Full meeting transcript - December 9, 2025

» We are complete. We have our clerk. Thank you, Ms. Hannah. Let's be called to order for Tuesday, December 9th, 2025, Kershaw County Council meeting. Welcome everyone out. This is the last meeting of the year to conduct business for Kershaw County. We're so excited to have you here and glad to get it wrapped up and focus on some family time as well. I'll go ahead and offer an invocation and pledge of allegiance. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank thee for our many blessings. Please help us be humble during this holiday season as we spend time with family and loved ones. Please help us share fond moments, bury the hatchet on disagreements, and extend grace. Please help us have the wisdom that we need tonight to make good decisions for Kershaw County and its citizens.

» Please help us as we wrap up December. Look forward to a very prosperous and exciting and spirit-filled 2026. We thank thee for thy son Jesus Christ during this Christmas season. We're grateful for our many blessings and the comforts that we enjoy, and we pray for those who might struggle or mourn that they might be comforted. And we say this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. All right, gentlemen, that takes us to item number four. And I want to make sure, do we have Mr. Tucker on the line? Yes, sir, you do. Okay, great to have you, Sammy, and Mr. Jones will be here. He's a little bit late coming from another obligation, but he should be attending the meeting in person. Next up, it is item number four. Yes, sir, you're welcome.

» Next up on the agenda is item number four, adoption of the agenda. Do we have a motion? Mr. Chairman, I make a motion we adopt the agenda. Mr. Thompson has a motion. Is there a second? I'll second. We have a second from Mr. Cato. Any discussion, Mr. Thompson? None. Seeing none, we'll have those are in person and present voting first all in favor raise your hand on the agenda it's unanimous in favor for those who are present and voting mr tucker how do you vote yes that is a yes from mr tucker remotely it passes unanimously miss hannah next up we have a proclamation that i placed on the agenda this is regarding mount moriah baptist church i make a motion that we approve this proclamation and would like to get a second so that i can share it before we vote i'll make a a motion well i made the

» motion you have a second mr shoemake has a second okay um i just want to share this before we vote um if you could if you're here uh affiliated with the church or in support tonight would you mind raising your hand i know we had a few folks here you can stand up either way my knees are kind of getting brittle from athletic days so least number of times i need to stand that's good but thank you so much for being here tonight i'm gonna go ahead and share this um the proclamation is whereas mount moriah baptist church in camden south carolina is celebrating its 160th anniversary on january 25 2026 communities and congregations from all over south carolina are coming together to help celebrate this memorable occasion whereas throughout its history the mission and activities of mount moriah bapt

» ist church has served the community renovating and enhancing the ministries as well as a building to accommodate the needs of the church family friends and neighbors and whereas our entire community has benefited from the charity and influence of this church that they've exerted through the years and the many facets of its outreach and practical assistance to the needy and whereas mountain rye baptist church has become an enduring presence in the community expanding its programs and ministries to promote the ever-growing spiritual needs and outreach efforts of its members and whereas mountain rise baptist church and its congregation are commemorating 160 years of spiritual worship education fellowship and faith guided by this year's 2026 theme which is celebrating 126 years of faith fellows

» hip and forward visions whereas it is a pleasure to extend this expression of our esteem and best wishes to the members of the mount moriah baptist church congregation on this memorable memorable memorable occasion on the 106th 160th anniversary now therefore i jay ben connell kershaw county council chairman hereby honor and congratulate mount moriah baptist church on its 160th anniversary coming up in the new year and witness whereof i have set my hand below to sign and we have um we have that document and framing up here for you council members any comments or discussion before we vote any questions i'll just say personally i've witnessed this church serve alongside many others and serve individually in the community and i'm extremely grateful for it and this opportunity to recognize you

» before the year closes out any other comments discussion yeah mr tucker oh let's go ahead mr tucker remotely go ahead sammy okay i guess i can you not sure who's in the audience but i'm pretty sure it's probably se and miss francis and others but i want to say uh thank you to mott mariah because um the doors have been open to i mean any and everybody um this is how the uh soup kitchen was formed which um it's not 160 years old but they've got a long running with their suit kitchen and helping feeding the needy here in kershaw county and who all shows up but remarkable work from remarkable people and that they have been a cornerstone in kershaw county camden south carolina for 160 years i can assure you but thank you to not only them but the congregation and all the members yes sir thank you

» mr tucker mr brazel yeah i'd just like to also extend my congratulations to to you fine folks in your church and uh spreading the good word of jesus christ in in our community here in kershaw county congratulations thank you very much mr brazel with that we'll move it to a vote all who are present in favor raise your hand if you and it is uh unanimous in favor for those who are present and voting mr tucker how do you vote remotely i vote for myself and mr jones yes i'm sure yeah i'm sure jimmy would be in favor he'll be here soon enough and i'm sure we'll hear about it in his council briefings it passes unanimously miss hannah thank you so much uh if those who are here in support and participating if you'd like to come up we can do a quick picture and we'd be glad to hear from you um any co

» mments you might have thank the council for their vote thank each and every one you don't know about mount moriah mount moriah is will turn to be 160 years old and we have been feeding the hungry clothing the naked and making the stranger feel welcome in the gate i'm so proud to be the pastor there uh so far for about two years so i want to I thank God for Mount Moriah and the people that help make things happen. Thank you so much, Ms. Ann Davis. Amen, I thank you so much. We are blessed and we are honored. Thank you once again. - Thank you, Pastor. We're proud to have you in the community, that's for sure. Gentlemen, next up on the agenda is item number six, public comments. Mr. DuBose. - Mr. Chair, we have two speakers signed up.

» are signed up somewhat conjunctively and concurrently the listing on the public sign-in sheet is pastor steve lee with leon prosser chairman alpha center board of directors and the discussion topic is ordinance thc and cbd i think as parliamentarian at your discretion whether those are two separate public comment sections with their own time limits or well i'm going to leave it up to the gentleman do you just need one speaker you have two just one so that that settles it no parliamentarian needed um yes sir please come up good evening everyone and thank you for allowing my comments my name is stephen lee i'm the pastor at mount olivet baptist church actually i'm a co-pastor i gave myself a demotion earlier this year and i'm now a co-pastor along with two fine young men.

» I also am on the board of the Alpha Center and I want to bring to all of our attention the growing concern in our community of the rapid rise of legal THC products being sold in gas stations and vape shops. These products fall into a gray area created by the 2018 Farm Bill and although they are marketed as legal and safe the reality is very different. Unlike medical cannabis, products sold in gas stations and vape shops are not tested for potency or consistency. This means that one gummy or vape might hit mildly, while the very next could be extremely strong, even for the same package. The companies are using a loophole created by the 2018 Federal Farm Bill. The bill legalized hemp, defined as cannabis, containing less than 0.3% Delta-9-THC.

» But companies quickly learned they could extract and chemically convert hemp-derived cannabinoids into products like Delta-8, Delta-10, THCA, and HHC, and others that still produce a very strong high. Because these products technically come from hemp, companies market them as legal even though the effects can be as potent as traditional marijuana. This loophole has created an entire industry of intoxicating products sold in gas stations and vape shops with little or no oversight. Unlike regulated medical cannabis, these hemp-derived products are not required to be tested for potency, contaminants, or consistency. That means one gummy might be mild, the next extremely strong, even from the same package. We also see THC potency skyrocket in these products.

» Years ago, marijuana typically was one to 5% THC. Today, edibles, vapes, and concentrates made from hemp derivatives can reach 20%, 50%, and even 90% THC, dramatically increasing the risk. These higher potencies are linked to anxiety, psychosis, rapid heart rate, and overdose-like reactions. This legal THC is not just weed, like hippies got high on in the '60s and '70s. And when products as potent are easily accessible in gas stations and vape shops, often with unclear age requirements or minimal ID checks, it creates a serious risk for our young people whose developing brains are far more valuable to these high intensity THC effects.

» For young people whose brains are developing, these high potent substances have long term impact on memory, attention, decision making, and medical attention. Edibles also pose additional dangers because the effects are delayed. People often take more before the first dose has fully kicked in, leading to accidental over-intoxication, and although these products are often sold as legal, they can still trigger a positive THC drug screen. Standard tests cannot differentiate between Delta-8, Delta-9, and other hemp-derived THC analogs.

» speaking off the cuff I received notice from the concerned clergy today that there was there have been a massive raids on these shops because of the selling of these products to underage people as a pastor and as a board member of the Alpha Center I can tell you what we need in this county and what we need in this state is not more drugs not more easily accessible products not sometimes drugs that are hide is hidden as candy and kids can't tell the difference or maybe they can but we would like to speak to that and say that we would we would hope that our County Council and all of our state officials would oppose any more expansion of this type thing thank you thank you sir for coming out tonight appreciate that that concludes public comments is that correct mr.

