Category Archives: Community

Images from 2013 St. Patrick’s Day fest in Five Points

With the Yesterday’s float gang, just before we set out. (Photo by Keely Saye)

Running a bit behind with this, but it was a busy weekend.

As you can see, a good time was had. Particularly by me, what with the honor of riding on the official Yesterday’s float. My first time on an actual float in an actual parade.

They issued me a green cowboy hat, but it was too small, and I was already wearing a hat, so I used it to wave with.

Turns out that early is the time to go. It wasn’t as hot as later, and you miss a lot of the crowd. I was a bit concerned at what I perceived as low turnout, but Scotty at Yesterday’s said, wait until about 2. I left a little before that, and the mob waiting to get in was impressive. The crowd was later estimated at 40,000.

Among all of them, I only ran into one person who I actually knew was Irish, as in personally from Ireland — Jerry Hackett, who teaches philosophy at USC. He and Bud Ferillo were sitting out in front of Starbucks. I joined them for a bit and we talked about the new Pope, which seemed the thing to do while celebrating a saint’s day.

Speaking of philosophy, I heard a pearl or two from the mouth of Cedric the cowboy as I stood next to the bathtub from which he waved. For instance, as he looked out on the sea of green-clad folk, he wondered aloud, “How come on St. Patrick’s everybody wants to be Irish, but on Martin Luther King Day, nobody wants to be black?” I’m not sure what it meant, but that was the only thing I actually tweeted out from the float.

I got a bit sunburned and my famous gigantic hornrim glasses got broken. No, I didn’t get into a brawl. And I had not so much as touched a drop. It was right after the parade, as I was re-entering the festival area; I was trying to remove my green sweatshirt and my glasses flew off and hit the pavement, and I saw one lens go skittering off down the street. I sort of repaired them with some tape from behind the bar at Yesterday’s, but it might be time to invest in some new ones.

So when you next see me, I might look different…

: With Keely Saye, who was in charge of our float.

: A cowboy-eye view.

: My daughter shot this as I passed where she and the twins were watching.

: As our float arrived at the heart of Five Points itself.

: The view from the float as we pulled into Five Points.

: People laughed and waved when they saw the live cowboy in the tub.

: My smashed glasses, repaired with tape.

: One of the many who was too young to get a pink armband. But he passed out anyway.

: This is the crowd that was waiting to get in just before 2 p.m., as I was leaving. This queue stretches across Blossom and well up Saluda.

Steve Benjamin’s State of the City address last night

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SOTC2013

Before I fold up the laptop for the night, I thought I’d share with you a few thoughts about Steve Benjamin’s State of the City speech last night — only about 24 hours late.

To begin with, you can read the whole speech here. Well, the whole prepared speech, anyway. I know of one thing that’s not in it — the mayor’s ad-lib about working to get professional baseball back to Columbia. But you can watch the video for the speech as delivered. (Or at least, I hope you can — I’ve had trouble viewing it. If this persists, I’ll check with the mayor’s office tomorrow.)

Beyond that, I share my Twitter feed from during the speech. All Tweets are mine, except when otherwise indicated:

Did I just hear Mayor Benjamin right? 263 security cameras installed since he entered office? I had no idea…
Mayor’s mention of the city’s ice skating rink is an applause line…
Steve Benjamin ‏@SteveBenjaminSC “We’ve added over $8 million dollars in public safety funding.” #SOTC2013
Eva Moore ‏@yesevamoore Just once I want to hear that the state of the union/city/state is anything but strong.
Susanna King ‏@superflippy @yesevamoore “The state of the city is discombobulated yet bodacious.”
Steve Benjamin ‏@SteveBenjaminSC “30 months later we’ve invested nearly $320 million in rebuilding our water, sewer and stormwater systems.” #SOTC2013
Mayor Benjamin says he’s working on getting professional baseball…#SOTC2013
Hey, Warren’s here! “@BoltonWarren: “The future holds great promise for this great city.” — Benjamin”
Steve Benjamin ‏@SteveBenjaminSC “If I had predicted accomplishing those goals in less than three years on Day One, there wouldn’t have been a Day Two.” #SOTC2013
Good job with the Tweeting. Could you email me a copy of the speech?
Eva Moore ‏@yesevamoore Columbia’s civil rights history makes it into State of the City speech. And: “While cities like Selma, B’ham burned…Cola remained whole.”
Mayor Benjamin: “Quality-of-life issues are essential to economic development.” Mentions 3 Rivers Greenway, Gamecock baseball…
Former interim city manager Steve Gantt, who did a great job, just got key to the city… #SOTC2013
Mayor Benjamin: “Many, if not most, of our city employees, are making less money than they deserve.” #SOTC2013

