should be combined with those or those should be considered as well. So, that would literally be for discussion, no dollars spent, only information shared with the public.

» And then the Motorola Ready Replacement for first responders, I've asked staff to give the council an update on those. There are particular dates that are relevant for when they're going to go out of service, when the hardware won't be served anymore, when the software updates won't be available anymore, that I think are really relevant. That's information only at this point, under the amendment. - Okay, Mr. Jones. - Mr. Jones, and we know all that, and we've got all that under control, and we're ready to handle that after the first of the year. Folks, I'm the one who brought it up at the last budget meeting and told this council that we think we've got a lot of time, but we don't have a lot of time for the Motorola radios.

» Because they're getting a backlog by orders right now, and we just haven't done anything on that. But I got no response, and of course, I had talked to Mr. Connell about it as well, when he had talked to me about the recreational issue. But one big thing that's been left out, the Motorola issue we've got here on this table leaves out Lugol Fire Department. They have no money. They have no money at all for those radios. They're not budgeted for those radios. And the new council is going to make sure that every public safety officer is funded with one of those new radios. Guys, here's where I have a problem. I have a problem when, and congratulations, Mr. Connell. I'm not under three minutes. When we have, when we have a, I congratulate Mr.

» Connell going to the Statehouse, but he's going to be gone. We're going to be here. It was mentioned to me about using $5 million out of the ARPA funds. Okay? I think the new council is capable of handling that. Why are we doing that now, in the last few weeks? I truly can't understand, and this is just me, and let me tell you something. I know, without a doubt, Mr. Brasel cares about recreation, and I know Mr. Connell cares about recreation, but this is wrong the way we're handling it. And as some of you said, we need to follow our own rules. Okay? And I want you to hear me. I'm going to be here. I'm not a first-term council member, and I'm not a lame duck council member. I'm going to be here after the first, and I can assure you that Mr.

» Brasel, myself, Katie Gwynn, Brent, those that are here, we're going to make sure that recreational needs is met. There's no, but give, give us a chance to look at it and give us a chance to work with the folks and see if we can find the money maybe somewhere else. Oh, not the taxpayers, but maybe somewhere else even other than the ARPA funds that everybody's kind of digging in like a shark finzy trying to get. I just don't get it. Why are we rushing? Why are we rushing so fast to do this and say, well, oh, we're going to get a commitment from MUSC. We're going to get a commitment from the Health Resource Center. Well, the last I talked to a board member at the Resource Center, there was no commitment talked about.

» And I don't think there's anything in writing from MUSC here tonight, but yet we're going to move forward with this. It makes no sense. Thank you. Let me, you mentioned rules. A little further on, we have a public presentation. And that public presentation is a recreation master plan. And certainly that would embrace somewhat of what is discussed here on Woodward Park. And I think we are permitted to have discussions among us during the public presentation by the recreation department. Isn't that correct? Yes. The council during public presentation can ask questions and discuss it. Yes. Again, you might be able to raise that offline. But again, for discussion only.

» And we may, as a body, decide to extend the public presentation of the Rec Department well up into the endurance of Shane's ability to stay up there while we entertain questions. So maybe that's the way, Ben, for you to get your point out. Mr. Chairman, I'm fine to amend my existing motion to agree with Mr. Jones to delete the Woodward Park master plan since it's discussion only and discuss it under the existing master plan discussion that's going to be a presentation. One thing I'd mention on the radios is I think it's useful for council and the public to know that in just the last few days, I learned from Mr. Templer that there's been a two-year change in one of the deadlines we were aware of before. Is that correct? Right.

» This is just relevant information for the public to know and for council to know and consider as they go into the next meeting. I'd like to know. I think I made Mr. Templer aware of that as well at the last budget meeting we were talking about. Did we not? The two-year deadline? Right. I mean, I believe I did that when we were discussing it up here. I mean, nobody's forgotten anything. And I can -- Mr. Jones, I'm referencing other dates that he had shared with me. I understand. Let me finish one second, sir. With all due respect, because I don't want to make you mad too big. Now, we've got a plan. And our plan is going to be transparent. And our plan is going to be January 1. Katie Gwynn, Russell Brazel, they're going to take the leadership of it.

» I'm here to support them because I support recreation. But that's after the first of the year, not now. Not shooting from the hip, violating our own rules. That's then. And to my colleague, I have much respect for sitting next to him. We just don't agree. I just happen to be right. And I've been right a lot of times up here. That may cost me a vote up here for saying that tonight, but it is what it is. Folks, we need to stop it. I think the new council is very capable of handling everything there is that's listed on here. Now, the boat ramp. Here's where I would have problems putting money in that. Mr. Brazel fought very hard for that in the early years of his two-year term he served so far. And he got some money to go into a study on that. And nobody ever got back with him.

» I mean, he put a lot of work and did a good job on that. But I'm telling you, there's nothing in the agenda packet under the boat ramp that says how are we going to pay for it. So we can't sit here and appropriate money because we've left that out. And not only do we leave it out, we posted it too late. The rules are the rules. Mr. Chairman, I don't agree with. He and I cannot sit down in a room and talk probably without having a debate or disagreement. But I find him an honorable man. We just don't agree with each other. Now, he and I can have some good dialogue if we've got a mediator, you know, and we can be on the same page. Folks, this is just not the way we need to be doing business. And I appreciate the enthusiasm and excitement from a couple of my colleagues up here.

» But we need to take this off, postpone it, come back at the first of the year, and I promise you I'm going to be here. I promise you, you will be happy with the results of this new county council coming in. That's what I'm asking. Because whatever they vote for tonight, they're going to leave it for us to have to fix and work on after January. Just doesn't make sense. You know, again, there's nothing on the agenda as to how much, where the money's coming from, or how we accept the Woodward Park Plan that has $14 million. You know, we haven't even finished West Water Reef. That's what he was talking about. Mr. Steele was talking about. We hadn't even finished the West Water Reef project. We still have maybe $800,000 we've got to put into that to bring it up to date.

» We haven't even finished the Larry Dovey's Field. Larry Dovey's complex. I think it's complete. That's going to cost us some money. But yet, why do we want to come in here and just completely start another brand new program? We're going to take care. Let me tell you something. I'm very, very interested in Woodward Park. I'm very interested. I think that's a good plan to talk about. But guys, we've got to do it the right way. That's what I'm saying. And I don't mean any disrespect to any of my colleagues up here. I know they're passionate about it. Well, I am passionate about it too. I taught martial arts at the recreation for 40 years because I was pretty good. And I know Mr. Connell wrestled, but I did karate. But guys, let's do the right thing by the people tonight.

» And let's take this off the agenda. We know it's coming back up in the first of January. And we would have a lot of public input. We would have a good study for 30 days done, come back to us. And all the answers and needs would be there. And you know what? We may can see that money to stay where it's at right now. We may can find the money somewhere else. Because I can assure you, we have some big sewer issues coming up. Now, I've got some big plans on that. Mr. Jones, I'm going to seize one of your points. We have rules. And as we said, this agenda item came in after the cutoff. It did. I think that's been agreed. How it happened has not been discussed. There's a second rule that we have. And everybody says, well, you're the chairman.

» Why did that get on there? The rule we have is this is a body of equals. And if any member of the council wants to put an item on the agenda, there is no one up here who can say otherwise. And it has to be decided in this forum and voted up or down as we're doing right now. So if you all would all pay attention to this rather lengthy discussion, you can see that we're putting a lot of degree of seriousness, not just on the timeliness of the submission, but the authority of this council to decide what we're going to talk about. So I'm ready to go to a vote. Yes, we can. One quick thing too. Yeah, go ahead. The chairman is absolutely right on that. It's one o'clock Friday.

» I've never missed a deadline that they got a complaint, but it's never ever, the rule has never been broken for one o'clock on Friday. To me, that's serious. And that's what we're going to be doing if we vote. Mr. Chairman, I'm done. No, that's good, Jimmy. I do need to, before we call the question on the third motion, the third motion we have in front of us. Mr. Tucker, do you have any comments? No, no, Mr. Chairman, I'm good. Thank you. And thank you for dialing in. I hope you're feeling better. Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman. No further, yeah. Mr. Chairman. I've just got to clarify that I submitted all agenda items on time. They just didn't end up in the proper order. At least one of them didn't end up in the proper order. I have no idea why the agenda got published late.

» So, I mean, I don't know what to tell you about that. I appreciate our staff very much. I think they're professional and do their jobs. But, you know, I've been talking about several of these items for months. And they, for whatever reason, did not come out at one o'clock. But thankfully, since this meeting was actually scheduled 24 hours after the normal meeting, the public had an additional 20 hours to look at the agenda, inquire, or look at it after it ended up online, because this is occurring 5:30 on a Wednesday as opposed to a Tuesday. Yeah, thank you. Mr. Jones. I have nothing else. All right. Very good. Do you want to restate your amendment, Mr. Conhill? Sure. Well, it's actually changed. I think I need another second. You can't change it. You just need to make another amendment.

» Okay. Well, so I'll restate what I intend my amendment to be. Leaving old business as is, okay? We can delete Woodward Park master plan as written and discussion only on item number three under new business. Otherwise, it remains as written on the radios. All right. Very good. Sammy, did you hear that? Yes, sir. All right. I want to call for the vote now. Sammy, how do you vote on that amendment? No. All others in favor, signify by raising your hand. Mr. Connell, Mr. Gardner, Mr. Brazel, and Mr. Tomley. That's four. All those opposed, signify by raising your hand. That's three, and Mr. Connell's amendment passes. Help me out here now. Ken, we now have, this is juxtaposed to the original amendment, which Mr. Jones came in with, is to remove all items from the agenda.

» The way I think this happens now is that the motion, of course, to approve the agenda was made. Mr. Jones made a motion to amend it. And Mr. Connell just made his motion to amend Mr. Jones' motion. And his motion to amend Mr. Jones' motion passed. Therefore, Mr. Jones' motion has been amended, I believe. No, it has not. So, yeah. Well, it's been superseded. Yeah, his motion was to amend your motion. I understand what his motion was, but my motion has not been. I want to take a vote on my amendment. It's up to the chair, but although his motion to amend it passed. That's right. We can take a vote on that. Yes, you can. Can I restate it? Yeah, restate it, Jamie. Okay, I'm going to restate the amendment.

» My motion is to amend the agenda to delete old business boat ramp, because we're going to take care of that. New business, Woodward Park master plan, and Motorola radio replacement for first respondents, because we're going to fix that. Thank you. And you can vote on that, Mr. Chair. Very good. So, all those in favor of Mr. Jones' amendment, signify -- and I'll first go to Sammy first. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote? I think it's an improper vote, but I vote yes, because once the amendment is done, we should be finished with it. I agree. Yeah. I disagree. I do too. But all those -- and so you vote against -- He voted for it. For it. Okay. All those in favor of Mr. Jones' amendment, signify by raising your hand. And all those opposed, raise your hand. All right.

» And in this case, I go with the majority, given that I think we've already passed it. So, where are we at? Mr. Chairman, give us an update. And we now go to the final vote, which is the motion as amended by Mr. Connell will go forward for another vote. Which is the agenda now is -- be approved with Woodward Park master plan, deleted entirely, and Motorola replacement first responder discussion only. Isn't that correct? And the other -- No, I think those are the two things that are there. Otherwise -- Mr. No, he said -- Mr. And the boat ramp stays under old -- Mr. Boat ramp stays under old business. Mr. Boat ramp stays under old business is what passed, as I recall. Mr. And -- Mr. Discussion only on Motorola, and item number one was deleted. Mr. Deleted. Mr. Under new business. Mr. Yes.

