Columbia's Birthday

Tuesday was an absolutely beautiful day to celebrate the 225th birthday of the City of Columbia. Down on Main Street, several hundred people gathered for music, speeches, and a huge birthday cake.

On Wednesday, the Census confirmed that Columbia was the state's largest city. And, Richland County is now South Carolina's second largest county with 380,000 residents (trailing Greenville by 70,000 and outpacing Charleston by 30,000).

Here's a prayer for our next 225 years!

And Here We Go, Again

Same old story, different characters - South Carolina has a Governor in some hot-water and a Lieutenant Governor in a lot of hot water. This past week has again been about our officials instead of our solutions. The “talk” coming out of the statehouse has (again) been questions about the ethics of our leaders. And, we certainly should be tired of that in the middle of South Carolina.

New questions have been raised about our Governor’s strange employment relationships and whether or not she has been an honest taxpayer. She's apparently claimed she earned $103,000 more than she claimed on her taxes in 2007. Her history does not serve her well. She has been far from forthcoming about these issues in the past, but I pray she is telling the truth now or this will get uglier for the state before it is all cleared up.

The Lieutenant Governor has been charged on more than one-hundred counts of either withholding information about his campaign account or using it as a personal slush fund for all kinds of expenses not allowed by the SC Ethics Commission. He's also had many ethics violations in his past as a member of the Florence County Council. So far his responses to the investigation have at best been unsatisfactory, and at worst have added fuel-to-the-fire.

Elected service thrives on trust. In most cases, leaders have only been able to make great strides when they have engendered a sense of trust with those they govern. It’s hard to take money or give it out when people don’t have confidence that you are an honest broker on their behalf.

Hope these come to a quick end. If these questions persist about the two highest elected positions in South Carolina, the Legislature will continue to hold sway over every issue (as it has for the last eight years) and our government will continue to be rudderless in dealing with the great dilemmas that face us.

Click here for the site thediscust.com which is offering mugs and cards that say - "Job Security: Make sure the next guy in is worse than you are."

Together We Can Read

I get to read at schools several times a year for many different events. It sounds like something you’re supposed to do or that you have to do, but it really is a lot of fun.

Yesterday, as a part of a collaborative between the City of Columbia and Richland School District One, I went to Brockman Elementary School to read to a class of third graders for the “Together We Can Read” initiative. It is an effort that gets community leaders into every third grade classroom to share a book and answer questions. The children are also given a copy of the book to take home for themselves, and for some of them it is the only book they have at home.

The driving force behind the three-year old project is City Councilwoman Tameika Devine, and I have been lucky to participate for two of the years. The hope of the program is that it will kindle a flame in children that will lead them to lifelong reading and learning.

After reading “Tori Explores South Carolina,” at Brockman Elementary we had a twenty minute free-ranging discussion about South Carolina and what a Treasurer does. I think my favorite question went something like: “How much tax did you make my mommy pay?”

Thank you to Councilwoman Devine, Richland District One, and everyone who made “Together We Can Read” another success. And, look for “Tori Explores South Carolina” by Ashlye Rumph-Geddis, a former School District One student and teacher, for your own children to read.

The deficits in looking at health care costs

I have never, and may never again, highlight a piece by Paul Krugman of the New York Times. Even though he is thought provoking, his writing is almost always hyper-partisan from a liberal perspective and hyper-partisanship will not lead to the solutions we need now.

Republicans are not always wrong and Democrats are not always wrong. At the very least, the law of averages means they have to be right some of the time. And, those who propose otherwise in our media-political establishment aren’t people we can usually trust for reliable information.

So today though Mr. Krugman continued his rant against the Republican way – and he made the continuing false argument that deficits do not matter much – he also made some interesting points about how we should be directing our health care spending as we dig our way out of this mess (read it here).

Skyrocketing health care costs are the most dangerous spending dilemma facing budget writers at the state and federal level. And, just cutting payments to providers or cutting people off from health programs isn’t a long-term fix, but only a band-aid to get us out of one more budget year. We need leaders who will construct a new, more efficient set of priorities for these programs, so that when government revenues do rise again we don’t fall back into these same old tried-and-failed bottomless and costly policy pits.

Chasing the Spotlight

A slew of national media attention shone on Governor Scott Walker for taking on the unions in Wisconsin. It was the first big national splash made by a new Governor this year and his actions garnered him the adoration of the conservative movement – and it made some of the other new governors, who styled themselves as reformers, stompin’ mad they were beaten to the punch.

You could almost see it coming. Which state’s Governor would try to catch the spotlight by piggy-backing on the labor issue? California, Michigan, Illinois – or some other troubled state where public unions have had a huge impact on state spending?

Instead, the next Governor to chase the spotlight was none other than our own Gov. Nikki Haley. Even though South Carolina employees have no collective bargaining, and no real union to speak of, and even though they pay significantly more for their benefits than state employees in those places up north, Governor Haley just couldn’t help herself – there was a spotlight out there, and she wasn’t in it.

Though state employees have endured significant layoffs, furloughs, and pay stagnation to help balance the state’s falling budgets – all reasonable responses when there isn’t money in the state’s coffers – the Governor tried to make the argument that our state employees weren’t sharing the burden in our failing economy.

See the article in The State HERE.

The Comet (as Gov. Haley was dubbed by the NY Times) quickly backtracked to state employees and retirees when confronted this week and said that the issue needed to be studied – a simple way of saying she spoke before she was informed. But, she got the headline and can write another chapter in her memoir about her conservative bona fides, and when you’re chasing the spotlight, that’s more important than being right.

News on the Budget in the Middle

There is some positive news for the folks in the middle about several of our leaders breaking away from their political phalanxes to begin working on the problems of our deficit and debt. Of course, the tone coming out of Washington in general leaves me skeptical, but I will take a sliver of hope any day.

I don't have much time to summarize today, but will try to do so very soon. For now, below is some reading on some of the budget efforts going on in Washington:

Senator Conrad’s Last Gasp – Lloyd Grove (Newsweek)

Republicans Duel Over Possible Tax Hikes – Carrie Budoff Brown (Politico)

A rare bipartisan call to share the pain – Calmes (NY Times)

Freshman Democrat Joe Manchin: Obama has ‘Failed to Lead’ on Budget – (Politico)

Finally Confronting the Debt Crisis – Joe Scarborough (Politico)

Big Weekend for Local Teams (and sleeping kids)

Bubby was so excited to go to see the Irmo State Championship game versus Ridge View Friday - even though it started an hour after his usual bed time. I played basketball for Irmo Coach Whipple years back, but I was pretty tired Friday night and would've probably stayed home if my little guy hadn't been so insistent on going to see "daddy's team".

We made it to the Arena in time to see the Spring Valley girls get some revenge and win their championship (congratulations!). Then, as you would've guessed, Bubby fell asleep ten minutes before the boys' game started and he didn't wake up until I was carrying him back to the car (we'd parked a half mile away - and I've got to say five-year-olds get really heavy after a while).

Congratulations to all the winners this weekend, but especially to all the folks in the Midlands who brought home championships. Sorry if we slept through it!

We have PLENTY of time for this irrelevant stuff

In her first opportunity to grace us with a breath of fresh air at the State of the State address, Governor Haley proposed cuts totaling $13 million to try to close a $700 million budget hole. Not much in the way of leadership or accountability there, but it was just a first try, so give her some slack.

But this week the Governor has struck forth again with a new initiative – she will grade lawmakers based on her criteria and her judgment. The whole concept is really kind of funny. Especially since her judgment has had a lot of errors in the past.

The Legislature has so many problems that include transparency, accountability – you name it, they got it. Some of the reforms on the list really should happen (the House already approved some of them when Sanford was still around). Still, it would seem that someone who had walked-the-walk would be the one who could shame the Legislature into doing what it should. Instead, we’ve got the equivalent of a drunk driver setting up the DUI checkpoint. I can see legislators now, “she did it and became Governor, so why can’t I?”

Though the four issues the Governor will grade won’t save the state money, nor create a job, they have the benefit of being extremely dull. Combining some state functions here, and adding to transparency and disclosure there … are you asleep yet?

And, now she wants to use these irrelevant hot-milk issues to show the state she’s got some pull. I suppose that acting like their school principal will get the statehouse to straighten up and be happy to work with her. It worked for her predecessor, right?

See THE STATE newspaper's story here.

You Can't Escape

Politics is bleeding more and more into everything we do, and that is not always a good thing. In fact, it is rarely a good thing because of the way politics is being practiced today. Folks in the middle understand that just because someone doesn’t agree with our position, they’re not a bad person – yet, the political rhetoric in the media-sphere says just the opposite.

On my way to work this morning, I listened to the ‘Mike and Mike’ show on ESPN radio for about ten minutes. I don’t know if the topic of unions dominated the conversation any longer than the ten minutes I was listening, but what I heard was a disturbingly angry translation of political talking-points into the NFL negotiations that are being held now. The talk was tinged by what is happening in Wisconsin, Ohio and other states. It was just plain odd (or maybe it was just me?).

Watch out! Until we get some adults leading the discussion, we’re not going to have adult conversations about anything.

Cutting with a scalpel or a mallet?

For all of the talk about zero-based budgeting that has made the politicians’ talking points in recent years, have you every seen anyone actually do the work? Have you seen anyone who even attempted it? Has in-depth evaluation of government programs been just another ruse to get votes? So far, these folks have been all talk and no show.

Now, in the third year of this ‘great recession’ – the third year of deep cuts at the state government level – you would think that there might be a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis showing where our tax-dollars have the greatest impact. Maybe now would be the time that some of these folks put their theories into practice?

Nope.

It is the time for something different. I’ve never liked zero-based budgeting because it was always just oversimplified talking points (and it previously failed when the US Air Force tried to implement it). But we need some effort to better direct the huge state cuts this year and, most importantly, how to direct the inevitable economic growth that will come in the future.

There should be a top-down programmatic review of what state government does. What is done well and poorly? What overlaps with other functions? Who can most efficiently deliver certain services? What can be privatized and what cannot? What are the priorities?

Right now, it looks like another year will pass before someone will do the heavy-lifting required at the Statehouse. But, if we don't do something different we will be unable to build a stronger future from the ashes of this great recession.