» those correct all right i'm going to vary the agenda just a little bit under chairman's prerogative i see some folks we have in the crowd with some items we could take care of before having to wait the entire meeting and they're generally quick we'll vary by taking the appointments 12 a and b this would be a planning commission appointment and clean community commission appointment we'll move those up to the current portion of the meeting and then we'll get back on the agenda as set so that takes us to item number 12 a planning commission district number five placed on by councilman brant tomlinson mr chairman i um make a motion that we appoint christopher strafella to as the planning commission appointment for district five okay is there a second i'll second we've got a second mr cato any

» discussion mr tomlinson um christopher has been been in the community a couple years now um willie really willing and eager to serve he's an engineer by trade um and him and i got to know each other over the past couple years and i feel like he'd be a great asset to our planning commission um and he's appreciate his willingness to serve thank you mr thompson mr cato you had the second any discussion no council members any discussion comments or questions for those who are present thank you mr shoemake mr tucker anything remotely i just wanted to say uh councilman thompson i said thank you for willing to serve and um appreciate only being here just a couple of years jumping in full force thank you councilman tucker with that we'll move it to a vote we'll do those in person first those in fav

» or who are present raise your hand it's unanimous in favor for those who are in person mr tucker how do you vote remotely yes that is a yes remotely for mr tucker it's unanimous as hannah on 12 a that takes us to number 12 yes sir mr tucker before we go to 12b i just want to put council notice that i will have um a reappointment for my district in our january meeting first meeting in january okay we'll look to ms hannah to make sure the applications in the packet or maybe you said reappointment i couldn't quite hear you i did it okay either way we'll take care of that thank you thank you that takes us to item number 12b placed on by councilman shoemake clean community commission mr cato mr chair i do have a motion this motion will come in the form of a slate appointment motion uh meaning th

» at we have four individuals that we would like to nominate at one time um if that's okay with the dice this will be for the clean community commission the first will be a connor rome from district two to say and if these people are in the audience please stand miss virginia long danielle pressner and that's district six and jennifer brown which would be the elgin appointment this would fulfill the the commission the clean commission list um and these individuals that's been strongly discussed with the chairperson miss jill wolf she has played a major part in uh helping us fill this this list this commission and uh these are our recommendations would you say the names one more time so we can get you a second connor rome virginia long daniel pressner and jennifer branham thank you is there a

» second second mr schumacher has a second any further discussion these all these all these gen all these i'm sorry go ahead dan all these individuals have come highly recommended again miss jill wolf the chairperson of this commission has really played a large part and i appreciate i just want to say thank you to her for the work she she does with this commission and the time she puts into it and um i know she'll be extremely happy to get this commission field yeah between this and the river cleanup i don't know how many tons the wool family is responsible for helping the cleanup in kershaw county it's amazing um mr shoemaker you have the second yeah again can't not reiterate the appreciation for joe wolf who i believe is back there yeah yeah so ms wolf is here with us and uh just uh you kno

» w connor i haven't met you yet but i will tell you uh connor as i understand is relatively new back to the area citadel grad correct graduated the citadel and it has eagerly reached out to ask to be of service and immediately agreed to do this and so i very much look forward to seeing all the things connor will do on this commission and what i suspect will be many other service opportunities in the county so thank you both for being here tonight and i look forward to working with you guys thank you mr um tucker you had the floor next yes sir thank you and i'm sorry to jump the gun there gentlemen um i just want to say because um this this is how this commission got um done in the past as well um certain commissions like the clean community commission and we have a few others we have to pick

» the people that's willing to serve so the kid the commission can do their job so don't get that out of shape if you can't find someone from your area because for me for my district which i know there's one in there um i want good people versus just having someone to represent district two they're not willing to put in the time and willing to do the work what what good are they holding the position so um it may get a little wacky moving forward but i want to thank miss jill wolf for coming up with a good slate of uh candidates um for us uh to approve but i i want to also put council on notice it's more putting good people than it is having representation sometimes thank you mr tucker any other comments or questions council members seeing none we'll move to a vote for those who are present al

» l in favor raise your hand on the slate it's unanimous in favor for those who are present mr tucker how do you vote yes miss hannah that is a yes remotely from mr tucker thank you guys appreciate it thank you so much appreciate y'all being here tonight all right that moves us to back on the agenda item number 7a this is fiscal year 24 25 audit presentation placed on by the administrator mr templar thank you mr chairman members of council we have uh mark wood here tonight for the presentation of our annual audit this is uh something we always do we try to get it in by the end of the year so mark would come up and give us the news all right let's uh we've heard the background for it let's go ahead and move to a vote for a public presentation i'll make the motion is there a second i'll second

» we got a second any discussion seeing none we'll move it to vote those who are present in favor on the public presentation raise your hand it's unanimous in favor for those who are present mr tucker how do you vote yes thank you miss hannah for the record it passes and mr wood thank you chairman connell and members of council it's a pleasure to be here tonight to go over the 630 25 audit summary everybody should have this audit summary in front of you so that's what we'll go through uh there are there's also a letter attached to this uh it's just a communication letter uh that's required under our standards and it basically just says that uh there were no new policies that the county adopted no difficulties encountered during the audit no disagreements with management so like i said it's ju

» st required communication that we're that we are have to give in our standards um the county once again received an unmodified opinion that just means a clean opinion on your financial statements number one we've gone through this enough i don't think i need to spend any time it just gives you a breakdown of how the audit report's laid out so i'll go through two three and four i'll do general fund and then i'll go back to the proprietary fund and i'll also give you page numbers in case you want to go and look at the detail later of how these numbers are derived the total assets for the general fund as of 6 30 25 were 53.7 million total liabilities and deferred inflows were 37.5 so your fund balance is a little over 16 million dollars that's made up of some non-spendable that's your prepaid

» expenses small amount restricted. Council has committed fund balance of $7.6 million and your unassigned is $8.5. You can find the information if you want to look and see the specifics of what's been committed and the total assets if you want to see the details that's on page 16 of the report. Total revenues were $28.3 million.

» Total expenditures were a little over 25 million and you had transfers and other financing sources of 4.4 negative and so your negative change in fund balance for 63025 was 1.1 million dollars you can find that on page 18 but i do want to mention that council had budgeted last year to spend 4.9 million dollars of your fund balance reserves so you only spent 1.1 so you were 3.8 million dollars to the good that you ended up not having to spend okay and we'll kind of get into that when we talk about the budget of why that is once again uh that information is on page 18 of the report proprietary funds so this is a combination so if you want to see how sewer and ems did individually you can look on page 20 But total assets and total deferred outflows were $52.1 million.

» Liabilities and deferred inflows were $8.3 million. So your net position, that's your equity, is $43.8 million. That's made up of, the majority of that is your capital assets. So that's $33.2 million. Restricted, $679,000. And your unrestricted net position for both funds is almost $9.9 million. total revenues 11.8 million expenditures 11.5 and then you've also got transfers and other sources what this what the majority of this is is your skip grant i know this is a little strange but because of the way our accounting standards are anytime you have a capital grant it gets recognized as revenue and you book an asset and as you depreciate that asset over its useful life that's when you recognize that expense, okay? So it's only a presentation, the way that this has got to be shown.

» But the change in net position was a little over $2 million. That information can be found on page 21 of the report. Getting into your budget, this starts on page 65 to 72. So you can actually go through and look at the different areas. But your revenues exceeded budget by almost $1.7 million. Expenditures were under budget by 2.2, and your transfers were over budget by 5 million. So what I was getting at when I was saying that you had budgeted $4.9 million of spending your reserves, the reason you didn't have to spend that much was revenues exceeded budget and your expenditures were under budget. So that's how you were able to not use as much reserves as what you had budgeted for. Once again, there's no findings this year.

» I would like to thank Sandra and the finance staff for all their hard work. And once again, you know, your finance director wrote the audit report. So I would just like to give her congratulations. And I come in, and we put them through the ringer for about two weeks up here and asked for a lot of information. And they're very easy to work with, and the administrator as well, too. So I just want to thank them for all their hard work.

» and with that i'm done and i'm happy to answer any questions if anybody's got anything thank you mr wood for um the packet staff to help him prepare this well as well any questions or comments from council members mr chairman if i may mr brazel hey welcome mark good to see you good to see you i appreciate the job that you do and that our staff does here we've always had positive reporting and positive findings in uh in our audits this year it looks especially positive in the fact that We Kershaw County received one point seven million dollars more than it spent in the general fund out of all all three of our funds All the findings were positive and non-negative. Is that correct? That's correct in terms of positive cash flow and More revenue than spending correct.

» That's right We've done this in the past and we've made headway. I know that there's a budget line item I think it's maybe $600,000 every year that covers debt. Is that right? Yes. A certain amount of money that's committed to old bonds, bonds that were maybe 2015, some older than that. So what I think is done in the past is anytime there's been a surplus, I think the last couple years there's been a concerted effort, not only from council but from the administrative side and finance side, is to start paying some of these bonds off.

» and y'all have done that aggressively um if you look at page get to the page here if you look at page 47 in your report under the business type activities so these are the sewer bonds your 2008 a um and i've discussed this with with administration and with finance but my suggestion is is you would try to eliminate the 2008 a geo bond during the 26th fiscal year you can see that that your ending balance is about $790,000. You've got to make a payment of $435,000. So I would say if there's any surplus, that you would go ahead and knock that bond out, and then you can start on the SRF. You can't do anything with the 2021 bonds yet in the general fund. You have a 10-year prepayment issue. What's the penalty for prepayment? They will not allow you to do it, period. There is no penalty.

» They just said you can't do it, period. that's been that's been confirmed by the bonding agencies so you can't make a prepayment on those 2021 bonds until 2031. interesting um okay well i appreciate the recommendation i'd like to make that recommendation to our finance committee um per for your recommendation into our administration um prior to moving in the next year's budget cycle certainly with a with a necessary payment of 435 five hundred and twenty dollars um there's no need to to not pay the other 350 000 roughly um and that would free up 435 000 worth of capital in 2028 is that right free it up in 2027.

