Q.Did you really devise a "loophole" and encourage the Council to fly to Hawaii at taxpayer expense?

A. Surely you don’t believe that… The truth is that each council member gets a travel budget each year – as do our senior staff members and most department heads. Conventions, continuing education seminars, meetings in Washington and Columbia to lobby for issues and funding – there are a variety of reasons to travel on official county business. The National Association of Counties has 2 annual conventions: March in D.C. is the Legislative conference, and each July a different state hosts the general conference. As well, the State Association of Counties has an annual meeting in Hilton Head each August, and several meetings in Columbia throughout the year. I have been to each of these conferences at least once, and decided the best one was the July national convention, so I annually pass up Washington DC and Hilton Head to spend my time and money on the July trip. I've been to Charlotte, St. Louis, Philadelphia, Portland, Phoenix, and plan to go to Chicago this summer. Last year, the conference state was Hawaii. Attendance was down from 10,000 to 7,000 because it was Hawaii, and every participant took abuse for attending in Hawaii. But it's a great conference, and I did not exceed my travel budget, so I went to that convention ONLY all year, and I considered it well worth it. [One day we'll build our International Convention Center in Myrtle Beach, and I hope we get to host the NACO Convention here – it’s a huge economic boon for the host city – and I feel sure every participant will be hassled for going to Myrtle Beach at taxpayer expense!]

Q. What about you raising taxes "hundreds of dollars" last year for no good reason?

A. Also false. Our millage actually decreased last year, because by law we can't make a "windfall profit" from reassessment (which is state mandated and done by a formula – County Council cannot do a thing about reassessment, which reevaluates your property's worth based on market value. Most folks in Horry have increased property value because of our hot real estate market, thus a tax bill that is higher because it is based on property value.) We rolled back the millage, then added 1.5 mills to pay for critical public safety needs. The total millage was actually a decrease in millage from the year before.

Q. So what was so critical about the public safety needs?

A. Our police response time to a crime-in-progress had dropped from the national average of 7 minutes to 14 minutes per call. Totally unacceptable. We hired 14 new policemen (29 overall in the entire budget) and were able to begin the Precinct Plan, which should give you much better area protection by police than the old sector plan.

We also added an ambulance, which I believed was critical simply because in the 6 weeks prior to budget being finalized, we had twice as many emergency calls to send an ambulance and there was no available ambulance in the county to send! I trust you agree that having enough ambulances available for service should be a priority expense for county government.

Q. Why couldn't you cut something else to pay for the police and ambulance?

A. Sounds easy. Actually our insurance had gone through the roof as well as our workers’ comp expense, and the gas for county vehicles went up the same as yours. In fact, most everything costs us more these days, so we’ve stretched your dollars to make everything fit without raising taxes, and there simply was not enough ability to stretch it to find another $1.6 million for police and the ambulance. I wish we could have – I pay taxes, too.

Q. Are you favoring a tax increase this year?

A. No, and I can tell you that no one else on Council wants one either.

Q. So why did you cancel the 2 meetings, causing the budget to be decided after the election?

A. Because I’ve never seen the council quite as politically motivated as during this spring’s budget deliberations. I hope that waiting until the election is over will take some of the politics out of the process. Determining our budget – which is your money – is serious business and should be done responsibly and rightly, not a time for grandstanding and showboating for soundbites and newspaper quotes to impress voters. The decision came down to "Do I move the meetings and risk being hammered, or keep the normal schedule and risk having the budget done poorly?" I chose to risk the election in favor of a better budget.

Q. So have you really never seen a tax increase you didn't like?

A. Actually, I can only remember ever voting for an increase for public safety expenses (fire, police, EMS) or to keep our employees paid at market levels so as to not lose the good ones to other jobs – which costs about $10,000 to replace an employee, affects the department by overburdening an understaffed group of folks, and gives you less service than you deserve. The bottom line on me and taxes is that the millage rate (which is set by Council annually and determines how much you pay that year) is one mill less right now than it was when I took office in 1995. Your home may be worth more, so you pay more in taxes (one mill is $4 on a $100,000 home, and $12 on a $300,000 home, and so on – multiplying $4 by each $100,000 in value). It’s funny – no one fusses when the home they built or bought for $140,000 is now worth $300,000 – but they sure hate to get the tax bill on that $300,000 home!