» Mr. So, the Woodward Park is off. Mr. Boat ramp is on for discussion. Mr. Boat ramp's on it. Mr. I'm sorry. Mr. Discussion. Mr. No, boat ramp is not discussion. Mr. Well, you can't -- you haven't said -- there's nothing in the agenda packet to identify how we're going to spend money on the boat ramp. Mr. How are we going to talk about that? Mr. That's been voted. Mr. Let's just make sure I've got your amendment restated, Ben. Mr. Okay. Mr. As I understand it, the boat ramp stays on. Mr. Wow, wow, wow. Mr. Correct. Mr. Correct. Mr. Woodward comes off? Mr. Yes. Mr. Under item one, correct. Mr. And then I'm moving down to the Motorola. Mr. That comes off? Mr. Discussion only. Mr. Discussion. Mr. All right. Mr.

» We now move to a vote on that restated amendment that was passed on the third amendment motion. Mr. I have a question. Mr. Yes. Mr. Legal question. Mr. I vote no on this agenda. Mr. Yes. Mr. We still discuss this issue, right? Mr. Yes. Mr. Absolutely, Jimmy. Mr. Because I'm going to vote no. Mr. Absolutely. So with that, all those in favor of the motion as amended, first going to Mr. Tucker. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote, sir? Mr. I vote yes. Mr. And all others in favor, signify by raising your hand. Mr. Connell, Mr. Burns, Mr. Brazel, Mr. Gardner, and Mr. Tomlinson. All those against as Mr. Jones, and the motion passes and the budget is amended as voted. Mr. Agenda. Mr. Agenda. Mr. Agenda. Mr. Agenda. My gosh. Absolutely. All right. Mr. Agenda. Mr. Agenda.

» If you can put it up on the screen, page forward for you, Sammy out there in the hinterlands. And I recognize that Mr. Tucker again called in, but thank you, Sammy, for your professionalism. Can we have a motion to approve the minutes? Mr. So moved. Mr. Gardner. A second. Second. From Mr. Connell. Discussion? Sammy, any discussion? No. All right. Any others? Seeing there is none, we move to a vote. Sammy, how do you vote? Yes. And all others, signify by raising your hand. Again, repeat that one more time, please. This is the approval of minutes. All those in favor of the minutes from the last meeting, and that's unanimous, Mary. Thank you very much, with Mr. Brazel, not in the room for the present. With that, we move to public presentation, a recreation master plan.

» We were not given a read ahead, so this will be our first opportunity, Shane, for you to dazzle us. As you've heard, we will take questions during this meeting. It's supposed to last 20 minutes, but I'll take a concurrence of this body if we want to go beyond 20 minutes. Okay, Shane, come on up. There it is. So what I'll do here is... I'll just ask first. Sammy, can you see these charts? No, sir, I can't, but I'll be okay. Okay, good. Go ahead, Shane. Sorry. So what I'll do here first is just introduce Alliance Consulting Engineers. They're the firm that actually did this master plan for us. The sole purpose of this presentation is information. National standards, what we should look like by national standards. These guys put a lot of work into it. I actually helped a little bit on it.

» We have Mr. Steve Whaley who will do the presentation. We also have Ryan Merritt and Kyle Clampett with Alliance Consulting Engineers. So they're going to do the presentation, give you some information. And like I said, we're not coming up here asking for any funds right now. This is just a roadmap for the future, our five to 10 year goals in this master plan. Okay? So these guys will definitely give you a good presentation here. All right, sir. Hello. I'm Steve Whaley and this is the report that we're going to be talking about tonight. So. We better go get some coffee. That's a big book. No, this should be pretty quick. I'm just going to go through 10 slides. So it's not going to take that long, hopefully. Will copies be provided to council? Yes, sir.

» There will be two copies of this book that will be given. And we also have digital copies as well. Okay. Well, we'll need to make sure it's distributed so everybody can see it. Okay. Thank you. On slide one, I would like to thank everybody for allowing us to come in and go over this tonight. And due to time, we're just going to condense the executive summary down to four points. We're going to do a brief history of the study, current inventory, public input, and future goals for the growth of Kershaw County Parks and Rec. Next slide. For the brief history of the recreation, initial study of the existing recreation was done in 2002.

» In 2012, Kershaw County invited the city of Camden, town of Elgin, Kershaw County School Districts, University of School, the University of South Carolina School of Public Health, Kershaw Health, and South Carolina Parks, Recreation, and Tourism to come together and review the 2002 Master Plan Study with Alliance Consulting Engineers to formulate a plan which would promote health, wellness, and growth of the recreation system within the county. During the meeting, there were ten five-year goals and seven ten-year goals within that study or that meeting. And through the ten-year period from 2012 to 2022, a majority of the goals were met.

» Moving forward, Kershaw County intends to build upon past success and update ten-year study to reflect past efforts within the 2022 Master Plan that we're providing tonight. Next slide. A recreation inventory was completed on September 6th and 7th of this year. The guidelines of the National Recreation and Parks Association was followed to incorporate all public and private facilities to get an understanding of the current inventory within the whole county. We had 103 participants provide input during the study. Next slide. This is an overview of the inventory, the current recreation inventory for the Kershaw County. This includes all public county, city, town, and community parks as well as private recreation. Next slide.

» This slide is separated because the school system has a lot of recreation, but a lot of that is not accessible due to security now in schools. Only the public playground systems are available after school hours. Next slide. On this slide, this is going into what we reviewed during our public input forum meetings that we had. We had three public forum meetings and during that time period we had a survey questionnaire that was distributed to the attendees as well as online survey of the county website up until October 7th. These photos around the screen shows what was brought out in the input, the majority of the things that were brought out.

» More indoor and outdoor basketball courts, repair or construct new concession restroom facilities, all park facilities should have restrooms, bring marathon running to Kershaw County, maintain the current facilities, need tournament facility, add indoor pool and add nature walking and bike trails worth more than a half a mile length. Next slide, please. Okay, so now after those items were brought to us with the surveys and the public forum meetings and we reviewed all of the inventory, we correlated the following items to be updated over the next five years, five-year goals. But then community center, they would get a general interior improvement and a HVAC repair. Copeland Park would be a concession restroom renovation and field improvements and irrigation system.

» Conifer Acre Park would get an outdoor basketball court parking, ADA standard playground equipment and access and a restroom building. Scott Park, which is a joint park with the city, your county maintains the shelter and restrooms in that area, so we would be looking at repairing the roof of the existing shelter and renovating the restroom facilities. The Science Park would have renovation of the shelter and restroom facility, add the storage building for long maintenance equipment and replace the model plane tables. Larry Dovey Park would get perimeter walking trail, paved parking, ADA standard, playground equipment, irrigation, upgrades, and lighting of the soccer fields.

» Boyd Young Park would get renovations to the community building and restrooms, a new concession stand, field improvements, add irrigation, and resurface the tennis court. Knights Hill Park would be renovate and replace the roof of the concession restroom shelter building, field improvements, and ADA playground equipment and accessibility to the playground and the concession building. Then there's also some ongoing things like ADA and standard playground equipment and accessibility for sidewalks through the countywide parks, signage and wayfinding package for each park, and a quick response reader system, which would be added to the parks and to the website. Next slide, please. A new walking trail and bike trail would be located somewhere in the northern rural portion of Kershaw County.

» Kershaw County West complex would get an added concession restroom building and a separate shelter for fields five through eight, two outdoor basketball and two sand volleyball courts with parking and eight batting cages, and a perimeter walking trail. West Watery Park would get renovations to the concession and restroom building, field and fence improvements, and added irrigation. Passett Park, which is a new park, would have clearing and grading for the parcel, perimeter walking trail, rest room building, parking and fencing. Mount Pisgah Park would get a renovation to the roof and interior of the concession restroom building, ADA and standard playground and accessibility for sidewalks, field fencing improvements, hard surface walking trail and irrigation.

» Bethune Community Park, which is the old elementary school, would receive a joint agreement with the recreation facilities to add a hard surface walking track, hard surface basketball court, ADA and standard playground equipment and accessibility, renovation of the existing restroom facility, and the usage of the existing gym that's being renovated by the town of Bethune. With all these items, item 17 would be to add two full-time maintenance positions to help with all the parks that are within the system. Next slide, please. The next items are tenure goals, which the first item on there is something that you already have been talking about tonight, which is converting... Just pause for a second. Okay. We're in transition to tenure goals.

» How was it determined that you were going to do five and ten or two or whatever? This implies there's been a prioritization. Talk to me about that. Yes, sir. When we were doing a lot of the studies, there was a lot of people that asked for their portion of the county to be remembered, that a lot of areas were overlooked. And we were trying to give a whole gamut of items to each park so that they could work toward getting these improvements done over a five-year period. Most of the things are more like maintenance of the clay and the turf areas and some irrigation that is needed for a lot of the baseball and softball fields as well as the soccer fields. So those are not as expensive as some of the items that we have listed. So the prioritization was based on expense? That's correct.

» All right. And it's... And it's also per input of the citizens there. Okay. So it's perfectly legitimate as a part of this input that this would go before a future council, as Mr. Jones was saying, and they could reorder these priorities and assign them... That's correct. Okay. So just so it's understood, this is staff input to this point. Thank you. Go ahead. Okay.

» On this slide, you'll see that we have listed the tournament park that was noted earlier for converting Woodward Park into a four 200-foot baseball field with central concession restroom press box, two 250-foot baseball field with two separate press box, two outdoor basketball courts, multiple picnic shelters throughout the park, perimeter hard surface walking trail, a 5,000-square-foot ADA accessible playground and restroom, 18-hole disc-off throughout the park, four multipurpose fields for soccer and football, a concession restroom building, and 550 to 600 parking spaces. The second one is an indoor basketball facility that was requested for the Kershaw County West complex.

» There would be two full-size basketball and volleyball court with concession, classroom and multipurpose rooms, reception area, lobby, office space, storage space, restrooms, and parking with ADA access. And the third is an indoor basketball facility conversion of the existing office at the seaboard park in front of that. And so what they would do there is convert the two buildings that are there now into two full basketball court, volleyball court with concession and then add additional office space for the staff, storage, restrooms, indoor walking track, fitness room, and large reception hall for special events and rentals along with parking and ADA accessibility.

» Also in the back of the park, there's an existing softball field that would be looked at as being converted to a miracle league field for special needs participants with a new concession stand and ADA accessible restroom. The fourth item is indoor swimming pool, which would be an additional building to the existing aquatic center. That would include eight-lane competition indoor swimming pool with restroom, shower, changing rooms, office space, and a paved parking lot with ADA accessibility. And the fifth one would be with all these additional indoor facilities, you're going to need additional full and part-time staff and seasonal positions as well. And the last one is opening to questions. All right. For comments, beginning with Mr. Tucker. Sammy? No comment. All right.

» Any comments from the table? Please. Who is that? Is that you? Yes, sir. All right. Mr. Brazel. I think we just found out who hit the lottery. Fellas, y'all. These are a lot of items, but they also are goals to work toward over the next 10 years. Well, from my point of view, we took a plan that was pretty well put together that Mr. Connell's been working on with others for a long time that was in reach financially. And I think we just watered it down to something that's impossible. You just said $100 million worth of projects in your proposal. And I thank you for your due diligence. And it's kind of like my daughter was the one that spoke earlier. And she's advocating for recreation. I'm voting for her. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Jones.