If you’d like something more coherent than my Twitter feed, go read John Monk’s news story.

Columbia’s Donehue Direct becomes Push Digital

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Wesley Donehue’s political tech outfit, which has helped campaigns across the country, is making a change, it announced today:

Top SC political internet firm rebrands as Push Digital

Columbia, SC – January 24, 2013 – Wesley Donehue, founder and CEO of leading political tech firm Donehue Direct, announced today the rebranding of his firm to Push Digital.

The new Push Digital will continue its nationally recognized work in website and application development, mobile marketing, online advertising and targeting, fundraising, brand management, and social media. Push is also reemphasizing its commitment to data collection, management and analytics, something that Donehue has working toward for several years.

“Four years ago when I was asked what the next big tech trend was, I said ‘data,’ and a lot of people rolled their eyes,” Donehue said. “Too many people think data is boring and it isn’t sexy, but we all saw firsthand the results of a data-driven campaign this year in the presidential race. Our goal, quite simply, is to be second to none when it comes to data, and that’s something that will mean big dividends to our clients in terms of their ability to target their message and raise cash.”

Push is one of the few political Internet firms that has run campaigns from top to bottom. Its team has been involved from the state legislative level all the way up to the presidential, as well as numerous marketing campaigns for state parties, issue groups and nonprofit organizations. The team has had broad experience running the political, finance, and communications operations.

Push Senior Vice President Joel Sawyer noted that too often, those branches of the campaigns are “siloed” from one another, and not integrated with regard to technology.

“Part of our new mission with Push is to give clients the tools they need to integrate tech into all aspects of a campaign, and more importantly, making sure all the data integrates,” Sawyer said. “We live in a world where the internet is completely pervasive in our lives, yet too many campaigns out there are run on a model from two decades ago.”

In addition to its political business, Push will continue its work with non-profits and issue advocacy groups. Push will maintain its office presence in both Columbia, South Carolina and San Francisco, California.

Learn more at www.pushdigital.com

Follow us on twitter: @pushdigitalinc

“Politics is always going to be our bread and butter,” Joel Sawyer told me this afternoon. But the kind of increasingly sophisticated data mining that the firm does can “apply to any persuasive endeavor.”

In the past, he said, many campaigns have had volunteers who are willing to wave a sign on a street corner on the one hand, and people who give $10 or $15 on the other — often missing that a sign-waver could well be a donor, and vice versa. What Push Digital will do is pull all of a campaign’s data together and make it work in ways it hasn’t in the past.

Y’all know Joel. He was for awhile Mark Sanford’s press secretary, and was the guy the gov left to hold the bag when he ran off the Argentina. Joel resigned shortly after that, although I don’t ever recall him saying that there was a cause-and-effect relationship between the events.

Wesley y’all will know from all those communications for the Senate Republicans, and from Pub Politics, which just kicked off its new season last night. (Joel fills in for Wesley occasionally, as their business often requires travel.)

Check out Pinterest for a look at the newly-renamed firm’s portfolio.

Good luck with the new identity, guys.

