Mayoral candidates make final pitches

Pam Sansbury said her years of experience in city government as a member of Hartsville City Council and as city finance director make her the only qualified candidate for the job of mayor.

“I know I am the only candidate that is qualified to do this job,” she said. She called her opponent “a fine young man” but said he has “absolutely no experience in government.”

Mel Pennington said his years on the city’s planning commission, where he currently serves as vice chairman, give him ample experience and insight into the workings of city government.

“The planning commission does the bulk of the work in city government,” he said. He said anyone contemplating elective office in city government should serve on the planning commission first.

The two candidates for mayor of Hartsville spoke in separate interviews with The Messenger.

Sansbury said city government needs to get back to basics. “We’ve just got to use a common sense approach,” she said.

“If people aren’t doing their jobs, they need to go. Everybody needs to be accountable,” she said.

Sansbury said she believes some employees are over paid and said salaries need to be looked at and, if necessary, renegotiated and adjusted.

She said she disagreed with city council’s decision to upgrade the city attorney’s position from part-time to full-time with a salary of $117,000 a year.

“Positions worry me. What worries me is what we’re paying for,” she said.

Her first priority if elected, she said, will be to get the city’s finances in order.

“It’s not going to be easy and it’s not going to be pretty, but the financial condition right now of the city is not pretty,” she said. “It’s just like running a business. You can’t spend more than you bring in.”

If elected, she will convene a budget retreat in January to do just that, she said.

“I’ve never seen a budget that couldn’t be cut,” Sansbury said.

“Cutting spending is something you always look at,” Pennington said.

But over the years, the city has cut and borrowed from its utility fund repeatedly to keep the budget in balance, he said. “It becomes a self-perpetuating problem unless we change it,” he said.

“We’ve had the same leadership for 25 years and it’s driven us down the road to a dead end,” Pennington said.

Pennington disagreed with Sansbury’s call to cut spending for recreation programs, calling recreation services one of the city’s key incentives to encourage annexation.
“Why would you take one of the city’s finer, shining features and cut it?” he asked.

“We’re going to show people outside the city limits that the county cannot provide a higher quality of life without its cities,” Pennington said. “The county is nothing without its cities.”

The mayor, Sansbury stressed, is just one vote among seven on council. “My job as mayor is to lead and show council where we can make improvements and changes. We’ve got an excellent council. But they can only make decisions based on the information that’s given to them,” she said.

She cited the recent hike in water rates as an example of where she believes council was not kept properly informed.

“Why didn’t someone realize that revenues weren’t meeting expectations?” she asked. “If you get the financial statements at the end of every month, and the money’s not there, why didn’t somebody pick up on that?”

Sansbury said she wants to secure the services of an outside firm to review the city’s computer system to ensure that posting is being done properly.

“We have to find a different way of looking at things,” Pennington said. “We’ve got a $12 million budget, and council has made cuts all through this budget.”

Pennington said he believes the answer to the city’s financial issues lies in developing new sources and streams of revenue. A proposed fiber optic network that would allow the city to offer broadband services on the open market is one such solution, he said.

“My intent is to solve people’s problems,” Pennington said. “That’s why I see this as an opportunity. I don’t want to sit by and watch it go away.”

With property taxes capped, the city’s revenue options are limited, Pennington said. Raising water and sewer rates will only make matters worse and impose a growing hardship on citizens, he said.

“My whole idea is a fundamental shift in how the city makes money,” he said. “This project is bigger than politics. It’s bigger than Mel Pennington.”

He also said a broadband network would serve as another critical tool to encourage annexation.

Sansbury called the broadband proposal a good idea with much potential – if the city can afford it.

She said if elected she will work with the county’s legislative delegation to reform the state’s annexation laws to better enable cities to grow.

She said she doesn’t know what other amenities or incentives the city can offer to encourage people to annex, but she said she does know why people don’t want to annex - rising taxes and fees.

Sansbury also said she will work to improve the relationship between the city and the county, a relationship she said needs to be strengthened. “At some point, the city and the county have to work together on recreation,” she said.

“The city and the county have to work together, both sides,” Sansbury said. “We need a much better working relationship between the city and county council.”

She said she would like to see more meetings between city council and county council. Currently, such meetings are held quarterly.

“I think both sides have to be more flexible,” she said. “What’s good for Hartsville is good for Darlington County, and what’s good for Darlington County is good for Hartsville.”

For now, she said, issues such as extra-territorial jurisdiction for the city into unincorporated areas immediately surrounding the city are going nowhere because of a lack of cooperation and trust. “We’ve got to build up trust between the city and county,” she said.

Pennington said city government should be driven by planning for the future. He pointed to the city’s 2020 comprehensive plan as an example.

Sansbury agreed the plan offers a lot of what is needed. “But the most important issues for me are timeliness and accountability,” she said. “If you don’t have a goal, you don’t have anything to work for.”

Sansbury promised more transparency in city government and pledged to keep an open door policy for citizens.

“To me, it all goes back to customer service,” she said. “The only thing we have to offer citizens is service.”

She also said she would like to post the city’s financial information online for easier access by citizens.

“We’ve got a day one plan,” Pennington said. He said if elected he will make his first council meeting as mayor a work session for council.

He said he plans to work with people who are interested in improving their communities. He also said he plans to work more closely with Darlington County’s state lawmakers Sen. Gerald Malloy and Rep. Jay Lucas. “They are the power houses in this county, and that has to be respected,” he said.

“They want to help us, but we’ve got to communicate with them,” he said.

He said if elected he will work to provide leadership to council. “On the planning commission, we have been begging council to give us some direction about what they want,” he said. “They’re void of leadership.”