Results 1 to 13 of 13

Thread: Hugh Leatherman bringing home the bacon.

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Posts
    15,733

    Default Hugh Leatherman bringing home the bacon.

    SC politics is probably worse than DC.


    S.C. Senate president pro tempore Hugh Leatherman – arguably the state’s most powerful lawmaker – has a science building on Francis Marion University’s campus named after him.
    The Florence County Republican is an emeritus member of the university’s board of trustees. His daughter has been an at-large board member since 2016 after the Legislature easily elected her over an incumbent.
    Leatherman also is the longtime chairman of the budget-writing Senate Finance Committee, which in April quietly added $7.1 million to Francis Marion’s budget for the fiscal year that started July 1.
    Republican Gov. Henry McMaster last week vetoed parts of a budget proviso collectively authorizing the $7.1 million – $5 million for a medical and health education classroom complex and $2.1 million for the honors college.
    In his written veto message, McMaster noted the proposed funding “represents special treatment above and beyond what was afforded to any other higher-education institution.”
    McMaster said the Legislature already had allocated nearly $50 million from the state’s capital reserve fund – a constitutionally mandated “rainy day” fund that lawmakers*typically raid*annually for their favorite projects – to South Carolina’s universities on “an equitable and pro-rata basis.” Francis Marion will receive $3 million from that fund for its medical and health education classroom complex.
    If lawmakers override McMaster’s budget vetoes when they are expected to return to Columbia in September, Francis Marion’s total budget for 2018-19 would jump to more than $78 million – a 16 percent hike from last fiscal year’s authorized budget.
    The total budget includes “other” funds – tuition and fees – which lawmakers decided this year to move “off budget” for all public universities and colleges, as recently*revealed*by the South Carolina Policy Council, The Nerve’s parent organization.
    The Nerve on Thursday left a written message for Leatherman seeking comment on the Francis Marion provisos. As has been his standard practice with The Nerve, he did not respond.
    Besides those provisos, legislators also will have to decide whether to override McMaster’s vetoes on other budget provisos, including one that would create a massive “data warehouse” containing sensitive information on children and adults in South Carolina. The governor’s veto of that proviso came several days after The Nerve*raised privacy concernsabout the controversial plan.
    The proviso was first passed in April by the Senate Finance Committee, chaired by Leatherman.
    It would create the “South Carolina Industry, Workforce and Education Data Warehouse,” purportedly to “prepare the state’s current and emerging workforce to meet the needs of the state’s economy.” Under the plan, lawmakers and their staffs would have access to “internet-accessible secure analytic query tools” for the proposed database, which would be managed by the state Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office.
    Appointments to the RFA’s three-member governing board are controlled by Leatherman, the governor and the chairman of the budget-writing House Ways and Means Committee.
    In vetoing the “data warehouse” proviso, McMaster said it would provide “no official oversight for the decisions made by the data warehouse committee, no requirement that citizens consent to their personal information being released and quite frankly no one to say ‘no’ or ‘pull the plug’ before it’s too late.”
    McMaster, however, did not veto another annually renewed budget proviso reauthorizing the “South Carolina Health and Human Services Data Warehouse.” Created in 2002 and managed by the RFA, the database contains, among other information, “medical claims data” provided by the state Department of Health and Human Services, including the names, dates of birth and medical treatment records of Medicaid patients, an agency spokeswoman earlier told The Nerve.
    McMaster issued a total of 42 vetoes on the 2018-19 budget compared to 41 vetoes on the 2017-18 budget, including the rejection of parts of a proviso directing a collective $750,000 to the nonprofit Charleston Library Society and South Carolina Children’s Theatre. The budget earmarks were sponsored by three House members, including Rep. William Cogswell, R-Charleston, who sits on the governing board of the Charleston Library Society, as The Nerve first*reported*in March.
    For the second straight budget year, lawmakers will have waited past the start of the fiscal year to act on the governor’s vetoes. They didn’t take up McMaster’s vetoes on the 2017-18 budget until January of this year; final votes on several vetoes didn’t occur until March.

    https://thenerve.org/committee-chair...es-to-senator/

    Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jan 2003
    Location
    SC
    Posts
    24,412

    Default

    I hope Leatherman can hang on for another......25 years.

    Sent from my Moto Z (2) using Tapatalk

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2016
    Posts
    2,625

    Default

    He is a crook.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jul 2012
    Posts
    222

    Default

    It pissed me off when he sidestepped the succession to Lt. Gov. I wrote my state senator and urged him to vote for Harvey Peeler for President Pro Tem instead of that crooked SOB (and Scott Talley will have my vote moving forward because he did).

    Ever notice how the interstates are concrete near Florence but asphalt most other places in SC? I'm guessing it's because Leatherman owns the concrete company in Florence.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Posts
    15,733

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Catdaddy View Post
    I hope Leatherman can hang on for another......25 years.

    Sent from my Moto Z (2) using Tapatalk
    In your district I bet so, he is doing your district well. I will not complain personally "they" are finally 60 day current on payments, we rather sell product than play bill collector.

    Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Posts
    4,759

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by papagood View Post
    Ever notice how the interstates are concrete near Florence but asphalt most other places in SC? I'm guessing it's because Leatherman owns the concrete company in Florence.
    Nah, his wife owns the company. She gets first crack at the contracts.

    Leatherman is a snake.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Mar 2016
    Location
    Low Country
    Posts
    237

    Default

    Absolute power corrupts absolutely. He runs this entire state. Top to bottom. Right Duck Tape?

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Sep 2004
    Location
    Petville Township SC
    Posts
    5,158

    Default

    Leatherman is a huge part of the problem in politics.
    Molon Labe
    HRCH Coal's Sparkleberry Cache MH

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Jan 2003
    Location
    SC
    Posts
    24,412

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by skrimp View Post
    Leatherman is a huge part of the problem in politics.
    There are 123 more waiting and hoping for his position.....and will do the same thing.

    Before Leatherman,all the money went to Columbia, Greenville, or Charleston. When he's gone, the Pee Dee is screwed for the next 30 years. We get it.

    Sent from my Moto Z (2) using Tapatalk

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Posts
    28,023

    Default

    "to the Victor go the spoils"

  11. #11
    Join Date
    Mar 2002
    Location
    'Down in the Holler', SC
    Posts
    14,556

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by papagood View Post
    Ever notice how the interstates are concrete near Florence but asphalt most other places in SC? I'm guessing it's because Leatherman owns the concrete company in Florence.
    Fwiw, I was told a few years ago by someone who should have known what they were talking about that there's a law somewhere mandating that the highways are split 50% concrete and 50% asphalt. This does not include two lane or county roads, apparently.
    .
    Foothills Golden Retriever Rescue
    .
    "Keep your powder dry, Boys!"
    ~ George Washington

    "If I understood everything I said I'd be a genius." ~ 'Unknown'

  12. #12
    Join Date
    Jan 2004
    Posts
    15,351

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by WoodieSC View Post
    Fwiw, I was told a few years ago by someone who should have known what they were talking about that there's a law somewhere mandating that the highways are split 50% concrete and 50% asphalt. This does not include two lane or county roads, apparently.

    Federal Highway administration
    Amendment II A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

    Quote Originally Posted by Highstrung View Post
    I like fishing topwater. Will one of you jot down some of this redneck ghetto slang and the definitions for those of us who weren't born with a plastic spoon in our mouths?

  13. #13
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Manning, SC
    Posts
    10,712

    Default

    So no one explained to McMaster that Leatherman deserves that power because he has been there for so long? He's done his time.

    Good for McMaster for calling it out for what it is.

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •