Category Archives: Midlands

Shadd endorses Meadors as 5th circuit solicitor

Free Times story on Greene BEFORE the vote

Corey Hutchins over at the Free Times brings my attention to his story about Alvin Greene, posted this afternoon:

…State party executive director Jay Parmley looked like he’d bitten down on a joy buzzer as he sat in the chair of his office, scrolling up and down the precinct reports on his computer monitor shaking his head, cursing under his breath, wondering why, why, why; how, how, how?

In the race for United States Senate, political unknown Alvin M. Greene had walloped challenger Vic Rawl.

Around the state, Democratic activists were facing the smacking electoral truth that a non-campaigning, unemployed, black, country-living, coo-coo-for-Cocoa-Puffs nobody who’d been kicked out of the Army and was currently facing federal sex charges had just beaten — in the Democratic primary, and by 17 percentage points — a well-known former legislator, judge and current Charleston County councilman who’d raised a quarter of a million bucks for the race and for months been campaigning his ass off.

The news wasn’t sinking in as much as it was settling like a depth charge….

But I wasn’t nearly as impressed by that as I was by the fact that Corey had done a reasonably complete story on Greene well before Tuesday’s vote. An excerpt from that May 19 piece:

At the end of a dirt driveway off a dusty highway in rural Clarendon County, just outside the town of Manning, a lawn overgrown with weeds sports no campaign sign for the man living in a house there who has filed to run as a Democrat for the U.S. Senate.

The candidate, a 32-year-old unemployed black Army veteran named Alvin Greene, walked into the state Democratic Party headquarters in March with a personal check for $10,400. He said he wanted to become South Carolina’s U.S. senator.

Needless to say, Democratic Party Chairwoman Carol Fowler was a bit surprised.

Fowler had never met Greene before, she says, and the party isn’t in the habit of taking personal checks from candidates filing for office. She told Greene that he’d have to start a campaign account if he wanted to run. She asked him if he thought it was the best way to invest more than $10,000 if he was unemployed.

Several hours later, Greene came back with a campaign check. The party accepted it, and Greene became an official candidate for the U.S. Senate. He was eager to have his picture put on the party’s website to show he had filed, says state Democratic Party executive director Jay Parmley.

And Corey was asking Greene himself some of the questions that should have been asked:

Reached by phone May 12, and asked how he thought his campaign was going, Greene said, “So far, so good.”

Asked when he planned to file with the FEC, he replied, “OK, yeah, so what do you need? What are you trying to get from me, now? I’m in a hurry.”

Greene says he decided to run for the United States Senate two years ago when he was serving in Korea.

As for the $10,400 he used to get on the ballot, Greene says it was money he’d made from being a soldier.

“That was my personal pay,” he says. “Money out of my pocket.”

Parmley says he finds the whole thing odd.

He says running for any other office in the state would cost much less money. “If you’re going to file for something and not do anything, why waste $10,000?”

Even then, ahead of time, Corey was raising the Republican conspiracy theory, rightly or wrongly:

Greene’s curious candidacy raises the question that something else might be going on.

Republican place markers in Palmetto State Democratic primaries are campaign legend.

In the early ‘90s, a Republican strategist was prosecuted and forced to pay a fine when he was found to have coaxed an unemployed black fisherman into running in a primary race to increase white turnout at the polls in a Lowcountry congressional race. The political operative paid the man’s filing fee.

Greene says he’s never heard of such a thing. He says he just really wanted to run.

Regardless of how or why he got into the race, his candidacy has certainly created some political intrigue.

Good enterprise, young man. Too bad more of us didn’t read it at the time.

How’s the turnout where YOU are?

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Note how empty my polling place was this morning at 10:50 a.m. Of course, this wasn’t exactly morning rush hour, and it was before the busy lunch hour, but still. Take a look at the pictures back here to see what it looked like on Election Day 2008 at the Quail Hollow precinct. In a big-turnout election, it would have taken me an hour of standing in the queue outside before I got to the doorway where I took the picture above.

But the poll workers said this was good turnout for a state primary. How good was it? At 10:55, when I left, there had been 218 voters in the Republican primary, and 31 (including me) choosing a Democratic ballot (for which I felt like I had to mutter an excuse along the lines of “I’m just fed up with those Republicans this year” — like they cared or something).

