Full meeting transcript - February 14, 2023

» Good evening Kershaw County. This is the Tuesday, February 14th regularly scheduled meeting for Kershaw County Council and I call this meeting to order. All right we will start with our invocation from Pastor Craig in Blankenship. Mr. Blankenship if you'll come to the podium please and just make sure the mic is really close to your mouth. Most of the time they tell me to pull it away from my mouth. My name is Craig in Blankenship. I am the pastor of Bethany Baptist Church up in Westville. I have the pleasure of knowing quite a few of you if I don't. I'd love to get to know you. I have been a resident of Kershaw County for 17 years and we love it here. Love the people here and love the servants here and I consider it a privilege to get to open you up in prayer today.

» Just want to share one verse with you before I say that prayer. That's one of my favorite verses and Jesus is speaking. He says the greatest among you shall be your servants and so I always try to hold that close and so let us pray. God we love you. We thank you for this day that you have blessed us with. Father help us to be reminded that greatness comes through serving and serving well. Father I pray that we would be people who serve each other, who serve you first. God that we would seek you in all that we do. Father I pray your blessing on this meeting today. Lord that it would be done productively. God that it would be done in a way that honors you. God that everything that we do would honor you because we know that is where success is found.

» Father we pray that you would guide us and be with us. I pray your blessing on these leaders and these representatives that they would know your presence, that they would follow you and what they do and the decisions they make. And God we just love you. We thank you so much for Jesus who died on the cross for us and we pray these things in his name. Amen. Amen. Thank you. Thank you Pastor Blankenship. Do we have Councilman Jones on the phone? No? Okay. All right. If everyone will stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Fine. All right. Public comments. Mr. DuBose, did we have any sign up? Yes Madam Chairwoman. We have six people who have signed up. Okay great. And the first person is Donnie Cato. Hey Mr. Cato. Good afternoon Madam Chair, Town Council.

» I come down to speak with you about a problem that I think exists in the town of Bethune. Bethune is a part of Kershaw County, autonomous by nature, self-governing supposedly. And ran into an issue up there the other night in a public hall meeting. Advertised on the road sign. Madam Chairman was there. So I have some things. I have some questions and I'll have a comment. I'll promise you I'll be through before 20 minutes. The first thing I want to make sure that we don't have a misunderstanding about what I'm about to say. Because it's very important in my opinion. The Sheriff's Department of Kershaw County furnishes one, two or more deputies to town of Bethune daily.

» Now my question about that is who's paying the Kershaw County deputies to spend most of their day, most of their shill in the town of Bethune. Primarily don't have a lot of violence in Bethune. If I say that, somebody will probably break loose. But they're writing speeding tickets because people drive too fast in Bethune, through Bethune, through Cassie, through Camden, through Columbia, down the interstate at 90 miles an hour. Do they need to be up there for that? Sure they do. But who's paying them? Who's paying those deputies? I think, and I'll leave that open, just keep that in mind. I think the County of Kershaw is paying those deputies. I could be wrong with that. They might be contributing a few dollars, but I doubt Bethune has very many dollars to contribute.

» Don't have that many businesses in Bethune for the money to come from. The money has to come from somewhere. So this is what I would like to ask. First question: How is that money divided up? No one in here probably knows the answer to that, unless it's my representative, Mr. Cato. He may know, because he's a part of the Sheriff's Office. How is that money divided up? They just passed up there, and Monday night's meeting is the way I understood it, a $500 cap on fines. Now, I know that it's up to the judge what he decides how much the speeding ticket's going to cost an individual, right? Tucker's a part of that group one time, I think.

» The judge does the deciding, okay? Where does that money go? Does it go to Bethune? Does it go to Camden, to the County, to the Sheriff's Department, or does it go to the state? How much does each one get out of the $500, $200, whatever the ticket's price is? Now, this is a very important part of what I must say, and it will not shock the chairman whatsoever because she was present. In that town meeting, the outside of the town limit, people that reside in that area, have been there, like myself, most of their lives, run businesses there before, were not allowed to speak. Not allowed to speak. Mr. Gaito, you've spoken four minutes. You have one minute left. Four minutes out of 20, right? One minute? I better speed up a little bit.

» There's one businessman up there, his grandfather ran a business there, had the only new car dealership in the history of Bethune. He went back into the '30s, '40s, '50s on. He's also a combat veteran. He got up to ask the mayor if he could speak. No, sit down. Now, that's no way to talk to anyone. Sit down was the only two words he used. No and sit down. Even there was a person there representing the group, she lived in town, gone speak for the outside group, and she was not allowed to speak on their behalf. No, sit down. My last point, I think here, is this. Kershaw County Council can't fix that problem in Bethune with that mayor. And I would suggest, this is a suggestion of mine, because I've seen the governor remove mayors.

» You should talk to the governor of South Carolina and take care of that problem. Now, whether that's taking her out of office or taking care of the problem, okay? My five minutes is up. Okay? Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr. Cato. Mr. Templer, can you call Mr. Cato tomorrow and get him the information about the money for the Sheriff's Office and who's paying the deputies? Thank you. Thank you. Second person signed up is Ken Carras. Afternoon. Hi, Ken. I've got a couple questions, okay? You're at the chain of command, okay? I've moved my way up to here so far. Gone through my councilman, gone through the other people. I live on West Drive in Cassett, okay? We have a wooden bridge down on there that is slowly sinking in. It's out of level. The one corner is down seven inches.

» In a 14-inch span, it's down seven inches more than the rest. The retaining wall on the side is starting to give away. I went to road people, talked to them. No answer. Nobody can seem to tell me when this bridge was inspected last. Yes, it's supposedly a five-ton bridge. Now, I mean, pickup trucks, a full-size pickup weighs between three and four-ton alone. The gentleman that does the road grading, on that road drives over with that big road grader, okay? Now, I don't know what model it is, so I couldn't figure out what the tonnage was on. And that all depends if they're air-filled or gas-filled tires, or water-filled tires. They use both on those vehicles. Now, I just wanted to know when it was inspected. Secondly, in front of my house, he's going deeper and deeper with this sand.

» My second driveway down was only for propane trucks to get in. They couldn't get in anymore because it was too steep. The gentleman that was on the road committee, who I have to know, he come out with the foreman. They looked at it. We'll fix it. So he sent the guy out. Well, instead of a backhoe, he came with the road grader to fix it. He started up and stalled. Well, I know why he stalled, but I didn't see it. He backed up, got a little less cut, and three big pipes rolled out, concrete pipes, 16-inch pipes. He said, "What are these?" Now, these, mind you, were probably a good foot. The bottom of them was a good foot off of the road base. I told him, I said, "Well, I'm just a dumb Yankee." I said, "But I can tell you one thing.

» Originally, there was a ditch on this road, and that was the drainage under that driveway. It's no longer there anymore." And then, when I went on Goodall, over by Goodall Park to the garage, I talked to that gentleman. I asked him the same questions when he gave me an answer on when it was inspected last. Between my house and Route 1, it goes all the way to Route 1, I'm the last house, and the rest of the house, there's nothing down there. I put a game camera up on the road just to be curious. I had one pickup truck go by in a week. But the one gentleman that came to deliver propane, he came out of Bethune. He didn't know any difference. He came down through there. He came across that bridge. He said, "You can't turn around. It's only 11 foot wide, the road." He came past another car.