» Here's where I think we might be getting in our own way. I think we're trying to please everyone. And we're not going to do that. As an elected official, I'm not going to please everyone. I know that. I don't try to. And I do agree with a lot of what's said. But we're going to take the money we have and we're going to spread it so thin. We're going to do what we've done for 40 years, 50 years. We're going to do a lot. And it's going to be the bare minimum. It's high time that Kershaw County pulls together. I think even my 11-year-old daughter spoke about teamwork. We need to prioritize. And we need to do it. We need to do it right. There's no sense in all this. It doesn't have to be my idea. It doesn't have to be Ben's idea. But we've had a lot of people come to us.

» I can remember going to Woodward Park and looking at it and thinking, boy, this place is a dump. And it is. We don't maintain it. It's in disrepair. It's dangerous. And I'm not necessarily advocating only for Woodward Park. But what I'm going to advocate for tonight is focus. And either let's do it right or let's just not do it at all. There's no sense in trying to please every member on council. That's not going to happen either. Shane, I appreciate everything you do. We've got to better maintain these projects. West Watery, I was out there early in the week. It's not complete yet. The project was started how long ago? 16, 18 years? It's not complete. 2002. And there's already maintenance items. We've got rotting soffit.

» There was a refrigerator in there with so much mold in it, it was pathetic. We've got some things that we need to do to right the ship. And there's no better time to start than now. But there's no way we can do everything that was just mentioned. And I appreciate the study. Those are wants. But my little girl that spoke brought me a Christmas list much like this the other day. And there were $10,000 worth of items. And I said, well, honey, you need to pick a few because mom and dad can't afford all of them. And as much as I know we have matching funds and we do have some of the COVID relief funds that could be reallocated, that wouldn't affect the taxpayer. Let's let's hone this thing down, guys. And let's let's pick the projects that mean the most and let's do them right.

» But let's not shortchange the project. I think if we do that, we're just shortchanging the community. So thank you so much. But I think we've got a lot of work to do. And I think Mr. Jones has convinced me that it's going to take us another 30 to 60 days to to hone this down to what is that project. And I think it started with Ben Connell. And I think it's going to end with the new council. And we're going to be carrying the water to make this to make this project work. So some that may agree with me, some may not. Shane, if you'd like to speak, go ahead. Sure. And just like the the presentation pointed out, these these are goals. We're not we're not in these. And don't be fooled by the numbers, the way that it's listed. That's not really a prioritized list.

» We're giving you guys the the roadmap, what we're looking at, the things that could be done. We like you said, we can still prioritize things. And those were not prioritized in any particular order. They're just that that was just a list. So and we did this. It was done the same way back in the 2012 master plan as well. They were there were five year goals and 10 year goals that we were able to accomplish from 2012 to now. There were some that did not get accomplished. And there's like you said, there's there's some here that probably will not be accomplished. But these are these are the goals so that we now can can start looking at prioritizing creating a prioritized list. And we did that in the past with the past master plan with rec commission also.

» So we use rec commission the last time to create a prioritized list. And we can do that based off of the information we have, because this is the roadmap for the for new for the new incoming group. And this was we were asked to do the two studies, the two different studies, the master, the full comprehensive master plan study and the Woodward Park study. And those those two we did complete. We do have information on the the Woodward Park master plan. And like I stated before, we did we didn't come here with any intentions of asking for any any funds or anything like that for for for these particular projects. We just want to present the information right now. Yeah, Mr. Chairman. Yeah, Mr. Jones. Let me let me start by saying, Carson, $10,000.

» I want to be I want to be I want you to be my daddy. That was a wish list. Listen, I won't happen. I agree with a lot of what my colleague said, Mr. Breslin. And first off, Alliance, I think you guys have done a great job. I've been a fan of your firm for many years, been here 16 years. And we've been there's some engineering firms I wouldn't go sit down with. But I've always liked you guys. And I think I've always been fair and have done a great job. And thank you. And that's that's a massive, awesome plan that we've got to wrap our arms around and we will. And this man and that man is going to be a strong part of it. And I'm going to lean on them to bring back some good suggestions and recommendations after the first two years. So I think that book is valuable. I think we need it.

» Shane, thank you for that as well. Your comments. But I just want to pass it on to you. It's just all it's all about timing. I agree with the concept, just not the timing. And with that, I'd like to ask if Mr. Templer has a view on the way ahead with this rec plan. Your predecessor, when he came here 10 years ago, asked for this earlier plan. And now we have an updated version that Mr. Carpenter, over his time here, brought in before council in a deliberate process that began with the budget process that we experienced every year in January. And you've heard Mr. Jones talk about it. How do you see it, Danny? I see it exactly as that. I see this as a list of items to select from for the incoming council and council for years to come. There's five, ten years worth of items on there.

» And so through budget workshops, through individual meetings with council, they can pick what's going to be the items they want to jump on in that particular budget year. Some are regional, some are up towards the north end of the county. So I think there's opportunities here for individual councilmen to look at this list and say this is what would serve my constituents best. And quite frankly, there's a lot of low hanging fruit in here. We need to do better in some areas. We need to revive some fields up in the northern end of the county. So I think there's a lot of opportunity here. And I see it as a process that's going to play out for the future. Okay. Other comments? Yes, Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir. Mr. Connell.

» Could we pull up the picture of Woodward Park, please? The 3D rendering or the overall? Yeah, I'd like to see it. I just had a few comments on it. I know it's in the packet somewhere. Yeah, that's it right there. Yeah, that's a great one. You want to use the other one, though, that has more detail? Yeah, I mean, we can rotate through and we'll switch in just a little bit. So for what it's worth, I just want to share my understanding of this project for the council going forward and also for what it's worth. A few comments on why I think and I hope this will become a priority that rises up. One, I have no pride in this project. It's not in the Elgin area that I actually represent. Of course, the State House will represent this area, but it won't be a county project at that point.

» There might be some PRT funds that can come and help out, but we'll have to talk about that and make sure it's eligible. But I think this is a great location. It's in the center of the county if you're going to focus on a project and put it as a priority. It's unique in all the county because it's adjacent to Scott Park, which is an existing public park you can connect to. It's really close to the Aquatic Center and also has a splash pad right there that you can connect to as well. There's an adjacent property owner that has not previously been willing to sell for this park to expand. That's over 32 acres. The drawing you see assumes that expansion. That would still have to be negotiated by the administrator and this council to figure out if you can come to an agreement on that.

» That's a contingency. I just learned recently that they might be willing to sell if it was deed restricted and held just to recreation. Mr. Templer is in contact with the owners and has their contact information. That's a very encouraging development, I think. The other things that are pretty unique about it is I don't think you could afford this project, which was put in there at with I think the original budget was about 12 million and then contingencies and escalations took it to 14. Is that right? Right. Well, that's just that's overinflated in my view. That's a lot of fluff. I think that 12 million dollar was overinflated, in my opinion itself. Whenever you're saying a concession stand would be $450 a foot, you can build a high-end custom home in South Carolina for $250.

» You go to the coast and the prices just jump up. Mr. Jones, I'm sure you remember whenever we did the chemical building. Remember that one? It came in at like a hundred percent higher price per square foot whenever we looked at it. And I remember calculating the price of square foot and said, this is just crazy, guys. We can't vote on this. We went back to the drawing board, didn't use Davis Bacon Act funds, found another way to fund it. And the cost was cut down by, you know, maybe 40 or 50 percent. I'm just shooting from the hip. But I remember Mr. Carpenter and many of the folks up here worked on that. So I think we can cost engineer, or the county in the future could cost engineer a lot of this project. It doesn't need miles and miles of concrete walkways.

» You could do hardened surface and save yourself $600,000 or so there. So I think there's a lot of savings to be had that brings the project down into a realistic budget. But what's most exciting, I think, is if the county has to pay for it, this project won't happen. If they have to pay full freight on it, it won't happen. If you can partner up with people, and by people I mean individuals or private entities, after this thing develops a certain momentum, particularly the Health Services District, I hope the county council will learn in the future from the Health Services District that they want to focus on community health through outdoor activity, athletics, and recreation. I think that's a great development because they have a significant amount of funds saved up.

» They're a public entity and they're required to distribute funds to the community for health purposes. They're also contractually related with MUSC, so that's another great potential partner right there. And, you know, you might be able to double your money. If you put in a certain amount, you might be able to get 100% on that. And I'm just hopeful that this thing can stay alive. It's something that's centrally located that would serve the county well. And I already mentioned the other unique aspects. I just hope in January or whenever it is, y'all continue those relationships. I'll try to connect with everybody I've been talking to for years. And I know we've been talking about it in detail for months and months. But that's the comment I had on that.

» I think this would be one of those, if you can get matching funds, that it would be a really neat opportunity for Kershaw County to expand recreation and then double up on quality of life and be attractive to economic development as well. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Comments? Yeah, Mr. Chairman. Oh, okay. Rantley. Ben, thank you so much for putting all this together. You know, Ben has been working very, very hard for years to come up with a recreation plan. And really, you know, with him stepping out, going to the state house, he's leaving a roadmap for new council. He agreed to have a discussion tonight. I think the public needs to be very aware. We have recreation issues. Ben has worked hard. The plan that y'all have, thank you for putting that together. You know, Mr.

» Jones said it perfectly. We, the public is aware now. We can start having those conversations. And in January, I will champion this. And we don't have to do it at the backs of the taxpayer. It can be done with ARPA. You know, there's other ways of doing it. And the new council will put it together. But Ben, thank you for your hard work. We also want to thank you for all y'all did to put this thing together. Thank you. And if I could comment, just a little background information on the Woodward Park study. The care group did come before county council and presented several different types of parks that they were interested in and seeing around here. And we were asked to do this study to give an idea of what a park like this would cost.

» So that was the main focus and the main purpose of this study is to give that information so that everyone can see what it will take to build a park like this. And we completely understand that it can't happen tomorrow in a couple years, five years. We get that. But it's just for informational purposes so everyone understands what it takes. Well, Shane, I'll comment on that. I think it can happen soon. I think a park like this is it's actually well planned out. It is centrally located. Do we have some loose ends to tie up in other areas? Yes. And I think that needs to be a part of it. And I think that's part of the reason why we kind of slowed down just a little bit to further assess those things. I think this is a park that can be a reality in the next two to three years.

» I'd like to see that happen. I think the economy is slowing. I think construction costs are going to become a little lower. It's honestly something that I'm going to champion as well. If we voted on it tonight, I'd vote for it. I would. So I wouldn't vote for the plethora of things that we had. But this is actually well planned out. It's in a good area. And the park is in disrepair and it's dangerous. This will bring tourism to our community. It'd bring tax dollars to our community. And I've had hundreds of people say, "Why are we not doing this?" Okay? And that's part A of a conversation that I want to have tonight. Later tonight, I want to address the why didn't we pay for the sewer expansion in cash. I would like to address some of those questions from earlier.