Q. What about the lack of leadership your opponent tells us about?

A. I think I’m just a different kind of leader than preceding chairmen. I believe the wise thing to do is assess your team and find the strengths, and then delegate certain issues and projects to the appropriate council member, which I’ve done. John Boyd was charged with leading the issue of I-73, since it came through his district. Howard Barnard had a vested interest in seeing that an evacuation route is built for his South Strand constituents. Harold Worley was put in charge of dealing with the casino boats, since they are only in his district. I don't think the leader should be the monarch and keep all the power or have to take the lead on every issue.

Q. So what changes have been made under your leadership that you can point to as evidence that you should be re-elected?

A. I’ve said it before: the lady who stopped me in Walmart and said “I used to watch the show on Tuesday night’s for entertainment – and now I watch it for information!” If you were here and kept up with Council, you know that we were the best sit-com in town until I took over the chairman’s seat. It wasn’t a coincidence that now we are seen as doing our job more professionally, agreeing to disagree without being disagreeable. I also allow plenty of time for the public to address us on issues, and am attentive and polite to those who address us. (Believe me, that’s a change…) Also, I virtually did away with executive sessions. I believe the work of the people should be done in public, not behind closed doors. Our executive meetings were a standard part of every council meeting for the 8 years I was a district representative. Since I’ve been chairman, we’ve had less than 5, and the last one (about 3 meetings ago, and dealing with a sensitive issue concerning a specific company looking to re-locate here which had to be kept confidential) was the first time in 2 ½ years that we’d gone behind closed doors for any reason whatsoever. I think that’s something to be very pleased about.

Our 9-1-1 system was so antiquated that we were having to scavenge for parts when something broke because they weren’t being made anymore – now we have a state-of-the-art system as well as a redundant (spare) system in another building that can be used for emergencies when needed.

We are among the national leaders (of over 3000 counties) in our IT department, having connected with fiber-optics our county buildings, the municipal buildings, and the hospitals. Our GIS (geographic information system) is completed. Our website offers more than most counties and is getting better all the time.

I went with a team of 60 folks from our county to a FEMA training camp in Maryland for 5 days of hurricane training, and we were judged to be "if not the best, at least in the top three" of the 165 counties and cities nationwide that had done such training.

Our Conway library will be dedicated next month and the county museum has received $5 million in funding from the county. We are clearing land for the Bucksport Recreation/community Center and are in the design phase of a new Health Department. Half a dozen fire stations have been built. The Hwy. 57 park is nearly completed.

We spent money to have efficiency studies done on the Solid Waste Authority, the Economic Development group, and the airport. Each was then used rather than being shelved as had been done in the past, and major changes were made for the better.

Along with Diane Devaughn Stokes, I helped begin the new Horry County ACE (Arts and Cultural Events) group, which makes us eligible for funding and grants that we couldn't get without a county-sponsored group existing.

We have completed the first of a two-year project to formulate a new Comprehensive Plan for the county, called Envision 2025, which will direct land use in the county for the next 2 decades. As well, I helped lead the formation of a partnership between Clemson and Coastal Carolina that will result in a Strategic Plan for growth for the county (another 2-year project) which, when completed, will guide our growth for the next 20 years as well, including all governments, utilities, schools, developments, and address such issues as economic development, tourism and the environment.

I'm sure there are more things I could list, but you're likely tired of reading!

Q. Have you been a good steward of Horry County’s money in your 12 years on Council?

A. In my personal life, I may at times be wasteful or careless with the few dollars I have, but I have never ever wasted or mis-spent county money. Taking good care of the county I am entrusted to lead is a sacred trust with me. And I keep that trust for the people I serve.