What do Rob Miller and Katrina Shealy have in common?

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Scenario: Veteran incumbent Republican shoots off his mouth in a way that embarrasses South Carolina across the nation. This creates the opportunity for better representation to emerge, for people with a lot to offer, people with a good chance of beating that incumbent, to emerge, to step forward and offer South Carolinians a chance to have better representation.

Instead, the disappointing candidate who ran against that incumbent last time around and was rejected by the voters steps up and grabs the limelight while media attention is still focused on the incumbent’s bad behavior. That person gets enough free media to become ensconced as THE alternative to the incumbent, thereby discouraging other, potentially stronger candidates from emerging.

We saw it happen with Rob Miller after Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” fiasco. Miller pulled in millions because he was sitting there alone as “Joe Wilson’s opposition” well before the time that better candidates might have made the decision to run. As a result, since Mr. Miller is not a visibly stronger candidate than he was when he lost to Rep. Wilson in 2008, Joe Wilson will be re-elected.

And it looks like the same thing is happening in the wake of Jake Knotts’ “raghead” outburst. Already, there is a “Katrina Shealy for SC Senate District 23 (2012)” Facebook page. Over on her Website, one finds the following message:

Dear Friends and Supporters,

Welcome to my temporary internet home. In the last few days, we have seen all that is wrong with politics in South Carolina and Lexington County. I want to announce that I will again be running for Senate District 23 in 2012.

We deserve real leadership and it’s time for the politics of old to end. Personal destruction and cronyism have no place in our state.

I’m not surprised that my opponent continues to fail to represent the strong values and beliefs of our district. That’s why I would like to ask for your help.

Would you be kind enough to support my campaign with $10, $20 or even $100? It would go a long way in spreading my POSITIVE message of real leadership and good government.

Thank you in advance for any support you can offer. Together we can, and will, change South Carolina in 2012 and beyond.

Sincerely,

Katrina Shealy

So it is that in the coming weeks and months, as other candidates contemplate offering themselves as an alternative to Jake, they will be faced with the prospect of an opponent who a) has name recognition; b) already has funding (both as a result of Jake’s outrageous comment and the pipeline she already had to pro-Sanford sources) and c) has had a lot of people flock to her in reaction to what Jake said. To most potential candidates, those reasons will be enough to say, “Never mind.”

There will be differences. For one, Ms. Shealy won’t pull in the millions that Mr. Miller did. For another, this would be a primary, and she’d have a better chance of beating Jake than Rob has of beating Joe. No matter what else happens in the 2nd Congressional District, when it comes time to count Lexington County’s votes, the Republican has the advantage. A Democrat has to be really, really strong to beat the Republican in that district (in fact, I’ve never seen it done since Floyd Spence was first elected in 1970), and Rob Miller doesn’t answer that description.

Also, the dynamics would be different. For one thing, with Mark Sanford out of office, Ms. Shealy would no longer have the taint of looking like the candidate the governor sent to take out his political enemy. (Which is why we broke our long history of opposition for all Jake stands for to endorse him against her; I suspect that’s why the voters rejected her, too.) She would have a better chance of standing on her own and defining herself as someone who would represent the people of the 23rd district rather than the governor. (That is, unless Nikki Haley is elected governor, in which case you’d have the same problematic narrative of the Sanford cabal trying to control two branches of government. And after Jake started the hue and cry that let to the exposure of their guy’s Argentina affair, they hate him more than ever. But that concern would evaporate if Vincent Sheheen were governor.)

But as I look forward to the 2012 election, I find myself wishing what I wish this year in the 2nd Congressional District — that other options would emerge. That someone new and untainted by the conflicts of past would step forward to offer a choice that we could all feel good about.

Any club that would have ME as a member…

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Today, I find myself in a bit of an ethical dilemma. And as y’all know, I am Mr. Ethics, although I do have a certain penchant for placing myself in … ambiguous… circumstances.

Y’all also know that I’m a member of The Capital City Club, of quite a few years’ standing. I’m quite proud of the club and its heritage, since it was founded to provide an inclusive alternative for certain other clubs that somehow hadn’t gotten around to admitting any black or Jewish or female members. Not only am I a member, but I serve on the club’s board.