» Because they were very good questions. Very well thought out questions. And my yawn was not intentional for Mr. Hutchison. So with that being said, let's move on and move forward. Thank you. Okay. Other discussion? Mr. Chairman. I just point out that we're well beyond our limits. And with a consensus, we'll keep on going. We're supposed to stop at 20. But go ahead, Ben. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just one other comment on financing. I've been researching this for a long time. Trying to figure out exactly a way that you might be able to fund it or make it make sense. And recreation bonds don't make sense. If you're going to pay cash for something, it'll be up to the future council on what they want to have as a priority.

» But if recreation is a priority, I wouldn't want to bond out recreation when compared to bonding sewer. Because the rates are so much worse for recreation. It's a non-revenue producing source and doesn't stand on its own necessarily from a revenue perspective. Whereas sewer does. You do have an A-tax fund that you could bond against. But that doesn't make sense because it fluctuates. Correct, Danny? The actual income amount fluctuates. I mean, it's a steady income source for tourism and recreation in the state. But it fluctuates so much that the rates are much higher on that, which make it really unattractive compared to a 1.6 rate. So I just want to mention that on potential options. Very good. I think we can make some closing comments. But let me see if Mr.

» Tucker first would want to say something. Sammy? No comment, Mr. Chair. Other comments just around the table? Just thank you. Go ahead. And I'll close it out by saying thank you. This is what we did 10 years ago. And it's what's in the classic military sense, an assessment. Now comes the point where the leadership that's up here, and that will be up here in January, will provide guidance for prioritization to the administrator. And he'll come back in and tell you what can and can't be done. I would only ask you to consider that you keep your powder dry until you understand what your decisions are and not make them incrementally. There's only so much money out there in the opera world. And there's only so much that we can put on ourselves to get done in the time available.

» With that, thank you, gentlemen. Safe journey back to where you came. Thank you very much. Mr. Burns, if I could just make a quick announcement. We have a special event scheduled for this Saturday, the Touch a Truck event that's scheduled at the Veterans Park. With the amount of rain that's coming in Thursday and Friday, we have actually coordinated with the school district. And we've got the parking lot area at Lugolf Elgin High School so that we don't have to cancel this thing Saturday. Because if we try to bring big trucks and tractors in down there, we're probably going to get stuck. So we want to make sure we still provide this event because this event brings about 1,400 to 1,500 people. So we're still having the event. It will be located at Lugolf Elgin High School.

» Thank you very much. Thank you very much. We'll move back now to the next item on the agenda. If you could take that slide down. And the next item is a series of ordinances. Item number 1. It's at tab B, page 8 for you, Sammy, downrange. It's a second reading of an ordinance approving the financing of the Southern Loop Sewer Improvement Phase 1 project through the borrowing of not exceeding $2,700,000, $740,000 of general obligation debt. We just had a public hearing on that. I won't read the whole thing. But with that, Mr. Templer, can you just introduce what we have here, please? Yes, Mr. Chairman, member of council. This is the second reading for the Southern Loop Improvement Phase 1 project for the borrowing of $2,703,740 in the form of a GOD.

» And this is a continuation of a plan that we begun some years ago, correct? Yes, sir. I don't remember how many years back, but it's been going on for a while. We had initially gone out with council's approval for this years back. We did not follow through with it. We used the money on hand to fund the work that needed to be done on Phase 1 of Southern Loop. Okay. With that, can we have a motion to approve? So moved. Mr. Gardner, a second? Second. That's from Russell. With that, it's on the table. Any comments, Tom? Yeah, this actually does some relief on some of the other work on the Northern Loop, if you will, I guess, to possibly reverse some flow and take some of the pressure and burden off some of that other route. Is that correct? Right.

» So this will allow us to continue the work on Phase 2, which comes up to, I believe, the Judy Pump Station. There's a restriction up there. So this alleviates that and further maximizes the efficiency of that sewer getting to the processing plant. And I note we have the bond attorney here. Thank you, sir. Yes. Best dressed man in the room. Okay. Russell, do you have any comments? Yes, sir. Danny, could you clarify? I think I already asked this question. It's been a while. Has this project already been paid for with cash? That was a question. Yes, Phase 1 is completed, so it has been paid for out of the sewer fund. So we're borrowing this money for what reason? This will pay back that money that we paid out from Phase 1 and will allow us to further continue and finish Phase 2, Phase 2A.

» So the money that we're borrowing against Phase 1 will pay for Phase 2? Correct. 2A. I suppose it would look better if we were borrowing money against Phase 2A, but it doesn't exist. So I guess there's nothing to borrow against. Is that the reason why? Essentially. I mean, the project is in phases. We need this to continue to pay for Phase 2A. Phase 2A. Okay, so there's not enough cash in the sewer budget. The sewer budget's an enterprise fund, is that right? Correct. And it's completely separate from the general obligation. Correct. So, correct me if I'm wrong, there are no tax dollars going into this fund. No, sir. So when we did the rate study a while back, the payments for this was essentially baked into that rate study to allow for the users to pay for this.

» There will not be a tax on anyone else as it was previously. The rate users will not see a rate increase from this project. What they're already paying is more than sufficient to pay for this. This being this loan and the payments that result from it. Okay. And I think maybe there's some verbiage the bond attorney could clarify. There's some verbiage that says, if need be, if we were to default on this loan, then we could create a tax to fund it. And that's part of your guarantee? Is that correct? That's part and parcel. Bring the microphone up and identify yourself once again, please. Yes, this is Gary Pope from Pope Flynn, Bond Council for this transaction. When you borrow money, the lender's going to be very interested in what the source of repayment is.

» And that's going to drive in large measure the interest rate that they're going to offer. By offering the pledge of a sufficient tax in the district in the full faith and credit of the county as your collateral, essentially. That taxing power, it allows for you to get a very low rate. Okay, so the taxpayer acting as a cosigner allowed us to get a very low rate, although they're not being taxed. Is that a fair assessment? The design, as I understand it, is to pay it each year out of an appropriation so that the tax will not be imposed. But due to the way that the credit of the obligation is structured so that you get the low interest rate, you're essentially, yes, you're pledging the taxing power in order to get a lower interest rate. Okay, I appreciate that explanation.

» That question was brought to me earlier this week, and that is the way I explained it. And I just wanted to make sure that I explained it correctly. Yes, sir. The question was, well, you could tax us for it, and that's right. I also made the point that if four people raised their hands, we could double taxation, but thankfully here in Kershaw County, we're a very conservative group. We look at all these things from all angles, and contrary to popular belief, we want to save the taxpayers money. That's why we relieved the tax from this fund completely. And the 1.6% interest rate is absolutely unheard of in this current market. That's right. It is at least double that. Yeah. So no taxes, but we are backing it up with the full credit of Kershaw County is what I just heard Russell say.

» I also point out to you that in the last 12 months, we've cut county debt in half, and that improves our position, both in what we're asking of taxpayers and our position and our ability to gain such a very favorable return here in this particular instance. Thirdly, we have removed the sewer tax. So as good conservatives, which most of us are up here, what we've done is said if you're going to use the sewer, you're going to pay for it. It's kind of like when you go to Burger King. It's not a tax when you buy a cheeseburger. It's you're paying for it. Same thing here with the rate study. Our rate study shows that we are charging those who use Kershaw County sewer significantly less than any competitive market.

» And any other county around right now, that number has been validated on a rate study that Mr. Templer and Mr. Carpenter brought into us back in spring when we approved this budget. So that was a great success of removing the sewer tax, which taxed people as far north as Pisgah and Bethune, who didn't have any access to sewer. Mr. Jones, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have some great questions I want to ask. Just get some clarification. How much do we get from, how much taxes or fee only do we get from South Carolina Water and Utilities? I think it's around, it's well over a million, I think. We use that to benefit the sewer. Yes. Pay for the sewer. Yes. And we were able to do that first go around, and that money helped. Right.

» We're still getting that money in, aren't we? Right. We do. And we're doing this project so we have better flow, right? Correct. Do you know what percentage of flow we have right now? No, not in that particular area. That would affect phase 2A, but... But we're still rated... Go ahead. Dan, please... Go up to the microphone, Dan. The people at home can't hear. And let's be sure Mr. Jones has these questions. If we can't answer them tonight, we answer them in our next meeting, okay? Absolutely. The flow on the Southern Loop project, I mean, is currently at essentially capacity at this point in time. We are... We have a pump station at Dobie Mill, which is a 900 gallon per minute pump station. And we've installed in phase 1 a 12 inch force main up to the Judy pump station.

» The capacity of that Judy pump station is 280 gallons a minute. So we have quite a constriction there. What is this constriction? What... Excuse me? What is it? What is it? The constriction is the fact that the Judy pump station cannot deliver the amount of flow that is coming to it. So we're limited to the capacity of the Judy pump station essentially. Explain the difference. Because I know that overall with our sequence batch reactor plate that we built back in 2007, you know, it was handling everything. Yes. Explain the difference from that with the... Because we have a 2 billion MGD on that. And we have the ability to go to a 4 MGD on that. Well, there are two different... You have treatment capacity and then you...

» But to utilize the treatment capacity, you have to be able to get the wastewater to the plant. Gotcha. So... So you say... This is part... The Southern Loop is part of the transmission system that gets the wastewater to the plant. Explain the... Explain so we can have clarification. I just want this on record too. But the clarification as to where... We have the 2 MGD currently. But I think we're probably maxed out about 90... I mean, about 900,000. We're... We're... Our maximum flow has been generally about 950,000 gallons a day, maximum daily flow. But we've got up to 2 million. But the average flow is... I think around 750,000, 800,000 gallons a day. That's pretty doggone good when you've got a 2 million capacity. That is correct. However, we have allocated...

» We have allocated capacity to the point that we only have 150,000 gallons of capacity left allocated. Correct. I think what we were talking the other night here, 90% of our checkbook is written out. Probably a little more than 90%. But the thing about it is, is that it's been that way for years. That's... That's correct. The capacity has been committed to those people. But... But I mean, they haven't used it for years. So therefore, our flow is pretty low. I understand. But the capacity has been committed if you... If they came and said, okay, I want... I want my capacity now, you're obligated to provide that capacity to them. Question about... Question about that. Sorry. Go ahead. I'll yield you. I haven't finished, but I'll yield. No, no, no. You finish. I'm sorry. Well, I like...

» I like to hear your question, because this is a good dialogue we're having. All right. I can ask you... Mr. Roswell, please go ahead. So, because the... The... We've allocated it to folks. Is it... Is it residential developers? Is it commercial developers? Is it industrial? Can we get a breakdown of what that looks like? And have they paid for it? Or have we just promised it to them? There's a lot of unanswered questions. If we're only actually using 40% of the system, there's no need to find ourselves pushing to spend a bunch of money to expand the system. These folks may never have any intention in using it. It may behoove us to refund their money if they're just... Oh, yeah, we're not going to do that. That's probably not something we're going to do.

» But we have no way of knowing because we hadn't had those conversations. I want to... I'll grab that one. So, I've already started some inquiry with Davidson Floyd to see just where are the opportunities to clean up our checkbook. To your point, is there some legacy project out there that has no real possibility of coming to fruition? And is it clogging our checkbook? I don't want to spend money for something that's just never going to happen that drives us to spend money sooner for projects or quantities out there that have been overstated or whatever by companies or developments to see where we're really at. So, to really clean up the checkbook, I think, is going to be the first order of business. And that dialogue has already started. I'd like to take my time back. Okay. Mr.