» So, he came across it. He says, "I had a full load." He said, "I was scared to death coming across that bridge." Anyway, the other question I had, they happened to show me when I was at that office in Goodall, they wanted to look up on the state map where my road was and where this bridge was. They did. And lo and behold, there is blacktop down to my second driveway on the state map. One more minute. And it's not. It's not blacktop. It's sand. So, who got paid for pouring that blacktop? It's on the state map. Somebody got paid for it. Who? I would really enjoy an answer for that one. The last gentleman that came out that my councilman said gave me to run around as usual.

» Well, we'll try and get some gravel down there at least on your -- I said, "All the other homes that you go on where there's sand roads and there's homes, they got gravel. I don't -- even my driveway, I've had to widen my apron because he's digging down there." So, I would just appreciate some answers to my questions. If you could help me out, I'd appreciate it. Okay? Yes, sir. Thank you. I have some pictures if anybody would like to see them. Okay. I would love to see them. Mr. Templer, can you also call Ken tomorrow? Find out if that's a county road or a state road and the situation with the bridge inspection date. Yes, county roads. Okay. Thank you. The third person signed up is Tim Taylor. Good evening. Hi, Tim. Hello.

» I've kind of noticed that since you've taken over, the new theme of the council is to be a good neighbor. So, I coupled that with what Mr. Templer did with his plus one program, and I came up with a good neighbor award. And basically, once a quarter, people would have a -- have a means to send in what somebody's done for somebody else, what, you know, great things they've done. Each councilman would -- it would be gone through by somebody else, which would probably end up with me since I'm talking about it. But it would be disseminated to each one of the councilmen to pick three people, and then it would be up to you to pick a winner from each district. I was going to do a presentation, but if there wasn't any interest in it, I didn't want to do it yet.

» It won't come out of any county funds. I can solicit local businesses to give rewards if they'd like and go from there. But most of the county would have to pay for is maybe printing a certificate. I'll pay for that, too, if I have it. If you like this idea, you know how to get in contact with me. So, do that, and we can move forward. And if needed, I can make a presentation. The second thing we have is unfortunately my wife and I missed a night to shine because special needs kids and animals are very dear to us. That's just a flyer. There's going to be another chance to honor these kids and special needs adults at the Easter egg hunt that the Lugoff Masonic Lodge is putting on. It's April 2nd, 1 to 4 p.m.

» They've got a magician, a bunch of fun games, and you can go to Eventbrite or their website to get more information on it. But I wanted you guys to know that and give you the chance to come and show your support for these kids and adults. That's it. Thank you. Thank you, Tim. I think that's a great idea, and we'll get together on it, okay? On the Good Neighbor Award. The next person who signed up, the fourth person, is Matthew Hutchinson. Hey, Matt. Hey, good evening. A couple things I just wanted to put out on the public record. I think the county council is already working on it, maybe. The county planning committee is a seven-member board. Four out of the seven members are from the same district, District 2.

» There are several districts that are not represented on that planning committee. I think there should be one from each and maybe an at-large seat. I think one of the seven is an at-large seat, appointed by the chair. I just think with the direction that this county is going as far as the growth, the new tenure plan, comprehensive plan, and whatnot, that we should have equal representation on this board. I'm not sure what can be done about it because the people are appointed for a set amount of years. Now, to get this list, I had to call the planning and zoning committee, speak to a supervisor, and have it emailed to me because this list was not on the county website. All the other commission's lists of people are on the website, but this one was not for some reason.

» So, I just wanted to put that out on public record and ask you all to see what we can do about that to get equal representation. Another thing is our Kershaw County Legislative Delegation. The concern that came up was our director of that Kershaw County Legislative Delegation does not reside in Kershaw County and hasn't for some time. The only connection to Kershaw County I can see is some friendships with people in downtown Camden, some prominent people, I guess we could say. I'm not going to name any names, but I'm not sure what the rules are on this. I did reach out to Representative Connell. His response was basically, there's no resident rule. We can pick who we want as long as they have the right credentials and this is who he chose.

» I think he's the one who nominated this individual and the delegation voted. So, I don't know if an ordinance needs to be passed for this. I'm sure the people of Kershaw County would like anybody who has anything to do with our political process should live in Kershaw County. I know I would, but I'm not speaking for everybody. That's pretty much it. I saw on the agenda tonight, just earlier, that the Council of Governments were going to appoint somebody else. I didn't know nominations were open, if that's the case. If so, I'd like to nominate Jeff Maddox for that position. Thank you. Thank you, Matt. The next person that signed up is Tom Webb III. I proclaim this Who Kills Scalia month. Seven years ago, Antonin Scalia died under unusual circumstances.

» Hardly anybody here would remember that now, but he was a very important person. I don't want to forget him. I wonder how many things can we continue to forget and still have some control over our future. Humans tend to forget. There's so many dreadful things in our lives, people we have lost. We don't want to just remember that as though it just happened yesterday. There are some things we should not forget. Scalia is one of them. I'll come back to that in just a minute. There are some very well-intentioned people who want us to have a constitutional convention, or a states' rights convention. Not states' rights. A states' convention, or Article V convention, which could turn into a constitutional convention.

» Very well-intentioned people who want to do something about term limits and balance the budget. But there are some wicked people in the world, and a lot of them live in this country. They would love to get hold of something like a constitutional convention. And they would do away with much of our Constitution. Certainly, the Bill of Rights. You lose your right to free speech, religion, Second Amendment, states' rights. The first ten amendments would certainly be thrown out. And they would just rewrite it. That happened one time before, kind of back in the 1700s when we were under the Articles of Confederation. And the Constitutional Convention was supposed to meet to fix that, to repair it. But they just threw it out and started over. It could happen again.

» So if anybody wanted to amend the Constitution, it's been amended plenty of times, one step at a time. Instead of going at it with a shotgun, and maybe doing too many things, and losing control of it. Now, there are people who say, "Well, we wouldn't lose control of it." But you look at who's in control of things at the federal government level now. I don't think we feel that we're seeing much control. I don't know how you could keep control of it. And this brings me back to Scalia, Supreme Court Justice. Very strong on the Constitution. He and Justice Thomas. If it wasn't for them, I don't know where we would be. And if Scalia were alive today, things would be very different, I believe. But Scalia liked to go bird hunting. So he went on a hunting trip down in West Texas.

» Knew the fellow that owned the ranch. John Poindexter. 35,000-acre ranch and a convention center. Quite fancy. But a hunting preserve. So Scalia went there, and he didn't come for breakfast. This was in 2016, in February. That's why this is Scalia month. So John Poindexter, the owner, knocked on the door. Mr. Scalia, are you coming for breakfast? No answer. Mr. Scalia. So he went in and he found Mr. Scalia, Supreme Court Justice Scalia. 34 years on the Supreme Court. Appointed by Reagan. Found him dead in bed with a pillow on his face. A pillow on his face. And he didn't get an autopsy. There was considerable confusion about what to do about this. Supreme Court Justice here, dead on my property.

» What do we do? What do we do? They couldn't get anybody of any significance to come and make any kind of pronouncements. They finally did get a judge. I'm not sure what kind of judge. Somebody on the telephone who said, "Well, don't worry about it. It's natural causes." So I guess he didn't need an autopsy. Very interesting that the judge's name down there in West Texas, close to Mexico. The judge's name was Cinderella. Now, I'm not joking. I remember this from seven years ago when it was in the news. One more minute. One more minute. Okay. Well, there are people who would love to get control of it. George Soros, the Clintons, World Economic Forum. If they would kill, if somebody would assassinate our beautiful, wonderful Supreme Court Justice.