: One of the newly-renamed firm’s many national clients.

livelikerick: In memory of Rick (RickCaffeinated) Stilwell

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I had a meeting this morning with Chip Oglesby, who hosts this blog, and he happened to mention that he had set up a special Rally page to the memory of his fellow social media guru Rick Stilwell (better known to many as @RickCaffeinated), where folks can leave words of tribute, and also make contributions to help out his family. Chip said that last time he looked, there were about $2,500 in contributions.

Here’s the page. Here’s a comment that exemplifies what is found there:

A real superhero doesn’t wear a cape and “smash.” He is a warm and caring person who helps where help and encouragement where it is needed. Rick was a superhero to so many people and will forever be a champion of social media to all. May God hold you, Rick, in the palm of his hand forever, and may he provide comfort to your family now and always. #LiveLikeRick

I also notice that, on the day after he died, someone used his Twitter feed to share again something he wrote last year, headlined “Working Together,” about the social aspect of social media, and of life. It’s fairly communitarian stuff. An excerpt:

For the past few weeks, I’ve been noticing negativity more and more online. It’s been on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram even. And my first self-judgment is that I’m noticing it because it’s welling up in me more than normal, too. My own judgmentalism and negative reactions are leading to me noticing it more all over – so I’m to blame more than anything for the “noticing” part of the equation.

So hopefully it’s without pointing fingers that I am now looking at this from the perspective of relationships and being together in the good stuff of life. We cut each other off in negativity. I cut others off when I’m looking through mud-colored glasses. And we/I end up losing more than we gain when we/I do that. One of the areas we/I lose out on is working together, letting each other influence and impact the whole separately and collectively.

I guess it’s the knowledge that I’m not perfect and that I don’t know everything that leads me to want to get more cooks in the kitchen. I want to know what you think. I don’t want to miss out on your addition to our experience…

So this week, I’m looking for more ways to work together with those around me. Whether it’s in the office or in various extracurricular get-togethers, how can I be a part of something collaborative and more truly representative of everyone together? That’s what I want to be a part of. That’s some of the meaningful stuff that’s been missing in my own recent descent…

Sounds a lot like what I consider to be among the highest aims of this blog, when it is at its best.

Randy Scott back as police chief

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Thought I’d go ahead and pass this on, since some of y’all expressed a lot of interest in the story earlier:

Randy Scott has been rehired as Columbia’s police chief.

Scott retired Jan. 1 to take advantage of changes in the state’s retirement system. He had to stay retired for 15 days, then reapply for his job under the state’s retirement rules.

He will return to work Wednesday, which is the first day he is eligible to return to work.

The city said Scott was one of two applicants for the job, according to a news release, though it did not say who the other applicant was. The chief’s vacancy was posted on a city website.

Scott will be paid $112,200, the same salary he earned prior to his retirement.

That was from The State. WLTX has much the same story, with one or two different details.

Personally, I’m glad the chief is back on the job, as bizarre as the whole retiring and getting rehired thing is. And I look forward to seeing a more complete story, answering questions not addressed above.

I know there are other opinions out there…

What should happen to teachers who have sex with students?

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Screen Shot 2013-01-11 at 8.29.24 AM

Boyd Brown picked at my friends at The State the other day over the above headline, which inevitably makes one think, “And in related news, Squad Helps Dog Bite Victim“… In The State‘s defense, they caught it and fixed it — I can’t find it anywhere online now. (That’s the awful thing about the 24-hour news cycle. Used to be, you had a chance to catch these things before anyone saw them. Now, even when you catch it, it’s already out there and somebody has preserved it.)

Of course, this is no laughing matter, however much our inner 8th-grader may snicker. There are serious issues at stake. I was intrigued by this angle, raised in a long letter to the editor yesterday:

Don’t prosecute Dreher teacher for having sex with students

The two young men whom a Dreher teacher allegedly or admittedly engaged in sexual intercourse were above the age of consent. There are no allegations of coercion, intimidation, payments or rewards offered or given in return for sex.

Had the teacher been a neighbor or a family friend, a Mrs. Robinson if you will, there would be no crime.