In that capacity I know that, with the economic downturn, we can use all the special events we can get. At the wonderfully low price of the club’s “Breakfast Club,” my eating grits and bacon there every morning isn’t exactly paying the light bill. With that in mind we held my great-aunt’s 100th birthday lunch there recently, and a lovely time was had by all. And if your family has a wedding coming up and you need a reception venue, let me know and I’ll see what I can arrange…

So it is with a mixture of grateful welcome and wry amusement that I look upon this item, which a colleague shared with me with the observation, “Interesting choice of location for our little populist …” Here’s what the press advisory said:

(Columbia, SC) – Today, the Haley for Governor Campaign released information regarding location for the campaign’s primary night celebration.

What: Haley for Governor Primary Night Celebration

Where: Capital City Club, 1201 Main Street, Columbia, S.C.

When: Tuesday, June 8th

Event begins at 7:00 pm. Media will have access beginning at 5:30 pm….

###

Personally, I think it’s absolutely fine that Nikki chose our club for her event. I may swing by to welcome her and her entourage. I’m sure they’ll find it an enjoyable experience, especially if the election returns break as I think they will, with her at least in a runoff.

And I doubt her populist fans will object. I don’t think they’re that kind of populist.

Benjamin’s statements and other documents

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As promised earlier in the day, here is a PDF of the documents Steve Benjamin released today. The Acrobat file includes:

A statement he made to police on May 3
A second statement made on May 6
A third statement dated May 19
A Uniform Traffic Ticket dated June 1 (it says “Date of Arrest,” but that’s just a formality; if I recall correctly, all traffic tickets say that)
The original incident report

Sorry to take so long to get these to you. I cooked and ate dinner first. Also had me a beer. So sue me.

I see that in the meantime, thestate.com has posted its own PDF of the same document, which they have enhanced to increase contrast. Read that one if you prefer, but I went to the trouble of scanning this one a page at a time, so I’m going to bloody well post it.

Benjamin pays $81.87 fine; ready to move on

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OK, that headline sounded a little too brusque. Obviously, the mayor-elect isn’t going to put this behind him in the sense of forgetting Ms. Ruben and her serious injuries. He makes the point repeatedly that she is in his prayers, and he would like a chance to see her when it’s OK with her family.

A phone photo of a copy of the citation; sorry about the quality.

But legally speaking, Steve’s mouthpiece James Smith says that now that the fine for driving without his headlights on has been paid (this morning, at a magistrate’s office), the case is done as far as any culpability for the accident on Mr. Benjamin’s part is concerned.

At the less than 15-minute press conference at City Hall, Mr. Benjamin’s aides distributed copies of a series of written statements by him regarding the accident, plus a traffic ticket he was given yesterday, and the original incident report. (I’ll scan those into a PDF for you when I’m home where my scanner is, or link you to them if someone beats me to it, which seems likely.)

As for how he could have been driving without his lights on in a high-tech Mercedes SUV, here’s the salient part of the statement:

My wife and I stayed at the Hilton Hotel in the Vista after the conclusion of the events of election day and election night, April 20, 2010. I was scheduled to be interviewed by WLTX on the April 21, 2010, 6:00 a.m. newscast. I awoke and prepared myself for the morning. I went to the hotel lobby at approximately 5:30 a.m. I had to retrieve the keys for my wife’s vehicle from the desk as there was no valet on duty and the valet had parked our vehicle th day before. I spoke with the front desk clerk and she gave me the keys to my wife’s vehicle. I prepared a cup of coffee and exited the rear of the hotel and walked into the parking garage. I located my wife’s vehicle, got in, started the vehicle, put on the seat belt and exited the parking garage. My wife’s vehicle has automatic lights. I did not adjust the light setting. As I drove the vehicle, the dashboard was illuminated and I was able to clearly see my path of travel.

Steve was reluctant to elaborate on how the lights could have been off, repeatedly referring reporters back to the statement. We were left with the implication that someone other than he had switched the lights off of automatic mode without his knowledge, but he hesitated to come right out and say “The valet did it.”