» Well, somebody did assassinate President Kennedy and his brother, Robert Kennedy. Somebody did try to assassinate a whole bunch of Republicans, the other person with that name, similar to Scalia. Scalise at a ball game among Republicans. It's been a couple of years ago. A sniper opened up on him. Scalise survived it barely. So this thing, people would say, "Well, this can't happen in America." It has happened. And how many other people have disappeared that weren't important enough to matter? And as far as I know, there hasn't been any real investigation into what really happened. That, in itself, is a crime. I wish South Carolina would back away from this state's convention. It's nothing but trouble. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Webb. The last person that signed up is Jeff Maddox.

» Hey, Jeff. I'm getting in. Ms. Chairwoman. I've got to get used to that. I'm sorry. Derek, welcome to the club or the fire, if you will. I don't really have much to talk about except trust. The last three years since the planned pandemic, the trust in all our institutions has been shaken, if not shattered. We've seen everything from masks that don't work, to social distancing that was made up, to locking down, to closing boat ramps, to mandating shots that don't prevent transmission and are not safe or effective. We've seen FBI censoring on Facebook and Twitter and all sorts of things. We've seen the CIA blow up the Nord Stream pipeline to start World War III. We've seen China balloons to distract us.

» We've seen all kinds of things to lead me to believe that I can't trust government whatsoever. We have a trust problem. And then on the other side, the government doesn't trust me. The FBI calls me a domestic terrorist because I speak against this sort of stuff. When I walk into county council, all these terrorists, potential terrorists out here are wanted. That tells me you don't trust dust. Everywhere I go, I'm now surveilled and tracked and my phone's tracked. And now they're talking about digital currencies. We're in a whirlwind of tyranny that keeps stepping up day by day by day by day. And you can see that the war machine is going to kill millions. And the next thing you know, there's going to be Americans over there. And all of them dutifully obeying. An unconstitutional war.

» We see this over and over and over again. And as obedient little slaves, we go to the meat grinder. We support it. Trust. I don't have any trust. But if the government says go, go. I think we've got to be more skeptical. We've got to ask more questions. We've got to pay more of attention. We've got to turn to God. We can't put our trust in men. We can't put our trust in government. We've got to put our trust in the Lord. And we've got to do what he says. You know, love each other and treat each other like you would. Every law can be judged by that simple rule. Look, don't harm anybody and don't steal their stuff. That's the basic rule.

» And if you can in any way move that back limited government to where you look at these little laws and all these rules and regulations and you judge them against that one thing, you'll do away with many of them. Perhaps we can move this ship in a more direction of limited government and individual liberty with what we stood for 200 and some years ago. So we all need to try to build a trust, but we also need to verify it. Thank you, guys. Thank you, Mr. Maddox. That concludes the sign up list. Thank you, Mr. DuBose. Adoption of tonight's agenda. Do I have a motion to adopt this agenda? Make a motion. Excuse me. Make a motion to adopt the agenda. Mr. Tucker makes the motion. Second. And Mr. Cato seconds. Any discussion on tonight's agenda? Okay.

» All in favor of tonight's agenda, signify by raising your hand. And it's unanimous. All right. Tonight we get to honor two groups. Two groups. Well, we get to proclaim Black History Month and honor North Central High School. So we'll move on to that. First will be the North Central High School proclamation. This was placed on the agenda by Councilman Danny Cato for District 6. And I will read it. A proclamation honoring North Central High School principals. Whereas David Branham is a graduate of North Central High School. And after graduating from college, he began a teaching career at North Central High School and served as principal at Mount Pisgah Elementary and Bethune Elementary. And was then hired as the principal of North Central High in 2014.

» And whereas Meredith Ogburn Kirkland served as a teacher at Camden High and Camden Middle and served as a curriculum effectiveness specialist at E.L. Wright Middle School in Richland County. And was then hired as assistant principal at North Central High in 2018. And whereas Tabitha Strickland served as special education coordinator for Berkeley County School District. And lead special education teacher and department head at Cane Bay High School. And was then hired as assistant principal at North Central High School in 2020. And whereas North Central High School was organized in 1979 with the merger of Baron DeKalb, Midway and Mount Pisgah High Schools. The facility was placed on a 60.35 acre campus on Lockhart Road between Highway 521 and Highway 341.

» In 1999 Bethune High School was closed and both the students and staff of Bethune High School joined the North Central High School family. And whereas on January 12, 2020, the North Central High School staff, students and parents faced a major tragedy when a tornado touched down directly on the campus, causing major destruction to the building and sports facilities. And whereas District 6 Councilman Danny Cato's son attended North Central High School when the tornado struck. Councilman Cato's family experienced the pain, sorrow and uncertainty of both students and staff that resulted from the tornado's devastation. So students, faculty and the entire community were left in uncertainty with no school to call home.

» And whereas in March 2020, the COVID-19 outbreak presented a second set of serious issues and challenges to the North Central High School community. With COVID-19 forcing school closures and students learning from home. And whereas despite the physical devastation to North Central High School campus and despite the challenges caused by the COVID-19 school closures. Principal David Branham demonstrated great courage, positivity and strength of leadership to the North Central High School community. And whereas assistant principals Meredith Kirkland and Tabitha Strickland were instrumental in rallying the North Central High School staff, students and families with effective leadership and resolve.

» And whereas principal David Branham and assistant principals Meredith Kirkland and Tabitha Strickland set the example for resiliency to North Central High School staff, students and family. These principals, along with the entire North Central High School staff, went above and beyond to make sure the students of North Central had a positive and enjoyable high school experience. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Kershaw County Council expresses appreciation and gratitude to principal David Branham, assistant principal Meredith Kirkland and assistant principal Tabitha Strickland. For their exemplary leadership, positive attitude and unwavering resolve in guiding the North Central High School community. Signed by Kershaw County Council on this 14th day of February 2023.

» Is there a motion to accept the proclamation? I make a motion we adopt the proclamation recognizing principal David Branham, assistant principal Meredith Ogburn Kirkland and assistant principal Tabitha Strickland. And Mr. Cato, motion. Second. I yield. I yield. I yield to Mr. Tomlinson. I'll second it. Second by Mr. Tomlinson. Any discussion? I'll give you the floor first, Mr. Cato, since you put this on the agenda. This was something that I had thought about a long time. As it says in the proclamation, I was present during these times of uncertainty with North Central High School. The devastation that took place in January of 2020 affected not just the school and the students, but it affected the whole community. And I've seen it firsthand.

» Students that lost a school that they call home, athletes that lost a place to play home games. Then in March of 2020, we had the COVID outbreak. Schools were shut down. Athletic events were stopped. School was done from home. It really took a toll on the students, the staff, and the families. When schools started back up, I started substituting at some of the schools around North Central. And I got a bird's eye view, especially at North Central High School, of exactly what these three individuals did for North Central High School. Now, I do not want to take away from what their staff did. They had a staff that went through major change. They had students going through major changes in their life.

» They had a cafeteria staff that fixed meals at a separate location and transported those meals to the school to serve the students. That's dedication. That's resilience. And it was all from the leadership of these three individuals. I personally want to thank these three individuals. Sometimes I feel like it being a country school, we may get overlooked sometimes. But that's a great group of people. It's a great school. And I thank you for everything you did and everything you continue to do. We have two school board members here, Dr. Charles King and newly elected David Roberts. They're both graduates of North Central High School. I did not graduate from North Central High School. I graduated from Bethune.