I believe it is unconstitutional to have one law for teachers and another one for everyone else. An act should either be a crime if anyone does it or it should not be a crime…

Of course the teacher should be decertified, fired and counseled. But she never should have been arrested, she should not face prosecution, and she should fight for the right of teachers to not be made criminals for what other women can do without a threat of prosecution…

What do y’all think? Should this be a criminal matter, or merely an administrative one for the district’s H.R. folks to handle?

Personally, I’m not a bit bothered, at least in theory, by the existence of a “double standard” whereby teachers are treated differently from other folks. They hold a special public trust, and should be accordingly accountable to the public.

I just don’t have a strong opinion one way or the other as to whether that accountability should extend to criminal prosecution. Perhaps some of y’all can clarify my thinking on that…

City’s ice skating rink extends its run by a fortnight

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Just got this release this morning from the city of Columbia:

MAIN STREET ICE TO REMAIN OPEN FOR TWO MORE WEEKS

The City of Columbia has announced that the seasonal ice skating rink in downtown Columbia that was set to close this coming Sunday, January 6, will remain open until the M.L.K. holiday on January 21.

Main Street Ice has become quite a popular attraction since its opening on Thanksgiving Day 2012. Thousands of area residents and visitors from across the state have made their way onto the ice over the past six weeks, bringing added excitement into downtown Columbia and increased traffic for surrounding businesses.

“We are pleased that so many have been receptive and supportive of this outdoor ice skating experience thus far and we hope that many more will take advantage of the opportunity to come out now that we are extending our season,” said Jeff Caton, Director of City of Columbia Parks and Recreation.

The ice skating rink will still operate seven days a week. New hours of operation will be as follows:

Monday –Friday, 4 p.m. – 10 p.m.

Saturday, 11 a.m. – 10 p.m.

Sunday, 1 p.m. – 9 p.m.

The rink will operate on special hours on closing day from 11 a.m – 10 p.m.

Skating fees will include skate rentals and will remain at $10 for adults and $8 for children ages 12 and under. Special senior and military discounts will be offered.

Be sure to head on out to Main Street Ice on Saturday, January 5, 11:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. for special guest appearances by the clowns of RINGLING BROS. AND BARNUM & BAILEY® DRAGONS, PLAYING THE COLONIAL LIFE ARENA MARCH 7 – 10, IN THEIR CLOWNING AROUND THE MIDLANDS TOUR. Come take a picture with Cherie and join her as she laces up her skates and takes her clowning onto the ice!

The release doesn’t answer my main question, which is… how does the ice stay frozen on days when the temp is in the 60s?

Farewell to a solid reporter, Jim Davenport

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Back in October, Nikki Haley gave Jim the Order of the Palmetto — which frankly made me feel better about Nikki than I had in awhile.

My favorite Jim Davenport story won’t make much sense to most people, but it always makes me smile.

Jim, whom we called “Dav” because that was his login on the Atex mainframe system we used at The State back then, first came to work for the paper on a sort of unofficial basis while he was still a graduate student at USC. Tom McLean, who was the executive editor in those days, paid him from some mysterious fund only he had access to — so Dav was working for us, but invisible to the folks in H.R.

The managing editor didn’t know about him, either. This was in the very late ’80s or very early ’90s, because that was when Bobby Hitt, now our secretary of commerce, was the M.E. One day in an editor’s meeting, Bobby (who had been away on a fellowship) asked, “Who’s this Jim Davenport and why are we cutting him checks?” One of my colleagues explained that he did various special projects and answered to the executive editor, but wasn’t able to provide any details.

At that moment, then-Features Editor Jim Foster leaped to his feet and cried, “Clarence Beeks!” At which point I just about literally fell on the floor laughing — although most in the room didn’t get it.

Assuming most of y’all are in the same boat, “Clarence Beeks” was the name of a shadowy character in the comedy “Trading Places,” who did top-secret, off-the-books jobs for these two rich guys who employed him to, among other things, get ahold of a top-secret crop report so that they could corner the market on frozen concentrated orange juice. There’s a sort of “eureka” moment in the movie when both Eddie Murphy and Dan Akroyd leap to their feet crying out in unison, “Clarence Beeks!”

