The previous administration borrowed money from Santee Cooper to develop the Mt. Holly Industrial Park. When Google moved into the Park, it was arranged with Santee Cooper that Google's annual "Fee In Lieu of Tax" (FILOT) contribution would be earmarked to repay this loan. Also, in the agreement, it was stated that, "when the loan to Santee Cooper was repaid", a percentage of the Fee In Lieu of Tax (FILOT) revenue would be channeled to the school system. This was not a "maybe" or a "gentleman's agreement". This was all in writing.
The annual loan payment to Santee Cooper was in the neighborhood of $1.2 Million. The total of the FILOT revenue from Mt. Holly was and is in the neighborhood of $2.7 Million annually.
Fast forward to January 2008. Mr. Davis came up with the bright idea to "borrow" $10 Million from BCW&SA. You see, the previous administration left over $17 Million in W&S's "Rainy Day Fund" and Mr. Davis found this situation too tempting to resist. According to Mr. Davis, he planned to pay off Santee Cooper with $5 Million of this "borrowed" money. (The March 2008 pay off to Santee Cooper was, in fact, $4.8 Million) Also, he planned to repay BC for the Cypress Gardens deficit of $4 Million. This action was somewhat like you taking money out of one of your pockets and putting it into the other since BC owns Cypress Gardens and, up to this point, no borrowed money was involved. Transferring this $4 Million into the general fund made these funds accessible and spendable.
Mr. Davis arranged for the W&S $10 Million "loan" to BC to be interest free. The County agreed to pay the loan back on a long term schedule at $500,000 annually. Keep in mind, this annual payment is to satisfy the entire loan of $10 Million, not just the $4.8 Million used to repay Santee Cooper.
As of about two weeks ago, information on this issue began to circulate. GE&P was very interested and began to to attempt to gather documentation. Eventually, the School District became aware of these facts and the cat was out of the bag. The School District conducted a cursory check on their FILOT account and found there had been no contributions from Google or any other Mt. Holly FILOT source in the previous two years. It seems reasonable the School District would have more than a passing interest in knowing where their money went.
Channel 2 News At 6 did a story on this issue on Tuesday, May 11, 2010. (As with so many other issues, the controversy comes down to statements made by the Supervisor, Dan Davis. ) In this interview, Mr. Davis is quoted as saying, "the Santee Cooper loan was repaid early using Berkeley County funds". (This is somewhat of a stretch as the funds were borrowed from W&S) Also, Mr. Davis is quoted as saying, "the money being received from the Mt. Holly businesses is being used to repay these county funds". In fact, only $1/2 Million is being used annually to repay W&S for the loan. BC receives in the neighborhood of $2.7 Million annually from the businesses in Mt. Holly Park. GE&P regrets having to use "neighborhood" numbers. The problem is that there are no official documents available on any of these transactions.
Now, we arrive at the genuine sticky wicket for Mr. Davis. If you will take the time to check the minutes of the 5/19/09 County Council Finance Committee meeting, you will discover that Mr. Davis proposed and achieved passage by Council to transfer the FILOT money from Mt. Holly into the County's depleted Fund Balance. You remember the "Fund Balance". This is one and the same Fund Balance mentioned in Mr. Davis' propaganda mail out earlier this spring. Do you remember how he bragged that he had replenished the "dangerously low" Fund Balance?This is the same Fund Balance that was at almost 17% when he took office. This is the same Fund Balance that declined steadily to 7.46% during his first three years in office. As a side bar, where is the accounting for where these millions of dollars were spent?
GE&P receives a great deal of criticism when we point out the fact that Mr. Davis often chooses to handle the truth rather carelessly. How can his statements on this issue be translated into anything other than gross prevarication?
Davis says, "Santee Cooper was paid off with County funds."
FACT: Santee Cooper was paid off with money borrowed from BCW&SA.
Davis says, "Mt. Holly FILOT funds are being used to replace BC funds used for the Santee Cooper pay off."
FACT: Mt. Holly FILOT funds are being transferred to the BC Fund Balance.
Davis says, "The BC School District can't expect any funds from FILOT until the debt for Mt. Holly is paid off ."
FACT: He has lumped the Cypress Gardens debt plus the remainder of the $10 Million loan from W&S into this pay off schedule and the annual loan payment comprises only a small portion of the FILOT revenue.
We wonder if those in control of the BC School District have their attorney on speed dial?
8 comments:
I attended the school board meeting last night and heard Mr. Hardesty comment that he was skeptical of the county supervisor keeping agreements.
Was this what he was talking about?
Great invesigative work!! Over the past four years (including his campaign), there is no doubt about Mr. Davis' advanced college degree. It is in Manipulative Science (MS)! Last night at the BC School Board Mtg and BC Council Committee Mtg, he, unfortunately, used tri-county business executives and their staff to "manipulate" some very well educated people and perhaps they didn't even know it!! The TV 2 news story started right on target, but, even they didn't realize by the end of the story Davis had told them a lie that was unfortunately aired! I am certain the only way to rid the County of this "parasite" is to vote him out of office on 8 June 2010 and for Council and others to seriously question him even if he says "good morning" before 31 December 2010!!! Citizens YOU MUST VOTE!!
The majority of the members of our present School Board, including the Superintendent, are very astute and well informed. We can have confidence they will see to it that justice is done.
This is exactly what Mr. Hardesty was talking about!! In addition, Mr. Hardesty has been watching Dan Davis' manipulative tactics from day one as CEO of this County. In my opinion, Mr. Hardesty has no trust/confidence in anything Dan Davis says. Remember, Mr. Hardesty was the first to announce his candidacy against Mr. Davis, however, when Congressman Henry Brown decided to run, he elected to run against BC Councilman Jack Schurlknight, District No. 6. Mr. Schurlknight is a "puppet" for Dan Davis and certainly needs to be replaced! If we want this County and its' citizens to be prosperous again, we MUST rid ourselves of elected people like Dan Davis and Jack Schurlknight on 8 June 2010!!!
Problem is you can't convince the print media into having a good investigative reporter confirm your facts. No body ever asks to see the documentation. Apparently none of our council persons are watching the hen house. My opinion is the Berkeley Independent reporter does not have a handle on the trickery and is content not trying to put two and two together.
I received the re-elect Dan Davis rag today. Now he says "for one year, we were required to forgo cost of living increases and merit bonuses for all county employees. Strange, in the Berkeley Independent he said "County employees have not had any raises, cost of living increases over the past two years". At the Republican breakfast he said, he got two 5% cost of living increases to bring his salary to $131,000.
Ask any county employee if he/her has received any cost or living or merit increases in the last several years. While he extols the personal sacrifices(the financial loss), of county employees, he is not suffering
along with the masses. His salary has continued to rise.
Davis says we have one of the lowest unemployment rates in the entire state. Well, the March 2010 state unemployment rate was 11.7 percent while Berkeley County's was 10.5 percent, Dorchester 9.8 percent and Charleston at 9.4 percent. In fact, there are 10 counties with lower unemployment rates than Berkeley County. Sound like we have made big strides in reducing our unemployment rate.
They are expanding the airport. The ground work for this expansion was started under the previous administration.
He also states that the Mt. Holley Industrial Park "has been paid off" so honoring the FILOT agreement to provide funding to the School District should not be a problem.
He conveniently said nothing about borrowing money from W&S to pay the loan.
As soon as GE&P gets our collective jaws off the ground, we plan to respond to this pile of bovine excrement.
Let me get this straight, are you claiming that Dan Davis has been lying this whole time? This is shocking!. Davis looks out for the little man the the problem being is the little man he is looking out for is himself.
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