» i'm saying pay it off in the first year again 2026 27 yes that would free that up perfect was was that not our intention i think i think that is the intention i just wanted to i haven't discussed that i just haven't heard anything about that i think that that's pretty i appreciate you bringing that up mr brazel yeah well we've done good work i think we've all we've all pushed this and i mean y'all have y'all been aggressively paying some of these bonds off and anytime that there's been surplus for the last i think three years now y'all have made extra payments on some of these bonds to get them paid off well i think done a good job no question about that and then the only one we would have left that we could that we could aggressively pay off before 2031 is the srf geo bond for 3.1 million

» that's correct okay thank you i appreciate it i'll come visit with you to talk more in depth in private and i look forward to it thank you thank you mr brazel any other comments or questions in person before we go remote mr tucker mr tucker any questions or comments uh no sir mr chair thank you uh just appreciate what they do thank you uh mr tucker mr administrator any other follow-up before we move on mark appreciate you again all right thank you for me mr chair sir i'd just like to say i apologize for being late welcome thank you it's good to be here mark great job all right gentlemen that takes us to item number uh 7b placed on the agenda by vice chairman russell brazel in relation to des mr brazel you have a motion thank you yes sir mr chairman i'd like to make a motion to welcome um mi

» ss myra reese jill stewart and david vaughn uh to come and give all of council a presentation all right do we have a second mr she makes got the second is there any other discussion or questions seeing none we'll move it to a vote for those who are present all in favor raise your hand it's unanimous in favor for those who are present mr tucker how do you vote remotely yes it's a yes mr tucker remotely ms hennix unanimous yes ma'am please good evening mr chairman and members of the council thank you all so much for giving us an opportunity to spend some time with you uh this evening and i want to begin by introducing a couple of my leaders um this is part of my 18th and i'm with the new department first and david i can't hear her because she's back in the mic i'm sorry just take that thing a

» nd pull it over here here we go i had just introduced david vaughn you may know david um he's the um our compliance assistance liaison and also jill stewart is with me tonight um she works with me as the director of permitting support so um they're going to be sharing a little bit of information a little bit later but i wanted to kind of you know set the foundation for why we're here tonight and kind of give you an offer offer for consideration yes sir excuse me give me your title again is that what do you do yes sir i'm sorry so i'm myra reese and i'm the director of the newly created department of environmental services congratulations yes sir yes sir and you may you may recall i mean that was a pretty significant state decision um separating dhack and forming a new public health agency a

» new department of environmental services and i've been very fortunate i have the best team in the world and certainly along with a new agency we had a new vision for this agency and one of the things that i have really been focusing on is our partnerships with local government i really feel like we serve the same communities we work on the same issues we work on storm water solid waste drinking water all of the infrastructure issues that might be things that we need to be working collaboratively with as we experience growth and and the county and the state see great things coming in so we want to set up a pilot to really work very collaboratively with the county and we just felt like kershaw would be a great opportunity and i've got a team of folks that are going to be a resource for you gu

» ys if you're interested but one thing i have been doing is going around to a lot of counties talking about the challenges with stormwater especially if a county has a certain area of their county that's an ms4 and then part of it is not and just a lot of questions and a lot of clarity that's that has been requested because of what's required at the federal level the state level and the local level so tonight what we thought we would do is just kind of just kind of plant a seed a little bit with stormwater but we look forward to continuing the conversation with kershaw if y'all are interested we have many things we could talk about um and we would we'd be open to having a retreat and really just talking about all the many things that i know that y'all think about and you demonstrate leadersh

» ip on a daily basis so with that i'm going to ask jill to come up and kind of give you a quick uh rundown of stormwater see if you have any questions and then if there's anything else for us if i may just briefly before jill get started i'd like to thank you for being here uh councilman jones you noted um she was she was shy to tell us who she was she took time out of a very big busy schedule to be here in kershaw county she's the director confirmed director of department of environmental services and she's done us a great favor by being here she's been so helpful to me and the ability to partner with a state agency this is something big for kershaw county and this is positive the conversations that she and i've had regarding how to how to have a solution for an issue versus the threat or t

» he fear of a fine or a pending fine for kershaw county is phenomenal i mean this is just the way state and local government should work together and i just really thank you for being here tonight um thank you i can't i can't sing your praises high enough and i do i thank you for being here and i thank jill and david for being here tonight as well but i couldn't i couldn't let you go without me saying that yes ma'am appreciate that um and um what i'm going to do you all have got the complete presentation tonight and i may breeze over a couple of of slides to remain succinct and within time but before i came to work with myra about a year ago working more broadly with our agency i led our stormwater permitting program at the state for about 22 years and in that time spent many opportunities t

» raveling the state and presenting on topics to county councils as as they're making decisions that are right when it comes to stormwater permitting at the local level because we do know y'all are are very much the front runner and front line when it comes to development in in your areas really kind of want to highlight a couple of objectives tonight is really to help you understand your responsibilities that stem from from federal stormwater rules how we as a state play into that and then what are your responsibilities from the our state and federal stormwater regulations and then we're going to talk about this little dichotomy we have with inside and outside this term ms4 and if you haven't heard that that acronym before its municipal separate storm sewer system and it originates from the

» fact that here in the southeast sanitary sewer and storm sewer aren't mixed in together if you go up north they have a lot of what are called CSOs where they're combined together so here we keep clean water clean and then the other water it goes to other places so and then certainly any questions you may have we're happy to answer those so when it comes to stormwater permitting des is kind of the nexus for our state we have regulations that flow to us from the Clean Water Act and from Congress and EPA those are called in PDS which is national pollutant discharge elimination system we also have a set of state regulations that were brought and promulgated by our General Assembly about the same time as our federal regulations and with those state regulations they're focused more on how much ru

» noff and we'll go into kind of the different aspects of stormwater as we go through this this this slide deck so if we talk about federal to state to local most of what your experience in as an ms4 is going to stem from from federal so the clean water act was passed in the 1970s and the intent of it is to restore and maintain the the chemical physical and biological integrity of our nation's waters and the picture that you see up top is the cuyahoga river in ohio which caught fire more than one time in the 1960s the bottom picture myra alluded to my connection to kershaw county that's lake watery um my family and i have had a a spot up on that beautiful lake since the 1960s and so personally keeping it clean and having the privilege to serve the state of south carolina to keep it clean is i

» s has means the world to me if i could point of order mr chairman to me this is a vital thing that we've got going on with uh ms4 areas and the stormwater areas and we don't have anybody from administration in here right now and i would like our administration to hear this um mr jones we had a general work session previously where the same information was shared i'm not sure if the administrator felt sick or had to use the restroom or no no no i'm not condemning i'm just saying there's no one in here from administration largely the same slides have been heard by the administrator and we have copies of them okay already this is this is the public sharing of the same information okay thank you for including me in the public part of it yeah and he's back and he's back yeah so when we talk abou

» t npds and stormwater there really are four distinct areas that we regulate stormwater we regulate it from construction activities so you want to if you need to build everything from a dollar general to a scout motor plant in richland county you got to get a stormwater permit if you're disturbing more than an acre for that construction activity we regulate stormwater from certain industrial activities concrete plants industries others that have products that if it gets mixed with storm water could impact our our state's water quality and then lastly is our municipal separate storm sewer systems and that is what in kershaw county is permitted as so ms4s if we zoom down into south carolina and these regs are replicated across the nation so ms4s are any cities counties military institute insta

» llations or public institutions the way that we identify what parts of a state or what parts of a a geographical area rms4s are by the census so each time the federal government puts on a census we look at the population boundaries and the regulations say that if you have an urbanized area then we have to issue a permit for stormwater quality to the government who's operating and responsible for for regulation to some for lack of a better word in that area in south carolina we have 82 ms4s so again that can be cities that can be counties even clemson university because they own their own storm sewer system is an ms4 and right now our boundaries are still based on the 2010 census they'll be working to reissue a new permit and updating some of those boundaries across the state where we've see

» n some really expansive growth do you have a um kind of an estimate on when those will be updated um are we looking at what then by the next census so we have the maps it's just that we can't until we get out a new permit we can't enforce those new boundaries so that's a tool through which we will expand boundaries throughout the state we're adding a couple new ms4s down along the coast but certainly our staff would could work with you and your your staff to understand what how how growth has impacted you here in kershaw county and you'll see in just a minute how um the level at which we these maps are derived but i think most people if you work around development what you see is the that when you hear stormwater programs you think about construction site runoff you think about post constru

» ction runoff but what you as ms4s have to do is to really kind of look at the big picture you've got to work to make sure you're educating your citizens um about the impacts that they have on water quality through the public education and outreach certainly the the work of the the your clean committee in litter control that's an example of you implementing as an ms4 whether you've made the nexus or not that is public involvement that is working to to remove store or pollution before it reaches our waterways a couple of the other elements that ms4s must deal with is illicit discharge detection and and elimination so mapping your storm sewer system and making sure somebody's dryer or water washer line isn't tied to it and then lastly would be pollution prevention for your own facilities so ke

» eping your own house in order but i think a lot of what we hear in a state particularly a growing state like south carolina really focuses on development so when it comes to development ms4s are required to through the permits to have ordinances where you review stormwater plans for land development you have to have inspectors to go and inspect those sites when they're under active construction and then you have to have the mechanisms to take compliance action or do enforcement when the operator of a construction site isn't following your ordinances and again we we have incorporated into that some of our statewide standards for stormwater management and sediment erosion control well we talk about ms4 what about outside ms4 um when we go to outside if you i've got a slide for that if you'll

» if you'll bear with me a little bit um so really if within them as far you are mandated to do these six things to have your program built around that if you hold that thought our state rules provide a mechanism called delegation and what when those rules were written they foresaw that some counties might want to implement a local stormwater program so they set a mechanism to do it county-wide and we had probably eight or ten counties before the ms4 program came along which was that ms4 program was in the early 2000s so before that we had richland county and york county and lexington county that were running a stormwater program county-wide no they didn't have to do illicit discharge detection they didn't have to do public education and outreach but they did have to do the plan review and th

» e inspection and the um here's my slide um so we'll get to that um sorry i didn't mean for that be so loud but that was just a reminder to me gentlemen i'd seek a motion to extend under our rules yeah i'll make a motion to extend all right is there a second all in favor her present will extend under the rules mr mr tucker how do you vote yes all right public presentation continues thank you so let's talk about what that boundary looks like and how big it is so if you look these maps so in kershaw county you only have a very little narrow band that meets the census definition of an urbanized area and we as a state can't force you to expand it largely we can bump those out a little bit by watersheds or other factors sometimes maybe there's a road if you look at the the other at the parcel sca

» le um sometimes we said okay you know maybe that census map cut the parcel in half let's bring it to roads because when you're reviewing development plans it makes it easier and more streamlined to implement your program so in in kershaw county in particular i'm pretty sure you've got the smallest maybe darlington portion of the county per overall percentage that's covered under your ms4 permit and it's not unusual lancaster county where i'm from same issue is that up in that indian land charlotte area is where they have ms4 and south of lancaster is is not but there are options and i know that we've had a lot of sites over the years where there's it's hard to help people understand if you're talking to a a developer and you're trying to determine who you need to submit a permit to and what