Other items from the statements and answers at the press confab:

He had the green light.
He was in the left lane of the two lanes heading east on Gervais at the time of the collision.
“I was not impaired at the time of the accident.”
“I was not fatigued at the time of the accident.”
“I slept approximately 10 hours in the two nights prior to the accident. The night of the accident I went to bed shortly after 2:00 a.m.”
At about 11:45 the night before, a supporter bought him “a vodka and tonic or soda.” He said “I cannot remember if I took a sip or two sips, but I drank a little just to be polite.” He later had a drink of Malibu rum and orange juice, just after midnight.
During the 24 hours before the accident, he had a biscuit with meat and coffee at 7:20 a.m. on election day; baked chicken and green beans for lunch, with water; snacks and candy at various times during the day; missed dinner at the usual hour but ate fruit and vegetables with some water at the convention center celebration.
He had the sips from the vodka drink at the Liberty Tap Room, where they had hoped to get dinner, but the kitchen was closed.
He and family and friends moved on to the Sheraton, where “I consumed a cheeseburger, fries, non-alcoholic iced tea and one Malibu and orange juice at approximately 12:12-12:30 a.m. He said he also had some appetizers. Then there was the coffee the next morning.
Other than the sips of vodka and the rum-and-orange juice (which I’ve got to say sounds like a nasty drink), he acknowledges drinking no alcohol during that 24 hours.
He says he did not make or receive any phone calls while driving that morning. Nor did he send or check text messages. But he adds, “I did check my voicemail and listened to messages using my speaker function of my cell phone.” The statement is unclear whether that was WHILE driving and no one thought during the press conference to ask that question. Sounds like it was. He concludes that statement, “I was not distracted at the time of the accident.”

That’s what I’ve got for now. I didn’t have my camera, but I’ll have a phone photo or two for you shortly. I’ll post PDFs of the statements and other documents tonight.

Oh, as the “move on” thing in the headline. James said this concludes Benjamin’s part in any legal matters having to do with the accident. As for the city police, their final report won’t be done until the state Highway Patrol is done reviewing it.

The mayor-elect himself made several references to his transition team and the 8 issue areas they are concentrating on, and said he hopes to get as good a media turnout as he had today when the team is ready to unveil their findings on those issues. In other words, he’s anxious to get started doing the job.

How is it that Benjamin’s lights weren’t on?

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If I can get away in time I’m going to run over and catch Steve Benjamin’s press conference on the subject, but I find myself puzzled by the news that police say he contributed to the wreck by not having his headlights on.

I thought he had one of those fancy new cars that automatically took care of stuff like that. Even my beat-up 2000 Buick Regal turns the lights on automatically when it’s dark outside.

And now that we know this, what happens next?

I hope to find out…

Military’s impact on the Midlands

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Just got this note from Mayor Bob Coble:

Great article by Jeff Wilkinson in The State on the impact of Fort Jackson, Shaw and McEntire on our economy. Ike McLeese has done a tremendous job leading the effort locally, as has Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom on the State level. The Rhoads Group has done an outstanding job for us making sure the Pentagon has all the information about the strengths of Fort Jackson. The BRAC decision in 2005 was a big win economically for the Midlands and South Carolina.

The piece does make an important point, and I know Ike McLeese has done yeoman’s work over the past decade keeping the military engaged in the Midlands.

Hail the hero! Some good news about Cola police

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Just saw this:

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) – A Columbia police officer is being called a hero after he pulled a woman from her burning car shortly before part of it exploded Thursday morning….

It’s nice to have something to celebrate with the CPD these days. Good work, Officer David Rusher!

Young lawyers vie for Kit Smith’s council seat

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Scott Winburn

Quick, what do Seth Rose and Scott Winburn have in common that makes them both look like smart, capable candidates?

Yes! They both advertise on bradwarthen.com. That, of course, should be all you need to know, but then, how could you choose between them?

What else do they have in common? Well, they’re both young lawyers who happen to be Democrats. I interviewed each of them over breakfast this week. And both of them are running for the 5th District Richland County Council seat being vacated by Kit Smith.

They are not the only candidates running in the Democratic primary for that seat (which by the way IS the election, since no Republicans are seeking it). Moe Baddourah and Kayin Jones are also on the ballot, and Mr. Baddourah has some catchy signs you may have seen around town. For all I know, one of them could end up in a runoff, but without any polling or anything else to go on, my sense is that most of the energy in this contest belongs to Rose and Winburn (a Free Times piece this week on the back-and-forth between Rose and Winburn didn’t even mention the other two candidates).

