Tag: Charleston

Irony of Myrtle Beach City Council Seismic Testing Vote – Update

When the Myrtle Beach City Council votes on seismic testing in the Atlantic Ocean later today, the result will mean nothing.

The resolution opposing seismic testing will be a statement of the sense of council, if it passes. However, local governments are not part of the decision process.

Local media reports speculate Myrtle Beach City Council is split 4-3 with Mayor John Rhodes, and council members Wayne Gray, Susan Grissom Means and Mike Chestnut opposing seismic testing while council members Randal Wallace, Phil Render and Mike Lowder reportedly support it.

But, it really doesn’t make any difference what Myrtle Beach City Council does.

SCDHEC determines consistency of permit requests with coastal zone management practices. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management issues the permits.

Seismic testing uses loud blasts of sound from airguns to gather data about what oil reserves might be under the ocean floor.

The hoped for result is that seismic testing will prove oil reserves of sufficient size to justify recovery are present under the ocean floor. Those supporting testing see this result as an economic boom for the state.

Opponents of seismic testing, and later drilling, point to the potential harm to sea mammals and the ever present possibility of another Deepwater Horizon oil blowout that devastated the Gulf Coast in April 2010.

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General Assembly Failing Citizens Again

The South Carolina No One Mentions

“Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.

I love South Carolina.

I love the fact that in a matter of a few hours I can be in the mountains or along the coast and never have to leave the state.

Great football is divided by only a few hours, and there is arguably no greater scenery anywhere with pink azaleas, Angel Oak trees blowing in a cool breeze, and yes, of course, the Palmetto trees and a crescent moon setting.

South Carolina is Charleston, the Grand Strand, Columbia and Greenville.

It’s where my family has called home since 1983, where I lost my mother to cancer and where I graduated from college, met my wife and got my first start in journalism.

It’s home to the Loris Bog-Off Festival, the Irmo Okra Strut, and the Prosperity’s Hoppin’ Fest.

It’s the home of Due West, Green Sea, Fair Play, Ketchuptown, Ninety Six and Wide Awake.

In case you haven’t figured it out, South Carolina is the home to many amazing things.

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Andy Savage Attorney, Renaissance Man

Andy Savage Attorney, Renaissance Man

Attorney, television host, veteran, and family man are some of the words that describe the varied life and career of Andy Savage. He is a consummate legal professional while fitting the role of a modern Renaissance man.

Born and raised in Kingston, N.Y., Savage graduated from New York City’s Fordham University in 1972 before heading south to stay. He received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of South Carolina School of Law in 1975.

“I always wanted to be a lawyer,” said Savage. “I had uncles who were lawyers and kind of grew up with the idea.”

Savage served as a prosecutor in the S.C. Fifth Judicial Circuit before becoming Chief Trial Counsel for the S.C. Attorney General’s Office Criminal Division from 1979-81.

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Events Celebrate Little Known Civil War Incident

On a foggy spring night 150 years ago, slave Robert Smalls commandeered a Confederate ammunition ship, steamed upriver to pick up family and friends, and then slipped past five Southern batteries on Charleston Harbor to reach Union blockade ships.

Smalls would return to Charleston a year later to pilot a Union ironclad in an attack on Fort Sumter, while after the war he served in the South Carolina General Assembly, the U.S. Congress and later as a federal customs inspector.

“His story, I think, is lost in the larger picture of the Civil War – Grant and Lee; Appomattox and Gettysburg. It’s important locally, but I would say it’s a story often overlooked,” said Carl Borick, the assistant director of the Charleston Museum.

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