» But I do feel like an adopted part of the family up there with my children going and graduating from there and being very active in the school. And I consider North Central home now. And I thank you all for making me feel that way. Thank you, Mr. Cato. Any other comments? All right. Madam Chair. Yes, Mr. Tucker. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Cato, for putting this on the agenda. And I just want to say thank you to Mr. Branham and his lovely staff and assistant. Up there at North Central. I'm often reminding the kids as I continue to drive them through the driver's ed that North Central is the hidden jewel of Kershaw County. They have all the things that they need and all the things that the other school has, but they're in a location when they don't have as much trouble.

» And I think that's a blessing within itself. And I say that and I also ask them to compare the other schools in their conferences and in their league on their facilities and their teachers and their principals and staff. And there's no comparison. So we thank you guys continue to do a great job, continue to educate our future. We appreciate you. Thank you, Mr. Tucker. Any other comments? All right. I'll call for the vote. All in favor of this proclamation. And it's unanimous. Is David, Meredith, and Tab, I see Meredith, Tabitha here with us tonight. Could y'all come up, please? Let's give them a round of applause while they come up. Am I y'all coming up? Yeah. You go first. There's a lot of fun parts about this job, and that's one of them when we get to recognize the community. All right.

» Moving on to our next proclamation. A proclamation honoring National Black History Month. Whereas, Kershaw County celebrates February as National Black History Month to recognize the vast contributions of African Americans to our nation's history and identity. And, whereas, Black History Month grew out of the establishment in 1926 during the second week of February of Negro History Week by Carter G. Woodson and the Association of the Study of African American Life in History. This week was chosen because it coincides with the birthday of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. And, whereas, Black History Month in the United States was first proposed by black educators in the black United States at Kent State University in February 1969.

» Six years later, it was being celebrated all across the country. President Gerald Ford recognized Black History Month in 1976 during the celebration of the U.S. Bicentennial. He urged Americans to seize the opportunity to honor the too often neglected accomplishments of black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history. And, whereas, the celebration of Black History Month is a positive way of recognizing the culture and history of African Americans as vital to the core beliefs and values of this community. And, whereas, the contributions of African Americans have been vital to the growth and development of Kershaw County. And, whereas, Black History Month is a time to honor the trailblazers who have made history like District 2 County Councilman Sammy Tucker Jr.

» and City of Camden Mayor Alfred May Drakeford. And, whereas, Kershaw County Council strives to close the equity and outcome gaps for African American citizens through policies and practices that reflect the experiences of African American citizens, ensure greater access and opportunity, honor history, heritage, and contributions. And, whereas, many individuals in Kershaw County have paved the way for black achievement by their contributions to help move forward together embracing diversity and creating change. We honor these trailblazers who have left behind a legacy to promote social justice and a growing awareness for stronger leadership and stronger communities.

» It is important to preserve our history, traditions, and culture by empowering our future generations to make positive differences to ensure equal opportunities, economic triumphs, and political victories that work to weave justice, freedom, and peace among all groups of people in Kershaw County. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the County Council of Kershaw recognizes that disparities existing in the various communities diminish intentional positive conversation.

» However, County Council supports organizations and associations such as concerned citizens of Kershaw County, Camden-Kershaw Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, NAACP, and unity in their efforts to assist in creating intentional spaces in the community which provide opportunities for citizens, regardless of class, color, race, or gender orientation, to experience challenges, affirmations, change, courage, gratitude, and to pursue their passion to unlearn traditions of misunderstandings.

» adopted this day february 14th 2023 is there a motion to adopt the proclamation i make the motion madam chair to adopt a proclamation okay mr tucker i'll second mr tomlinson and discussion on the proclamation um madam chair if you may yes sir i just want to um i want to recognize a few folks that i know are in the audience and um before i do that i just want to say uh thank you guys for uh for putting this on the agenda thank you madam chair um this is a very important month to the folks and citizens of kershaw county and all throughout the world on the many accomplishments that have been done but we try to do something local to um make sure that the folks here in kershaw county understand a part of our history uh and with me saying that is that um we have our president and our first vice u

» m reverend um kenneth carter he's back there i saw him peeping there that's him leaning his head kind of sideways i hope the preacher ain't drunk um he asked for that one and then we have uh reverend mini bing uh benny mango who's also sitting right beside him who's our first vice and uh we've got two loyals that normally come to about every meeting and that's miss martha robinson raise your hand miss martha and it's miss hessie peterkin here as well she's not here tonight but we see them about every meeting um they're they're they're what we call um uh good attenders here at the council meeting i also want to recognize miss ann davis uh that's a lot of history there i won't go how far back um because i won't be telling things that i don't need to tell but she's the president over the uh co

» ncerned citizens of kershaw county which is also an awesome group as well but i thank all of you who has attended for this purposes of receiving this proclamation and the work that you continue to do in this community a lot of it goes unnoticed and uncelebrated but i know and many others know how important your organizations and your supports are and i want to say hi to my grandson and my daughter-in-law who i had no idea was going to be here tonight thank you thank you mr tucker any other comments well hello to mr tucker's grandson and i want to thank my colleague mr tucker for um helping with this proclamation and also miss ann davis we pulled up last year's and and we didn't want to just rubber stamp it and just change the date on it we wanted to rewrite it and make sure it included ever

» ything about our community local to us so i appreciate everyone that helped rewrite this and put some specific details in it so it would be specific to us there's no other comments we'll go to a vote to adopt the proclamation all in favor of proclaiming national black history month in kershaw county and it's unanimous and we will take a picture if i can invite the chapter of the naacp reverend miss ann davis concerned citizens oh y'all come up yeah anyone that would like to come up hello hi there okay we're going to move into our public presentation part of the agenda we have two on the agenda tonight the first will be the santee lynch's council of government community development block grants miss sylvia fryerson and council do you all have the handouts that yes ma'am okay hey miss sylvia

» thank you for being here tonight oh thank you for having me madam chair and council um so the reason i'm here and i hope to do this again next year but the reason that i'm here is because i've been getting asked not just by kershaw county but also by um some of the other counties in the santee lynch's region um for those of you that don't know santee lynch's one of the things that we do is we do grants management for the santee lynch's region um so back to the the needs assessment public hearings so i've had people asking me why are we doing this what's going on we don't remember it so the past two years due to covid um we have actually been doing them virtual which is over the phone um we advertise it like we normally do but we haven't been getting a lot of participation so mid-year last y

» ear i said to the grants management staff i said so what we're going to do is we're going to start hosting them in person um we used to do it years ago um that's what i was told i wasn't there but we used to do it years ago and i said you know we're going to do it now um so what happened uh december 31st of 2022 last year they said uh hud came in and said guess what um no more virtual public hearings so we have to do them in person now so um what i would like to do tonight and every year going forward is basically come and brief the council on you know just the high level view of what's going to be available through cdbg funds talk a little bit about the purpose of it and hopefully we'll be more successful working together so you can actually see the presentation um this is a high level vie

» w of the cdbg program we're going to talk about what is cdbg the purpose of the citizen participation plan and the needs assessment public hearing and then of course talk about the cdbg application deadlines we do have a needs assessment public hearing scheduled for march the 14th in room 207 where i will actually go over the citizen participation plan and the needs the community needs assessment public hearing um survey so um basically what is cdbg so cdbg stands for a community development block grant this is a program that is administered by the grants division in south carolina department of commerce please understand that the primary purpose is to address community development needs of the low to moderate income individuals in the communities you're going to see where this starts to fi