» Jones, back to you. Thank you, Russ. You know, I have other plans for sewer after the first year, so I won't be supporting this because I've got a great, great, great idea. And I'm going to bring it before the council sometime in January, maybe February. So, I don't want to go in debt or anything else until I get my answers on that. If we paid, these guys are a whole lot smarter than me. They probably already know the answer. But if we paid cash for the first time and we feel we've got to go ahead and do this, why don't we pay cash for this one? We don't have the ability to. Not out of the sewer fund. Can't you? Well, we've got South Carolina Utilities putting a huge amount of money from fee and loot into the sewer fund. Right. Can you look at that? We can. Absolutely.

» Is it a possibility? I don't know. It is. I didn't mean to answer myself. I don't know at this moment. I'm very interested to know that because I just, you know, like Mr. President said, you know, we were questioning about the flow, what we have our flow versus what we have in our capacity. We're in great shape. Great shape. And I think there might be another way to do this without having to go to a bond. I actually know there is, but I'll be saving it for later. Thank you. So to sum up here, what I thought I heard is we have a constriction on the Southern Loop. Yes, sir. That's correct. Thank you. And we don't have a capacity issue at the processing plant. The Southern Loop is solving a very definitive, precise, particular problem that needs to be solved.

» In summary, basically, the Southern Loop is providing additional capacity in the southern part of our system. It's also relieving pressures on the northern part of our system down the Highway 1 corridor. We have four pump stations there that are currently in stress because of flow there. We're diverting some of that flow down through the Southern Loop. And just to be quite frank, the Phase 1 of the Southern Loop project is essentially useless unless you complete the project to its fruition. Phase 2. I think the answer was yes. That's correct. Thank you, sir. Yes, sir. Danny, I applaud your approach on the checkbook, which is a bookkeeping issue. But the physical issue is associated with this right here. I was the first one to bring that checkbook up. Yeah. We'll give you due credit.

» There's a medal for people after this meeting. Thank you. Mr. Tucker, we have not heard from you. Any comments before we move to a vote? Yes. I just wanted to check with Danny on the bond attorney. There's no penalty for paying that offer is correct. That is correct. It can be paid off at any time without penalty. That is one of the benefits of going with the SRO. Excellent. One quick interest. If we went through -- Wait a minute. He's still talking. Go ahead, Sammy. So that means that we do the construction and grow that line with more customers, we have the potential to pay that off early with less interest is what I'm trying to get at. That's correct. Yeah. Yeah, Jimmy. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm not sure I have that immediately with me, but I can look.

» I mean, it's got to be, you know, somewhere in the low threes probably. Three million. Yeah. I think somewhere in there. Thank you. Hold on, Jimmy. Yeah. Okay. With that, let's move to a vote. I think we're okay. Yes. I just wanted to bring up one point. I think we've learned recently that Kawashima, one of the larger consumers or users recently indicated they're going to be dropping their usage by 200,000 or more gallons per day. They were allocated X amount under the old operation. The new operation, from what I understand, is not going to need as much capacity during the day. And that's part of the discussion I will have with Davis and Floyd to really drill down what they need and not allow. Let's wait for the conversation here. What do you got? He's responding to your question.

» Go ahead. We were bonding. Go ahead. No pun intended, right? Right. So we don't know the number yet, I guess is your point. Right. But do you expect it to be substantial? I would expect it to go down. Because our, I think our processing at peak flows is like 950 pre reduction in Kawashima. Right. That's peak daily. Peak daily flows. Yeah. When we can actually process 2 million, our peak peak is under, what's that? Actually, we have issued a discharge permit by, on the county in the, through their industrial discharge permit program to Aaron Mills who has taken over for Kawashima in the amount of approximately 455, I can't remember the exact numbers, but 450 to 500,000 a day, 500,000 gallons per day.

» And if I recall correctly, I believe the original discharge permit to Kawashima was in the 700,000 gallon per day range. So it's about 200,000 gallons per day that we've, we've reduced that flow by, but, but we've also accounted for that in the Southern Loop phase 2A that, in order to handle those, those additional flows that we need. Does that reduce the actual processing capacity percentage then? If it was at, uh, 950 or whatever it was before, is it now in the 45% range or 42% range after that? Actually those are, those are average daily flows. I'm, I'm looking at average daily flow here. Okay. And that, uh, that basically does free up an additional, uh, 200,000 gallons per day at the plant.

» But, uh, you know, that brings us from our, our, our capacity is, uh, you still at about a hundred, well, our capacity was at 150,000 gallons a day. We had excess, uh, we had additional flow on our checkbook. That would bring us down to about 300,000 gallons a day. So we're still, we're still fairly, fairly high on the checkbook. But as, uh, as Mr. Templer said, we, we do have the ability to look at the checkbook and see what, uh, what's going on there. Thank you. Ready to call the question. Um, real quick question. Yeah. I'm sorry. Tom, go ahead.

» When, um, would we be able to have that data by third reading of this? Um, would there be a possibility that we could say that, hey, there are some funds available that we could utilize to put back into supplement or, you know, the kind of look at release, um, capacity, you know, flow, like we're just talking about kind of the different levels. Um, and what would be a scenario that would cause immediate, so much strain that it overflowed the system and would put us in a mess? Um, it would be a plus to total them one time. Yeah. Um, the, the last scenario I saw like that in, in my experience, um, was during the pandemic when everybody was at home, similar to what Russell was saying. Um, toilet paper shortage.

» So that caused a, a lot of issues, um, with sparing you the details, but it, that was a huge strain. Um, so something like that, but it, it may not be something as, as direct, direct, direct disaster. It could be a kind of a perfect storm scenario. Yeah. So it could. Yeah. Hurricane Matthew was, was a challenge because it overloaded us with volume of water, not sewer water. Exactly. Yeah. Saturation. Thank you. Which is one good positive thing about having a sewer compared to septic tanks and everything else with ground water and flooding EPA regulations. Uh, okay. Thank you, Mr. Triple. Okay. All right. I think we're ready to vote. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote, sir? All right. All right. Those in favor signify by raising your hand, uh, Mr. Gardner, Mr. Burns, Mr. Connell and Mr. Brazel.

» Those opposed, uh, Mr. Tomlinson and Mr. Jones. The motion passes and moves to a third reading. With that, we move to the next item, which is item number two under ordinances. It's at page, uh, 21. It's tab Charlie. Can I get that up on the screen? Holy smokes. All right. All right. I'll try to read that in detail here. Hang on. Second reading of an ordinance of the county council to amend the official zoning map designation for 53 acres of land plus or minus tax parcels for diversified land and timber, which I believe up is the Carolina Motor Park. Uh, Mr. Templer, give us a quick rundown and I'll put it on the table for a vote. Yes, sir. Mr. Chairman, members of council. Yeah. Before you second reading of a, uh, rezoning, uh, request for Carolina motor sports.

» This is, uh, property they obviously own and it is on a, the perimeter of their, they're already in use property. And what I understand it is being purchased to create a buffer and there was no immediate plan to develop it in any particular way. Um, that's my memory at the planning commission. There were two inquiries from surrounding neighbors to ask what they were going to do with that. But, um, the response was essentially a buffer. Very good. Thank you. Can we have a motion to approve? I'll move. Uh, Mr. Gardner, a second? Second. Uh, for Mr. Brazel, it's up in your area. Mr. Gardner, you want to lead into discussion? Yeah. Uh, Carolina, uh, Carolina motor sports parks has been a good, uh, neighbor to Gershaw County. And, uh, the owner of that is the, is the buyer of this.

» The owner of this property is. Yes, sir. To understand it. So, um, I have no reason to believe that this would not be a good idea to rezone this for him. All right. Mr. Brazel, sir. Uh, truly an asset to the county. I was just up that way and I passed by Sunday afternoon. They were having a race, you know, it brings a lot of people in tourism, um, brings tourism dollars. So I think it's a great thing. I've yet to hear a complaint. Maybe, uh, one in the last couple of years about noise, but I think by and large, these guys are doing a great job and I'm glad to have them in Kershaw County. Yeah. Mr. Tucker, any comments? No comment. All right. Any other comments from the table? Uh, echo those with Mr. Gardner and Mr. Brazel.

» Excellent initiative and it shows Kershaw County can bring people in. He came all the way from Atlanta. We have people coming in from New York and Watkins Glen with their formula racers. And this will further enhance the park. It's a 24 at seven park with lights, significant investments. Frankly, um, they turned, Mr. Cummings turned this thing around into a wonderful business. Uh, I would ask Mr. Connell, given your victory, that they need some help getting a law passed, uh, for go-karts up there for the underage. That would be very helpful. We can give you the details if you need it. With that, we move to a vote. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote? Yeah. And all those in favor, signify by raising your hand. And it's unanimous, Mary. We move into the third reading. We move now to old business.

» No, excuse me. We have another ordinance. Can you get that up on the table, please? Item number three, page 36. And for you, Sammy, it's at tab D. Uh, it's the second reading of an ordinance authorizing the execution and delivery of a fee-in-lieu tax by and between Kershaw County, South Carolina, and Project Orion with respect to certain economic development property in the county, subject to certain payments in lieu of taxes. We have economic development in the back of the room. Good to see you, Jeff. Uh, with that, uh, do you want to add anything further before I put it for a motion, Danny? No, sir. Okay. With that, let's move to a motion. Who will give us a first, please? Submove. Mr. Gardner, a second? Second. Thank you, Russell. Uh, discussion. Mr. Gardner. Uh, I would refer to Jeff.

» He knows more about it than I do. I'd like him to come up. Yeah. Jeff, come on up, my friend. And once Jeff finishes, I'll let Mr., uh, Mr. Tucker speak. Go ahead, sir. Yes, sir. Um, pleasure to bring, uh, Project Orion in tonight. Uh, it represents, uh, originally it was proposed as a $9 million investment. Uh, it's come back in at a roughly, uh, $13 million investment, uh, into, into the county. It represents about, uh, 54 new jobs. Average wage is going to be $25.87 at this point in time. Uh, the group is, um, very much, well, they plan on it. Uh, pretty much, well, they plan on being here at the third reading to introduce themselves to counsel and, uh, the public at that time. Very good. They weren't going to take any questions, though. Yeah.

» Uh, let me just let first go to, uh, the, the man who made the first motion, Mr. Gardner. And this, this is the spec building. Yes, sir. Right. Okay. That's all I have. Thank you. Um, and then Mr. Tucker and then Jimmy, I'll get right to you. Uh, Mr. Tucker. I have no order. Okay. Jimmy, please. I didn't have any comments. Thank you very much. Uh, second, sir. Jeff, we took this up, um, earlier in the year when we sold on the building. So, we're just now getting to the, uh, the investment period. Yes, sir. In which they're doing an expansion or what? No, this is actually the same, um, project that we started the first reading on in December of last year. As everybody ran into what was happening with the prices on all equipment and machinery. Right.

» Uh, they had to go back and retool their financing for the project and then just decided to add some more stuff into it. So, that's the reason for the increased investment and the delay. So, as much as everything costs, they probably didn't add much. Exactly. I got, I do have, do have a comment and question. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Mr. Jones. It just inspired me to ask a question. Uh, what do we sell this? They, they're buying the spec building. What do we sell it for? Uh, two. Okay. Now you're stretching me. Two point one million three hundred and. Because we had, we had three point two in it. I believe. Yes, we do. I have two point six on the books. No. That's what I have on the books. But we have three point two in it. I think it was less than that, Jimmy. But we can talk about that.

» I think that was for the total amount of land. We still have some land left over out there. I believe so. Yes, sir. That's correct. But, but, and I can agree with that. But I mean, we got three point two million in it. Thank you. And we are getting more than double back and jobs in philo. Um, anything further for Jeff? He looks like he's been working real hard. All right. Thank you, Jeff, for the success today with a hard fought battle to win in Vista. I think it was some 40 jobs and I didn't get the number on philo yet. It's well, their expansion is going to be between 64 and 70 million. Yeah. Expansion. There will probably be future developments out there based off of this. Yeah. And the Koch brothers, which is now down to one, sent their top man here. Mr. Connell there.

» Thank you for coming, Ben. I got a chance to introduce our future state house representative to the Koch brothers. And that was really quite a thrill. Um, and I think prestige is soon to open up. Jeff, you're just working too hard, but don't stop. All right. Don't plan on it. Excuse me, sir. Okay. Uh, Jimmy. Thank you. Thank you for giving me a little bit of time. Appreciate it. Um, regardless of my comments and my questions to you about it that are very true. I know it's true. You've done a good job and I'm glad this company's coming. Thank you. No worries. And thank you so much. My pleasure. Yep. Working towards 500 jobs, right? Thank you very much. With that, we move to a vote. Uh, Mr. Tucker, how do you vote? He went to sleep. Yes. All right. Very good.

» All those in favor, signify by raising your hand. Thank you. And Mary, this moves on to third reading. Thank you very much. We move now to old business, which is the boat ramp. Did we agree on that? We did. And with that, it's on the agenda by Mr. Connell. Um, Ben, do you want to introduce it? And I think it's for discussion or is it for a vote? I've decided just to make it for discussion. Thank you very much. And talk about potential funding sources. But I'll make a motion that we, uh, discuss the existing status of the boat ramp or lack thereof. And, uh, possible funding sources. Okay. Can we have a second? Second. Got to be Russell. Absolutely. Right. Okay. Ben, go ahead. Just on the table. We all know, uh, Mr.

» Brazel in particular, and, and several folks in the community are really keen on this issue. This is one that I just wanted to bring back up to talk about because from time to time, we get focused on projects and then they languish. COVID distracted us from a lot of different things that were going on. Um, and I think this may have been one of them, the boat ramp, boat ramp, moss focus. Uh, I think the study is underway right now. Is that right? So the study is going on. So go ahead. I was going to say, we signed the PO. And so that the, the, the group doing this boat ramp study was actually handling a couple other studies. So now they removed the backlog. So. Okay. So, uh, is there anything else in front of it? You know, I got leapfrogged, Danny. All right. This is perfect.

» I wanted council to have an update on when it's going to be completed. Um, ADC engineering is the firm that's handling this study and they are actually doing a lot of things for us. They, they actually did the Woodward park study. They're also working on the, uh, the pay parking project at Casey West. So they, they, they have like four or five jobs they're doing with us right now. And, uh, we like, like Danny said, we have signed the agreement. Um, they're, they're starting to study. And what we'll do is we plan to have some, uh, public input sessions and we will promote those or, uh, publicize those at least 60 days out before we have those so that, uh, the public can come in and make their comments.

» And basically what we're going to get out of this study is the same thing we got out of the Woodward park study. We're going to see it. They're going to give us, uh, uh, somewhat of a plan and cost estimate. So we know what, what it'll cost to, to actually do the project. And can you and I talk before we, um, we publicize where and when those meetings will be, please? Sure. Sure. Thank you. I'd like to be involved in that. I still got the floor. Yes, sir. Um, the Elgin park, I just wanted to, to bring this up. I had intended to try to put some funds towards us tonight for the purpose of saying that there are matching funds at the state. Please remember the Elgin park. There hadn't been a, um, a public county park in Elgin ever. So the first one we did was around that pond land.

» We already owned adjacent to an existing. Um, really it's kind of a healthcare park that we've done over there. And so that really worked out. Well, the county set aside, I think it was $65,000 for that project. And then we went and talked to, uh, Senator McElveen and a couple of others, but primarily him to say, what can we get from the state? We've got some funds to match. What can we get? We want to repatriate Kershaw County tax dollars back here. Right. And that's going to be one of my big goals that the state. And so I was going to try to set aside a hundred thousand dollars or so. I know it's going to cost a lot more than that, but just working off the ratio. We saw the PRT, uh, previously the state ended up coming back with $275,000 or so. I think you're correct.

» That more than paid for the project. Right. And so we were able to take our original match. We didn't have to match. We put it towards other recreation, uh, needs at that time. And so I'm hopeful something like that would happen. I hope come January or at some future council meeting, you'll set some funds aside soon so that I can honestly say at the state, Hey, we've got matching funds. They have skin in the game. Let's make this project happen and get the thing funded. Um, I, I missed it. Did you say when they're anticipated to finish the study? No, that we haven't, they haven't determined that yet. They're just, they, we've just gotten it started. So we'll. Is this like a six month thing or is it going to be? It's probably going to be something like that. Yeah. Really? That long? Yeah.

» Well, if the study comes back and says you put it on the downside of the flow, did you throw the whole thing out? Gotcha. Cause the engineers, uh, from the state or whoever put it in last time swore that was the right thing to do. Right. And apparently it damaged personal property all the time. Uh, serious health risk. Right. And the, uh, ADC engineering and the, uh, uh, the other partner with them, they, they've given me some photos of some ideas. So I can forward you guys those, those ideas that they, they have, but, um, they'll definitely work on a good plan, a good plan and a good study. ADC has been doing a great job here lately. Okay. Well, again, I would just reiterate for the state budget process.

» I hope you all set some funds aside soon so that I can legitimately say as the state moves into its budget process mid year, Hey, Kershaw County's got some matching funds. Let's make it happen through PRT. Thank you. Mr. Chairman. Those, uh, those state pass through funds have also helped us with the, uh, some of the renovations on the, uh, old national guard armory armory, which we're still doing working on as well. So, uh, he's, he's completely correct on that. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The point I hear going off this discussion is there's not a person up here that doesn't want to get this thing done like yesterday. I see Mr. Knapper back there and duck hunting season is almost over, man. Okay. Uh, can I close it out after a comment from you? Yes.

» I just want a quick, quick comment. You know, we talk about where the money's going to come from with this. Can you move up, Shane, just a little bit? Sure. Why don't we get Mr. Paul Knapper? He's gotten so much money for the Alpha Center. We need to get him to go to the state house and lobby with Ben Connell to get us some money for this. Thank you. Okay. Uh, with that, thank you very much. We move on to the next item, which is item number two. I noticed the chief just came in. You can't hide, chief. We see you back there. Item Cassett, fire station bid. It's a tab F. If you can bring that up on the screen, please, sir. It's a tab F and page 73 for you, Sammy. Can you bring that up? That's not it. We're skipping past the Woodward one. And this is it here.

» Danny, I'll need you to do a little bit of openers on this. This is a part of that study of hope and hub and spoke that was begun seven years ago. Mr. Connell and others were the architects of this. Danny, could you introduce the topic with your recommendation? Yes, sir. Mr. Chairman, members of council, we have before you a bid selection process to choose the lowest bid here for the Cassett fire station. You're correct. That was, this is part of the recommendation from the fire ad hoc committee years ago. It seems like four years ago. This will be the final major piece for this project to, that will allow us to rebuild the Cassett fire station in a new location right off of highway one.

» And your recommendation is? I recommend we go with the low bid of $2,744,776 of Loveless Commercial Contracting. Okay. With that, can we have a motion to approve? So moved. Mr. Gardner, a second? Second. From Mr. Brazel. A discussion beginning with you, Tom. Then we'll go to Mr. Tucker. Yeah, this is part of the fire study and everything that we did several years ago where we had the ad hoc committee and talked about how we're going to improve our fire service. And this, I think, is one of the last steps of what we talked about at that point in time. So, I mean, there's a lot more to do, but this will finish off what we talked about to get our fire service at least up to a certain stage so that we can continue that, so. Okay. Russell? Oh, no. Excuse me. Mr. Tucker. Yeah.

» Thank you, Russell. Mm-hmm. No comment. Thanks, Nick. Did I say no comment? Okay. Russell, back to you. Thanks, sir. Do we have any kind of idea of what materials we're using? Is it brick? Is it hardy plank? Is it vinyl? I'm not going to build this thing. I had Pete Burlong here who can answer those questions. Yeah, Mr. Pete, can you come on up? There he is. The outside of the building is CMU block. Okay. And we have steel roof. Is that a split-face block? A split-face block. Okay. If you go and look at the wastewater treatment plant building, it will look like that, but much bigger. Yeah, durable. That's right. Quite durable. That was the whole idea. We want to get a 30-year building. We want a building that's going to sit for 40 to 50 years with minimal exterior maintenance. Good.

» That's good to hear. Thank you. Okay. Other comments? Yes. Jimmy, right ahead. If you could, I wanted to ask, what did we budget for that? That was originally, this was going to be funded, a couple sources. There was, there's money in fire reserves right now for this to contribute towards this. And then we have the, when we defees the bond, that's $7 million there, we identified three projects and this was one of them. So. So is the money there? Yes. Yes. Not in hand. Any increases on the taxpayers? No, sir. The vast majority of this comes from the bond defeasement we did. Other comments? I would say that the bond defeasement was a piece of work. And about a year ago, Mr. Carpenter and Mr. Templer brought that in. And we agreed that. And we cut our debt in half and freed up money.

» That was the wondrous nature of running a very conservative, tight enterprise fund like this. And I congratulate you, Danny. My concern would be the same as any other builder as you are, is watching the inflationary pressures. Can you address that for us? Well, waiting is not saving. We, we originally had probably seven or 800,000 set aside for this during the, the, the result of the ad hoc committee and the plan. When we put that in motion, the price went up to 1.2 million and then here we sit at 2.7. Yeah. So we don't want to see any more growth in this son of a gun. Right. During its lifetime. And the new council will be able to cut a ribbon up there at a bargain price. Thank you. These are tough times for everybody. Good. Well done. With that, we move to a vote. Mr.

» Tucker, how do you vote? Yeah. Okay. And all of those signify by raising your hand. And it's unanimous. Mary, thank you very much. Hard work, chief. Go make it happen. Thank you very much, Pete. Good luck. With that, we go to item number three. I believe we did agree. We were going to discuss this one, right, Ben? Yes, sir. Motorola radio replacements for first responders. There is no attachment. There is no tab. Would you introduce the topic for discussion? Sure. I'll just make a motion that we discuss this particular item for potential funding sources and an update as well. All right. Can we have a second? Second. From Mr. Gardner. Go ahead, Ben. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Jimmy, I just remembered, I put this on here because you asked me. I did.

» I also put it on the agenda at the last budget session and y'all wouldn't take it up. I just remembered that. At any rate, this is something that I think will cost at least $2.5 million at some point in the future or more. I was just wondering generally if Mr. Templer could give us an update and the council an update on any relevant dates that may have changed or dates the council should pay attention to in the future for funding this and just concerns you have in general. There was a change in the date and I have Chief Glover here to help me out on the nuts and bolts of this. But the change you alluded to earlier did take the drop dead date from 2025 to 2027. This is a large project and I think PAL 800 recognizes that.