So, what separates the two candidates? Quite a bit, actually. For instance:

The Kit Smith factor… Rose started running for this seat before Kit Smith said she was ready to vacate it. Why? Because, he says, he didn’t think she was visible enough in the community. He says his model for a good council member is his city council rep, Belinda Gergel — whom he says he sees everywhere at community functions. By contrast, Winburn — who didn’t announce until Mrs. Smith decided not to seek re-election — has her endorsement.
Last time I looked, Seth seemed to have a lot more yard signs than Scott. That could be because he’s raised a good bit more money.
Scott may not be old Columbia, but he’s old South Carolina. My uncle knows his mama and daddy up in my hometown of Bennettsville. In fact, my uncle called me last weekend to tell me to expect a call from Scott. (Initially, Scott had wanted to talk to me to get advice on how to get The State’s endorsement. I had to break it to him that The State wouldn’t be endorsing in his race. The overworked remnants of an editorial board are only endorsing for governor, attorney general and solicitor.) To cite another connection I have to him: My uncle serves on the board that supervises Scott’s father, who is Director of Disabilities and Special Needs for Marlboro County.
By contrast, Seth never knew his father, and his mom was 18 when she had him. He was born in West Virginia and raised in Florida by his mom and aunt. His grandfather was in a pipefitter and a union man, which Seth credits with helping start him down the path to being a Democrat. He also credits his background with having instilled in him a strong work ethic.
Seth went to USC on a tennis scholarship, and he made All-American. Scott went to Clemson, like fellow Bennettsville Democrat Doug Jennings.
Since I mentioned that I have indirect personal connections to Scott, I should mention that Seth is in my Rotary Club, and like him, my Dad went to a South Carolin college on a tennis scholarship (Presbyterian College). Dad still follows SC tennis, and when he saw his yard signs recently, asked, me, “Isn’t he the tennis player?”
Scott is in private practice with Rep. James Smith. Seth is a prosecutor in the 5th Circuit solicitor’s office.
Winburn claims the support of both Smiths (James and Kit), as well as former Gov. Jim Hodges and such conservation activists as Ann Timberlake. (He has in the past worked for Hodges and the Coastal Conservation League, and clerked for Ed Cottingham.) In contrast to that constellation of white Democrats, Rose cites the backing of Todd Rutherford, Chris Hart, Vince Ford and I.S. Leevy Johnson. I’m not saying there’s a racial thing going on, but it did strike me that there was that contrast among the first names each cited when I asked who was supporting them.

As for the “issue” that has emerged between the two… Winburn supporters have accused Rose of the “Don Tomlin candidate” because the developer has given his campaign $1,000. This, of course, is muttered darkly by the conservation-minded folk who back Winburn and have long supported Kit Smith. Rose indicates this all took him by surprise. First, he doesn’t personally know Don Tomlin. Then, once the name came up, he did a little research and found that Mr. Tomlin has given to other Democrats as well — including James Smith and Kit Smith, in 2006.

As an issue, that sounds kind of like a wash to me. I see no indication that Rose is another Brian Boyer. Mr. Boyer, if you’ll recall, was the young veteran who actually was in Tomlin’s employ when he ran against Belinda Gergel in 2008. By contrast, Rose is a great admirer of Mrs. Gergel, the historic preservationist. He also says he has worked to obtain limits on development in his community.

So I think those of you who live in Richland County’s 5th District will have to make your decision on the basis of something else. Check out their websites, which are linked from their ads, and from the first reference to their names above.

Seth Rose

Our Kathryn gets after McMaster

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Kathryn called my attention to a piece in The Free Times about our fellow Rotarian Henry McMaster (“Henry McMaster: Slumlord Millionaire?”), and I moaned about how it was way too long to get to… not realizing that she wanted me to read it because she was quoted in it extensively. I’ll quote a portion of it, and you can go to The Free Times for the rest:

The whole spectacle regarding the McMasters and their lawsuit makes University Hill resident Kathryn Fenner bristle. She’s the vice president of the University Hill Neighborhood Association and serves on the city’s code-enforcement task force, a blue-ribbon committee that was set up to make recommendations on city ordinances.