OK, so maybe that story doesn’t tell you much about Jim Davenport, who died today at age 54 after a two-year battle with cancer. But in a way it does, because even that early in his career, he had a quiet, matter-of-fact competence about him that made you believe that he could go out and get done whatever needed doing. Tom McLean obviously thought so, or he wouldn’t have brought Jim on board when there was no actual position open for him. He was something of a jack-of-all-trades, as the story by his AP colleagues today attests:

Before entering journalism, he drove a barge for a dredging operation, worked as a roadie for a band and made tires at a factory. He also had a master’s degree in English. The journalism bug bit him while he was at the University of South Carolina…

… which was about when I met him.

Today, most in the trade in South Carolina know Jim as the Associated Press’s longtime stalwart watchdog over the State House. He’s known for such attention-grabbers as being the first to report when our governor went missing in 2009 (only to turn up later on a return flight from Argentina).

But Jim was also the kind of reporter that an editor like me particularly appreciates. I’ve never been a big admirer of the reporters who just hit an occasional home run and then rest on their laurels. I like the ones who get on base at least once in every game. Jim was solid day after day. Nothing stopped him. Just as one small example — it was his dogged persistence, nagging at the governor’s office, that finally got Nikki Haley to admit that she had no idea what she was talking about when she claimed that half of job applicants at the Savannah River Site had failed drug tests (the actual rate was less than 1 percent).

What I like is the kind of reporter who just doesn’t let feckless politicians get away with routine assertions about things that fit their ideologies, but not the facts, and that’s the kind of reporter Jim was.

I knew some months ago that the end was coming for Jim. Still, he was out there working, even when the sweat was pouring from his brow as he showed up for yet another press conference. Despite the obvious physical strain, he would still set the tone for the event, calmly asking his common-sense questions, not letting anything get by him.

The last time I saw him out there, I asked how he was doing. Not well, he told me matter-of-factly. He wasn’t going to get over it, not this time. I didn’t know what to say. I told him I didn’t know what to say. He just nodded, like a man who had already sorted it out in his own mind, but understood that others might have trouble dealing with it.

I so wanted to say something that would make it better somehow. But I couldn’t. Now he’s gone, and South Carolina is the less for having lost him.

A communitarian view on gun control

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I thought y’all might be interested in this perspective on gun control from Amitai Etzioni, who is sort of the godfather of the rather modest communitarian movement in this country. An excerpt:

We should not wait for our elected officials, in President Obama’s good words, “to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics.” We should do our share. One way to proceed is to mark our homes, apartments and condos, with a “gun free” sign. Parents should notify their friends that they would be reluctant to send their child over for a play date unless the home was safe from guns. Residential communities should pass rules that ban bringing guns onto their premises, clearly marking them as gun free.

Anyone who puts up such signs will become an ambassador for gun control, because they are sure to be challenged by gun advocates to explain their anti-gun positions. Here are some pointers they may wish to use against the typical pro-gun talking points.

“Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”

• Tragically, it is the case that there will always be dangerous individuals, but they can kill a lot more with easy access to guns. On the same day as the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, a knife-wielding man targeted a primary school in a Chinese village. Twenty-two children and one adult were wounded, but none were killed.

“Guns deter crimes and save lives.”

• Of the 30,000 gun deaths in America every year, only 200 are caused by self-defense. Studies have shown that a higher rate of gun ownership is correlated with higher rates of homicide, suicide and unintentional shootings. The U.S. has a firearms homicide rate 19.5 times higher than the combined rate of 22 high income countries with similar non-lethal crime and violence rates…

Note the emphasis on community-based solutions — starting in one’s home and workplace, engaging one’s neighbors in debate. Very much based in faith in engaged communities.Very different from the “50 percent plus one” forced solutions that left and right tend to jockey for…

Not that a communitarian would object to more reasonable laws regarding guns. As Etzioni says, “No right is absolute. Even the right to free speech, considered the strongest of them all, is limited. You cannot shout ‘fire’ in a crowded theater — precisely because it endangers life.”