» So the drop dead date will mean that if you're not updated with this equipment or not have your current equipment flashed that can be flashed over these radios that can take this new platform, then your equipment is essentially useless. And for the flash, you mean just a software update that makes it relevant for actual use? Right. And that would have to be equipment specific because not everything is eligible to be flashed to be updated. Guys, we've seen so many times the designed obsolescence of this equipment. I mean, what is the cost per unit? $7,000 or $7,500? Probably $6,000, $7,000. Right. For the ones that are top flight and you don't have to worry about? Right. To me, it just seems crazy.

» I don't know who can address that directly, but $7,000 or $7,500 a unit does not include the prescription. Correct. Or subscription, excuse me, the subscription you have to pay and then the periodic flashes as well. So the days of holding a radio in your hand and when I was on the road, it was low band. Nowadays, you're holding a $6,000 cell phone in your hand because you need a subscription and you have to pay a user fee per month per unit, which it adds up. Okay. Thanks for that update. Sounds like you got two more years to consider how to fund it, but what's the backlog on orders? Have you heard about anything in that way? No, but it's a concern just what we've seen previously with supply chain issues, microchip issues. So it's a concern.

» It was something that I would like to do sooner rather than later and not get too close to the end. Do you have a comment on that, sir? Yes, sir. Good evening. I was able to speak to a Motorola rep today that said some of the radios are showing 24 weeks out now. So if you were older today, 24 weeks later, you might get it. That's going to continue to go up as, of course, we get closer to this deadline. And also, the other thing that he wanted to point out was over the past year, the prices have increased about 11% on these radios, and for the next year going forward, they're projecting an 8% increase also. So I just want to pass that information on that I got today. You know, it's interesting. There's some industries where prices are resetting.

» I mean, there's some industries where the prices continue to rise. Never seen that with Motorola. Never. It's always rising. If I may, briefly. Yeah, go ahead, Jimmy. Chief, thank you for being here. Thank you. You're doing a good job. Listen, we don't have the price exactly right, but we're going to be addressing that in the next year's budget, and the money's going to have to be there no later than that, because you're exactly right. There is a backlog growing. And I brought that to this council's attention last year in the budget session. They ignored me. And, you know, of course, Mr. Connell did put it on the agenda tonight, because I had asked about that to talk about it. And I'm glad, Danny, you're staying on top of this. And we'll get it fixed next year.

» Chief, real quick, have you looked into any federal or state grants that are potentially available to help supplement for these specific? We actually have a grant that's still out right now for $990,000 to replace a good portion of ours. It still doesn't reach the whole fire service. It's through the AFG grant. They've been awarding. We haven't got a denial letter, but we should know within the next couple of weeks if we're awarded or denied on that grant. Okay. And who wrote that grant? I did. Good work. Thank you for doing that. As not only leading our fire services, you're also a grant writer. I think it'd be a big help if we looked into getting a grant writer, because there are a lot of funds out there that we could be getting available.

» But thank you for your time and everything you do. Go ahead. Any further discussion on this topic? I will say nobody ignored anybody with respect to our first responders. We took what was a justifiable risk to address this topic in 2023, and I invite the new council to do that. With that, we move on to the next item, which is a grievance committee appointment. It's tab G, page 74. And I turn it over to Danny to make the statement. Mr. Chairman, members of council, we have before you a grievance committee appointment. We had an individual that was previously employed with Kershaw County, resigned, move on. So we have an opening there. I recommend Yasmin Modesto. Let me say again, Yasmin Modesto. Modesto. Okay. Can we have a motion to approve? So moved. Yeah. Mr.

» Gardner, a second? I'll second it. Thank you very much, Brantley. Discussion to you, Tom. I don't really have anything. We need to fill the spot. So if they're willing to serve, let's appoint them. Yeah. And this is an important venue where we get our employees involved in the movement of complaints. I'm hearing from Mr. Tucker that his phone's going dead. Sammy, are you gone now? Yes, on this vote, and I will be done. Okay. Very good. Any other comments? He didn't have a charger. No, sir. I, listen. Yeah, I have a comment. Let me help. Danny. Yes, sir. On the grievance committee, I dealt with them a lot when I was with the county. A lot. And I appreciate these employees willing to do that. Because it's a very important, vital part of how we operate. It is.

» And if I may, one of the things I'm looking to do is retool the grievance committee and call it the employee relations committee. So these individuals that serve, they have some cohesion, they meet often, and they are going to be able to select some of the good things that happen in Kershaw County as it relates to our employees and not just the negative things. Well, thank you. Very good. I try to stay positive all the time. Thank you, Mr. Jones. Any others? Seeing there is none, we vote. Mr. Tucker, if you're still there, how do you vote? He's gone. Mary, can you reflect that? And with that, we move to the vote here. All those in favor, so signify. And it's unanimous. Thank you very much for that attendance to the detail, Danny.

» With that, we move to the next item, which is boards and commission appointments. Tab H, page 75. Can we get that up? There it is. Mr. Tucker would otherwise handle this, but I think he has deferred to Mr. Gardner for Claude Eichelberger. Can I look to you for an appointment, nomination, please? Yes, I'd move to reappoint Claude Eichelberger to the planning commission. Can we have a second? Is there a second for the commission? Sorry, I didn't hear that. Ben? Yeah, Ben, good. Thank you very much. He has been an excellent chairman, I would say. Tom, have you got any comments? He served us well and, you know, he's very knowledgeable and he does a good job of that commission. So, very happy to reappoint him. Yeah, very good. Ben, any comments? Sure. Claude wears many hats.

» For those who don't know, he serves on the advisory board for MUSC. He's the chairman for that as well. So, he serves quite well in the community. He's been doing so for a long time. Yeah. And he is, it's often a contradiction in terms to say a distinguished Air Force officer, but he is a great one. Any other comments? And with that, we move to a vote. All those in favor, signify. And we have Mr. Tomlinson, Mr. Gardner, Mr. Burns, Mr. Brazel. Okay. It's now unanimous. Thank you, everyone. It's unanimous. With Mr. Tucker, no longer with us. Would you, can I say something, Mr. Templer, please? Yeah, sure. Would you please make sure that there's someone in the Planning Commission meetings? Because there's been some issues in there. Yes, sir.

» To that point, we- There's been some irresponsible issues in there. Yes, sir. We have tasked Tommy Morgan to sit in there and provide guidance. And you are aware of what I'm talking about? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Thank you. With that, we move to the next item. Can you go to the next page, advance one page? They were, I want to tell you that Mr. Carpenter was aware of it, too, and that has been taken up. Jimmy, you can bet. We all know about it. And thank you for your attention on that. I ask Mr. Brazel, do you have a nomination on the Rec Advisory Commission? Yes, I move to nominate Rick Jay. Do we have a second? Second. Mr. Jones, a discussion? Mr. Brazel. Rick's been very involved in athletics and at LA and different sporting events for years. He's passionate about it.

» He's looking forward to these recreation projects, and I think he's excited about it. So, he's a good guy and he cares. So, that's what we need. Thank you very much. Mr. Jones? Yes. I've known his family all my life. His dad's a great friend of mine. And, Russ, I think you made a great choice here, because I'd like to see Rick Jay involved more after the first year as well. He will. Thank you. All right. With that, we move to a vote. All those in favor, please signify. And it's unanimous with Mr. Tucker now out. With that, we move to the next item. If you could advance the slide to tab I, page 78. The topic is on Mr. Jones, County Council Public Comments Guidelines. Can you move to the slide forward? Next slide, page 78. Go ahead, Jimmy. We'll wait while we bring it up. Go ahead.

» You want to make a motion? I'll make the motion. This goes on the floor for a vote. I'm sorry? You want to make the motion for this? Yeah, make a motion and put it up, please. Yeah, that's what I said. I'll make the motion. Okay, good. Can we have a second? It's for discussion or a vote? No, it's for a vote. A vote, okay. It's under new business. I'll second. Okay, good. We have a second. Go ahead. Okay, and this is no fault of anybody's up here, but we kind of learn as we go along. Go ahead. Well, as I said, no fault to anybody personally, but we learn from experience. And when we had our problem the other night and an individual had to be removed, we had our audio and our video turned off. But that's just like a police officer turning his body camera off. That is evidence.

» And we need it. And thank goodness there were two or three folks that did video it. So, no pun intended on anyone. I didn't think about it until the incident happened. But I think this is a great time to correct it to where it says here, I move in my motion that the public comments to council as an agenda item also shall continue uninterrupted to be live streamed and audio and videoed until the public comment agenda item is finished and concluded. All right. All right. Do we have a second on that? I'll second. All right. And let's have some discussion. Well, I think it speaks for itself. You know. Yeah, sure. I'm sorry. I thought y'all had a copy in your agenda. Did they not? Y'all got one in the agenda. No, no, no. But anyway, it just, as I said, think about it in this aspect.

» It's like a police officer turning his body camera off when he gets into an incident. We need the video and the audio going on continuously so that if we do something wrong, it's there. If they do something wrong, it's there. It's a protection for the county. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, good. Brian? Yeah, I agree.

» measure where we can you know protect ourselves in case we have an event like we like we did before appreciate everything the sheriff's department did last time and I think it's this adds more authority over this meeting in the process all right other comments I sure I have a question so is it generally our intention that the entire meeting even if we entered an executive session because I think we've been live streaming and having audio even in executive session we're literally not in the room discussing anything is it streamed then as well historically it's been the audio is muted well y'all are not in here well it's right well but it's it's still the the video is streaming but there's no audio to it okay all right I'd like to ask a comment from the attorney well this only applies of the

» comment but as the administrator said traditionally the video video has continued for the entire meeting after the meeting starts video continues the audio is not on when council's not in the room because the audio is for the purpose of recording council not discussions by other folks but this just makes it clear or establishes that public comments are going to be live streamed for the entire time mm-hmm and audio too right yes just good common sense let me just get a clarification or we have our wonderful deputies in here tonight do they have body cams on I think the answer is yes that correct all right and so we this would be an added insurance for the purpose of documenting misbehavior is that what we absolutely okay I'm certainly not against that but the point there was is that it's a d

» isruptive scene and as I tried to make clear tonight we have sometimes have children in here and children certainly watching and it gets a bit offensive sometimes so you guys if you guys are okay with that I'm not offer anything objection well mr. chair here's what it boils down to you know when we're conducting business and it's something erupts where the children in here or not we need to leave the audio on in the video because that just I think decreases our liability it's a protection for us yeah ask a question of clarification do you think that that when something disrupts like it has in the past that we could be quicker to take action do you think that would that would help us or I think the audio the audio and the video needs to be on throughout the entire council meeting however I'm

» just addressing public comments now at the beginning of the year I will be getting with you and Brent and looking at making it through the entire county council meeting that we don't turn the audio and video off but I think it's two separate issues what you and I are talking about well I just I don't want it to become a stage for people to act up and act out I'm very much in favor of of having a better dialogue I mean today was great everybody who spoke was genuine and concerned and we didn't have any issues I mean I really appreciated all the comments today I don't have any issue with leaving leaving it on I just don't want it to set the stage for more disbehavior because that was really unnecessary and in the ending was unfortunate you know in my opinion and to to council members if I may

» follow up on that thank goodness three individuals in here did video that scene and and listen I'm not blaming anyone we've been turning it off I'm just as guilty because I never called a point of order and I went along with it I'm just saying now we learn from things that happen and I'm a little disappointed myself that I didn't figure this out earlier because I should have known that when you when you have an incident happened and we got the opportunity to video it and audio it we want it I mean to to turn it off I would question what are we trying to hide and I know we're not I know nobody up here is well I mean I do have two two young kids I think they're actually sitting there listening probably to us right now um so I could see would there be a possibility that we could you know whene