» the rules are that one parcel could be different than the other and who's going to inspect it so it's it can be quite logistically challenging so when it comes to within the ms4 and outside of it i created this slide that really kind of tells the different in what you must do and what you may do so having local ordinances for stormwater Kershaw County must do that within the ms4 area and that pertains to development illicit discharge detection post construction construction runoff when it comes to the site scale when you're reviewing development plans you have to have the staff and you have to have the inspectors to review those before they're approved and then to inspect them as they're undergoing construction that's a must do from both the construction site runoff and post construction si

» te runoff control but if the county were to select the option of expanding the program a little larger you would be the ones taking the lead for that now there is another little kink in that that they're still going to have to come to des um for so every construction site once they come through you we have a big statewide stormwater permit and we have to give them a permit under that for construction site operators now when you've got an ms4 that's your lead in permitting if you are acme development and you're building a new warehouse here in kershaw county right now acme would send their development plans to kershaw county kershaw county would review them issue a local approval when it came to us it would be an administrative review it's essentially a rubber stamp and epa won't let us pass

» that down further we've we've we've asked but we can't do that well if acme development is working outside your ms4 area then i think i'm pretty sure y'all have got some other county ordinances that may deal with land development and and other concerns and what we see a lot of times is acme would have to submit a plan to kershaw county get those approved but then they have to submit that plan to us for a stormwater permit as well and and again we have to issue the mpds permit i'm going to pause right there because i know that's that's confusing um it it took me no it leads me to have some questions but i'm gonna yield to my colleagues and see what they gotta say so if if we just want to take a little quick uh q a um for points of clarification um if if we have an industrial site or commerci

» al site that's outside of the ms4 we'd be tasked as the county with a proven construction process and we can utilize des as an agency to help us in an assist to regulate storm water and that's something that we wouldn't have to do with it in that scenario if you're outside of an ms4 area we already are doing it right so we are reviewing for stormwater runoff from pre-development looking at how much does it increase for development to post development we're looking at water quality we are not looking at the sizing of any of the internal pipes and drainage in those we don't look at and a lot of counties the standards for sizing of drainage and roads is is done we don't do any of that so we don't have statewide standards for for culvert sizing so we wouldn't do any of that but yeah it still ri

» ght now comes through through us when it's outside of that kind of must-do area now if if kershaw county uh reviews the plans um if our ordinance says that that it must comply to our standards equal to the inside of ms4 is that all of a sudden ms4 is kind of applied county-wide at that point no what you would do is you would essentially submit a uh a request for uh the way that it's written in the state regs is you request delegation so you could come to us with an approach with a a proposal and say you know what we're going to review plans we're going to do inspections just like we're doing in the ms4 area and in essence we would hand over the reins and say yeah we we trust you you're doing it right we would review that and essentially that's the form delegation is the formal way in which

» we hand over the reins so that is a process that we've done in like newberry county has been delegated to run the state stormwater program for about 15 years down amongst corner they know they're going to be an ms4 so they went ahead and because they wanted to control the development process they sought delegation of that state stormwater program so now if you're doing work in monk's corner you go to monk's corner they're not an ms4 yet they likely will be in this next round but they saw it as a benefit for their citizens to to bring about that option one one quick question so say the rms4 is expanded now or if it expands to a certain area where there are businesses that have that are now within that ms4 there's neighborhoods that are now within that ms4 through the expansion there are they

» grandfathered in to the old or would they then so so say that you know you mentioned your washing machine drain being hooked up to stormwater right so we have a lot of that in an area that's been taken in what would be the methods forward and who would be responsible ultimately for that since it's now within ms4 so if that were the case you would then the first step would be you would have to map your storm sewer system in that area the permit the way it's written right now says okay once you expand your area even if you um annex a larger area a neighborhood that you're given a period of time with which to to map that area see where the pipes are do some sampling and identify that but it would be expected for illicit discharge detection and elimination you would have be expected to have to

» do that and so kershaw county would be responsible for that one but for instance um like pond maintenance detention pond maintenance if that site was permitted 15 years ago you wouldn't be expected to make sure they maintain their storm water system the permit kind of teases out different aspects so be based upon when the permit was granted yeah it would be based on when or who reviewed it the way we when we wrote that permit we said you know most of the ms4s are not going to have our old files you're not going to have our plans what what let's Let's say this is a scenario where the state legislature decides that that is something that they want to enforce and have it enforced within a strict period of time.

» At that point, what would be, I know that, you know, because being a state agency, you're at the direction of the legislature. So if that was to happen, ultimately, what would, I mean, would the knife be in our backs at that point? How would we go about doing that? We work for the General Assembly, and they pass laws and regulate. Actually, they pass laws, we write regulations. And both of those are open, very transparent processes, and any regulation we propose has to go before the South Carolina General Assembly and be approved by the General Assembly before it's implemented. So there are many opportunities for potential stakeholders to explain what the impact of any regulation we write is.

» So, and for instance, with counties, certainly the Association of Counties, the Municipal Association will work heavily with their member organizations to have conversation with us about the impact of it to them. Thank you. The way I understood that, if I may, and to your point, Councilman Thomason, currently inside MS4, we would probably have, and I'd like to identify through our partnership, who we do have that would qualify as someone who we are responsible for in that scenario that he mentioned. It doesn't sound to me like there are going to be many cases where we would be responsible for somebody's detention pond. Am I hearing that correctly? You're hearing that correctly.

» We do have some counties that have opted particularly in residential to take over maintenance of detention ponds no matter when they were permitted because they know that for their citizens that's in their best interest but no the the way the permit is has been written the past two two cycles is we we are forward-looking so any that you permit as Kershaw County and you have the plans with and you have the history of you kind of would keep keep rolling with those keep keep track of those keep inspecting those and make sure those are done and and working back with in terms of a partnership if your staff are out and you get a complaint about a detention pond then working with us in our regional office to to try to figure out who owns it and who's responsible for addressing any concerns with th

» e condition of that pond so for the sake of a 30 000 foot view of of what we're trying to do um and to that point councilman des is offering us an opportunity tonight to to form a pilot program through a cooperative partnership and um i even thought about it today what do we call this partnership right i said jill you can you can help me figure that out but it's a collaboration between kershaw county and des in a co-op partnership that that helps us find solutions not through fines not through uh an iron fist but but through a friendly partnership and working together i don't know if if david i know he's a his title says liaison i don't know if if he'll be dedicated our liaison we we will figure that out and we usually work together and we kind of tag team um to to i think as we flesh out t

» his partnership understand what the value is it to you what is the value to you as a council what is the value to to the residents and businesses in kershaw county um we learn with other part we've got a pilot we're doing right now with kershaw camp or not kershaw with lexington county where we're doing some deep dives into their permitting process and through that we're having some really good conversations that then we can take and scale up to a statewide level so looking at how the lens with which you view things is really important to us i've always said we don't run an ms4 program we don't understand the limitations that you have we have regulations that we have to write permits by but you got to have some pr but having practicality in that because ultimately it's the watery river it's

» lake watery it's it's the creeks of kershaw county that benefit from that and it's your citizens so being collaborative it helps us all and again it helps us learn as our state grows so incredibly fast well if there's any takeaway that i want to have and i'm going to shut up and i'll let you finish your presentation but if there's any takeaway tonight is that this council has a unique opportunity uh to to save save money save time and you know if there's any burning issue by administration bring it to light with with des now through our liaison attack it head on fix it manage the future and we're just in a beautiful spot i mean if this is for real what she's saying up there it's the first time i've heard it these are these are the heads these are the chiefs a wonderful opportunity for us to

» be able to work with you and not have to fund an enforcement department to go there and write tickets and write fines and charge people but to work together with the state agency and i was always under the assumption that all the retention pods were our responsibility well i think maybe some are but that's something like we just need a clear definition we can clear definition of that and and you talk about not writing fines david another part of david's role is working with home builders and and compliance assistance with them so in in partnership conversations if your staff is repeatedly having concerns from from builders or from painters or whoever then you know maybe part of what we do is okay let's let's do some focus training and instead of doing penalties let's let's teach them why we

» do it i always think making the connection to whatever it is you're doing personally is really helps people to understand why they've got to do it and for me making the connection to lake watery and to the value there helps me see why my job is important or when i go to talk to engineering school students at usc like they like to kayak like you know you're as engineers the work you do is going to protect those waters that you enjoy spending time with and i know you all value this community and so that would be our goal from this partnership is help all of us to come to common understanding and and come away with some good ideas this is a refreshing view from a state agency I think we've got a lot of House representatives and senators to thank for hiring the right person and putting her in t

» his place and I just love this attitude it's very refreshing I think in the reminds me myself there you go I think we need to let let her proceed so we can get through this and be mindful of your time is all of the presentation that i that i have um so thank you jill any other questions or comments from council members mr tucker anything remotely that's a no from mr tucker mr jones how do we get started i think probably david and i will talk but maybe uh like a workshop type session where whoever from the council and and i'm guessing the administration and your existing stormwater program we sit down and let's define what the scope is almost like you would do with strategic planning well and council can help me and correct me on this if i'm wrong but i think we've been talking about creatin

» g a stormwater department i'd rather sit down with you instead of create something that's going to cost millions of dollars to the taxpayers and it sounds like you guys really want to work with the people of crush on county and that's what it's all about yeah we can do that and you i think you've just offered us a wonderful opportunity that's why we should stop and let's think about this before we move any further and by doing that i think maybe having a work session with you or with your agency whoever uh i'm all in but it takes more than just me can i mr chairman yes sir i just want to be because i was in the session we had earlier i just want to be clear because address something councilman jones says in our breakout session i remember when our work session we talked about you guys aren'

» t suggesting we don't set up a stormwater department as i understand you guys mentioned that des is sort of the least standard and that standing of a stormwater department would not be a bad idea is that correct we don't tell you how to structure your program we tell your program what you've got to do and it's up and there are many different models in city and county government of how storm water the permit is implemented but we again our role is to make sure you implement the permit the pieces and parts and tools that you do organize organ is i can't talk this evening i got a little bit of a cold um organizationally is really your decision of what's best for kershaw county and whether it's through a standalone department there's it's done different ways throughout the state and so maybe br