Pride and Prejudice and Scandal

An appeal from Harvest Hope

The transportation penny passes

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This email just in:

Friends and Leaders,

THE PENNY PASSED!

Just left 2020 Hampton with final numbers including absentee and precincts:

Question 1 YES 74,029 NO 64,684’

QUESTION 2 YES 69,391 NO 62,884

This is gratifying. Congratulations to all those who worked hard to make this happen, and to the people of Richland County for making this decision. The community has decided to build a better future for itself, and that’s a very good thing.

I look forward to seeing the improvements, in our bus system and in the county’s roads…

The race I didn’t quite get to posting about

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UPDATE: Heads up! WLTX just reported via an alert on my phone (although I can’t find it on their website) that Kirkman Finlay III is now the winner.

So disregard all that stuff I said below speculating as to why Joe McCulloch won. At least, until we hear yet another correction.

This Richland County voting mess is such an embarrassment…

UPDATE TO THE UPDATE: This thing is a mess. Here’s a brief explanation of the differing stories out there.

Actually, that headline isn’t quite right. There were a number of electoral contests I wanted to get to and didn’t. Nikki Setzler’s battle against an ideological extremist who spent loads of money trying to assassinate his character, for instance. Or the race to replace Phil Leventis in the Senate (which I only touched on from a distance). There were others as well, but since I don’t do this full-time, it’s hard to get to them.

In fact, the only local race in which I actually sat down with the competitors and interviewed them and wrote about it was the one between Beth Bernstein and Joan Brady, and I just barely got that done in the last few days. Which is pathetic, but as I say, I don’t get paid a salary to do this anymore.

Anyway, what I’m referring to in the headline is one that I almost got to, but not quite.

At the last minute, I tried to get interviews with both Joe McCulloch and Kirkman Finlay III about their contest to replace Jim Harrison in SC House District 75. I got together with Joe, at the Starbucks in Five Points, but after a number of calls and emails back and forth last week, somehow the Finlay interview never happened.

And I just didn’t think it was quite fair to present McCulloch’s side and not Finlay’s. I debated back and forth about going ahead, but in the end ran out of time anyway.

I actually chose those two House races because I wasn’t sure which of the candidates in each of those I preferred. I’m still not sure about the District 78 race, although I congratulate Beth Bernstein on her victory. I think I would have ended up favoring McCulloch (who also won), but I don’t know, since I never sat down with Kirkman. I knew whom I preferred in other local contests — John Courson, Setzler and McElveen (and the voters in those districts agreed with me, apparently).

One thing sticks in my mind most clearly about the interview with Democrat Joe McCulloch — he stressed that he has lived in the district for all of his 60 years. I suspect that was a factor in his apparent victory in a district that’s been in the Republican column for quite some time. (I suspect something similar was at work in Setzler’s victory over Deedee Vaughters, particularly in Lexington County.) He said he’s practiced law in the community for 35 years, and “I’ve had the fortune to have a law practice that’s been eventful and high-profile.”

Mr. McCulloch described his campaign as a “ground game” versus Finlay’s “air game” — walking the district and talking to voters as opposed to spending money on TV ads. Aside from the usual door-knocking, he held two or three events a week with small groups in the district’s neighborhoods, generally in private homes.

As I have done over the years in such interviews, I asked what he’s hearing from those voters. It was fairly typical stuff — people are sick of nasty politics, tired of people substituting ideology for effectiveness on issues that matter.

He noted that this was one of the wealthiest, best-educated districts in the state, and had large numbers of people who don’t just pull the lever for a party, which he saw as accruing to his benefit. “The same people that believe John Courson should be re-elected are the people that are voting for me.”

I don’t know whether that was the key to his success or not. All I know is that it appears at this point that he will be the victor.