» t together in a little bit so um the citizen participation plan what it does is basically it provides guidance to the low to moderate income citizens not just low to moderate income but they are important um as well as the the remainder of the locality as to the standards of participating with the community needs and when you actually apply for grants all that good stuff it lets them know basically what their rights are and what they can actually the information that they can actually get from their locality um basically what is the purpose of the community needs assessment right um what happens is when you have your community come together in that public hearing um it's going they're going to let you know what their needs are okay um in that the locality is going to understand okay well le

» t's look at all the needs and then basically what we will do is we will prioritize those needs um and we'll come up with the plan with the basically a plan how are we going to move forward what is it that we're going to work on um we will identify a project and again that's why santee lynch's is here um we will help you to develop a project and then of course we will apply for the project an example would be um fire truck maybe okay um also another example would be um what is it ge up in at here that's another example of cdbg project um so i won't go over all i won't break it down but basically what you see for 2023 department of commerce for cdbg they actually have 19.7 million available in grants um how do we actually get some of that we're going to have to once we develop and decide on o

» ur project we're going to have to request an application so basically we have to request our application um there are actually two different rounds right depending on what it is that you want to do a grant for whatever project it is that you actually decide that you want to do it there's going to be two rounds the first round which would be mainly for community infrastructure which is like water sewer drainage that's going to be in april to actually be able to do an application we have to request that application march 17th so you're going to request the application first and then you will actually turn in the application about 30 days later anything else that you may want to apply for maybe that another fire truck maybe you want to do some demolition of some dilapidated homes right that st

» uff would be in the fall basically you would reply you would apply for that application august the 15th yep and then the application would have to be turned in about 30 days later in september the 15th so please understand the whole purpose that i'm here is to make sure that basically that the council and the locality has the conversation or the communication with their community um understand that the majority of the cdbg projects the beneficiaries need to be at least 51 percent of those beneficiaries need to be low to moderate income okay so it's not just about having the public hearing it's about making sure that we identify those that would benefit from it okay um so basically i will do a um a more in-depth um meeting at the public um needs assessment basically um breaking down that um

» community needs survey with the community and speaking about the um community what is it the citizen participation plan um i think that's it i basically have this to keep me from talking so much because i'll go off sylvia thank you so much for being here um does anyone have any questions um i just manager if may um just want to say thank you to miss fries and i know this has kind of been a whirlwind because i'm all out of place this is not my room of expertise um but i'm happy that you guys are back meeting in person um i just want to say if you have any additional questions on dates and timelines uh they're going to stay for a little bit in room 190 which is over here by the ladies restroom um to answer any of those questions um but she will be back on the 14th to give you more in depth an

» d take those questions yeah and i thank you and your staff y'all do a tremendous drop throughout the region you know i'm just i don't have many prejudice things in me but i'm prejudiced when it comes down to kershaw county and so and i don't mind saying it on the cog board and but i thank you and i want to recognize mr john thomas who's also a cog board member back there who stays on top of this stuff as well and we appreciate all that staff does and you guys thank you thank you miss sylvia i have a couple questions sorry no worries um the march 14th participation meeting and plan what time does it start six i apologize it starts at six and do we have a map of the different localities that can apply or anyone can apply that's it so basically the way it works is it's going to be the local go

» vernment okay so we will apply on their behalf okay absolutely and we can talk more okay um we can do like a technical assistance visit on it if you'd like to just to kind of really break it down okay so you would like as much participation from kershaw county on the march 14th meeting absolutely so that we can get some goals and plans i would like to tell you that um lee county we we're naming them the people to beat they actually showed up with 50 over 50 people over 50 okay so i'm i'm bragging on lee right now if anybody wants to overdo them and the 19.7 million that's for santee lynch's or that's a statewide pot so that is actually statewide okay and basically santee lynch's only gets um administration fee from it so basically we'll get um what is it 10 up to 50 000 on that that's all t

» hat we can get um we don't get it um whoever the locality is that is awarded the grant gets it and you guys give it to us okay okay yes sir um derrick shemake i'm a new council member so yes uh indulge me so i assume that the localities that this applies to is are just those localities that are part of the santee lynch's cog correct say that again so these would just be the localities that are part of the santee lynch's cog and not so elgin for example my district has gotten carved with another cog which is a different discussion for another day but this would apply only to santee lynch's cog so actually this is statewide it just so happens that you all have to be you happen to be up under santee lynch's region um any any locality in south carolina can apply for this it's not just it's not

» just going to santee lynch's information madam chair i'm going to give you a little bit more clarity okay because i think you don't know this part so in in in our region here at santee lynch's we do not this mike's about to choke me um we do not have um the transportation part of santee lynch's in the west watery area so that's where he's going at but all the other um programs and stuff you're eligible for in lugoff elgin and all that it's just a transportation portion is in the cm cog which we're fighting so hard to get out so we're one of these counties that's got a split cog when it comes down to transportation only but it's just transportation everything else the whole entire county qualifies for uh thank you that's that's very helpful thank you you're welcome all right miss sylvia than

» k you so much and i'll see you march 14th for sure thank you right next presenter will be chairman daryl ogburn of the state of i'm sorry the health service district of kershaw county um we named this presentation the state of the health service district thank you madam chair a man with my reputation has to look to see who's turning his back to before i speak a moment of personal privilege if i may i want to thank danny for for putting forth this proclamation uh having witnessed what those administrators up there went through firsthand thank you for recognizing them they they hung tight and now they've got a beautiful school and thank you for recognizing them um madam chair thank you for the invitation to come this is my duty to come to you on a regular or irregular basis and tell you what'

» s going on with the health district of kershaw county first of all let me tell you maybe some of the audience that may not know who we are we are we've renamed ourselves some years ago when we uh transitioned from the old hospital board to the health services district of kershaw county and that is the old hospital board we own the hospital we own the nursing home and we have leased our hospital thank goodness to the medical university of south carolina we're made up of nine members appointed by this county council and they are myself as chairman eric boland vice chairman tjj donnie wilson eric gunter nick moore is nick is here with me tonight leo scott walter long and shannon west this is an extremely talented group of men and women and they work hard but we bring our talents together and w

» e work very well together and thank you folks for taking the time to vet people and to get them reappointed this this group is really fantastic um we are a special purpose district we are created under the statutes of the state of south carolina we are not subservient to the county council uh we are appointed by you but we are a freestanding um sexual purpose district mr mr dubose am i correct thank you exactly but we both represent the citizens of kershaw county we want what's best for them um i am thrilled to stand here today to tell you that six o'clock in the morning we'll begin to move our patients into the carriage wing we got approval yesterday for our we got approval yesterday from dhek for our kitchen and scott neal and his folks are going to be there first thing in the morning to

» start bringing our patients in there if you've not been up there and had a chance to go i invite you to come uh it is an absolutely beautiful piece of property and a beautiful structure uh nine nine hundred another ninety thousand square feet somewhere in that range we are upgrading from a 82 bed nursing home to 132 bed 90 private beds of which 22 are rehab 42 semi-private rooms they're organized in neighborhoods of 22 beds each neighborhood has its own kitchen uh it its own dining room and its own living rooms the gorgeously decorated the halls are wide everything's on one level and it is just a fantastic uh building please come see it when you get a chance scott neal is very proud of what we've been able to do and and he he'll show you around from top to bottom i'm here to say that financ

