Full meeting transcript - March 9, 2021

» check one two it's a great day in kershaw county we have a quorum mr jones is on the way it's a great day in an all-american county and we also happy to report that after one year of covid we're starting on the other side of this pandemic we hope with less than 200 cases active right now for the first time in over 100 days and that doesn't mean we're in good shape it means we seem to be on the downward path when only four cases reported today we're still in an emergency session in accordance with the law from our governor and the state accounts the city of camden and we're following our e-meeting format and before we begin let's just remember that coming down from a tree is often as dangerous as going up and as and we haven't gone through a pandemic before and we've never come out of a pand

» emic before and we're learning as we go let's take every step to do it as quickly as we can get rid of these masks and all these other restrictions and voluntary and otherwise but at the same time exercising appropriate care and concern for one another and in token of which we've lost a few more of our devoted souls and so i ask for a a moment of silence for each of those families. Amen. Amen. And with that, can you join with me in the invocation and pledge allegiance? Please stand, everyone. Remembering the words in the psalm, blessed is a nation whose God is the Lord. We invoke his Holy Spirit with us today.

» Give us wise counsel to direct just actions in this council on behalf of our people and in honoring the glory of his holy name this which we ask in the name of our lord and savior let all the people say amen amen and join me in the pledge of allegiance i pledge of allegiance thank you very much indeed now with that we move to public comments mary do we have any mail-ins or email formats none with that mr dubose do we have any uh people signed up for public comments two two individuals signed up the first individual that signed up is tom webb and the second individual is tom webb the third ah excellent mr webb please sir senior or junior oh it's not son and daughter it's tim come on up tim webb and tim you're familiar with me tim webb i apologize yeah now mr webb you're familiar with our pro

» tocols here it's not a question and answer please go right ahead i'd like to thank the council for the opportunity to speak as a retired army officer one of the most important traits i look for in my elected officials and friends is authenticity if an elected official actually believes in a policy he's advocating he won't equivocate based upon the popular popularity of that policy within different groups last night i witnessed the council member in a political gathering remove his mask out of what i must assume was political expediency. He did this despite recently demanding in this forum that another council member wear the mask. I don't appreciate or condone that kind of hypocrisy from an elected official or a friend. Thank you very much, Mr. Webb and Mr. DuBose. And now Tom Webb III.

» The real Tom Webb. Well, I attended something yesterday afternoon, last night. It was wonderful to see great crowds of people acting normal. They were close together, really enjoying talking in each other's faces, very few masks. I sure hope that this is an indication that we're getting over the hysteria. And what I've always assumed would have helped a lot is the zinc that helps me rather than be too afraid of this thing. Nobody wants to catch anything, even a bad case of the cold. Zinc, for me, has proven its worth over a great many years, so no telling how many people it would have kept out of the hospital if they'd have just known how to use it, when to use it, and to stay warm, and maybe a little vitamin D3.

» But it seems like it's been suppressed somewhat by the upper levels of national medical people like Fauci. Well, it seems that we are expected to look out for our neighbors' health, and I don't mind doing that a little bit. You know, if there's someone in here that does not want me close to him because I'm not wearing a mask, I respect that. But when I'm a little further away from him, I want him to respect that I don't want to wear that mask. So, you know, there's a back and forth in this thing. So I'm expected to look out for my neighbor's health while I'm not looking out for the country that he helped hold together many years, working, paying his taxes, may have served in the military, may have been a policeman.

» So I have to look out for his health while I let his country go to ruin, falling prey to a very dangerous thing, this international communism. And it looks like the communists played on the world stage to create a hysteria that has caused us to lock down at times and to keep people from meeting together from formulating some response to this uh hysteria um i guess that's enough of that particular topic but the next thing is um the world economic forum klaus schwab who's the head of the world economic forum has said that their agenda 2030 um will end private property by 2030 that you won't own anything you'll um you'll have to borrow it i guess from whatever government entity is in charge at the time and he says you will like it and i take that not to mean not a comment of uh you're gonna li

» ke it a lot but uh you will have to like it uh private property has been chipped away up for such a long time and uh it looks like now there is a crescendo coming of the end of private property and if you can end private property that is i can't own the things that I have bought or somebody has given me or I found that nobody else claimed. If I can't own that, then what's the next step? That I can't own my fingernails, my hair, myself? I can't own my arms and legs? These things occur step by step, little by little, until it's too late. So watch out. Please watch out for private property.

» It's a very American thing, and it's connected with your self-ownership don't we as americans own ourselves don't we require that thank you thank you tom uh mr devos that that concludes the sign-up list very good thank you very much and uh we move now that concludes uh public comments for that matter and uh we are moving to adoption of the agenda the agenda is on the board can we have a motion to approve i'll move uh very good mr gardner second second uh who is that mr tucker yes sir very good any discussion uh seeing there is none we move to a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and we move now to approval of no a public presentation south carolina equine park miss tamara flynn uh ma'am can you come on up and uh normally we provide about 15 minutes this

» is a part where we can do an exchange with question and answer if you'd like and and we also welcome uh miss cindy prestidge have nice to have you here also a member of that board from the south carolina equine park please ma'am thank you so much council for having me come speak tonight um we do have a new executive executive committee and i'm recently been voted in as the chairman of the south carolina equine promotion foundation so i wanted to come over and meet you all um introduce myself a little bit just a short background i reside in columbia south carolina move the microphone in front so everybody can hear you i've had a horse in camden for over 35 years showing my age a little bit and have horse showed at this park it's near and dear to my heart and something i was very excited um t

» o be nominated as as chairman of um and i'm gonna let cindy introduce herself because she is also recently the uh vice chairman for our board um my husband ron prestige and i moved here about 35 years ago to start up an equine practice and shortly after we moved here the equine park was actually established and it was a vital part of our profession and our careers having this park here and having a prosperous park it benefited the community and benefited us greatly so i'm looking forward to paying back thank you completely so i've put together a presentation that i hope is going to answer all your questions but certainly feel free to ask me anything along the way or at the end if you don't know or haven't been out there we have over 60 acres right off of i-20 and black river road you can se

» e it from the interstate it's usually very lit up at night we opened in 2009 and we are a 501c3 organization so we do look look for sponsorships for uh to run our business we average over 30 events per year we really could fill up probably every weekend but just the weather in south carolina nobody wants to horse show and 108 degrees in the summer and and obviously the winter can be a little tricky with the weather and you know every horse um i'll show you later in the presentation for every horse that comes to the park they usually average three people per horse um so we consistently create a multi-million dollar annual economic impact to kershaw county and um not only do they come with with three horses they usually stay a minimum of three or four days and nights within the town and we ha

» ve a great website i'd love for y'all to go south carolina equinepark.com you can see see more pictures and anything you want to know about us um included in that just a little bit about our customers we're a little bit different than a normal uh facility and that we're not like a like an amusement park where we need we need spectators to come out and pay to come visit and see our facility. Our customers are horse show managers that rent our park and bring all of their participants with them. So, you know, the money that's generated is generated from these show managers and the participants. And we want to really try to maintain and grow as a leading competitive venue of choice in South Carolina. And we want that to be here in Camden.