How’s the voting going at your polling place?

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Sorry about the finger. I was trying to be sly and not make people self conscious (something I'm usually better at than this). There were only about a dozen people outside the door this morning, and no more than that waiting inside, when I arrived.

This morning Holly Bounds, who covers SC for WSAV out of Savannah, wondered the following:

Holly Bounds
‏@HollyWSAV

Looking at all the lines people are posting, I wonder why more don’t take advantage of early voting. It was no wait Saturday.

I replied:

Here’s why: Voting is a community exercise of citizenship, and should be done with one’s neighbors at the appointed time…

But y’all have heard that sermon from me before.

Actually, I didn’t have all that much time to commune with the Quail Hollow folk today. I got in and out pretty quickly. The picture above shows what I found when I got there — about a dozen people waiting outside, about that many in the queue inside. (Sorry about the finger in front of the lens, but this shot still shows the situation better than the other one I took.) Right after this shot, someone said everyone from L-Z should come on in, so I and maybe one other person did so. One of those few instances when it’s best to be at the end of the alphabet. Inside, there were only a couple of people in front of me.

In the A-K line next to me was Big John Culp, the retired Methodist minister best known for having founded the Salkehatchie Summer Service program. John lives a couple of blocks from me, and passes my house on his daily constitutional. We talked about my Uncle Woody in Bennettsville, where John was once the pastor at the Methodist church on Main Street. I noted that where Woody would be voting today, the outcome was likely to be different from at our precinct.

That, and a brief exchange with my county councilman Bill Banning, who was leaving when I first arrived, was all the socializing I had time for. I was done voting in about 10 minutes. I could have been done faster if not for my compulsively pausing to take pictures of the voting machine screen (the picture above was taken at 8:42, the last shot I took of the screen was at 8:51).

But… that’s not the way it had been earlier. There was a long line stretching out to the parking lot earlier, but it was mostly gone when I got there at 8:40. (I had figured that would give enough time to clear out the early rush, and I was right.) Right after I entered the building to join the short K-Z line, one of the workers looked out and marveled, “We’re almost at the end of the line!” Another worker told me there had been about 300 voters so far — I neglected to ask her whether that was the total, or just the K-Z line that she was working.

The firing of Keven Cohen

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Somehow I missed this this morning, until Silence brought it to my attention on a previous thread:

Keven Cohen, the longtime afternoon drive host on WVOC-FM 100.1, was fired Thursday afternoon before he went on the air.

Cohen had been hosting the 3-6 p.m. slot since 1999.

“I had a great run at WVOC,” Cohen, sounding gracious, said when reached at his home Thursday evening. “It will always have a special place in my heart.”

Removing Cohen, who peppered his talk show with news and opinion, is a curious decision by the Clear Channel-owned station, especially with a momentous presidential election just four days away. Cohen also anchored the station’s pre- and post-game coverage of USC Gamecock football.

“It’s a scary and confusing time,” Cohen said. “It’s a very challenging time for me emotionally to not know what I’m going to do when I wake up tomorrow morning.”…

From what I’ve seen, radio is more abrupt than print is about these things. I had a couple of weeks to clear my stuff out of the editorial suite; this seemed to hit more suddenly.

For my part, I always thought Keven did a good job. I didn’t hear his show much because of the time of day, but I was a guest on it a few times, and always thought he was a considerate host and a thorough professional. I wasn’t the only one who thought so. I recall walking around Madison Square Garden with Lindsey Graham during the 2004 Republican National Convention (I was doing a column on the way he was working the media), and between chatting with Tim Russert and Biff Henderson of the Letterman show, he paused to take a call from Keven.

There was no one else like him in this market, to my knowledge. He will be missed in that role. I hope he finds another one, just as fulfilling, as soon as possible.

