May 21, 2012

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Senate passes pension reform bill

May 17, 2012 By

The South Carolina Senate on Wednesday passed a pension reform plan which makes big changes to the state’s retirement system. The proposal now goes back to the House.

 

State Sen. Greg Ryberg (R-Aiken)

The Senate version scales back a reform proposal that passed the House earlier this year, by putting most of the changes on new employees instead of current ones. However, it does require current employees to contribute more towards their retirement, raising it to 8 percent from 6.5 percent.

Senators advanced the bill Thursday, a day after approving it in a 39-1 vote.

Rep. Greg Ryberg (R-Aiken) said lawmakers are trying to cut down on a $15 billion liability that the pension fund currently faces. He said much of that was due to the Retirement System offering overly-generous benefits.

The Senate sought to bend the cost curve, so most of the savings will come on the back end as newer employees become vested into the system. Ryberg said the plan would increase the funded ratio of the pensions from 65 percent this year to 84 percent by 2041.

“This problem was caused over a 20-year period of time and the solution we’re looking at is over a 30-year period of time,” he told South Carolina Radio Network, “I think it’s a great solution to a huge social problem and arithmetic problem.”

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Filed Under: Featured, Legislature, News, Politics & Government

Woman struck and killed by train near Charleston

May 17, 2012 By

A woman was struck and killed by a freight train near Charleston early Thursday morning.

Berkeley County Coroner Bill Salisbury says the victim was standing on the tracks in Hanahan when she was struck by a northbound train around 3 a.m. Thursday.

Salisbury says the woman died of massive head and body trauma.

Lt. Michael Fowler with the Hanahan Police Department told the Charleston Post and Courier the black female has not been identified and that investigators are using fingerprints to determine who she is.

Fowler says the case is being investigated as a possible suicide.

He says the woman would have had to walk off the main road to get to the tracks in that area.

Fowler says the engineer told police the woman was standing in the middle of the tracks with her hands in her pockets waiting for the train.

Filed Under: Accidents & Disasters, News

Candidates will not be let back on ballot, says Election Commission (AUDIO)

May 17, 2012 By

State Elections Commission Director Marci Andino

Getting candidates back on the primary ballot will be easier said than done, according to the State Election Commission.

The commission says the SCGOP’s internal decision that some of their candidates should have been certified is a moot point, based on court rulings.  The commission issued a press release (PDF) stating, “The June Primary ballots are set, ballots have been printed, voting machines have been prepared, and voters are voting.”

A state GOP executive committee heard appeals Wednesday and said that Katrina Shealy of Lexington should be on the ballot.  She is challenging sitting Senator Jake Knotts, a fierce critic of Gov. Nikki Haley. Gov. Haley spoke on Shealy’s behalf at the hearing.

In an interview with South Carolina Radio Network, the state party’s Executive Director Matt Moore said, having them added” May require some court action.”  Moore says the hearings were to “be absolutely sure that these candidates should or should not have been certified.”

AUDIO: Moore explains purpose of hearings, outcome. (1:18)

In a related matter, the SCGOP executive committee voted last night to allow Jim Lee to remain on the ballot for SC Senate District 8 race in Greenville county. In question was whether Lee was a resident of the district.

“I’m so disappointed to see our political process deteriorate to this, ” Lee said after the hearing. “The individual bringing the protest didn’t even show up for the hearing. There was no evidence presented whatsoever.”

 

Filed Under: Crime & Courts, Featured, News, Politics & Government

“3 Hebrew Boys” victims receive payments

May 17, 2012 By

Investors are receiving back some of the money back they entrusted with a South Carolina trio dubbed the “3 Hebrew Boys,” currently serving decades in prison for an $82 million scam.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office says roughly 3,800 investors have been sent checks totaling some $19 million, or about 46 cents for every dollar invested. The payouts are the first to victims who say they were fleeced by Joseph Brunson, Timothy McQueen and Tony Pough, formerly of Columbia.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Winston Holiday said the three hoodwinked investors by assuring them they would be able to pay off substantial debt in a relatively short period of time. “They told people that if they gave them certain amounts of money, which were usually in the low thousands, that after anywhere from a year to 18 months that they could be paying off major expenses like their houses, cars, credit card bills, student loans, that kind of thing,” he told Columbia radio station WVOC. ”And, of course, it just turned out to be a Ponzi scheme – that they were just using the money that was coming in to pay people who had previously given them money.”

Holliday says the “3 Hebrew Boys” used investors’ money to buy a private jet, luxury suites at stadiums for the Carolina Panthers and Atlanta Falcons, a fleet of cars, homes in Florida, condos in Atlanta, a $900,000 party bus and more.

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Filed Under: Crime & Courts, News

Gowdy speaks for House’s Violence Against Women Act, tells SC story (VIDEO)

May 17, 2012 By

Congressman Trey Gowdy made an impassioned speech on the U.S. House floor in support of the House version of the Violence Against Women Act, telling the story of his experience as a prosecutor in Upstate South Carolina.  The House version offers less protection than the Senate version does for lesbian,  transgendered, Native American and undocumented immmigrant women. This disparity sparked a partisan divide, though the measure passed 221-205 in Wednesday.

Filed Under: News, Politics & Government
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