Fenner has observed Peggy McMaster for years — Peggy sits on the board of the neighborhood association — and Fenner’s house is surrounded by five properties the McMasters own.

Sitting in her modern, brightly colored, sun-lit living room with two large dogs playing around her, Fenner launches into an all-out assault on the way Henry and Peggy McMaster have handled their role as local landlords in the neighborhood. To her, their actions have been offensive.

The McMasters, she says, have a don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy with their tenants regarding the city’s over-occupancy laws. As an attorney, she finds it laughable that Henry is appealing a zoning ordinance because she thinks he’s clearly ignoring precedent of the law.

But that’s the thing with the McMasters, Fenner says: They have a sense of entitlement that allows them to act like complete hypocrites, apparently without even realizing they’re doing it.

“I think that if you are supposed to be the chief law enforcement officer in the state, you probably shouldn’t be nodding and winking at lawbreaking,” she says.

She’s speaking specifically about occupancy laws, which several tenants admitted to Free Times they were breaking but said they had a wink-and-nod agreement with their landlords about doing.

Henry has fought hard against the city to keep on doing what he’s doing and several tenants are happy their landlords are going to bat for them — with good reason. The McMasters enjoy more rent money coming in and renters end up paying less individually.

But it’s the way Henry has been doing it that bothers Fenner so much.

In testimony he gave on his wife’s behalf to the zoning board in 2007, McMaster said, “The constitution says if you’re a single housekeeping unit you may not be the traditional family, but you’re a family just the same and you’re not hurting anything any more than a traditional family.”

That really bothers Fenner, a self-described Democrat, who took umbrage to McMaster’s staunch, headline-grabbing opposition to same-sex unions when a constitutional amendment to ban state recognition of them was put on the ballot in 2006.

“What offends me chiefly is the hypocrisy,” Fenner says. “The hypocrisy that we’re going to protect non-traditional families when we can make a buck out of it and we’re going to pillory non-traditional families when we can make political bucks out of it.”

Benjamin’s transition team

Vote for me, the liberal republican (or conservative democrat, if you prefer)!

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You know, I don’t know if I can abide seeing one more mailer (such as the one above that came in the mail today) or yard sign trumpeting to the world that the candidate in question is a “Conservative Republican.”

You know, as opposed to all those liberal Republicans running around over here in Lexington County.

This is not new, but in the era of Nikki Haley and the Tea Party (which I’m considering using as the name of my new band, if Nikki will agree to front it), I’m hearing it more and more. And in the more extreme cases, such as with Nikki herself, “Conservative” is being touted as something apart from Republicans, mere Republicans not being worthy, you see.

Set aside the appalling notion that to the voters these folks are reaching out to, ordinary South Carolina Republicans just aren’t right-wing enough. I mean, think about that for a minute…

That’s long enough. Thankfully, S.C. Democrats aren’t given to this sort of redundancy, this rococo gilding of the ideological lily. If I saw one sign in my community that claimed to be for a “Liberal Democrat,” I believe I’d run for the hills. That would be just one extremism too many for me.

Remind me, if I run for office, to put “liberal republican” or “conservative democrat” (note the lower case; God forbid I should be mistaken for an adherent of one of those granfalloons). And I think I’ll refer to my opposition as “fascist anarchists,” to use Ferris Bueller’s term.

Anything for a little variety.

Benjamin wants to put new law school on Main St.

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It’s going to be interesting having Steve Benjamin as mayor. His mind is just going a mile a minute spotting opportunities, making connections, such as this one reported by Mike Fitts:

Columbia already has the right major tenant to go into the former SCANA Corp. space on Main Street, according to mayor-elect Steve Benjamin: He wants the building to be the new home of the University of South Carolina School of Law.

Benjamin hopes the school could work out a long-term lease with the Palmetto Center, the building that now has about 450,000 vacant square feet in the heart of downtown. A long-term tenant such as the law school should be appealing to the owners, Benjamin said, and would keep the building in private hands and on the tax rolls….

If the school were there, it would be surrounded by the offices of many of the state’s biggest law firms and several courts, including the S.C. Supreme Court, Benjamin said.“It’s a perfect place for law students,” he said.