» Our events are self-sustaining like i said we do not rely on people to come out and pay to come come see an event i know chairman burns was able to join us this weekend admittedly i am not and don't know a thing about quarter horses but i also went out this weekend and had quite a large time there were probably 650 people out there almost a thousand people which is crazy lots of what almost a thousand yep yeah it was it was amazing um and and that's a little bit what i highlighted um they they had a big time this weekend so 2009 um we averaged about 299 996 horses in attendance obviously dude with everyone else we were just closed during covid it's not that that people didn't want to come out they were unable to come out but amazingly enough we were less than only ended up a less than 100 h

» orses lower this year than we did last year which is amazing once we started back showing everybody wanted to be out there and at horse shows i think all of our horse show managers had a 20 increase in participation because it was something everybody could do it was outside you know it was it was great so just a little formula on there i'm going to leave obviously you have this presentation you're welcome to look at it but that's how we come up with our figures it's about people spend about 150 dollars per horse times three people that come with every horse and they stay a minimum of three days so you can imagine that's a good amount of money back out in the economy recent improvements that we've done this is really over the past five years and i don't want to get into the details of how to

» train horses but sometimes they do come off the trailer a little wild and they have to be kind of run around on a rope before anybody gets on them and we had a lunging area that needed some work and we got got that footing improved and taken care of uh we had to we had to make some bigger manure bins to take care of our manure out there and get it get it moved to off the property uh tons of grass out there obviously we're continuously having to keep you know our lawn mowers and things of that nature updated we got great screens for the covered arena of sun comes in like driving down the road at five o'clock at night kind of blinds the riders so got some screens that come down and kind of cover cover that area and more importantly there's a lovely double stall bathroom um down at the area wh

» ere you actually horse show which 60 acres that's real important it's a little far to run back up the hill to the restroom so that was a lot lot of improvement over a tight year but we have some very big plans for 2021 and beyond uh we do have to your horses jump jumps they're all made of wood weather everything else involved in it does make the jumps deteriorate over time we've had these jumps for quite a long time so we're going to replace two rings full of jumps got a retaining wall that um that is having some some issues that we need to get repaired we've got over 180 stalls that are in some older barns that really are need to be refreshed um landscaping around the park you you kind of go down the hill and you're in a in a bit of a um it's just sand pit there's just no other words aroun

» d it it's very sunny um it's very hard to be a spectator and an exhibitor down there we really need to bring in some shade down to that area for people to sit and watch and and stand and then we're gonna we're gonna light up the whole park um these horse shows are running way past five o'clock every weekend exhibitors can't show in the dark we've got one ring that has lights so we're gonna light all of them up and let them keep showing all night if they want to and then our biggest um probably to me most exciting uh next improvement is an rv park and with that rv park although it is designated for people coming to the horse shows uh this weekend we had almost 80 campers and they are huge these are everybody's campers are getting bigger and bigger and bigger um but the good part about this i

» s this also um can be used when there's not a horse show for overflow for events downtown um off the interstate rv parking i mean we're we're not talking about just a just a piece of grass that we want to throw some campers in we really want to make this water sewer electric um and bath houses and everything to get give us more room on the property for actually horse showing also because these campers just take up an incredible amount of space this is our this is our new active um fresh committee but we also have some long-term and original board members which is amazing um and they're really helping keeping this keeping this board moving forward and we're excited about it and our campaign this year is just going to be make a mark on the park so we're going to focus our fundraising and spon

» sorship opportunities around around that message and we have also come up with some other ways for people to to buy some sponsorships within the park as well that should generate some interest anything you want to say i mean we certainly i was just going to mention we used to be honestly the top facility in south carolina and i will say it it's been a lot of years we've put a lot of work into the park um but there are definitely some things we need to do to not get surpassed by some of the other venues in the area so i've left y'all at the end of this with just my bio in case anybody wants to know more about me but that's really um all i have to say about the park and let me know if you have any questions i appreciate you giving me your time thank you tamra uh comments from the council uh m

» r tucker thank you uh mr hammer appreciate the um presentation and uh that's in my area as uh my council district how you doing miss cindy um i just want to say uh that's some serious girl power up there for officers and we appreciate it yes it is thank you though thank you uh mr snodgrass i just want to say thank you so much for for your work and in continuing to invest in kershaw county and helping us become or continue to be the premier equine county i know there are other counties and other areas that um that have the equine industry uh but we can i want to continue to be heads and shoulders above them and you guys are are a part of that so thank you so much uh so as far as shows yeah is the park you're equipped to do uh every every type of discipline all kinds of disciplines yes you go

» t it to show jumping and everything in between good which is wonderful thank you again certainly thank you for having me comments um very impressive yeah thank you that's a lot of work i couldn't imagine what it takes and it was a very nice presentation thank you i appreciate it presenting yeah i recommend you all go out there uh vision 2030 has got a horse on the front and on the back and inside it's a part of our culture here with the equine horses not just the fancy pants horses but any kind of horses we got two fox hunting clubs we've got an equine center we've got people that ride for pleasure we got rodeos coming up johnny outlaw is going to have another one we've got a south carolina rodeo we do everything on horseback around here we've even got signs downtown saying don't ride on th

» e sidewalk and i'm happy to say as a member of the board we're going to do the carolina cup this year in may everybody should know that the tickets are on sale right now and they're going quickly all the berms with all the tents are filled up already uh what's known as uh and the also the lower area is filling up so if you want to come in and have bring your car and your family the tickets are on sale right now and they're and they're flying out the door so i recommend it thank you for your presentation thank you uh there's some discussion going on with mr carpenter as you may be aware tamara that within his authority uh the rv park and my judgment needs a little more development yes uh and discussion before it comes back up here if it comes back up here um the basic idea is the county inve

» sted in it some years before i joined this council and we're hoping you to be self-sustaining but there may be an opportunity for us to help with grants and things of that nature uh any further comments wish you a safe journey back to tamara thank you columbia but why don't you live here i ask myself that every day that i drive over here thank you thank you very much uh mary we got a full quorum now with mr jones joining us uh jimmy we just finished a public presentation thank you mr chairman i'd like to say thank you for your patience no worries nice to have you sir uh we move now to approval of minutes if you're ready to move forward danny and those are at page four in your book and up on the screen and tab a can we have a motion to approve so move mr gardner a second second uh for mr sno

» dgrass any discussion on the minutes thank you ms mary thank you again mary second uh no no discussion let's move to a vote all those in favor so signify and it's unanimous and the minutes are approved we move now to an administrative update that we've become to expect mr carpenter on covet 19. mr Mr. Chair, members of council, I hope this will be soon to be a non-existent update, but the current update is you've already kind of stolen my thunder at the beginning of the meeting. Our 14-day total is now under 200, which has been a while coming. You can go back and see it the last time just using your eyeballs. We're that same category and territory. Our mortality rate is still at 104, precious deaths, people that are passed, but hopefully that is over as well.

» There's the mortality rate right there. Our total, we've been, for most of the last week, single digits in how many we have had. There's your average of nine, which is the best in six months so far for the month of March. So we're well under there. And, again, total monthly cases as well reflecting that downward spiral. So as the chairman said, climbing down a tree sometimes is as tough as climbing up the tree. But right now we seem to be climbing down the tree. Yeah, praise God for that. Comments and discussion with Mr. Carpenter. We also all saw the governor's announcement last week. And it seems like he's starting to climb us down the tree very slowly. But he still recommends the mask and so on and so forth.

» I'm sure there'll be a lot of discussion about that going forward as to what's the next step. But I appreciate everybody's goodwill and cooperation in working through the issues that are associated with coming down the tree, hopefully, and staying down. Okay, no further discussion. That concludes the update. We moved through a series of ordinances. The first one is a second reading of an ordinance. It's on page 8, tab B, and it's up on the screen. Mr.