» inging in some of the others and talking about different practices would be part of what we do in different organizational structures that breed success well and i'd like to thank my colleague for his clarification but i'm still all in with what you said tonight i mean there's there's no how is there any take back or kick when you're doing something for the people when you're doing something to save them money you know i can remember a man told me one time when i first ran he said look you've got to continue your services but you've got to stop looking at tax taxing and creating new fees to resolve an issue you need to find alternative ways but you just offered us a wonderful alternative and i will speak to my right we we are doing that throughout our agency where we are working to evaluate

» the ways that we think the efficiencies of our programs and and how do we run our agency better how do we work with our customers better and we are picking up another of Myra's elements spreading that and how do we leverage what we're learning and working with the counties and cities throughout the state who are our other key partners so well I read the book by language three times in the 70s and i'm not gonna you could probably read my body language i'm all in to sit down and talk when it comes to making something easier on the people that we serve that put us there that if we don't be careful they'll wipe everybody out put somebody else here if we don't take care of them the proper way i think you've all pointed out a lot of good things and had a a lot of good questions and and what we co

» me away with as a a goal or a a game plan or areas to evaluate well i'd like to um i'd like to ask our chairman and our administrator mr templar um i think mr templar is a little bit under the weather i hope you feel better soon um this uh miss my reese in our conversation this morning recommended a summit of some some sort a stakeholder summit i'd happy to be part of that if we could have some members of council administration and engineering work together and tell me what i'm missing but i'd like to i'd like to do that if possible i mean we've done a work session once yeah we've heard from you again tonight which is great and i'm just interested in getting granular knowing what the program will completely entail if there's matching funds required from kershaw county or you know having ser

» ved at the state house and been on the split uh that relates to des and then coming back here and serving i'm just interested in getting into the details which would be probably two in the weeds for the meeting tonight but i would be interested in setting up a work session at some point where we can get together and you know have whichever uh folks from your administration uh miss reese that are you know on point for the various uh subject matter we'll have questions on so can we set a time on that well we're not gonna be able to say it at night but we have to hurt the cats after the new year i'm sure why why could we not set a 30-day time limit to have something brought back to us on the time for work mr jones i don't think 30 days is quite going to work with travel schedules we only have

» one meeting i'm not going anywhere well unfortunately i am i think every other council member is which is why we had one meeting in december for the holidays i think it'd be a great issue to visit right after the new year i'm getting nods from des as well maybe they have travel plans that we'll put we'll put a follow-up tickler on on the next meeting miss santa if you could do that for me um just to make sure we have something in january we can at least have something planned by the next meeting i think we could probably do that that's reasonable thank you thank you all for this opportunity thank you so much look forward to working with you we're very grateful appreciate you coming out tonight all right gentlemen that puts us back on the agenda no votes required on 7b we're on to item numbe

» r 8a approval of the minutes is there a motion make a motion we're approved a minute mr cato is there a second second mr thompson has a second any discussion mr cato thank you miss hannah appreciate your hard work yes ma'am okay seeing no further discussion of questions we'll move it to a vote for those who are present all in favor raise your hand on the minutes it's unanimous in favor for those who are present miss hannah mr tucker how do you vote remotely i'm abstaining abstaining that's what i thought for the record miss hannah so it passes the minutes pass on 8a item number on a placed on by vice chairman russell brazel pecan orchard update for discussion only is there a motion i make that motion and thank you mr jones makes the motion yeah okay what's the second well second mr jones yo

» u made the motion do you defer to mr brazel no yeah he defers yields mr brazel mr brazel you have the floor thank you um this is basically just uh wanted to put this on kind of like we we just discussed a a friendly reminder um just like we'll do in 30 days for for the des summit um i know we had two people in the room tonight that live in the pecan orchard um we have anybody else here tonight that's uh regarding the pecan orchard okay so um i think those folks have come and gone they were here to present actually i know we allocated some funds was it last year and just wanted to make sure that we we were moving the ball forward in this next year um i know it's been a busy season danny do you do you have an idea when we're going to start do we have any kind of start date so essentially the

» project has started with the permitting processes um there is one area that we will need to so we have water outflowing into one parcel outside of the neighborhood i reached out to that property owner i know him personally so uh had a discussion to see what his what his thoughts were on a potential easement or right away depending on what we need so he's amenable to it just wanted to see what the engineers come up with length with kind of what does it look like not one of the more important outfalls but it is one that is needed if we're going to be successful on these permits utilities the utility companies are aware out there they're going to have to do a lot of relocation so this is uh kind of all the background work right now before shovels start getting put in the dirt but the project h

» as started um and it's it's you know speaking with michael baker they're handling the permitting um so and it's just this phase i think his first two two phases is essentially going to be on the one street i think it's blackberry but that's where a vast majority of the impact is coming so um yeah we'll if we do a 30-day kind of a mile marker like we did with the last presentation i hope to have a little bit more in terms of permitting and i want to set up those meetings sooner rather than later if i can get some sort of rendering with that with that gentleman and his willingness to have a uh an easement or right away so that's okay so i would make the recommendation that if um if we can't have that done within the next 30 days we find an alternate solution um i know water's running in diffe

» rent directions um it's already going somewhere it's probably going across his yard now so hopefully we can we can make it a better better for him as well whoever that landowner is um can we can we get a hard timeline no later than 60 days as far as when shovels hit the ground and we'll put a reminder in 30.

» we've been talking about this this was august 12th of 2025 that we passed the uh we got finance committee updated us on phase one and it passed so here we are at the end of the year time's just getting by and we're meeting infrequently so um not to say i want to put a rush on it because it wouldn't be a rush i'd like to get this thing moving though so you're saying shovels in the ground in 60 days no i want a a hard timeline i want a soft timeline in 30 days and a hard timeline in 60 days i could do the soft i can't promise anything on hard because i'm not in control of a lot of these things these or outside utility companies if you have trouble with them call some of us i think we can make some phone calls danny to help you sir call us if you're having trouble with them i think we can get

» chair vice chair someone make a phone call that might help you in the next meeting let us know what you need from us and we will help along the way but um whatever it takes is what we're going to do amen i'm happy to help just let me know just let me know what what to do and we'll do it look at look at what we just have presented before us from from a state agency these people are ready to help kershaw county um if if there's any kind of permitting issue i think we've got all the help we need in columbia if there's uh if there's a utility issue i think we can help with that as well we've got great friends with fairfield electric um who's the electric service provider the pecan orchard i think it's fiber and and things like that but i don't i don't know who the electrical provider probably f

» airfield electric duke is duke david said he doesn't pay the bill well whatever we do to help is you know i'm not here demanding a result without offering my help i'm i'm here demanding a result in offering my help um but we've appropriated the money we we need to we've got that we have so many things to do we need to get this one moving in behind us Um, I just I don't know we've talked about it for a long time really talk about something fresh Thank you. Yes Mr. Jones, I'm great. I'm doing great. All right. Merry Christmas any other comments or questions on item number 9a Mr. Tucker anything remotely All right, that concludes item number 9a no votes required. Thank you. Miss Hannah Mr. Brown if you could put a reminder on on every agenda moving forward throughout next year All right.

» That takes us to item number 9B. I'll make a motion that we discuss pickleball courts at West Watery Complex. Is there a second? What did you just say? That moves us to item number 9B. I make a motion that we discuss pickleball courts at the West Watery Complex. That's my motion. You said it so fast I couldn't understand it. We got a second from Mr. Shoemake. Okay. So we've talked about, and there's been public interest in having the tennis courts converted to pickleball courts out at the West Watery Complex. You already have some construction going out there in the form of utilities being moved and then significant parking being accomplished based on what the council's done.

» I just wanted to update the council that I've got a private donor who's willing to put $105,000 towards that project. And I think based on, I'll leave it up to the administrator, this is really just for update. We don't have any quotes or anything. I know you have to follow procurement. But we've got a private donor that would have $105,000 to go towards that project. I know at one point that was more than half of the proposed cost of the project, which I thought was great because it saves the county those funds. But I'll bring additional details, and as the administrator lets us know, you know, what potential costs are.

» Do we have an idea what the ballpark cost of that would be? At one time it was $150, then it was $180, and I don't know what it is now, but that was within the last four or five months. cost escalations have been kind of ridiculous over the last 18 months to two years or five years depending on the horizon it really is just crazy and so it makes me feel like somebody's trying to get over on Kershaw County but then I see cost escalation and and you know all private matters that you try to build and do as well so um but anyway update for the council that we've got those funds from a private donor um they're the motivation is someone who really is interested pickleball it'd be donated in uh in her name and they would name one of the courts after this person who had some health issues in the pa

» st as i understand it but as an avid pickleball player and they just want to you know do that for kershaw county in the west watery complex and that concludes my remark any questions any comments if we don't do the pickleball course could she donate that money to uh stormwater to the stormwater yeah well i i don't think so we're gonna have to find an independent way to fund that they're not as passionate about stormwater mr jones and that is exactly why i'm so glad the state of south carolina was in here tonight to tell us how much they can save our citizens thank you all right that concludes on item number 9b if we don't have anything from you mr tucker no sir all right that takes us to item number 10a this is a first reading on orders to amend um the zldr land use development any uh backg

» round we need mr templer on this one on first reading uh we're on 10a well sir this was just some light background this was to adjust the zldr as it relates to where these types of businesses would be allowed to go within the county from a planning and zoning aspect okay thank you for the background do we have a motion yes mr chairman i'd like to make a motion to pass the first reading of an ordinance to amend the kershaw county south carolina unified code of zoning and land development regulations to add section 3.3.29 and amend table 3-3 to establish retail establishments selling hemp-derived or synthetic cannabinoid products as a conditional use in certain zoning districts subject to location, separation, and operational restrictions. That's the motion. Is there a second? Second. Mr.