Benjamin said he has met with the building’s owner and real estate agent to pitch the plan. The building could be bought by a new owner and renovated for substantially less than it would cost USC to build a new school, he said.

Moving it there “would mean giving Main Street a big old shot of adrenalin,” Benjamin said. He compares the potential impact on downtown to what the Savannah College of Art and Design has brought to that city….

Already, this idea is creating a lot of buzz. Mandi Engram posted something about it on Facebook and has kicked off a lively discussion there.

What do y’all think?

Meanwhile, from the soon-to-be-FORMER mayor…

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I received this from Bob Coble over the weekend:

I am attaching the City’s current Budget and Investment Reconciliation Statement that shows all of the City’s bank and
investment accounts are reconciled and balanced.

I am attaching the link to the City’s current financial that is on our website. The statement is through April. http://www.columbiasc.net/depts/finance/downloads/April%202010%20Report%20Cover%20Memo%20and%20Revenue-Exp%20Report%20Preliminary.pdf

Also, attached is the link to our current check register that is through April 30th. The register shows all the checks written by the City this fiscal year. http://www.columbiasc.net/depts/finance/downloads/Truth%20in%20Spending%20April%202010.pdf

I wanted to give you a budget update. We are continuing to make progress in bringing in a budget. The current budget’s expenses are $5.7 million under budget. General fund revenues are above target. Next year’s proposed budget includes, through greater efficiencies, an additional $500,000 for police overtime. We will add 15 police officers
from stimulus funding. The fire department budget fully funds all fire suppression and prevention responsibilities, and fully funds all firefighter staffing levels. Additionally, we have eliminated over 30 unfilled positions saving over $1.4 million.

Columbia’s financial statements are current and on the City’s website. The City’s check register is current and online. All City bank accounts and investment accounts are reconciled. The City’s general fund rainy day fund and GASB 45 reserves are above $30 million. Moody’s reaffirmed in 2009 the City’s excellent credit rating for the general fund and the water and sewer fund. I will continue to keep you posted.

I also received a copy of an op-ed he sent The State. Last time he sent me one of those I posted it here before The State could consider it, and I worried that I was hurting his chances of being published. Makes me hesitate this time…

An update from Steve Benjamin

Robert’s take on the Benjamin wreck mess

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Kathryn was bragging on my good friend Robert Ariail’s latest creation via e-mail today, so I thought I’d share it here.

Robert’s one of the best in the country — in the world — on national and international issues, but it’s his takes on South Carolina people, events and issues that make it most worthwhile to check out his blog on a regular basis.

Benjamin and Sheriff Lott, having a chat

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Forgot to mention this yesterday. Steve Benjamin came up to me yesterday after a lunch meeting of the Capital City Club board to talk about several things. None of them newsworthy, yet. More later.

But I thought I’d mention that, at the end of our chat, my “twin,” Sheriff Leon Lott, came up to take my place speaking privately to the mayor-elect. I walked away a few steps, then turned back saying, “I want to hear what these guys have to say to each other.” It was halfway a joke, as I knew they weren’t going to talk about anything I wanted to hear while I was eavesdropping, so after they politely laughed I left.

I don’t know that they were talking about taking advantage of this great opportunity to merge the Columbia police and Richland County Sheriff’s departments, but I hope they were. Of course, such dialogue would be informal and unofficial at this point.

By the way, one of the reasons I maintained my membership at Cap City after being laid off was that it constantly exposes me to little inconclusive bits of intel such as this — you see who’s talking with whom, and sometimes learn what they’re talking about, and it all goes into the general hopper that provides perspective on what’s going on. Another reason I kept it was that I had just joined the governing board — two months before I was laid off — and didn’t want to bail on that. Besides, the food at the lunch meetings is great.

Just to round out this contact report, among the other board members at this meeting were Converse Chellis, Jim Hodges, John Scott, Warren Tompkins, Luther Battiste (our chairman), Jimmy Derrick, Robin Gorman, George Wolfe, Matt Kennell, Tom Persons, and my financial adviser (poor fellow) Chris Burnette. By the way, Chris advised me to keep my membership, so I know I was on solid ground with that decision. Of course, he’s also chairman of the membership committee. Hmmm.

Kathryn’s going to look at that list and say, “Hey! A Rotary meeting!”