» Carpenter, can you tell us where we are on this? chair members of council you have in front of you tonight for second reading an ordinance that would result in the rezoning of approximately 99 acres of land from mrd1 to r15 located on old stagecoach road council previously has passed this very good uh mr snodgrass is in your district you want to make the motion all right mr tucker well thank you i would have you i'd like to make a motion for uh we approve second reading on the uh 99 acres very good and the second second mr snodgrass discussion looks like it's pretty straightforward all those in favor will move to a vote it would signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous and moves to a third and final reading the second item is an ordinance to establish safety measures and virtual meet

» ing attendance as an emergency ordinance it said page 22 in your book it's a tab c and mr uh mr brys will make the motion sir i make the motion yes sir i make the motion to uh to put this on the table for discussion or for a vote yes sir well i i kind of like to discuss it can we discuss it well we have to vote first well no we do the way it's done is you you make it up a motion to vote and then we move to discussion okay or he can just say he wants to make a motion for a discussion mr chairman well either way how would you like to do we're going to end up voting yeah absolutely okay well normally we just do a vote okay and then we won't go vote right away we'll discuss it however you want i'm fine either way okay so so so what this is now we won't describe discuss it just say uh make a mot

» ion if you would just read the item number two and then off the agenda an ordinance to establish safety measures and virtual meeting attendance is an emergency ordinance i wish we could get rid of that word but we can't so that's what it is okay can we have a second second second for mr tucker now we move to a discussion uh over to you russell okay so basically um we're talking about walking down the tree i'm bad about jumping out of a tree so we um we came to a we came to a happy median and there were a couple items of concern um in the old ordinance and we we removed those items um i won't specifically point them out they were number four number five and number seven in the old ordinance and then number six was amended so it was it was some talk and chatter about um how this affected cens

» orship and these different things so we wanted to remove it but what we didn't want to remove was the ability for uh for us to use social media for folks to comment and you know watch us on facebook and we amended number four and basically four members of council need to be present and then other folks can call in and come in virtually so i think everybody's got a pretty clear understanding um all right very good um other discussion here uh mrs snodgrass david sure so on the uh on the comments on electronic are we still we still giving variants for for folks to submit electronic public comment yes okay and that i mean that won't just be facebook comments that'll that'll be an actual email like we've been doing is that correct i think it would allow for both wouldn't it well i mean anybody c

» an comment on facebook but as far as being an official public comment it'll be an email that's gone to the clerk as as usual is that correct okay other comments mr mr tucker thank you um mr browns i just want to point this out to make sure we're clear this is not a 60-day ordinance it's going to expire on the 14th of next month yeah it was a little over 30 days i think it'll give us the opportunity to read it three times all right well it's an emergency ordinance we don't need it we'll just need to read it one time one time so uh virtual meeting okay um mr dubose could you clarify there was there was a reason why we did like 34 or five days well uh the reason is that that there are two ordinances on the agenda. This is an emergency ordinance, which, as Mr.

» Tucker points out, is a little over 30 days. Mr. Yes, sir. Mr. But there's also an ordinance, first reading, to amend the rules and order of business to do exactly the same thing that the emergency ordinance is going to do. But that ordinance would not, if it's read three times by council, would not be read the second time until April.

» So, the emergency ordinance expires the day after two council meetings from today which would give the council an opportunity to amend their rules and order business to provide for electronic meetings electronic submission of comments to provide for streaming on a permanent basis yes sir thank you that way when we come out of an emergency ordinance then we can still do all those other things i think that gets to your question david yes it is okay helpful yeah i'm mr jones thank you mr chairman members of county council uh councilman brazel let me just start off by saying a couple of things one i want to commend you for just pulling every single tooth out of the lion let's look at the lion as the emergency ordinance you went through it where we pretty much gave up i feel like my vetting proc

» ess of of government to two individuals that no at no fault of theirs you know by you going back and having those issues deleted you pull the teeth out of the lion and i really appreciated that that was some good work you need to be commended for that now let's go on the other side i don't think we need the emergency ordinance well first off let me just say this to you as well you always have the right in this county council to put anything on motion by discussion if you wish okay and then you can always call for a vote once you sit there and say i make the motion for you got to vote for it now a second doesn't have to vote for it but you had to vote for it am i right on that mr devos typically if you put the motion on the floor then yes you're indicating you're going to vote for it because

» you're moving for approval whereas a second doesn't necessarily have to do that second no not necessarily correct but anyway just just wanted you to know that because i i think you wanted to get a good discussion before we moved into this and i commend you for that as well too but mr jones just a word of clarification if you make a motion you can withdraw the motion anytime before the vote you know one thing i would correct one thing i will say is that um i like the fact that you had a little bit of an issue with the term emergency in there and you said well i wish we could get away with it i'd do away with it well we can we can just take it out but uh the bottom line is i do want to commend you for the hard work you put in and the reaching out to me that you did and i really really really

» appreciate that and uh i feel like you and mr connell both have worked with me very well and i y'all may not always agree with me but you guys are always somebody i feel like i can really talk to and sammy too from time to time when he's not acting up but let me get back to the point of hand i can't support this tonight because i feel like i feel like it's just a little bit of redundancy i understand that that i feel like we could move it to the first reading or we could put it in our amended reinstated orders we could put it there we'd have to wait a couple of weeks i realized that to the next reading but bottom line is it would it would delete what i feel like is a lot of bureaucracy by having an emergency ordinance which to me just there isn't an emergency to have this emergency ordinanc

» e and to your point and the reason you know we i could have pulled this off the agenda we could have we could have done away with it entirely but i looked at henry mcmaster and i saw what he did and he's he's slowly backing this thing down and i thought you know what he's been doing this just a little bit longer than me so i'm gonna follow suit with what he did and we had good discussion about it and i felt like it was it was appropriate to to leave it on and um so that's what we did and i respect that i just don't agree with it and i know i got your respect on that as well absolutely yeah yeah and i appreciate that but but thank you for throwing that in there as well and but that's where i'm at you know i'm not going to support the emergency ordinance tonight i would absolutely love to see

» us disorder and mr bozo i'll ask you this question before mr connell he's got a question or some comments but explain the process if we did not do the emergency orders tonight what we would do well then you would not have any any rules or abilities to have virtual comments and meetings or to have a council member attend a meeting virtually or if you had a public hearing to have virtual comments until until two two meetings from tonight four weeks from tonight so maybe yeah so this was just a way to carry us to that point and and then we can we can further discuss how how we can get back to normal completely it's still having the floor i get it i get where you're at i just you know don't agree with it that's cool okay uh mr connell thank you mr chairman um i think this is a move in the right

» direction i tend to jump out of trees too sometimes mr basil but uh it's a move in the right direction uh and for the following reasons uh mr dubose january 12th was it a 60-day emergency ordinance that we had in place number 361 2021 yes so it would end in just a day or two or whenever that is what are we at yeah so just a few more days it'd be done and the meetings between now and whenever you could potentially have a third reading if we had an amended uh let's just call it electronic uh incorporation uh into meetings we wouldn't be able to do it between now and then i think it makes sense this is a what we've seen throughout covet is a big modernization of camel county council meetings and participation by the public which i think is great um and then also it's a little bit over a month

» as mr brazel said that feels about the right time period uh lets people who have remaining concerns hopefully get those resolved over the next 30 plus days if in if governor mcmaster's moves recently or any indication um hopefully nobody will be under a state of emergency and we can just move on uh i'd be hard-pressed to see how you can go into a government building which we're in but a state one without a mask on and that's okay by the state government and also a restaurant and that's okay by the state government but you know i have to have one everywhere else it's just not very intuitive so i think hopefully this will all be resolved in a relatively short period of time and the better um the sooner we return to normalcy the better off we'll all be thank you mr chairman yeah uh let's see a

» nybody else uh mr stonker guys russell uh councilman brazel thank you for your work on this um i think this does help us begin to climb out of that tree and i know for me i don't get i think it helps if we don't get hung up on the word emergency i know we read that and we think uh we think everything's bad i think it just indicates that the possibility exists that there could be an emergency or it could be an emergency for someone while it may not be an emergency for for someone else there's 60 000 plus people in this county and so covet has impacted everyone differently it may not be an emergency for me but perhaps it was for someone else and so the county HAS BEEN ABLE WE NEEDED TO BE IN POSITION TO BE NIMBLE TO BE FLEXIBLE TO BE ABLE TO RESPOND AND WE ARE GETTING TO A POINT WHERE AGAIN W