How to help Red Cross help those hurt by Sandy

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I’m kicking myself because I neglected to pass this on to y’all yesterday. Doing so now:

Dear Brad,

Superstorm Sandy has forced the cancellation of approximately 325 American Red Cross blood drives, resulting in a shortfall of nearly 11,000 units of blood and platelets so far. That number is sure to rise over the next several days as Sandy is causing power outages and flooding in many areas along the East Coast, which will result in the cancellation of additional blood drives throughout the week.

While Sandy will affect the number of people available to donate, hospital patients still need blood. The Red Cross has begun moving blood products to the affected areas as necessary, but nationwide, around 44,000 blood donations are needed each and every day to meet the needs of accident victims, cancer patients, and children with blood disorders. When disaster strikes, the need for blood does not diminish, even though blood donors may find it difficult or impossible to get to a convenient donation opportunity.

It’s the blood that is already on the shelves that helps save lives before, during and after a disaster. We urge you to schedule an appointment today to donate blood or platelets.

Sincerely,

The American Red Cross

P.S. If you have recently donated blood or platelets, there are other ways to help. To make a financial donation, please visit www.redcross.org, call 1-800-RED CROSS (1-800-733-2767) or text the word REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation*. Your gift enables the Red Cross to provide shelter, food, emotional support and other assistance to those affected.

Lott, others endorse ‘yes’ vote on the penny

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Nicole Curtis from the Columbia Chamber just saved me a heap o’ typing by sending out this from the presser I attended at the Clarion Townhouse this morning:

Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott officially endorsed the Transportation Penny Plan on Tuesday at a Unity Rally to demonstrate the strong and broad base of support for the countywide plan to improve roadways in the Midlands and save the area’s vital bus system.

“Passage of the penny will help protect public safety in Richland County,” Lott said in his endorsement of The Penny. “The penny will provide infrastructure that can be life-saving. It will pave hundreds of dirt roads across the country. This is about far more than convenience. When sheriff’s deputies and ambulances can’t get down a dirt road because it’s turned to mud, people can die.”

Other local leaders, including Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin joined Lott at the Rally, which was held at the Clarion Townhouse in downtown Columbia exactly one week before the crucial Nov. 6 vote on The Penny.

“Those who oppose this initiative say it costs too much. But it’s a no vote that costs too much,” said Benjamin. “It would mean the loss of over 16,500 new jobs and billions in new investments. It would mean continuing to pay the terrible cost of having the second most dangerous roads in the state. It would cost our community millions in federal matching funds for transforming our bus system. It would lead to fees that would cost our families twice as much as The Penny. It would put the entire burden of transportation costs on Richland County residents, rather than letting folks from outside share the load.”

The event represented a diverse cross-section of individuals, including business, community and faith leaders, elected officials and various activist organizations.

Others on hand at the rally included members of the Richland County Legislative Delegation, Columbia City Council and Richland County Council, representatives from the United Way of the Midlands, Sustainable Midlands, Greater Irmo Chamber of Commerce, Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce, Eau Claire Community Council, River Alliance, League of Women Voters, Conservation Voters of South Carolina and the Midlands Business Leadership Group, and additional neighborhood, faith and community leaders.

“Today our answer is a resounding YES – YES we want more jobs, YES we want local control, YES we want a first class public transit system and YES we want safer roads,” said Bunnie Ward of the United Way of the Midlands. “By investing today and saying YES, we will ensure a successful future for our community for generations to come.”

The Penny is on the Nov. 6 General Election ballot as two separate “Sales and Use Tax” questions. If approved by voters, it would add one cent to the Richland County sales tax for a period of 22 years to raise funds for vital roadway improvements and to provide long-term support for the local bus system.

Citizens for a Greater Midlands, the group pushing passage of this referendum, has done quite a job of assembling a broad coalition, as evidenced in the third paragraph from the end.

Of course, as I’ve noted before, the other side has a lot of passion going for it. Or at least, I thought it did. I was a bit surprised that, unlike at the last one of these events I attended in the same location, there wasn’t a single “no” counterdemonstrator outside. And this event was publicized in advance. I don’t know what happened to them today…

Last week’s election forum at the library

bradwarthen.com

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