» Jones has a second. Mr. Brazel. Thank you, Chairman. As we've noted, and you'll probably see highlighted very soon, this poison is killing our children, strangling generations from our mothers, our grandmothers, and our children because of a silly loophole left in a farm bill that's allowed THC-driven synthetic Chinese-made drugs prevalent in gas stations, vape shops, throughout the state of South Carolina and specifically where we can legislate here in Kershaw County it would be my resolution and my best effort to get this poison off the streets save our children save our parents and loved ones who think maybe they're buying a drink that's something as mild as a CBD oil or cream that you could buy yet it's synthesized potent THC marijuana that could have as noted earlier terrible effects o

» n our children causing states of psychosis and currently in South Carolina in our County it sold with no age restrictions this is not your granddaddy's pot this is poison this is something that is plaguing it's plaguing the world it's plaguing South Carolina and now we're starting to see state level mandates and regulations we're We're going to see federal change, but something that we can do sooner than later is help through zoning ordinances. And I really appreciate our county attorney working with me on this. John, you've done a great job. I commend you, and I thank you. I just hope that we've talked about this, and through the briefings, I hope that everybody sees how devastating this is to families here in South Carolina. Thank you, sir. Any other comments or questions? Mr.

» Jones, you have the second. I just want to say thank you to Mr. Brazel for the hard work he's put into this because this is a lot. And I usually don't vote on a whole lot of new ordinances, but this is one that's a no-brainer. And it's good to see our chairman from the Alpha Center here, and Pastor Reverend Lee. And I heard that y'all had spoke tonight on it. But this is a no-brainer. And I'm just thankful that this council is supportive of this. Thank you so much. Yes, sir. Thank you.

» other comments or questions for those who are in person mr tucker any comments or questions remotely i just had a question on so this won't affect any of our establishments that's already in place and then my next question before you answer that is um how has anyone talked to the city's municipalities in the surrounding area because that's where i see a lot of them which are within the city limits of camden and elgin mr bose defer to our attorney for existing establishments while they might not be able to satisfy separation and location requirements the proposed ordinance does have them having to satisfy the operational restrictions blocking these products requiring identification requiring okay um independent testing of the products etc etc has a sunset provision for cessation of use to ha

» ve those non-conformities not be able to reopen if they stop operating for a period of time so yeah it does address existing uses and to councilman brazel's point there's federal legislation that becomes effective in the not too distant future which may um largely control this again in the future but in the present um many local jurisdictions have turned to zoning restrictions of these products to um stem the tide yeah can you win a fair government we'll all be dead thank you mr tucker i have a question um has any is the city or the town of elgin addressing any of these issues in their um municipalities was my second person i'm not aware of that but mr brasil and i did have discussions of uh the fact that um those those talks can occur and um you know administration and myself can certainly

» reach out and have those conversations yeah and the only reason i'm bringing this up because as we move through this ordinance i don't want the future stores to run to those locations because it's it's not an ordinance correct and just procedurally for for the benefit of council um this matter will appear on the planning commission agenda in january um january 3rd 12th planning commission meeting and then um we'll return to council with planning commission's recommendation okay great thank you thank you mr tucker anything else yeah i have a lot to say but i'm not going to say it right now thank you thank you mr tucker mr jones you said you're not going to say it now yeah yeah because mr tucker get mad at me all right well thank you mr jones Seeing no other comments or questions, we'll move

» it to a vote for those who are in person. Raise your hand if you're in favor. It's unanimous for those who are present and voting. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote on 10A? Vote yes. That's a yes. Ms. Hanna, for the record, it's unanimous in favor. Passes on first reading. We move on to item number 10B. This is a first reading. Briefly, may I say thank you to everyone? Sure. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Templer, any background we need on 10B before we seek a motion? Just this parcel, the property owner wishes to kind of clean up the overall parcels that they have to make it consistent and rezone to B2. Okay. This is the first reading on ordinance to amend the zoning map located in Lugoff and Boulware Road to B2 in a general business district.

» Is there a motion on 10B? I typically defer to the council member whose district it would be in for such a motion. Is there a motion on 10B? Councilman Jones, is that in your district, sir? you see me making a motion no sir i'll make a motion for purposes of discussion all right hold my hand for a second mr attorney we've got an item on the agenda under 10b not listed for discussion only we've got a motion that it comes up for discussion only not to have mr let me clarify i'll make the motion i'm doing so not because i support it but so it can move to discussion okay we do have a motion is there a second yeah i'll make a second there is a second Mr. Shoemake, you made the motion. Yeah, like I said, I'm interested. This is going from, I don't know if this is you, Danny, or John.

» What would be the density change with this zoning granted? Would it increase the available density? So there are contiguous parcels owned by the same property owner with different zoning designations. As far as the allowed uses, B2 and GD are not too dissimilar. Street frontage setbacks for B2 go from 50 to 40. Side and front setbacks remain the same, except rear setbacks would increase in B2. And there's some additional B2 setbacks if adjacent to residential. I don't believe it really has an impact on density, of course, for any kind of residential use. GD is the multi-use district intended to provide highest and best use of land. It is typically a little more permissive than the B2 and allows mixed-use products. But, again, they are both largely commercially aimed districts.

» So on the plat on Boulware Road, it's parcel B that's under review, correct? The 4.18 acres? Correct. It is that highlighted parcel on Boulware Road behind the frontage parcels along Ridgeway Road. And then on Boulware Road, the contiguous tract is 29 acres, and that's already B2? Yeah, I believe the properties under ownership by the applicant are B2 zoning. In fact, I believe the intent, and Mr. Hoover, our planning director, is here to provide a little more clarity, but I believe the B2 properties facing Ridgeway Road, some of those are in common ownership with this GD parcel.

» so the the track um the up church tract ending in zero seven five zero seven six zero seven seven are all um b2 as well correct those uh ridgeway road facing properties owned by up church are b2 that map showing the zoning designations of the adjacent properties are on page bear with me uh 10 of the staff report which has the aerial and then the zoning designations across the road between buckeye and bulware again fronting ridgeway you have a lot of r15 and across from this b2 on ridgeway there's a lot of r15 again mr hoover the subject matter expert and planner has arrived so um i can defer further granular questions to him and um ask that he make sure i did not misstate anything for council also interested to know the rezoning to similarity for adjacent tracks is there a common plan among

» st the own tracks you're aware of or not this is zach hoover for mr tucker's sake as far as we know there hasn't been no development plans uh the applicants i believe are here if they are to speak to that mr chairman when it's appropriate i want to make an amendment well let's hear from mr john wells welcome mr wells and for the record by the way this is district two is the district this is in okay this would be sammy's district just for what it's worth we've talked about it thank you according to this you sure about that i'm sure that it's what the thing says i'm sure that it says it in this document the reason for this request um came up because of a january 6 2022 plat prepared for dan rip prepared by dan riddick for the um for betty sue up church who is now deceased and it showed the lo

» ts on ridgeway road which are b2 and it showed the lot the 4.18 acre lot and it had a squiggly line between those two apparently he meant that that parcel the 4.18 acre parcel was joined to one of the ridgeway road and planning and zoning told us that was going to cause a problem because you had two you had two different zoning for the same piece of property and you have a policy in your zoning ordinance that you won't parcels uniformly zone the same thing throughout the entire parcel so we are asking to down zone the 4.1 acres, 4.1 acres. We're asking to down zone that from general commercial, which it is right now, down to B2, which is the more restrictive zoning.

» We think that would be the best interest of Kershaw County, and it would mean that all the Betty Sue upchurch lots would be zoned the same thing. They're going to be sold as one parcel. That makes perfect sense. I don't see the issue um with doing that i don't either um i believe we were getting a positive a positive recommendation from the planning commission said tonight but you again we've been through the planning committee yeah it's in the packet yeah you got a 4-0 and i mr wells i appreciate that just a moment of you know quick we're restricting ourselves more restrictive we want to sell it as one parcel could that have been general development due to the fact that mr upchurch had a landing strip for his helicopter could that had been a reason for it being in gd back in the day i thin

» k it was just this was where g general development and b2 met and the property behind this 4.18 acres is general commercial this was just where they met but we think that this parcel suits is more like the ridgeway road lots than it is like the gc it is development property behind it well i think that makes sense i'll tell you what if you if you could promise me a grocery store would would come to that property i could probably get um an extra vote from somebody in the audience in favor of um i'm very familiar with the property general development like you said is is the least restrictive um in the highest density and all that sort of thing so i think you guys are just trying to make one large parcel to offer one large parcel we don't want to confuse anybody yeah prior to offering it for sa

» le or development or something like that billy what yeah billy way is in charge of trying yeah and mr chair if i would i'd i'd appreciate again mr wells i appreciate you that that i think very much helps us yes and also just as one last thing i'd like to say which is a bit unrelated but uh as of course everyone up here knows mr wells used to sit in well i don't know if it was this specific chair but used to sit in my seat i was here with him county i know you were yeah he's a tough opponent i just wanted to say thank you for your service uh to this county because i know how difficult it is so thank you for that and that explanation was extremely helpful it's almost as if you've done this before yes well i thank you all because i've escaped and you're still in the arena i hope with our votes

» tonight we haven't created more work for you uh at the town of belgium mr chair it would be stones would be appropriate don't act like you're annoying don't act like what sir let me smile when i ask you a question you act like you're annoyed with me listen i smiled at my wife go ahead would it be appropriate mr john devos would be appropriate if i can do an amendment that would change mine to make an emotion we accept this for first reading it's on there already i thought you said discussion only no no no i clarified it we've got a motion it's on the table you got my vote john wills council well seeing no further discussion uh mr jones has already voted but we'll move it to a vote for those who are present all in favor raise your hand passes unanimously for those who are in person um mr tuc

» ker how do you vote yes cs remotely miss hannah it's unanimous and passes on first reading that's 10b well thank you yes sir your church family thank you yes good to see you tonight billy and family thank you all for being here item number 10c this is first reading on an ordinance to establish operation regulations regarding golf carts placed on by councilman jones and councilman tomlinson do Do we have a motion? Mr. Chairman, I make a motion that we adopt first reading of 10C. All right. Mr. Thomason has a motion. Is there a second? Second. We have a second. Mr. Thomason, you have the floor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm going to be a lot more brief, and hopefully this won't take as long as the last ordinance.