» E'RE COMING DOWN THE TREE AND SO I WILL SUPPORT THIS TONIGHT REALLY BECAUSE IT HELPS BRIDGE THE GAP TO GIVE THE PUBLIC A VOICE ELECTRONICALLY I I LOVE THE TIME OF PUBLIC COMMENT I LOVE THAT THIS IS A FORUM IN WHICH THE PUBLIC CAN CAN LET US KNOW WHAT THEY'RE thinking they can let us know what they're seeing out in the county and without this there's no bridge to get us to the point where our rules are changed so i i will be supporting this tonight because it does help us bridge that and i believe very firmly as all six others on this desk do as well believe firmly in the citizens ability to be able to um divorce their concerns and if we're having meetings electronically then they need to have the ability to divorce their concerns as well i know this uh this ordinance takes out some of the o

» perational um parameters that were stated in previous emergency ordinances but if i understand mr de bose if i understand our our our governance correctly a lot of those operational parameters that the county administrator already has to be able to to run the county and to to make changes in already allocated funds in order to make things work is that means is it there's somewhat accurate well it does the emergency ordinance kind of enlarges that but i believe it often indicated at the last meeting that he was not using those extraordinary provisions anymore and had not used them for some time is that correct that's correct but by and large he he still has parameters to run the account and do his job yes okay and um so you know i think there were some things that a lot of people got hung up

» on here and we didn't realize that some of that was already a part of just kind of OF HOW HOME RULE IS SET UP SO I'LL BE SUPPORTING THIS NIGHT UH MAINLY BECAUSE IT ENSURES THAT THE VOICE OF THE CURRENT CITIZENS ARE IS ABLE TO TO GET TO COUNCIL EVEN THOUGH THEY MAY NOT MAY NOT BE ABLE TO BE HERE IN PERSON THANK YOU OTHER COMMENTS UH MR JONES PLEASE JIMMY ONE THING TO MAKE SURE WE'RE CORRECT ON THIS THE ADMINISTRATOR ABSOLUTELY HAS THE RIGHT TO RUN COUNTY AND TO MAKE LINE-IN TRANSFERS BUT AS JUST REMEMBER AS THE ATTORNEY SAID THIS THAT ENLARGED it to some degree emergency ordinance enlarged that amount to some degree and also it pointed out that the chairman no pun intended who's sitting at the chair but he gave a lot of extra power to the chair to trim the agenda and other things without cou

» nty council's consent and and that's just a fact i don't know whether he would do that or not he did not do that i'll give i'll put that out to him he did not do that but i'm just saying that the ordinance gave him that authority to do it and that's what i that's where i had a problem with it it could have been anybody sitting over there as chairman i would have felt that way about it it was just that i think it gave too much to one person or two people and as mr carmen said he he never ever really even used it as well and and on the electronic and everything else i i think the citizens kershaw county knows that jimmy jones is for transparency and i think they know that i i whether i vote for this or not i have my reasons for voting against it but i am absolutely for transparency i've been

» fighting transparency for 15 years here and uh along with some other folks but anyway thank you very good uh mr brazel please one last comment sure i i just wanted to say thanks for um thanks for helping uh on your end um you're very intelligent and um i am the the censorship issue is is what i had had a had a big problem with and we we went through when we found some things that needed work and i want to commend everybody for working together and you know us being able to do it together as a group and i appreciated that thank you i didn't talk about it with you all right with that i think we're ready to vote i would like to just say thank you russell that's an excellent piece of legislation here and you've removed some of the thorny sides of things so we can move forward well done with tha

» t i call for a vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and uh it's uh mr snodgrass mr tucker mr gardner mr burns mr brazel and mr connell those opposed is mr jones and the motion passes uh with uh six to one we move now to the next item which is item number three which is a first reading in title only uh there is no enclosure i will turn it over to mr brazel to make the motion to put it on the table for discussion sir to make the motion for the first reading and title only of an amended and restated ordinance by kershaw county council determining rules and order of business and providing procedures and requirements for conducting electronic meetings of kershaw county council as well as public comments and public hearings and matters related there too thank you very much can we

» have a second second uh was that you jimmy okay mr jones second all right russell go ahead and introduce this recognizing it's entitled only and we will vote on it moving on to a subsequent reading later on sir so so this is basically in mr devos help me with this um i was a little unclear as to it's it's basically redundant of what we just talked about but we want to make it um a permanent part of our meetings that is not an emergency fashion that's correct okay well i'd like to introduce this and let's put it to a vote all right uh second mr jones thank you and this is my point exactly this is the way i felt we should have done it you know we have three readings here correct mr dubose correct and and this is entitled only and this gives us time to do our research a little bit more so this

» i can't support okay other comments very good uh with that we'll move to a vote all those in favor on the first reading and title only so signify and and it's unanimous mary we MOVED TO NEW BUSINESS. ITEM NUMBER ONE IS A DISCUSSION ON HEALTH SERVICES DISTRICT FOR DISCUSSION ONLY. IT'S ON PAGE 25 WITH SEVERAL PACKAGES AND IN FRONT OF YOU IS A HARD COPY OF WHAT YOU SEE ON THE SCREEN. I'VE ASKED MR. DARRELL AUGBURN TO BE HERE FOR THIS. SO CAN WE GET A MOTION TO OPEN FOR DISCUSSION? MAKE A MOTION WE'LL OPEN FOR DISCUSSION WITH THE HEALTH SERVICE DISTRICT.

» tucker give a first second mr snodgrass thank you very much and daryl i'm going to open it up for a discussion first of all and then i'll ask you to help us out and delighted you could spend a another night away from your beautiful family thank you thank you to have you here and i'll just say in opening that the health services district is a star of our county it's got a hospital it's got a it's got the carriage wing and other things of that nature and i hope people in the county appreciate all that has been done you have all received the one pager as shown on the screen and it was framed by the attorneys for kershaw county council and for the health services district that one-page summary was drafted by the county attorneys as their as a result of their meeting last yesterday morning and i

» t was drafted on the basis of the two-page item in your agenda tab d that i already described that was sent to the health services district after the meeting on monday morning i was invited by chairman ogburn to discuss it with the district by a conference call i think it was zoom to discuss it with the district by conference call monday night after which chairman ogburn agreed to this formulation that you see on the screen and for further discussion tonight in council and mr and no votes will be asked today but we will use it as the basis for the formulation of a resolution that we'll have on the 23rd of march when we next meet and we will vote on that so i will read in summary the full text for a record but let me first say this that the health hospital district is at a critical point mr

» ogburn has made that point and all his board members have made that point to me over the last several weeks first the board sold the hospital some five years ago but retains oversight and has managed that transition with some skill and with wise decisions these last five years every citizen in kershaw county is grateful for the maintenance of the kershaw health and of the carish wing by the team that chairman ogburn represents concurrently they took on no rules that were never new roles that were never before handled by that board and those wrong roles are difficult and strongly suggest that the old statute needs to be updated to manage carriage wing to maintain the pension plan to interface with kershaw health and to transition beechwood from its current location in the carriage wing just

» among name a few daryl management roles were not like this were not foreseen in statute further the board embraced vision kershaw 2030 under daryl's leadership and found innovative and courageous i would have to say ways to help this county and the school district and our non-profits among others and we all look forward to an eventual groundbreaking at beechwood in testament to the board's vision and the role played also by ed royal and austin shaheen both former chairmen of this body and i also should take a moment to say how we regret the loss of that visionary austin shaheen last year this present statute urgently needs updating times have changed with the board's new roles and with our populations changed demographics and needs and yet a year ago the sale offer for prisma to buy kershaw

