Friday, April 19, 2024
Last October, during her reelection campaign, Gov. Nikki Haley told South Carolinians that she had a secret plan to fix the state’s roads she would announce after the election.
When the election was won, Haley said she couldn’t divulge the road maintenance plan until the New Year, but it would be obvious in her budget.
When Haley’s budget was made public last week, there was no money or plans to fix the state’s roads.
It’s two weeks til Christmas and Horry County Council is in the gift giving mood to AvCraft again.
This is an act that plays in December almost as regularly as “A Christmas Story.”
And every time it plays it provides another lesson about everything that is wrong with the concept of giving incentives to companies in the name of economic development.
What it really boils down to is corporate welfare.
The message seems to have finally gotten through to Columbia that South Carolina roads are in generally poor condition.
However, how to fix the problem, or more specifically how to fund the fix, elicits differing solutions but no consensus to date.
Gov. Nikki Haley has promised to unveil her “magic” road maintenance funding plan in January. So far, she has promised to not raise the gas tax and to veto any legislation doing so.
A good first step toward ethics reform in South Carolina would be to fire S.C. Ethics Commission Executive Director Herb Hayden.
Last month, Richland County Circuit Judge Alison Lee approved a consent order ruling Hayden propagated a “falsehood” to a state ethics watchdog agency and in responding with a falsehood violated the Freedom of Information Act.
As part of the settlement, Hayden and the ethics commission maintained the falsehood was inadvertent and unintentional.
It’s a great day in South Carolina!
It has to be.
Gov. Nikki Haley was reelected to a 2nd term in office by a 57% to 40% margin and incumbents around the state were swept back into office.
Many of the incumbents didn’t even have opponents to worry about in the general election.
The most interesting contest in this fall’s general election in South Carolina will be the special election for S.C. House District 114, the former seat of deposed Speaker Bobby Harrell.
The S.C. Election Commission has determined a special election is called for after Harrell’s resignation from office and has set the date for a Republican s[ecoa primary as November 25, 2014. The Democratic Party candidate, Mary Tinkler, and Green Party candidate, Sue Edwards, are already set through the normal election primary process.
The election commission has set the special general election date for December 9th.
The first S.C. Gubernatorial Debate for 2014 is now history and it proved absolutely nothing.
Gov. Nikki Haley is cruising to a second term election victory next month as long as she doesn’t make any fatal errors. Haley is smart enough to avoid fatal errors and she’ll “spin” her way out of any other miscues she makes like she always does.
Haley’s comment about being found “not guilty” on ethics violation charges is a perfect example, even though she paid ethics fines for incomplete campaign finance records and for using a state plane for prohibited events.
Nearly three years after it signed its latest economic development incentive package with Horry County, AvCraft Technical Services has one last chance to demonstrate its promises are more than hot air.
Sources within county government said AvCraft is currently three months behind in rent payments to the county. Additionally, according to those sources, AvCraft has not begun to make improvements to the fire suppression system and other improvements at the hangars it rents as agreed to in the latest incentive package.
Horry County Council voted Tuesday night to send AvCraft a “Right to Cure” notice that will specify how many days the company has to bring its rent arrearage up to current status or eviction proceedings could begin.
This wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t so predictable.
Gov. Nikki Haley holds a 10 point lead over Democrat Vincent Sheheen in the first Winthrop Poll results with other gubernatorial candidates making little impact.
In like manner, incumbent senators Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott hold very comfortable leads over their main Democratic challengers Brad Hutto and Joyce Dickerson, respectively.
Gambling in Myrtle Beach?
What makes this poll interesting is the three questions on gambling casinos. Respondents were split 47% to 47% when asked if they favored or opposed allowing a limited number of gambling casinos to operate in South Carolina.
Politics abhors a vacuum and moves began immediately to fill the one left by the suspension of S.C. Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell last week.
Hampered with his nine indictments, Harrell’s political career is probably over. He is on the ballot in November and could be re-elected to his House seat while suspended and awaiting the legal process to go forward. But he cannot assume that seat again unless exonerated and the vote for a Speaker to lea the House in the next legislative session will be long past by then.
In the meantime, it appears Speaker Pro Tempore Jay Lucas, the man filling the Speaker’s position until the organization meeting after the November general election, is in the lead to succeed Harrell as the next Speaker.
Speak Up…