» ials of the health care district are in good shape i won't get into a lot of details about it but we have um roughly 11 roughly 1 million dollars in unrestricted cash we got 3.5 in our checking accounts and deposits and 4.5 million dollars in marketed securities and that is your money that is our money that is the people of kershaw county's money um i failed to mention that i have sally harrell here sally sally sally is our executive director and we're happy to have her running our organization for us um we have a good cash flow we've got an income from the tax debt set off money that we have of around two million dollars a year we're anticipating about 1.5 million dollars in investment earnings uh this year and uh as soon as we get our nursing home up and running we anticipate 1.5 million

» dollars in revenue per year we use some of this revenue to give back to our community uh we are nick moore handles our grants program and annually we generally give away about 500 000 to different organizations across our county who are focused on health care of our citizens we think that's our obligation and we we're happy to be involved in that um we have plans and ideas and thoughts of continuing to build on that beachwood property we want to build some independent homes maybe apartments and maybe assisted living in memory we haven't nailed down anything yet but we're ready to move in that direction let's see i want to say something right now and i hope the people in this in the city hear me from day one this the city of camden has been a delight to work with they've been worked hand in

» hand with us everything that came along that we needed some help with they were there to help and they around just give them a big shout out here tonight they have really been helpful they've taken it on the chin for the last little while about some things that went on but i'll tell you i'm proud of what they did with us and how they worked with us very good um at the end near the end of our meetings every every month we go into an executive session and we uh discuss a lot of things um last night when we left executive session i got a motion uh that was adopted that the health district of kershaw county in conjunction with the medical university of south carolina uh is ready to commit three million dollars from musc two million dollars from the health care district to be appropriated to to

» uh and i've got the written re um motion here that i'll leave with madam chair to do an outdoor recreation facility and jointly with the county of kershaw we're asking you all to match that five million with another five million of your own money and we'll work out the further details about that uh as we move along the second motion that was made was that we would respectfully ask for a reply from the county within 90 days if possible so that we can move forward with this project together the doubt to read our plan is to what we've discussed with a lot of people is to hopefully to expand and upgrade woodward park here in the city of camden and to build a facility like other counties have where we can have ball tournaments and bring in it'll pay for itself the industrial development that i m

» ean the economic development we can have coming off of that is is huge i've seen some really good uh statistics on it so that's what we are proposing to do uh jointly uh with the county council and i want to say thank you to the musc they have been a marvelous partner to work with after they took over our hospital we have no more worries about the future of our hospital they're here and they're going to stay here and they've been a great partner and they've been willing to do step up and do this could commit some money some of their own money to help this project come about so i would hope that we'll we can work together and make this happen thank you again one further thing i wanted to mention that just ran through my feeble mind is uh our our health district is local uh our attorneys are

» local our accountants are local our financial advisors are local we shop local so thank you thank you madam chairman and i'll be happy to answer any questions that anybody may have daryl thank you for being here um and i want to give another shout out to city of camden and mayor drakeford for her leadership the municipality participation and help um i was gonna say hey to sally if you didn't remember so i i had your back sally um and thank you to the health surface district for being forward thinking on this um it's a huge economic impact to host tournament tournaments and get people coming into kershaw county that we don't have to teach and feed and house so they can go somewhere else um so thank you for having that vision of what where we need to get to moving forward i don't have any spe

» cific questions um at this time thank you for the update thank you i yield um so i just have a comment and a question one is i just want to personally thank you i know that uh when you're just joining an organization like this there are a lot of people that reach out to you and give you advice about how local government how the sausage is made uh chairwoman glenn councilman tucker and mr ogburn you are one of those people so personally thank you for that help and just just so i'm clear i think i am but the five million that you're talking about would basically mean that if the county puts forward five million dollars we're effectively getting a five million dollar we're basically getting 10 million dollars for the price of five exactly and um you know i'm a baseball a travel baseball dad or

» was my son plays in the high school now and i've seen the money that flows into these travel tournaments and so i i i appreciate what you're saying and just thank you but i just wanted to clarify that so thank you very much mr augman that's great mr tucker thank you thank you madam chair chairman auger how are you i'm fine sammy been missing me yes sir they got me in the dungeon i'm gonna get out one day um a couple quick questions i want clarity on all right all right so the vote you guys took last night that's uh that's in your minutes so that's in writing and will we receive a letter to the council yes okay we'll get a formal letter from us right and then in the 90 days you're speaking of you want a formal vote from this body council i guess what what motion was is is we want to see uh t

» hat we're moving forward with the project and making sure that this happens and we uh i guess we're anxious to spend our money yes sir and get that the project done as quick as we can right and but i want to make sure that you you want to reply back committing within the 90 days yes we don't have to have all the plans drawn out no you want the commitment within 90 days and we're not ready to write the check yet either okay all right well y'all keep fighting the money and um we'll come together up here and figure out how we can do a best plan um moving forward for our citizens because i think this is a lovely opportunity well it gives me an opportunity to sammy to say how how delighted i am to look around across this table and see the next generations of leaders in our community i'm an old m

» an up the mantle is passing and and those old guys are going to go off to pastor and some of us need to go now um you talking about me but no but uh but it is exciting to have uh some young folks on this council some forward thinkers and some thinkable people who can drive our county forward not to say that the ones that have gone haven't but they've been in politics for more than a few years and sometimes you get stale right and it's it's refreshing to have new enthusiasm and excitement and different ideas and a female finally right and a female yes exactly exactly so uh thank you sammy for all your service on this this board for all thank you as well for all your service thank you madam chair yes mr auger thank you so much for putting all this together your presentation is wonderful this

» is um this is what government is about just public private partnerships we can't we can't do this all ourselves and and musc health service district coming together with the county this is an opportunity we have to act on um this is doesn't come around this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity our county you know going back we were built um on public private partnerships and then recently you know the past years it's been they've been lacking um we appreciate y'all stepping up um giving us this opportunity i'd like to point out that this is more than just woodward park we're tying together scott park the aquatic center and woodward park i mean i grew up playing on those on those baseball fields football fields soccer fields it was it was a family fun day every single jamboree kickoff um i'd

» love to see that again this is a huge opportunity for our county um not only keeping citizens healthy but giving them an opportunity to go out and exercise um economic development opportunity but thank you so much for all you do really appreciate it thank you it it was the board it was the board's hard work that did it wasn't just me madam chair yes two years ago you and i i think met at the house of pizza and i thought all right what's this gentleman got up his sleeve i'm gonna tell you something getting to meet you and getting to know you has been one of the pleasures of serving here at kershaw county um mr augwin does a fantastic job he keeps everybody informed and um he keeps things fluid we really appreciate the job you do and your leadership thank you russell that means a lot to me ye

» s sir i asked for this job because i wanted to give back to my community that had done so much for me over the years and i was rewarded with the opportunity to sit on this board and i've been further honored by being permitted to serve as chairman well i can tell you we couldn't ask for anybody better thank you thank you sadly i told the board when you get ready for me to go please tell me don't don't embarrass me by beating me just tell me and i'll get out of the way but it has been a delight one of the best things i've ever been involved in my life my goal from personal goal of a long time ago from the time we set up the health district and released our hospital was to put together an organization that could throw up let's just pull a number out five million dollars a year to be spent bac

» k in our community in ways to make our community healthy you put something together like that that belongs to our citizens that you can put that money out there and partner with other organizations across our county you can have an impact on health it may take 20 years to do it but you can have an impact on health for our grandchildren and so that has been my goal personal goal for a long time don't know we can get there but uh we'll we'll try and keep sending us good people over there on the board sir madam if y'all get ready for me to step down tell me too i'll leave i want to dovetail on what mr chairman armand just said um nick moore who most of y'all don't know he's a former co-worker of mine we worked for the same organization there for a few years and when i was a state trooper um di