» health arrived on the very day very same day and as covid and we suspended both rotations of board members and the effort that we had begun to discuss to modernize the statute so now is the time to move ahead on both of these efforts to modernize the statute and to renew rotations of members of the board and for the people watching i'll now read from the text of what our attorneys and staff have agreed to put before this body and uh thankfully mr ogburn as i've said has agreed to come here and we welcome you now i would say up front before i read the text that mr ogburn is deeply involved in some contractual matters on behalf of the board and some of the questions that you may have for him may not be answered here in this body but he'll tell you where those are so let me read the text of wh

» at's on the screen daryl it's hard to make you stand up there so long uh proposed general legislation to modernize the statute enabling legislation to be agreed upon by kershaw county council and the health services district for submission to the south carolina legislature for consideration and to enacted in this session and it has a number of bullets beneath that to modernize language in the state statute statute as to propose the scope the purpose and duties of the health services district district to provide medical care and services in broader terms to retain a nine-member board appointed by council this council and the board terms would be six years initially appoint nine new board members for staggered terms of two years that's three of them four years for three more and six years for

» three effective one july 21. terms would be for a definite time of six years beginning one july 2021 and ending six years later when term ends appointment and service on the board would end more board members could be reappointed one member from each council district and three at large so we would have to change the current township map that we've been struggling with to a district map that matches county council moving on to the other quotations actual process of nominating and rules of as to nomination would be decided by county council by ordinance but council as a whole would appoint so that ends the text uh and i'd like to move into your questions and discussion with an idea that we would show back up here in two weeks on the 23rd and approve a resolution would you like to hear from mr

» ogburn first or you would you like to okay is that everybody's view yes daryl you're popular go right ahead thank you mr chairman before i get into the comments about the um statute i'd like to point out a few additional things mr chairman that our board has been able to accomplish in the last little while um in regard to Beachwood, we continue to work with our construction manager to handle day-to-day operations related to the construction of the new carriage wing. We're ready to approve the guaranteed maximum price contract with Thompson Turner Construction, which will be $2 million under the original budget. We initiated city water and sewer improvements by the Beachwood property and neighboring area, to the Beachwood property and neighboring area.

» Initiated a process to place beechwood property on the national historic registry thereby raising awareness of the property we said we're seeking tax credits to benefit the district which the district will use to offset construction debt and fund community projects we've established a five-year plan strategic plan to include renovations of the main house and carriage house as well as other successful planning and zoning approvals for the property we have we're also looking into independent living and some assisted living projects as well done some feasibility studies on those we can sit continue to use those feasibility studies as a guide in the in 2020 we granted three hundred thousand dollars in community project grants to different organizations across our county this year we will do at

» least three hundred thousand perhaps more we're focusing on closing the gap between drug and alcohol abuse, obesity, and lack of health education and resources, and lack of transportation in our county. We continue to monitor the contract that we have with LifePoint, and we're engaged in trying to figure out this complicated situation we find ourselves in. We are obligated to provide an acute care hospital in this community, and we will provide an acute care hospital in this community. We continue to collect that tax debt set off money to the tune of $2.5 million a year. We monitored the COVID-19 closely in our nursing home, and I want to stand here today and tell you what a joy it is to have a company like White Oak operating our facility. They're incredible.

» Scott Neal is one of the finest young men you'll ever want to know. A couple of weeks ago, we were number one in the White Oak organization, which covers North Carolina, South Carolina, and a little bit of Georgia. I believe they have 30-some-odd nursing homes. We are the only nursing home that they manage, and we were number one in their organization with profitability, number one with COVID, lack of COVID, and that is a remarkable accomplishment, and it has affected our bottom line. We're above. We're in the black. We're not in the red.

» There are some nursing homes across our state that may not survive this pandemic, because you lose your census your census goes down below a certain percentage you're in the red and you're getting the red real quick in this business so we continue to uh we have gotten rid of the are about to get rid of the burndale property thank goodness goodbye adios and we've hired a new uh pension asset administrator advisor we've done all of that with nine hard-working board members and one employee, Sally Harrell. She's the only employee we have in this thing. In January 1 of this year, I started my 43rd year in the Statehouse Arena in Columbia. And during that period of time, I've learned a lot. I have developed a tremendous respect for the legislative process.

» And I assure you that what I say today is only my opinion and the opinion of my board. I yield to the kershaw county legislative delegation to draw this statute in any fashion they choose to draw it because it is their authority but i have talked to some members of the board of the legislative delegation and they have asked me to give them our position and we have done that the chairman's little uh sheet up there is very succinct and very clear we we had one that was a little bit different than that because it was the one that i had sent out when we sent out our agenda for for our board but it's just nothing that we can't address and move on move forward with we agree that it's time to modernize it it's time to upgrade it and it's time to reset and we're here offer our support i will tell y

» ou that i will give my time and the time that it takes to work with the delegation i've talked to some of the members of the delegation already and they have asked me to give them their opinion and i will continue to do that what the opinion of our board and we want to be aligned with the county council and do this together and get this done thank you mr chairman i'll yield okay very good comments i want to say thank you russell russell brasil thank you very much you guys work you know um hours on end and it's thankless um my brother was a part of the board for a long time and i saw him put in hour after hour after hour and he cared about the hospital and i know you guys care about the hospital and um probably a very thankless position and i thank you for for what you've done for the hospit

» al here in kershaw county thank you we appreciate it very much thank you mr brazel very much i appreciate other comments yeah mr connell thanks for coming tonight mr auburn and thanks for your communication uh about this beforehand i think that this move and the efforts here are very important for two primary reasons uh in kershaw county one the modernization will lead to a more appropriate representation on the board based on population in Kershaw County. We're just working off of some old laws and maps that don't allow for a significant portion of the population to be represented, at least by those that live in the area, which is of course representative government. The other issue is, you know, continuity in effectiveness of the board. So on one side, I'm really excited.

» And on the other side, I want to be a little conservative too. We have to make sure that we have the right pieces in place, that there's not a case of brain drain from the board for those who are aware of the deals and have already negotiated $2 to $2.5 million in savings on contracts and that kind of thing for big projects going forward. So for those two reasons, I'm excited about it, but I think we should be very cautious and deliberate. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Very good. Mr. Connell, I agree with you. That is an important point. This board is extremely talented. It is a varied board. It is very talented. The committees work. I give them the work and they do it. And they bring it to the board and the board generally draws a consensus.

» But it takes a long time to get up to speed on the issues that we have to address. And they're very complicated. Particularly the financing of $33 million is a pretty big deal. And that's what we're in the process of trying to do right now. We've got good contract people. Gene Hancock and Godwin are our accountants, and the Savage firm is our lawyers. They're all very competent and very helpful, but when it comes down to it, those nine members on the board are the ones making the decision, and it takes some time to learn what you're doing. I would urge you to look to some seniority when you begin to pick the new board. That's down the road. We can talk about that later. Now's the time to get the board reconstituted and reset in the terms, rotating as they should rotate. Mr. Tucker.

» Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Auburn, thank you, sir. Thank you for your dedicated and passion to drive this ship and make sure it continues to sail in the right direction with, you know, the three major things that I know is going on with it between parish wing being built, the new one and pandemic that we're in and a future for our hospital. And those are three big challenges. And I think we're kicking butt with all of them.