» But last legislative session, South Carolina passed a law that kind of set up the framework for golf cart registration and golf cart operation on public highways. That also pushed down to the local counties, municipalities, the ability to regulate golf cart hours, amongst a few other things. So right now, currently, underneath the state sunset law, you cannot operate golf carts after sunset. This doesn't change the ability of registering a golf cart. You've still got to register it. You've still got to be 16 or older, driver's license. You still can't go on a major highway. It's got to be 35 miles an hour or under. but it gives the ability for someone to ride their golf cart based upon all the state regulations after dark. That's all it does.

» We have to have this because currently you can't do it. And it's in unincorporated areas of the county, and it cannot be on a major highway. I appreciate y'all listening and look forward to y'all supporting it. Mr. Jones, you have the second. Thank you, Mr. Thomason. I agree with Mr. Thomason 100%. I think Surfside has the... I think there's a few municipalities who've done it. They do, and it's worked out well. I'm not going to drive mad at night because I don't see as well as I used to. But I think this is definitely a good law. We've got an expert back there sitting in the back. And Taz came to us amongst other residents. But I don't think any council has questions. We can bring somebody up. I think we'll just go quickly. I'm fine with it. He's got my support.

» Any other comments or questions for those who are in person? The only thing I'd like to add, he didn't say, is these golf carts are also insured. So they have to carry insurance. and that's based upon state law yeah and that's based upon the state law thank you mr kato mr tucker anything remotely before we vote yes sir um because i'm not quite uh familiar with all what's in the state law um so these are definitely lights signals um rear view mirrors is that included as well i'm not sure about the rear view mirrors but yes license or mr bowes you want to answer that yeah the state requires registration permitting age restrictions that have already been recited yeah safety equipment lighting yes mirrors essentially the state has again allowed these until dusk aka sunset but um have regulated

» them such that the state believes certain minimum safety requirements um exist uh for the golf carts that they do allow to operate on on these roads okay thank you mr devils i'll give it my first start i have a few more questions but i'll i'll get with um brant or um one of the other council members there jimmy with my additional questions okay oh councilman jones that's what it was thank you mr tucker thank you all right we'll move it to a vote mr tucker since i have you uh already how do you vote remotely that's a yes yeah i heard uh miss hannah from mr tucker remotely for all those who are present and voting raise your hand you're in favor and it is unanimous and passes miss hannah on 10c up next we have a a resolution a resolution this is a standard business for us to approve the slate

» of meetings for the next year and so i'll make a motion that we approve the slate of meetings that's proposed in the agenda packet for next year. Is there a second? I'll second. All right, we've got a second. You see the resolution before us related to business meetings or council meetings, second and fourth Tuesdays throughout the year. Only thing that I think we might bring up in January, and I'd like for this to be on the agenda, please, would be work session dates.

» So when we're doing budget work sessions, if we can get council information and update and commitment to that so everybody can attend as best as their schedules will allow that will be great and working through budget items and then we'll of course do special called meetings as we need to or vary based on holiday schedules after we get through the budget next year mr chair yes did we when we voted last time and i'm fine with the schedule but did i thought we had said that january and or february we're going to do one meeting is that did we not say that last time am i just misremembering that i i think we we did not we said we were january i thought it was just yeah january i thought with january we're gonna i mean i'm fine with the schedule but i just want to point out that we had said one

» but i'm fine with two i just want to point that out well mr shoemake any other comments or discussion mr tucker yes sir mr chairman yeah it's always been um that we did we scheduled the two but we have made in many occasions um an adjustment to our schedule after um we get the um millet set and attacked the bills out in october so just putting that out there to you i don't remember that sammy tucker had two meetings in december well we've got the motion as proposed and presented from staff i'm happy to entertain an amendment if somebody wants to amend it to just one meeting in january i like it i think it's going to be a heavy lift early on next year um if we find that january might look a little bit lighter we could drop it down to one meeting after our first meeting in january if we need

» to i need to say something um sir mr Jones. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, I voted with this council to go to one meeting and I thought it would work well, but I feel like we tend to get a little disconnected when there's 30 days in between, especially during the busy times of the year. But I like this schedule. I'm going to support it and appreciate what y'all have done as well. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Jones. Any other comments or discussion? Seeing none. Mr.

» DuBose? Just operationally, to the extent that it impacts uh council's consideration of that second january meeting um currently the required 30-day public hearing notice for the cannabinoid zoning regulation would um fall on that january 27th meeting for council um so again to the extent that influences scheduling i just wanted to make we don't have an amendment so it's on for right now all right see no see no further discussion uh questions or amendments we'll move to a vote for those who in person if you're in favor raise your hand on the resolution this is 11 it's unanimous in favor for those who are present in voting mr tucker how do you vote remotely yes all right that is a yes for mr tucker remotely miss hannah that takes care of 11.

» uh gentlemen we've already addressed both items under 12 for appointments this takes us to council member briefings mr cato please i'm going to be very brief i want to thank staff i've i've looked at some of the um ball fields that's taken place and and progress is moving along i hope i don't take anything from danny but progress is moving along very happy with that looks like everything is going to get completed here very soon and and it looks real good so thank you for that um on a sad note i want to take the time to send my condolences to the elliott family mr gary elliott was a a friend of mine but he was also a a long time county employee he served his community through the fire service for many years he was the fire marshal here in kershaw county and he passed away back on december th

» e 7th and he will be greatly missed and um if you've ever he could cook and he could make you laugh and that was two things that you can remember he was he was an outstanding outstanding person he also served on his council and uh and and actually the district that i serve now so i thank him for everything he done for kershaw county uh services is going to be on december the 14th at powers funeral home at 3 p.m if anyone would like to attend that service but again my thoughts and prayers go out to the elliott family lastly i hope everyone has a very merry christmas a lot of things going on family related and parades and events and i just pray that everyone stays safe and and enjoys the the wondrous holiday season as we celebrate the birth of jesus christ thank you thank you mr kate mr tomli

» nson thank you mr chairman um i too have some some news about a passing my great uncle passed saturday evening mr ronnie holland lives on Franklin Street in East Camden wonderful wonderful individual he was mean as a dickens too, but wonderful individual, please be with the family and and Keep him keep her family in your prayers And then lastly I hope staff and everybody has a wonderful holiday season If you need me will still be available even though we will not be having another meeting Please feel free to call me anytime if you need anything. I'm always available. Have a blessed one. Thank you Mr. Tomlinson. And sorry about that loss. Mr. Jones. Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of council. A couple things on the same note.

» Cecil Truesdale, I don't know if many of you knew him and Lorraine Truesdale. Their daughter is Jessica, who married Jamie. And anyway, she passed away a few months ago, and then he passed away this past week. And I've never seen such a celebration of life as I did last night with his service and I have to say that that young lady Jessica nobody nobody plans to bury both your parents within months from each other you know we don't always know what our plan is only God knows but she is strong she has shown what a true daughter is a true mother wife I mean she's she's just been she's had a big burden on these last few weeks and I just wanted to pass this song do y'all keep her and keep the family in your prayers and also um i met gary elliott in 1966 he had a 1962 chevrolet and he was in mart

» ial arts he could take his foot and change the gears in the car and uh he picked me up off the street well actually i was 14 years old he picked me up on the street hitchhiking emmy joey poo and some others from columbia and they brought me to camden because i was coming to live with my uncle bob who is now in a uh in the veterans hospital to bronze star recipient and from that point on it was just a wonderful friendship I always looked up to him he got me started martial arts and we did it through the 70s and you know we both started back with the county together back in my second go-round was 1983 Gary became the fire marshal and he did a wonderful job with his fire service he took a guy mayor who's the first fire marshal ever and then Gary it was the second but Gary it was a was a good m

» an he as you said he could cook he could you know do a lot of different things and uh but uh he will be missed and he was on county council we just happened to not only work together through our careers but when i got out and retired and he retired then he ended up running for county council one i ended up running for county council one and he did a remarkable job up here he and i agreed on a lot of things and uh he was a great man i hated to hear of his passing but uh thank you also for recognizing him councilman that's it thank you mr jones mr tucker i'll go to your remote i'm just staring at your chair that i'm sitting there you sit in my chair yes anytime you're not here i sit in your chair last two times you need to get back here please allow the man to continue yeah oh man it's broke

» um i just wanted to um share that um um i actually participated in the Association of Counties legislative conference last week and it was it was great a lot of good things the state should be able to fund us some additional money and our local fund for the counties which is going to be a great help and there was some other things that they were working on as well and the conference last month in November was just as good a lot of good thing and uh have some ideas that i want to bring in our retreat that's coming up i also want to announce that on the 19th which is not this friday but next friday the finance committee will be meeting at four o'clock um i want to say that i'm sorry for all the deaths uh in the county and throughout the state in the world for all who's going through bereaveme

» nt during these times of holidays my prayers and love are with those families and i want to tell everyone merry christmas and a happy new year and let's as ben said in this prayer let's look to kick off 2026 in a very prosperous meaningful loving way that we can best serve the citizens of pershaw county that concludes my report mr chairman thank you mr tucker mr shumate yeah um well first off i know i mentioned his name earlier but uh hats off to connor rom for being the only person in the room who isn't paid in some level to be here because martin at least gets paid by his paper so the only person here for free that's impressive everybody's gone i mentioned the level of service you know that's impressive it's december almost christmas and this guy's sitting through a whole council meeting

» in per in person that shows his shows his dedication to the county so that's awesome um jimmy i'm sorry to hear about uh her family i i didn't know that it happened of course you know i know her well of course know your son well so they love you to death i love them and i hate to hear that um and i want to say on a positive note um congrats to my daughter she was accepted last week to the college of charleston honors college as a biology major where she hopes to do a pre-med track and i want to thank chairman connell and mr lauren birch who's a board of trustees member and so many other people that helped get us get her in front of the right people but mostly of course i'm proud of my daughter who as a senior at height luga falgen the senior class president has never made less than an a and