» dn't know what he was getting into i mean and it was not a pretty picture when he got there but i appreciate you young man stepping up and hanging in there and um being able to volunteer yourself for more duties and responsibilities on this board because i've watched you grown from you know i don't know what the devil i just volunteered for him to um to being in positions where you make a big big difference and i wanted to say that and that's something of your leadership young man thank you chairman that's kind of you sammy thank you yes yeah nick is my wingman and my bodyguard he's big enough madam chair yes mr i would just like to reiterate what these gentlemen have said and and madam chair said um i appreciate your service as chairman i really do um and i and i want the people too to kno

» w and and i i'm here to represent district six for a minute but i want them to know that this doesn't exclude us this frees up other monies that we can use to help build up the upper part of the county also so that money is going to help the whole county and not just one particular area so i thank you for that thank you dan that's been part of our discussion it was it would relieve pressure on the on your budget to let you do some other things in some other places and so thank you very much for your time and the kind words but it's not me it's it's the board and they all work really hard and we work very well together uh i can't tell you the last time we've had a split boat nick do you remember well that's just the way we work together and we come together so we can have a common agreement

» and we're here tonight to tell you this we think this will will be good for our community and hopefully we can do some more things down the road thank you madam chair chair do you have any vacancies on the board or do you have any reappointments when the reappointments came up um and the reset we reset it two years ago so i think there's three people that come up this year okay and that would be probably in may or june somewhere along in there i think maybe the term starts july 1 or something but there'll be three people up and if i if i'm not mistaken i think it's tjj leo scott and donnie wilson okay and all three of them will only have served two years and uh i asked some of them the other day if they were willing to reach to if they wanted to be renominated and all three of them said the

» y would they would like to be renominated so that we'll get back into the rotation there'll be three others coming up in another two years and in another two years so if we stay in that same rotation you'll have you won't have to worry about the situation we got in earlier okay so and if you or miss sally will just remind me when it gets a little closer we certainly we certainly will thank you so much for your kind words and i will pass these words on to the to my board so thank you thank you all right 90 days is may 13th so um if my colleagues will start doing their research um i'd like to put this as a discussion item for the 28th too right moving right along approval of minutes on the january 24th regularly scheduled meeting i'm chair make a motion that we approve the minutes that has be

» en submitted by our clerk to council motion to approve by mr tucker is there a second and mr shoemake second any discussion thank you miss lauren and i'll call for the vote all those in favor of approving the january 24th 2023 minutes and it's unanimous we have no resolutions tonight no ordinances we're down to new business first item of new business is the grievance committee appointments this is now called the employee relations committee um that does sound a little better mr templar uh whoever decided to change the name that was a good idea and i will give you the floor mr templar um to let us know what you need from us and if you can explain the committee a little bit sure thank you madam chair members of council what you have before you is uh the grievance committee or formerly known a

» s the grievance committee which is now the employee relations committee we thought that the grievance committee name was a little too draconian if you will so we also tasked this group of uh county employees to not only hear grievance hearings which this group will but they will also be a part of the plus one program where they uh select the nominees and the award winners for the plus one program that's just the start of it we will pass them with other items but it's mainly in in the spirit of uh employee relations and um the the welfare and morale of the the employees so what we're doing here today is uh pointing new members three four new members here um to serve on this committee and these are your recommendations yes yes how did you select these employees what we try to do is go around

» and have representation from different departments more so departments that are not contained within this building okay so try to have a uh a uh a uh a diverse cross section of employees okay and have they all been asked to serve on this committee yes okay all applied in the affirmative okay um and i have one more question um their schedule and their duties does it allow for them to have an additional duty like yeah i wouldn't want to put someone that is already saturated with extra duties or um too much for an additional duty right and so we won't overload them um but the the grievance committee meets during business hours okay and we do take that into consideration because not all departments are um suitable for having employees be away for an hour or two on a grievance hearing so we're a

» ware of that okay thank you madam chair yes no okay okay thank you so mr templar looking to you fall right on that chart no problems very good looking to the next block over i know this is probably not an intent i know that for a fact but um we probably need to mix that up a little bit more on the next appointments because and i know i don't want someone on there just because of who they are they got to be a good board member and open-minded but i want to be deliberate in seeking out those people okay thank you very much mr tucker thank you for bringing that up i that was a question to miss reader okay about diversity so any other questions for the administrator okay and is there a motion to appoint these four individuals to the employee relations committee at this time madam chair i'd like

» to make a motion that we appoint uh jenny ray matt sales autumn tucker is there second and second by mr shoemake any discussion on these four appointments okay with that i'll call for the vote all those in favor of jenny ray matt seals autumn furnace and liz brown being appointed to the employee relations committee indicate by raising your hand and it's unanimous thank you gentlemen next item of new business is the santee lichness council of government appointment there is a vacancy on the cog this is placed on the agenda by mr tucker so i'll give him the floor thank you madam chair um i just want to say this before i make my motion is that um this board is so important to our region and um i'll go into further details on on some of the ways that it has this county has benefit but at this t

» ime we have a vacancy and we're the only county who uh does not have uh our chairperson that's on the board so i would like to make a recommendation that chairwoman katie gwen serves on the santee lynch's reason councils of governments that is my motion i'll second okay motion by mr tucker second by mr tomlinson mr dubose do i need to recuse myself from this no or this is part of the i think you could vote but i think it might be wise to recuse yourself okay i don't think you have to but it might be wise okay then i will recuse myself at this time if i may yes mr tucker okay so um this position would be she will be joining the board with myself um mayor draford um mr john thomas as i mentioned earlier um mr brad hanley councilman brad hanley from elgin um mr kenneth mccaskill from bethune a

» nd what we have done as kershaw county has grown we've strategically made sure that we had all areas of this county represented bethune elgin camden all these are council seats um that we could appoint different people but we want to make sure that we have this whole totality of kershaw county in mind when we sat down and discussed business um i say that because if you look at the bypass that's built over there those were close to probably 35 billion dollars of monies that this county this county did not have to spend and um you know and it was a lot of runovers with that that project started out in the 20s it might have got up to 40 i can't remember i got a headache after they kept telling us the price tag was more and more and more um it's done a lot of good things uh in this region we're

» looking at black river road currently now that's going to be tremendous for that subdivision and also the industry part industrial part we have there that's huge that's money that we're not increasing fees and taxes and millage on our own folks the money's coming out of uh the federal government out of colombia and i know they print it like it's you know paper money but i've always been of the mentality if someone's going to get it i darn sure won't be in line to get some and so that's what santee does it drags down those federal dollars and turns them into projects within our region now keep in mind we have three other neighbors uh softer county clarity county and lee county so we have to be willing to cooperate and collaborate on different projects to agree so everybody can get a little p

» iece of the pie but this is a very important organization and it's not going away no time soon despite how one may personally feel about it thank you i think it's a great idea um fully supportive you know we were talking about the cog earlier in relation to transportation and one of the things that elgin suffers from is from the transportation side is we're in a separate cog that deals you're fighting with richland and lexton dollars and in fact as of last week you went on the midlands cog website it doesn't even list kershaw capital when it lists so i very much want to see everything we can do to get elgin into this group and so obviously that's not part of this discussion but i understand that having a strong uh will help us pull elgin over so i'm fully supportive and know chairwoman will