» So I appreciate what you and uh the crew are doing and um and you're right uh you know there are some concerns in reference to uh moving forward um who's going to be where and how much uh brain power we're going to have remaining on the board but i think we'll have to cross that bridge when we get to it after the legislators do what they need to do and um please feel free to advise them when we don't have um legislation that don't make any sense back here not saying that they can't do it but a little bit of push and pull and recommendation won't hurt that's exactly tell your board i said thank you for all that they do thank you mr tucker thank you uh mr snodgrass i'm sorry david mr chairman thank you so much for being here thank you for your work and i appreciate the dedication uh that you

» and your board have uh to serving the citizens just want to echo the things that ben ben talked about yeah this this this new language helps us modernize and you know i'm looking at this map and I can't remember the last time that I said that I'm from the DeKalb township. You know, I just don't know that's a vernacular that we're using much anymore. I do probably say I'm from East Camden. East Camden, that's right. But so I think this helps us. And also I'm committed to ensuring that we do not lose any organizational memory. There's a lot of things, a lot of intangibles that are not written down. And any time you're making transitions, you have to be sure that you don't lose any of that.

» so i will be i will i will be committed to making sure this this all happens very seamlessly i had a chance to um walk the beachwood property yesterday in fact and uh i see the work that's already being done on the house and the main house there and the vision that you guys have for that it's just it's just phenomenal and i can't wait till i can't wait till it gets done thank you appreciate you thank you um local contractor marty kelly has been doing that work on the house and we set out initially just to do the outside to stabilize it to keep it from continuing to rot and and develop problems and he's within about two months and a hundred thousand dollars i think of having it finished on the outside and uh we're trying to figure out what the purpose of the house will be how we can utilize

» it in the grand scheme of things and sometimes i wake up in the middle of the night and and just pinch myself and say did we really buy 4.7 million dollar piece of property for two five hundred thousand dollars that's pretty incredible the generosity of Lucy Lindsay and that's where this property came from that's where that project came from it's going to be transformative for the bus dusty bin area I don't know how many new jobs we're gonna we're gonna add when you go from 88 beds to 132 heads substantial amount of new jobs essential amount of new tax new people in the generating income in our in our county and it's a it's a joy to be part of and there again i thank the board there are eight hard-working people they just let me uh sit up and call on the motions and declare an agenda very g

» ood uh mr gardner sir again uh appreciate what you do and and all the the uh alligators that you've had to tread through over the over the years as you know we have as well but uh you You know, Karish Wing has been a beacon of this community for so many years. We appreciate the foresight of moving forward to build a new one and to bring a better facility and that sort of thing. We appreciate what you do. I never understood the township part of this 11 years ago. When I got here, it makes a whole lot more sense to do it this way as we do with many of our boards and commissions to allow council members to appoint. I'm looking forward to that day that we can do that. We appreciate your work.

» started to do the statute in old english but we couldn't find anybody that write it like that we appreciate the work that you do thank you thank you so much mr jones go ahead jimmy thank you mr chairman members of council chairman augur glad to see you here and once again i'm just going to echo thank you for all the hard work you know not only the carish wing but you and this existing board transformed the hospital saved the hospital and i thank you for that because it was a six months away from probably becoming a band-aid facility when you guys came on board and uh i don't know if anybody can remember but i remember i remember all the hard work and the fight that you put into that to get it to where it is now and then to to end up where we are here tonight i have i just want to tell you t

» his i am com i am in no way interested in changing any member that board at this existing minute at this moment you know you're 30 ways 30 days away from groundbreaking got the new facility opening up you got so many challenges ahead of you in the next six months to 12 months or whatever i think you would almost be foolish for us to try to replace you wayne tidwell eric boland i think those are the three that would be up but i do support mr tucker i will say this thank you in trying to get things in line with the appointments we we need to do that and we also need to update the language i agree mr the gardener on that you know the town and and the pastor you know the townships that's old language districts did y'all recommend those the districts came from you guys or what i want to commend

» you for that good language good language that's something we all can understand i'm going to certainly support a legislative local legislative delegation the word they put in this and you as well i'm 150 committed to you and that board and i just want you to know that thank you thank you but as currently as we stand here today i believe if i'm not mistaken uh we have a one representative in every in every county council district as is except for mr tuckers that's correct i think there's two in in one district and none in your district as it works out now i do believe that nick moore is going to be relocating from elgin down do you have the tombfield road area down there he's building a mansion down there yeah but so he's going to be relocating but thank you council for being so kind and so

» complimentary to my board and they're they're good people they're hard-working people you all have done a marvelous job of vetting those people and uh giving us a right a good kind of mix um i'm gonna go forward basis you all will continue to do that i know i have confidence in you i will go to the legislative delegation in consort with the chairman and we will begin to talk to them about getting this thing done uh as i said i've talked to several members of it uh it passes the house perhaps first and then perhaps it'll get to the senate and then get the governor's signature so we'll navigate through this these waters and when it's all said and done we'll all collect we'll be here together doing something good for our county thank you very much let me just see if i can sum up any further di

» scussion it looks like we are ready to get started and let's get going and uh we'll bring that in for resolution everybody next uh next time we meet on the 23rd daryl i'll make sure i cross level with you but we can't close this discussion without first thanking uh sally harrell and especially mary back there who pulled all this together so make sure we thank both of those ladies and uh convey that to them would you please thank you so much we all right uh mr jones you have another one quick question mr bowes explained to me the resolution why would we do the resolution uh mr bowes come on up well i think i think the to get on the same page with the legislature i think mr augburn will tell you this nice if if the health district which is a governmental body and the county council which appo

» ints the um members of the health district and incidentally if you recall previously we passed a resolution regarding their financing so um i think if they're on the same page it's going to help that's my point mr i just want to make sure that whatever resolution we do that the chairman auburn and his board are on board with that resolution yeah we'll vet it with them okay that's i just want to make sure of that that's what i said good for you jimmy thank you okay with that i think you can go home and we're going to stay here and starve today thank you daryl good to see you again two nights in a row all right we move to the next item which is item number two it's on page 42 which is mary has helpfully served up a zoning board of appeal appointment for amy ud we had to forego it the last tim

» e we met because we didn't have a read ahead and uh with that can we have a motion i believe it's from the camden area can we have a motion district i'll i'll move that we appoint amy uti to the uh to the board tom gardner second second from david snodgrass any discussion again we appreciate our volunteers uh with that we move to a vote all those in favor signify and it's unanimous mary thanks for bringing that one home well done uh the item number three is a selective service board discussion it's on page 43 and one late one night i got a phone call we're not going to vote we're going to discuss but we're going to serve this up at a subsequent meeting i just need a county to follow through on my duty to inform when i get a call from the pentagon saying we don't have anybody on the draft bo

» ard so what i would propose we do maybe tom webb can tell us what a draft board used to be but what happened is is there is no eminent draft i don't want anybody to go running out of here and saying we're going to reinstitute the draft but we got this call from this guy and i said send me something i can show county council but it must it can be anywhere from one to five people uh there's no pay it's a volunteer there's no duties because there's no reason to have a selective service board stood up at this moment because there is no draft but there's some action officer in the pentagon is feeling lonely and feels he needs to have all of his counties in the united states 4 800 of them have a selective service board the anomaly here that mary and i still cannot understand is the person on the

» selective service board cannot have any form of military service it's crazy but that's the rule that's the law isn't it amazing um so at any rate my proposal is is that we kind of agree in here and like to have any discussion that you'd like to have that we ask mary to go ahead and formulate this and in due time uh we'll bring before you a nominee unless unless you have a nominee that you want to give to mary and we'll bring it in and vote on it we can have five but i propose we have one so that we don't have a management issue for a position that's important but at this time is not active clear any discussion yes sammy you got drafted too didn't you yes sir okay i felt like that you know what the navy stands for right never again volunteer yourself i enjoyed my service my question um becau

» se i was thinking i said man i know some good veterans who can do this and when you told me that what are the qualifications or disqualifications um how can we get those so if we're talking to someone we can kind of vet them before they get to you miss mary okay yeah thank you actually they're set forth on that enclosure they're set forth in the enclosure second paragraph behind the general's memo or the chairman's memo chairman if you don't chairman excuse me i'm sorry chairman i apologize i'm a private these days in the army the chairman's memo the second page the second paragraph has the requirements after the chairman's exclusions basically having a pulse the only requirement of board members are that they one cannot have a conviction and other than that both men and women 18 years and

» older can be a board member and they cannot have been a former military service well actually current or retired military former military cancer that's right yeah oh former military camp yes it cannot be current or retired military but that's the same thing as former okay no you can be a veteran and not be retired or current right you can't do it so so i think mary if you can go ahead and formulate that and let everybody know and then then they will advertise for this position. It is an important position and potentially very powerful. So it shouldn't be taken lightly even though it's presently inactive, okay? So can we close the discussion on that? - I'm good. - All right, good. Thank you, Sammy, for raising that.