» is also a girls state graduate and a member of the track team so very very proud of my young lady she took after her mom she absolutely took after her mom certainly with the track um yeah so and the last thing is obviously merry christmas and you know to those to the extent you can and those anyone that is listening shop local we got some good places you know over in elgin we have south by southwest stacy i want to say stacy bryant's place i know that's your maiden name but i can't remember your married name and i know she got her place you have a new hardware store it's the old hardware store but it's under new ownership they have a lot of cool stuff good stuff gorget or gorget depending on how you want to pronounce it there's a little liquor a little liquor place right there on whiting wa

» y they do their own they brew all their own stuff it's all historically tied and from south carolina so there's a lot of place in kershaw county to find really cool gifts so avoid amazon and shop local and boost the kershaw county economy merry christmas thank you mr shoemake mr brazel well yeah and roy's wood products for all your wood needs yeah there you go please do yeah we love the christmas rush you can't top it no john deboza got hatchacked and all kinds of other things written across his forehead mr brazel please lord have mercy i'm terribly sorry to hear about the loss of of gary elliott he did a lot for the fire service um thank you for highlighting for highlighting him i'll have to agree he was a great guy i met him when he ran for uh council years ago and um i can i can remember

» him doing exactly what what you said was he he was cooking and out seeing people and visiting people very likable very personable individual and um and he did he brought a lot lot of good food he brought some by our work so um jimmy i'm sorry for for you and your your families your extended family's loss and and brand you as well i didn't i didn't realize that i'm terribly sorry to hear that um as in life we we all face seasons of grief and um they're not easy and uh i hope everyone can can rest and and know that during this christmas season that the the reason is jesus christ and his grace and forgiveness is um what what allows us to endure um i'd like to say thank you to to our chairman ben connell and um derek uh thank you for emceeing the ribbon cutting at the boat ramp i think the boat

» ramps turned out absolutely fantastic i think um i think they drained all the water out of the river as soon as we cut the ribbon um It was at five foot one for about a week afterwards, and there were a few complaints that they're having trouble launching their boats, and that's more like a July-August river level. So throughout a little bit of conversation, we've got some solutions for that. Maybe on in the summer, we'll mark the end of the boat ramp, put up some safety signs, and we found some concrete products that we can embed in the mud at the end to fix those small percentage situations in which the river is five foot, not six foot, and that's still low. So a very well-engineered, thought-out, yet imperfect boat ramp.

» We never strive for perfection because we are all human, and I'm glad of that. So, but very happy with the way it turned out. Very happy with the amount of people that came. And just real happy Councilman Jones. Who all attended? Councilman Jones attended. Everybody attended. Kato was there. That's right. Brant showed up. Everybody was there. That was a good turnout. Brant showed up last. I really, that's right. I really appreciate, I really appreciate we had law enforcement. We had law enforcement. I had a college friend that's a game warden show up from Florence. It was just a good event, and I appreciated everybody being there. It was a big deal for Kershaw County and a highlight for me as we fought hard for that to happen.

» So with all of that being said, I will shut my mouth and say Merry Christmas. Thank you all. Thank you, Councilman Brazel. I've got a few things to share as we conclude the year. And I have no idea how many people are watching online, So I'm just going to treat this like a small group of friends that I'm talking to as a parting message for 2025. The formalities first and for administration and if someone's listening, anybody that's stealing something from the Tinsel Trail, it better be Santa's little elves out there packaging up gifts for children. Because if you're so petty that you will take a truck from a sandbox or a basketball from a display, all in good faith in this community, you know, the Lord knows. I just pray for you. I hope that we're better than that.

» We've never had an issue out there. But for whatever reason, this year, maybe people are really hard up for toys. And I understand we've got some lights and whatever security measures you can put out there. We don't want it to put a taint on one of the most positive things we have in the county, the Tinsel Trail, and focusing on the Veterans Park out there. I just wanted to mention, this Saturday, you've got the Camden Christmas Parade and the Lights of Lugoff Parade, both on the 13th, I believe, is the date. one in the morning, one in the evening. It's a great show of Christmas spirit and the community coming together. I've always loved attending. I'm not sure if I would be able to make lights a luge off, but I encourage everyone to go out.

» And lastly, I want to mention this before I share my last thought. Do you know that this group, other than my immediate family and sometimes my church family, this group is the one that I pray with the most every year. If you think about that, particularly for those who attend the agenda meetings. We pray together more frequently than just about anybody else. And to me, that is very special. We unite when two or three are gathered in his name, he's gonna be with us also. And so we unite in prayer so frequently. I just thought that was important to call out as we look at this year in passing and the year ahead. Next year, we will be the group of people that pray together the most, most likely in our lives, other than Bible studies you might attend or your immediate family.

» And so that's special, and I hold y'all in a high and special regard because of that. We share a prayer life in that way. Unfortunately, but I hope it will bring light to her name, Sister Katie Peoples. I don't know if you knew Katie Peoples. She just passed away. And I kind of hope you don't know her name because it will bear fruit on what I'm about to share with you. Katie was a testament to the fact that you don't have to have a lot of money to be rich. She was a testament to the fact that you don't have to have a whole bunch of education and degrees to be very intelligent. Sister Katie Peebles taught me since I was a child in primary at church. She spent most of her life helping a family member who was special needs. She always worked hard and did her best to provide for her family.

» A woman of slight means, but one of the richest people I've known in the world because of how kind and loving she was. Excuse me if I get emotional. She just had such a big impact on my life. And so tonight, I share as a memorialization for this small group how important Katie Peebles was in my life. and I hope that her example will echo throughout history in some way. I guess this is recorded so people can watch it at some point but know her name. She was a special person. She reminds me of the lady that had such a big impact in the scriptures with the widow's mite. She gave more than everyone else because she gave what she had and that was the example I witnessed from her and I hope it sticks with me and I'm able to share with my kids at some point. And that concludes my remarks.

» Merry Christmas everyone. We do have a little bit more business to share and wrap up. We have an administrator's briefing. Anything for us, Danny? Yes, sir. Just on the potential trail stuff, it's very unfortunate, but what I'm looking at doing is when we cut the lights off there at 930 at night, just locking the gates because this is going to continue to happen. And, Danny, correct me if I'm wrong, there was a woman out there who was a victim of a homicide. There was a tree set up in her honor. I think that was picked apart.

» it's just super unfortunate i don't want to see this this really nice feature it's always talked about it has really positive uh reviews and and positive community feedback but these people are going out there and putting their time and effort into these trees for the enhancement of our community and they're just being vandalized and the things are being stolen so just while this event is going on we're going to lock the gates there to prevent any of this any further also Also, Mr. Administrator, I know you're going to bring up before us a ordinance or some type of regulation in relation to boat ramps. While we're addressing that, please consider other things we need to tack on to address this kind of issue.

» If we need to have some additional teeth for law enforcement or surveillance or otherwise to protect these types of public parks, I'd like to see that. Yes, sir. So that will be on the next agenda where we have the ability to deal with trash and camping and just any kind of things that may go on on a boat ramp that we don't necessarily have the teeth to enforce with both DNR and local law enforcement. So we will work to get that message out, but we do want to protect a tensile trail because that is just a very unique feature. And, of course, the boat ramp across the street is still available. But just as soon as this is done, we'll get that open back up. Okay, so you proposed closing at 930 at night. What time would it open, Danny? Because this is the first I'm hearing of it.

» and everything that i've been told and heard is that the boat ramp was available 24 7. so everybody that has asked me that has been what i've told them so um with duck season uh just around the corner i think it um i don't know what the opening date is well it's not before the end of december is it yes i think opening date was last weekend um that's going to pose the second split is december 12th so we have a thanksgiving season and then it opens december the 12th and then it goes out january 31st so um that's this friday morning that it's going to open probably a lot of people i would think that are going to plan to use it i'm sure they can use the other one if they have to but no different than what you just mentioned thievery the issue with the other boat landing and one of the big reaso

» ns why we built this boat landing was to provide a safer place for people to park because um i know i spoke to two or three people just this week that thanked me for um the work and effort that we put into it because they said at our age we weren't able to use the other ramp anymore and now we can so if if there's a boat we can't lock somebody in if there's if there's a truck and trailer at the ramp um people are going to want want to go hunting they're going to want to leave by 5 a.m i would think so how do we navigate that we'll look at doing whatever we can to be as as accommodating as we can we know that this is a there's a short mesh period there it's not anything earth shattering can we get a 5 a.m gate unlocked so that we can tell people when it will be closed for the short period of

» time and reopen so yes we will come up with a schedule i'll share it with y'all and make sure that we can honor what we say with the 5 a.m again i just want to protect this display but still be accommodating and available so okay well like that would so that would be my suggestion um as far as a reasonable time to open if it were any later you wouldn't have time to to get out and set your decoys and hunt it'd make it less safe so you know everybody has a something they like do some people like to set up lights and christmas trees on the tinsel trail and i respect that and others like to give duck hunting and i respect that so i just want to make sure that we're covering all our bases thank you anything further mr administrator that's all the good news out here mr bose anything that doesn't

» require executive session no good news yet all right uh council members last times we have an executive session under 16 this is a and b i would seek a motion that we enter executive session under item 16 a and b all in relation to receipt of legal briefings regarding a matter subject to attorney client privilege this is under sc code 30-4-70 and related subparts so we have a motion second motion and a second any discussion for those who are in person seeing none any discussion mr tucker no mr tucker how do you vote no yes that's a yes and for those in person raise your hand if you're in favor executive session it's unanimous miss Ms. Hanna, we are in executive session. And just for the public's benefit, Mr.

» DuBose, no votes anticipated, correct? We've got a motion to come out of executive session. Is there a second? Second. We've got a second. Seeing no discussion, we'll move it to a vote for exiting executive session. All in favor, raise your hand on exiting executive session. It's unanimous, Ms. Hanna, for those who are present and voting. Mr. Tucker, how do you vote? He's out. He said he's off. Oh, he's off? All right, so we're out of executive session. That passes, and seek a motion to adjourn. Make a motion we adjourn. Mr. Cato, any second? We got a second from Mr. Tomlinson. Seeing no discussion, we'll move it to a vote. Merry Christmas, and everybody raise your hand if you're in favor. Happy New Year. We are adjourned.