» ver it gets to a point where it shouldn't be past Jesus's ears no you leave it on you know and to answer your question I disagree with that all all the way Grant we leave the audio and the video on because that's that's our protection it's uh well it's like the the deputies won't turn their body cameras off this is like our body camera and uh they I think they might can turn it off they go into the bathroom but yeah I understand the point I just don't want it to become a well a stage for more misbehavior it that doesn't make sense to me but let me just say this when I offered live streaming of this meeting I was voted down two weeks later they came back and live streamed it and changed two words and said I just didn't word it right I worded it right uh WS was on as well here to interview wh

» y we weren't going to live stream and why we voted it down I I hate to bring those things up I know it sounds ugly but it's the truth I don't I don't think it sounds ugly I just want to I want to make sure that absolutely and see you haven't been in law enforcement Mr. Tucker myself I've been in law enforcement and I can tell you that the the body the body cameras on the law enforcement has saved a lot of folks and I just think it's reckless for us now that we've been made aware of it to not do it all right I'm ready to call a vote and call the question all those in favor signify by raising your hand uh unanimous thank you thank you thank you agree with that approach good that's a helpful clarification with that I think we're at the end of our day uh with that I turn to council briefs and o

» ver to you Russell yeah you know we talk we talk a lot about free speech this is this is what the federal government wants they want silence we had a lot of people come in today and speak I applaud you I thank you we won't be silent I won't be silent we do speak up and we take care of things that that we need to take care of we may not always agree and unfortunately sometimes things do get out of hand but everyone here tonight has a closer interaction with their public servant than you ever will with anyone in Washington so I say to you keep coming keep speaking out and keep doing it the right way because we do hear you I think someone said earlier tonight that it falls on deaf ears it does not there is radio silence in Washington but Kershaw County is not Washington we listen we care we ta

» ke what you have to say into consideration and for that I'm thankful so let's continue to be a community let's continue to care about one another and let's continue to improve Kershaw County thank you and to our departing councilman mr mr connell thank you mr chairman um I'd be remiss if I just first didn't mention the family of Foy Thompson um incidentally Foy's my great uncle but I wanted to mention him because he was affectionately known as coach in the community everybody knew Foy Thompson he was a great example a great man and he brought wrestling to Kershaw County something that I'll be forever grateful for if uh if I hadn't had the experience to roll around in spandex with a bunch of guys in high school I don't think I would have my college paid for directly so thank you great uncle

» Foy he was just an awesome man uh for anybody who's an Auburn fan if you even though they're the tigers somehow they've embraced the war eagles as well at the Auburn um athletic center for football there's a large eagle carved that he used to carve woodwork right up 521 at their home place and that sits in honor of him and a donation that he made to the university so thoughts and prayers go out to that family for sure I just want to mention it's been a joy to serve on county council I've appreciated learning from Mr. Tucker I hope you can hear me Mr. Tomlinson Mr. Gardner Mr. Jones Mr. Brazel and Mr.

» Burns and the others who served previously as well it's really a humbling experience and I think that local government is the most effective and responsive form of government here you'll see people who want to talk about various issues or vote on various issues up or down or do or don't do something you'll see them at lunch or you'll see them at the grocery store or you know my cell phone again is 843-513-0087 call me anytime people call you up and so it's been a blessing really to participate in this form of government and a huge honor to represent the be representative in the community that raised me and gave me a core of values that I hope I have been honorable to I'm grateful for the work of Mr. Templer Mr. Carpenter before him Ms.

» Siegler incidentally I saw Vic Carpenter this past week he was getting a vehicle repaired at Lugolf Toyota of all places I said you couldn't find a Toyota dealer up where you are now ran up gave him a big hug and both of us lit up it was a really great time to see him but apparently has a daughter that needs a vehicle repaired locally and so daddy came down to handle that you know that's that's a special thing I'm grateful for all the county staff and employees for law enforcement for the firemen locally people who devote their lives and careers to trying to serve the public in a meaningful way it's not easy to do and particularly for the men up here I think those who are newer or those who are rolling off or those who will remain will find that it requires a great sacrifice of time sacrifi

» ce is very worth it but there are nights you don't get to go and see uh you know your kids play whatever game you don't get to kiss the babies going to bed and then uh sacrifice in your marital relationship as well for various meetings that you have to go to all the time particularly during budget session so for that i express great thanks for my wife kristin who is a rock and a wonderful woman and a great mother to our three children i'm grateful to heavenly father as well for the blessings he's placed in my life i'm thankful for the constitution and what it represents in our republic i'm grateful for the freedoms that we have and i hope that we'll always take advantage of them mr henry powers and the entire powers family in general but mr henry powers put together these little yard signs

» that say love first and i've always found that to be one of the most valuable things in life um you know it's it's odd to be typically one of the biggest guys in the room and mr jones alluded to his karate skill and my wrestling ability but to be one of the biggest guys in the room and just find yourself wanting to say you know it's important to love first try to find the best and assume the best in all people that you can try to forgive and um and you know don't paint somebody with a picture on their worst day or worst act because people can be forgiven people can change and that's the attitude i hope to take to the state house and use logic reason and persuasion to get things done for kershaw county one of my main goals is going to be to repatriate tax dollars and bring it back we we send

» so much out but we don't get much back and it's not um i hate to say it's just not fair but it's generally unjust when we subsidize projects in numerous other areas that's one of the main reasons why i want to run and try to help kershaw county in that way i was very thankful to see carson brazel tonight you've heard me talk time to time about the brain drain that kershaw county experiences we raise up these amazing kids with really strong moral compasses but we tend to not have the jobs locally to have them come back and be able to raise their family here and so they travel somewhere else and so that that brain drain occurs and you don't have an opportunity being back bring back your best and brightest and i'm really hopeful for carson and all the other kids that are in that generation and

» for my kids i hope they have opportunities to come back and and be in this area having worked uh all over the place and traveled the country in the world i came back to kershaw county because i think it's a special place it's where i was raised and it's where i wanted to raise my family so i just say thank you in general for the opportunity to serve with y'all again i'm humbled and i look forward to having a great meal tonight in celebration of six wonderful yields on kershaw county council thank you thank you sir mr jones if if i may ben i just want to say congratulations to you and um i am very proud of you and i know you're going to go over there and work hard and you understand the local government fund how we've been cut you understand what the disadvantage act 388 is to our community

» or to to south carolina and i think you do a great job over there now you and i have been sitting here eight years and out of that eight years you never moved years sir six years i mean six years well other six years you never moved your seat there's been two council members that sat here that's moved their seat they said i'm not going to sit next to him and uh and that was fine with me i told him i loved him before i left um but that was the number one thing i'll say but uh number two um i just want to make sure that everybody knows that uh i'm going to be here for a long time and i'm looking forward to i'm looking forward to working with the guys that are coming back and uh haven't always but i mean you're working with the folks leaving but um another thing too i want to congratulate myse

» lf for winning thank you and uh ben i wish you the very best and i'm always available here to talk with you if anything comes up with you working at the state house then i will say this about ben he he would take time to talk to my son taylor when he was in wrestling he would take time to demonstrate on me an arm move for my son when he was 11 years old he'd pull in the yard and um those those are just great memories but i wish i'd hit a few of those moves a little bit harder in hindsight i'm saying but but i do want to say this about ben connell and i've said said this from the very beginning he's he's not a republican he's not a democrat he knows where i'm going he's a christian man otherwise he'd have been jumped on me three or four times in the last six years but uh thank you ben that c

» oncludes my report um tomlinson i'll be brief thank you everybody for coming out tonight thank you i believe we have very very good conversation um and i know we have good representation for kershaw county at the state house now um for two years and hopefully um even further in the future i look forward to working with you ben it's been a pleasure or short um time that i've been on council um thank you for all you've done and thank you for your family for for um paying the price while you have to do it it's it's very tough burden on the families but thank you all again um thank you ben uh it's been a pleasure working with you uh you're truly a man's man and uh probably the smartest guy up here i'll go on record saying that uh without question and we appreciate your leadership look forward t

» o your leadership in the state house and godspeed to you thank you thank you and i'll close by echoing that it's been a real joy to work with you ben i'm afraid you're inheriting a pretty long list of things to correct and it's uh and not the least of which is redistricting and and the census results and things of that nature that make it harder for you to be our representative but there is no one who could do it better and i especially enjoy getting to know your family all three of those young kids and one of these days uh maybe we'll see one of those kids up here running the county as well that was just great and good luck to you it's been terrific there are some really tough and courageous things that happened here while you i won't just enumerate a few of them the fire study we now got

» hub and spoke we right we right-sized the pay system for our employees we got a park in lughof where there was none before we've got a park in elgin where there was none before and i could go on and on and we've had everything that we bring credit back to you and it's been a joy working with you you challenged me you challenged us and you made the tough decisions without any concern for your own outcome and i just want to tell you you'd make quite a good army officer too i'll tell you that you really would but you look kind of funny and fatigued better in spandex uh tonight everybody we heard a lot of talk about rules and it's a complex job up here and the rules that mr jones paid such infinite care to tonight were most helpful in defining how we interact up here and unfortunately it took a

» bout 20 minutes to get through the agenda but you saw how important that was that we made the point that the rules had to be transparent to as to get the work of the council done objectively and transparently and also where the concerns of the public are taken in and it was a brilliant move tonight where we were able to accommodate mr mr connell's agenda item and ben you handled it like a gentleman you really did and i want to thank you for that your demeanor that bespeaks uh your faith in our lord and savior it really does it showed tonight thank you i want to wish you all a happy veterans day and you marines just remember without the marines the navy is just another coast guard okay congratulations to the marines on their birthday right paul era yeah i would like to get a point to you the

» attorney that makes sure that when people have a concern that we return their calls and i'm talking about the issue with uh the dogs and i'm sure that that young lady will probably get a call very very soon i would like secondly to get an update on where we are in that court process it's a long time between now and the 19th of december and uh unfortunately or maybe fortunately we are constitutional government here and we don't believe in wrongful taking and and so we proceed with people like that with due diligence but gosh it's taken a long time i wonder if it could be moved up in the court docket or something like that and the last thing is the next meeting is the 13th of december over to you um danny uh yes sir just a couple points just to reiterate what shane said as a reminder the touc

» h of truck has moved to le high school this weekend also um amy scholdfield has rejoined the library as a librarian she left we had an interim she thought about it and realized kershaw county is an amazing place to work so she came back so happy to have her back on board um also we will be closed for veterans day friday to include the convenience centers reopening saturday for the convenience centers and business as usual there also ben it's been a pleasure to work with you um you've taught me a lot vic and i used to kind of have a running joke if you will that when ben called and gave you a list of five items it was five items but five items under each of those items to look into so it was 25 items so but it was uh it was the attorney's take on on uh inquiries and um we always appreciated

» it you kept us on our toes and it was uh really truly a different perspective in looking into items with some of your questioning so we appreciated it and uh kept us sharp kept us on our toes so um please consider me a resource as you as you move on for anything i can help you with in kershaw county and i wish you the absolute best so my report thank you to the attorney i have nothing mr chairman and we have a motion to adjourn second a second for mr connell any discussion saying there is none let's move to a vote all those in favor so signify as unanimous mary and we are adjourned