» All right, we'll move on to item number four, which is the 2021-22 goals and objectives. It's at tab G. of you have a hard copy and if you would just page through danny uh to the third slide that one um and with that um let's place it on the agenda but first mr carpenter can you walk us through what we're about to vote on the mr chair members council of the county council met um back in february on the 2nd and the 16th and the 20th to hear presentations from various entities staff members of the county as well as some outside agencies the meeting on the 20th the council formulated some goals and objectives uh those discussions were moderated by miss holly hayes ms hayes took that information and has put it in this format and it is now presented to county council as a draft of what was discu

» ssed and the conclusions that were reached on that day by the county council very good can we have a motion to approve these goals and objectives for the budget cycle so move mr chair uh mrs snodgrass is second thank you second for mr tucker now just to walk you through this these were derived from vision 2030 the core group by uh susan witkowski paula and uh and uh and uh holly hayes and of course george gibson and then we went through a session now just to russell what we do here is approve these or modify them if we want to make amendments and we'll go through a series of votes here or maybe just one single vote and then when we start our county budget process this is kind of our our guide and and there and sometimes we don't do first priority all of first priority all second priority be

» fore getting to third sometimes we do a little bit of each sometimes we do none of some of these but that's the budget process this is the goal setting and so with that uh who was the opening uh mr snodgrass go ahead please sure i was just reiterate what what some of the things that you said mr chair that this is this is a guide sometimes we look at this and we think you know if we if we vote for this or vote on for that then we're we're emboldened to everything that's on this list this is really just uh as i've seen it uh it gives mr carpenter and staff a a map of where they what general direction they should they should go uh when they begin to set the budget and of course when you get to the budget then you can you know you can you can say whether you dislike or like something that mr ca

» rpenter has put into the budget um i i um i like what's here i i would point out that I THINK I THINK I THINK HOLLY WHO I KNOW KIND OF EDITED ALL THIS DOWN SHE UNDER HIGH PRIORITY GROWTH COUNTY SERVICES CREATE AND CONDUCT A WIDE VARIETY OF GROWTH STUDIES I WANT TO BE CLEAR THAT ONE OF THOSE IN PARTICULAR IS AN EAST CAMDEN FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR FOR THE HIGHWAY AND WATER ISSUE OUT THERE I WOULD PREFER IT TO BE WRITTEN BUT IF IF I THINK STAFF UNDERSTANDS WHAT THAT MEANS so and and uh we've talked about that so i can it's not a stickler sticking point for me um but just i've just i could i can verbally say that's uh within that let's just be clear that's the third bullet yes sir underneath gross studies okay got it thank you is that how you'd interpret that mr carpenter yes sir what we would do

» is we would come back and in the budget we would show studies and what we were recommending budget council agreed they would if the council didn't agree then we would change it in the budget process thank you that's all uh let me interrupt there because that's a good point um we're going to have a series of work sessions on some of these can you tell us what work sessions specifically you have laid out for us yes sir we've got the work sessions on fire on ems and on planning and zoning issues okay good um who has who had the second there please i did mr tucker please go ahead um i just want to say that i'll appreciate miss holly as well uh working on this mr carpenter and um i enjoyed the um treat uh if you want to call it that i think that's the proper name we get workshops retreats and ev

» erything all mixed up but this was a little different um due to several reasons but i thought it worked out well and i'm fine with what you have there i can dig down a little bit more as we go into the budget work session thank you okay all right ben please mr chairman as i've uh said in the past if you could schedule the retreat on my birthday each year that'd be great let me skip out no i appreciate everybody on council for uh acknowledging the list that i sent in uh with priority events i see that they've largely shown up here um one one thing i want to check on medium priority bullet number two continue white pond road and highway is that supposed to be one slash elgin improvements okay so i'd make an amendment that we indicate that as highway one just a grammatical thing but uh we can

» make that a scrivener that's fine with me okay that's fine okay marriage you get that okay and uh i bring that up to say obviously the council and myself have been working at times feverishly on trying to identify funds and sources for white pond road improvement we've done studies uh 10 years ago they did a study and i think moving it to or having it in in this designation, like some other issues that we experience, acknowledges that we're beholden to variables we can't control, namely DOT funding, what's gonna happen with the census. I hope that that gives us a reason to have a motion to put it back into high priority because we can actually do something about it.

» Maybe we get to compete better with local counties that have a higher population, but I'll reemphasize that is a real issue for the county. That is the most densely and fastest growing area in Kershaw County, Lugolf's right there with it. And if we don't do something about infrastructure and travel and the roads over there, it's going to be a real pain over the years. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. - And I'll just say thank you for Mr. Connell's help on that West Watery study. It didn't get us any nickel, but it got us at least to the table where we can say with analytical clarity that we need to improve the roads in the West Watery section. Lugov, Elgin, the whole area. Thank you, Ben. Other comments? Mr. Jones. Very briefly.

» You know, in the past, I've had a big problem with these goals that we've put up here. I don't really have that big of a problem with this one. It's just a suggestion, sort of a guideline. You know, well, Sammy, you look at me that way, but when you've got a water park or a splash pad as your number one top priority last year, I had a problem with that. But, you know, we didn't do that this year, and I appreciate it. But really, where I'm looking, I really want to see some stuff done with staff development. Because if we don't have retention instead of growing, growing, growing, let's take care of what we have now. You know, and that's really important to me as well. And I know we all want better fire service, and we're going to have probably some different thoughts on that.

» But I support the process. I may not support the funding mechanism, but I'll bring an alternative if I don't. because one thing i'm not going to support this year is any tax increases the fee increases of any kind whatsoever i think we have the means to do within our means this year and uh i will certainly identify certain ways and bring it back before this county council yeah thank you i think uh let me make sure that we got it right uh vick can you want to address the staff development concern mr uh jones's rate i think it's in the lower left-hand part it is yeah i i don't think um it is one of our high priorities so so i think that mr jones i appreciate his his concern about staff too because i think we all want to make sure that our staff are developed and that we maintain and support t

» he staff we have currently yeah there it is almost in jimmy's exact words good jimmy uh mr tucker that was the question i was going to ask mr carpet these aren't any type of order in the high priority right sir just happen to get put down to the bottom yeah okay yeah just correct I appreciate it. Okay. I just wanted to make sure. Good. And the budget- Because that's more important to me than the fire growth right now. Right. Yeah. But it has no seniority of either one. I'll make myself clear on that. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Very helpful. Other comments? Russ? Yeah. Just to be clear.