» do a great job i think it's a great idea absolutely and let me say this too about kershaw county we show up for these meetings we vote so where something county may outnumber us in seats on the board well they got to come to vote we come to vote and we come prepared and that's a good core group i think it's eight or nine of us i have to list everybody out to know that actually set on committees take the time out of their busy schedules and come to the meetings and that's why black river road right now is currently thrown back into what we call the tiff which is how we rate our projects because it was one time taken out but we fought and made the arguments that this needs to be in and that we weren't going to get sucked up in the census and all that's taking place but i'm just trying to tell

» you on the important work that the cog does and we'll be so much better off having a madam chairlady to serve on there as well okay at this time i will call for a vote on mr tucker's motion that the chairwoman of kershaw county council serves on the call all those in favor and mr brazel mr tucker mr shoemake mr tomlinson and mr cato madam chair you abstained you abstained miss reader as i abstain thank you um thank you gentlemen but for record you're not required to just right in the future you can vote for yourself madam chair vote for yourself that just seems a little weird like no i do it on time vote for yourself all right um no further new business no old business to discuss we will go into council briefings and mr shoemake district 3 we'll start with you um again i'm right i'm brand n

» ew so i don't have a lot other than that um the infrastructure is a really big deal for me the cog is a really big deal to me you can probably tell just from tonight uh i appreciate councilman tucker's assistance and helping me study this process and learn it better so that we can come after it but it is my fervent hope that we find a way to get elgin and its accompanying dollars into the sandy lynch's cog as to transportation or get the middle of scott to do what it's supposed to do but i'm not sure first one's going to be easy but again i appreciate the opportunity to serve elgin and look forward to the next several years doing so thank you thank you mr tucker thank you madam chair i've got a couple uh things that we need to do one i want to say uh welcome mr shoemake uh to your first mee

» ting and congratulations i'm happy of the governor's moving forward on your appointment and uh look forward to working with you um i also want to say uh to everybody but especially to all the ladies happy valentine's day big commitment madam chair for you to come you might be in trouble when you get home but i'm gonna call him up and prepare him not to be too mad okay out here with all these guys on valentine's day um i want to also share some um information i have um take one pass on uh the council uh retreat that she's going to talk about and the committee um and the yes three this should be three pages there is a uh physical the first one is the physical page of 2024 budget workshops uh kind of look those over and get with uh the chair madam chair and see if any of those conflict you guy

» s um and if not that's kind of the schedule date that miss lauren's put together and uh we would go with that there's room in there for a little um makeup if we need to right miss lauren and then um you should have your sheet for the retreat that's laid out that's on one of the staple pieces it says i think it says retreat on it and madam chair put this schedule together um last week for us and she'll go into more details and then you got one for the uh workshops who's presenting on what days and times and we're going to try to stick to schedule but we will not deprive anybody from asking questions and learning we understand that this is a young council in age and in experience i think german argman called me old but i'm gonna let him slide um i'm getting older experience yeah well thank yo

» u madam chair so look those over if you have any issues get with uh myself or madam chair to um or miss lauren to try to see to make sure that we can have as much participation as possible we want to move through this and be done with our um departments as uh early as i think miss lauren the end of april purpose of april so it's going to be hopping pretty good um she'll take good care of us as far as you know making sure we have the things that we need and i look forward to sharing and debating and asking questions on this financial um budget cycle that we're in thank you madam chair and welcome to the call thank you mr brazel yes thank you um i don't have a whole lot but i would like to um give a big shout out to mr bill robinson you in here still yes he is all right he he formed the knigh

» ts hill historic preservation board and so far he's received a five thousand dollar grant and they're they're using some of that money and i think the recreation department is helping as well um is that right okay and and they're working on uh basketball courts outside uh getting some bleachers and and really pouring into their community you know in their in their park and uh we've had some meetings out there councilman tucker and i we uh we attended a community meeting and really enjoy getting to know you guys and getting to meet you and any way we can help moving forward just let us know it i know all the young people in the community are going to have a good time out there playing ball and um just being outside right so we're thankful for people like you in our community yes sir that con

» cludes my report thank you so much thank you mr brazel mr cato i'm gonna be short and sweet i think i've said enough tonight but i do want to recognize tonight the teams of north central high school and lugoff elgin high school wrestling teams both these wrestling teams went to the state championship over the last week and they come home runners up but they're still winners to us and i just want to congratulate them on making it for it that far it it really takes a lot of commitment and effort on these um these athletes part to contribute to their school work and and dedicate themselves to the sport and i just want to say congratulations to them on their accomplishments appreciate the council and i appreciate everything that we got accomplished tonight thank you so much thank you mr cato mr

» tomlinson um derek welcome um tonight's meeting i think was a record time since i've been on council um so i'm going to be short and sweet happy valentine's day to everybody thank you all for the participation i think we got a lot accomplished um done all right i'll try to keep it short and sweet i think that was the message there um mr shoemake i'm so glad you're here i'm glad we have a full not tonight but um i'm glad we have a full council now so i'm very excited to work with you congratulations again um i have a couple photos that i just want to show everybody kershaw county had night to shine last friday it is a prom for special needs it's not just for kershaw county anyone can come to kershaw county's night to shine um we there were 116 honored guests that attended this prom there wer

» e 223 volunteers and i'll have to get the metrics of hours they put in um because i'm i'm sure it's unbelievable friday night there were 600 people all celebrating god's love for people in the special needs community here's a picture this these are all the deputies i want to give a shout out to kershaw county sheriff's department each deputy that worked security that night volunteered their time no overtime no compensation whatsoever they were there to make sure the special gate the special guests were safe and the next picture is a picture of the actual prom and everybody in it so it's a it's a very special night and i think it's really awesome that kershaw county has one they're not everywhere it happens on the same day everywhere in the world and we have one right here in kershaw county

» and we have people travel very far to come to kershaw county so i wanted to recognize that happened the retreat february 24th and saturday february 25th there will be a two-day retreat um we plan on two full days um the briefs from the departments there'll be 35 departments briefing council the public is welcome to come and listen absolutely and the reason it's two days and maybe a little more robust this year is because we have a very junior council and i wanted to make sure each department gave us the information that they thought was important so that's why it's a little longer i want to thank sammy you are very organized thank you for getting miss lauren miss lauren and mr tucker very organized with the finance committee and thank you for getting this schedule out to everyone the admini

» strator and i are still working on the clerk interviews um even though we want to keep miss reader because she's amazing um and i didn't get a chance after chairman ogburn spoke but i want to say thank you to musc thank you for their commitment in our community um sue sugar is doing an amazing job and um they are wonderful uh they're taking care of my husband right now too so they are awesome um community contributors so thank you to them and that is all i have mr templar we'll go to you next um madam chair members of council i have just one thing since you all kind of hit everything on the council retreat and the date and all i owed you some information from our last meeting on the mobilization cost for the fire station and that was thirty thousand dollars okay thank you and that is my rep

» ort 30 000 i have nothing 30 000 you said thank you danny mr i have nothing thank you all right we do have um an executive session to discuss administrative administrative briefing personnel um so we do need to go into executive session for that is there a motion to go into executive session for a personnel matter manager make a motion to go into executive session for a personnel matter mr tucker makes a motion is there a second second and mr cato seconds all in favor of going into executive session and it's unanimous right go into executive session in the back room mr templar who else do you need um the attorney myself and y'all okay all right do i have a motion to leave executive session i'll make a motion mr tomlinson makes motion any second i'll second mr shoemake second right we are ou

» t of executive session back to our agenda and it's adjournment do i have a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn motion to adjourn mr tucker and mr brazil seconds this meeting is adjourned madam chair thank you gentlemen