» So under staff development, we're talking about pay raises for employees, a potential one-time bonus, create a pay improvement plan, addressing staffing shortages, continue staff development plan to result in better developed staff and better recruitment and retention that's what you're talking about okay I noticed in the medium priority there's also under staff development consider restructuring organizational chart is that also something that you were that's totally different okay that's something he's gonna be doing okay he can actually do that without that I don't even think that should be a goal but I won't go there I'm just no problems with it because that's something he does I'm just making notes other comments i think we've got a fine piece of work here i mean the proof will be when

» we get into the budget and allocate resources against what we hope to do and we've never been able to do them all and we've never been able to do first priority first and not second and third priority uh please pass on to mike conley and mary and danny who are here and also to holly our and and the core group in particular for taking their time to come in and help us with this yes um i note here that there's also a addressing vision 2030 going forward as well so with that let's uh move to vote all those in favor signify by raising your hand and it's unanimous mary thank you this has been a wonderful process and a team building event as well uh with that next item on the agenda is council briefs i believe and with that mr jones you have the you're first in the batting order i briefly i just

» want to say that i'm six feet away from everybody okay this is legal this is legal with the governor this is legal with city this is also uh not restricted under the resolution resolution has no teeth no power whatsoever however in in order to get along for the moment we'll put it back on now i'm not going to tell you how long i'm going to wear it because there's no date of destruction on your resolution which is is not a law it's just sort of a and it by the way the resolution passed on as we know a 4-3 and it was targeted to me it's obvious about that and uh i appreciate my colleagues on here who recognize that and made that clear you can say it wasn't targeted that was not targeted at me but it absolutely was but i want everybody to understand i obey the law and i'm obeying y'all you kno

» w y'all are not within six feet apart right now i don't know that y'all are really legally within the boundaries of the law but i am six feet and uh i've asked for that to be done before and y'all moved back up just so you could do a resolution and force me to put a mask on so i'd like y'all to consider going six feet apart as well as wearing your mask i think that'd be a good gesture to show that you too are trying to do everything you can along with your language that you spell out there that you support safety and goodwill. Also, I'd like to just give some kudos to a young lady. She is a Apache helicopter pilot, the hero in my book, and she is serving as liaison for the local legislative delegation, Katie Gwynn. She is absolutely phenomenal.

» She's outstanding she's a hard worker we're lucky to have her uh the delegation is lucky they found her and i just want to give a shout out to her and i know that most of you here have met her and i know we'll all give her our support and mr chairman with that i uh thank each and every one for this moment to speak appreciate it thank you sir mr congress mr chairman members of council i want to say that this past winter i had the chance to participate in uh the record league basketball and coach my girls and just wanted to give kudos to our rec league uh during uh just unprecedented time they continued to offer a great service in a great league with great protocols keeping everyone safe and so mr carpenter if you would just send those kudos over to shane and jeremy and the rest of the staff

» over there and also i want to continue to remind people please please please watch the litter uh it's our it's just it's everywhere uh and uh i'm gonna be working on some some letter pickup days for my area and uh hopefully we'll be able to announce that the next meeting and uh i know the commission the clean community commission is getting back um they're getting back in action again now that things are beginning to open up so just look just just uh encourage people take please please please please take pride in your area you know people in kershaw county they they say hey we want you know we want growth and we want this and that but then at the same time we're also throwing our trash out the window and um let's i think um just want to encourage it all to uh to be take pride of where we ar

» e so we can do it and uh thank you that concludes my remarks yeah mr tucker another report mr chairman uh mr garner no report uh sir um just to reiterate what mr snodgrass was talking about steve zobel actually reached out to me and is planning a community cleanup i think the weekend before the carolina cup so if that falls in line if that date works i just wanted to say thanks to steve for for reaching out and trying to lead um with uh we all see the the trash it's you know been winter and nasty and rainy and there's a lot of trash on the road and um look forward to doing that and look forward to um the first annual river cleanup we've got a date now august 14th good and uh that that's going to be a big event we're going to have a lot of fun we're going to we're going to use veterans park

» and we're going to have uh some sort of event to get folks to come out and have a good time afterwards and we'll spend a few hours on the water that morning and i hope we can clean up the watery river uh mr connell thank you mr chairman two things um interesting that everybody's talking about cleaning up uh spring maybe makes you feel that way but i've noticed it as well in the community i hope that we'll take pride and have a better sense of duty to our surroundings to not litter and just dirty up the roads being part of some of these cleanups you'd be imagine how much trash you find uh on the side of the road and you know recently i was thinking about it because i've got a friend that's a ceo who is interested in looking at kershaw county considering having a business come here and uh try

» ing to work on dates that they can come out have the family come out and look and i'm just thinking gosh what what roads do i take them down that uh that will present kershaw county in the best way possible you know we shouldn't have to think that everybody um the way we handle our own personal trash should be reflected in our moral character which i know kershaw county has high moral character in general the other thing i want to mention mr chairman and council is a big congratulations to kershaw county wrestlers between north central and camden and lugo you had champions you had people who way outfunded their coverage on what you would expect from them at that type of turn it based on the record throughout the year but they just showed up and were gritty and worked hard and and beat guys

» that they shouldn't have beat it's just a it's a beautiful thing i congratulate the wrestlers the coaches and also the parents that did well and in some form here in the next couple of meetings we'll be bringing them up for recognition because it's very deserved wrestling is such a tough sport i mean it's just such a tough sport and lays a foundation for um for the rest of a young man or woman's life in fact um you remember patrick payne sergeant major patrick payne who came through he wrestled league off elgin high school and he'd tell you if he was sitting here today he attributes a lot of his success in the military and overcoming obstacles to what he experienced and learned in the sport of wrestling thank you mr chairman very good and uh i'll close it out very quickly letter everyone is

» majoring on litter pickup uh last uh weekend we had melissa kinlaw and nicola and then the week before that nicola garcia with tom webb from our clean community committee uh i would ask you to link up with the clean commission they will give you the instruments and i would just tell you all those homeowners like steve's oval and all the rest of them as you go out to do that also you david is coordinate with the sheriff so he can provide a little top cover people tend to drive too fast by these people and the sheriff has been all over it all right tom he's been out there with you uh to back us up so our people can do that pickup safely and it's always a great community effort i thank you for that secondly i'm with you ben all these sports are starting to show who our young heroes are and we

» kind of need some heroes in this as we're climbing down from that covid tree and it's just great to go to these high school and junior high school sports um and it's just terrific to also see their success and to celebrate it. Lastly, I would say, Mr. Broussel, thank you for jumping out on those two very difficult ordinances. I think that'll help us as a team to get down from the tree. Let's do that. I have nothing further. I turn it over to Mr. Carpenter to take us out with the administrative briefing. Chair, members of council, one item coming up as we roll back open events. We have another movie night at the Water River Veterans Park this March the 26th. It's an Easter movie. 730 is when the gates open. We ask that people call in to reserve their space.

» We are beginning to move away from in-car only and having outdoor to encourage more families to participate. There will be food trucks as well, so it'll be a nice event for families to come out to. So encourage everybody who is interested. It doesn't have to be a family. You can come out yourself you don't have to have kids uh come out and see it and uh we're doing now it's averaging about one a month that we're doing around uh around the county uh parks and rec was up uh at the irish fest on saturday and the movie that was shown was parks and recs was showing that movie i worked in tandem with the sheriff's office showing movies as well so you'll see more and more of these these movies around the county as parks and rec tries to reach out to our families in our citizens so it's going to be

» a great spring mr carpenter i heard you say call in where does the public find the number to um is the flyer just cut off yeah yeah the flyer is cut off there it's not the flyer itself and it's also the parks and rec number two but but it's on the flyer and it's on the facebook pages for the county parks and rec as well yeah terrific terrific and that's eastern daylight savings time i would point out to you which does change this coming sunday so an extra hour i wish we could pass an ordinance about that all right that's my portion okay very good mr dubose i have nothing mr chairman and with that there's no further need for an executive session can we have a motion that we adjourn motion adjourn mr chairman of course mr tucker second for mr connell of course any discussion i wish you all we

» ll don't forget to set your clocks back all those in favor signify by hand spring forward and we are unanimous there we go