Climer challenges Hayes: Youth vs. experience in Rock Hill Senate race

The race for Rock Hill’s next senator is coming down to a campaign about the benefits of incumbency, between two men who are a generation apart.

The GOP primary in Senate District 15 pits Wes Hayes, a 32-year Columbia incumbent, against Wes Climer, who was born two years before Hayes was first elected to the Legislature.

Climer – an advocate of term limits – argues the state’s troubles can be traced to career politicians who have been in office while the state’s roads and schools have fallen behind. The financial adviser and Rock Hill native hopes voters are prepared to shake up the state Senate.

On the other side, Hayes cites his long tenure and involvement in several key issues passing through the Statehouse as experience he can carry over into a seventh full term, when he says there’s still work to do.

The winner of the June 14 Republican primary won’t have opposition in the general election, so primary voters will effectively decide the area’s next senator. Both candidates gave interviews to the Herald, edited versions of which can be read below.

Wes Climer

Q: What are the big issues facing District 15, and what do you want to do to address some of those?

A: Over the last several years, the Senate has been a total failure. The Senate is the place where reform goes to die. There is a group of very senior senators who have been there since the late ’70s, early ’80s, who are really entrenched in the way they do business and don’t want to change it. So the only way we are ever going to change it and make progress on core priorities like roads and schools, reforming our tax code and making meaningful reform to our ethics laws is to replace the guys who are entrenched in the status quo. It is time to change the way the Senate does business.

There’s a culture of corruption in Columbia, a lot of self-dealing, powerful legislators who appoint relatives to boards, lawyer-legislators who appoint the judges before whom they do business. There is nonexistent disclosure of potential conflicts of interest. Those things have to change.

In the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s, our economy was hollowed out, thousands of middle-class jobs disappeared, and that is a function of bad public policy. Over the last decade or so, we’ve started to see some recovery, in large measure because we have inexpensive land and a technically competent workforce, and lately a governor who is extremely aggressive in bringing jobs into South Carolina. Those things, over time, will be insufficient for South Carolina to maintain its economic competitiveness.

By 2040, 2050, 2060, if we don’t take the major steps we need now to fix our roads, fix our schools, fix our ethics laws, fix our tax code, then what we saw in the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s is going to repeat itself. And the guys who have been in there for 30 years are less interested in reform than they are with tinkering with the status quo.

Q: The state of South Carolina’s roads has been the Legislature’s main focus for the last two years, without a final version reaching the governor’s desk. How should the Department of Transportation ultimately be reformed, and will the state need to raise its gas tax?

A: Our roads system is a disaster because our Department of Transportation is a disaster. Legislative meddling, legislative malfeasance, and bureaucratic incompetence are in large measure responsible for the sorry state of our roads.

So we currently have a system where political interests, parochial interests, and backroom deals between legislators dictates where road funding goes. What we need is a system where traffic studies, safety concerns, and economic development interests drive the allocation of roads funding.

You have to get the politics and corruption out of DOT. And the guys who have been there for 30 years like being able to appoint people to those boards. They’re not interested in changing the way DOT is structured.

Ultimately, you need to have a secretary of transportation who is hireable and fireable by the governor. It is worth noting that Mr. Hayes voted against DOT reform last year. We could have had this bill a year ago, but he stuck with that same group of 30-year veterans who always block reform, and he blocked reform in the Senate finance committee.

Three years ago, there was a $900 million surplus. Two years ago there was roughly a billion dollar surplus, and this year there’s over a billion-dollar surplus. That’s $3 billion that could have been directed toward roads. Many members of the Senate say roads are their top priority, but their actions do not match up to their words. Instead of spending that on roads, they spent it on a lot of other things.

Reform for me is a pre-condition to talking about funding. And reform can be a component of a bigger bill that includes funding, but reform has to come first.

Q: A bill reforming the state’s ethics laws is now close to passing. Does it go far enough in policing legislators, proposing punishments, and regulating money in politics?

A: You have to have meaningful disclosure and meaningful transparency, and an independent investigator who can actually investigate. Where else in government do you need a three-fourths majority to do something (as the new ethics commission would)? A three-fourths majority just to start an investigation, not to reach a conclusion, but just to do fact-finding. If they were serious about reform and ending self-policing, there’s no way they would have imposed a three-fourths majority.

The ethics commission has to come from somewhere, so it’s reasonable the governor and Legislature will share appointing members, but a bare majority should be fine to initiate an investigation. The other thing is that, in South Carolina, corruption falls under the civil statute. They need to be in the criminal code. If they were, that would serve as a more effective deterrent. There are many more law enforcement or prosecutorial resources for criminal violations. That would be preferable to self-policing.

(On “dark money”): Yes, the current system is inadequate. The bills the Legislature is currently looking at would have a stifling effect on speech. They’re lumping in think tanks and civic organizations with political organizations. If an organization engages in explicit electioneering activities, if you are explicitly endorsing one candidate and engaged in politics, you ought to have to disclose who gives you money. If you’re a think tank that just creates white papers or a civic organization that invites candidates to come speak, like Rotary Clubs, there’s no reason to require disclosure of their donors. But for organizations directly involved in electioneering, it ought to be disclosed.

Q: The next Senate will have to address the Supreme Court’s decision on education funding in the Abbeville case. How can the state improve rural school districts?

A: I had breakfast Monday morning with a great guy who grew up in Abbeville, went to Abbeville schools, his parents worked in the school system, and I’ll borrow from his insight about what the solution is.

There are clearly deficiencies in facilities that inhibit a good learning environment. It is a mistake to conclude that you can solve this problem by backing up a dump truck full of money and calling it a day. Money is not going to solve the essential challenge of creating opportunity for the people who live in those areas.

So there has to be a funding component that takes care of infrastructure, but solving the persistent, intergenerational poverty requires a concerted effort around economic development, around civic organizations and local governments, and it’s going to take a lot of investment and time to fix a situation that has been generations in the making.

It’s on all of us to make it better. The Legislature can do it through some funding mechanisms. But civic groups, churches, nonprofits, the Department of Commerce, everybody has to play a role in that. Commerce can do what it always does, which is try to attract industry.

If you’ve been in the Senate for 30 years and say that education is a priority, how can you be comfortable with the results? Guys who have been in the Senate for 30 years are responsible for the failure of our education system, and they need to be held accountable for that.

Wes Hayes

Q: What are the big issues facing District 15, and what do you want to do to address some of those?

A: The biggest issue is always jobs and the economy. Everything, to a great extent, hinges on people’s ability to provide for their family, keeping South Carolina business-friendly, a place where companies want to come and grow. Two things we’re starting on this year are the need to work on the roads system, because companies aren’t going to come to South Carolina if they can’t get their goods to market, if people can’t work and the roads are in terrible shape.

Infrastructure must be our top priority to keep South Carolina business friendly. The second thing is schools. You’ve got to have a good, educated workforce these days to compete for jobs. We’ve made progress this year on both those fronts, but we still have a lot of work to do. I’ve been very much involved in the progress that we’ve made, and I plan to be very much involved in what still needs to be done.

After roads and the education system, I think we need to restore trust in the system through ethics reform. We’ve made some major steps, assuming those bills pass and are signed by the governor, which I think they will be. But we still have work to do in restoring trust and competence in the system. Those things are at the top of the priority list, and I’ve been very much involved in making the progress that we’ve made, and I plan to stay involved if re-elected.

Q: The state of South Carolina’s roads has been the Legislature’s main focus for the last two years, without a final version reaching the governor’s desk. How should the Department of Transportation ultimately be reformed, and will the state need to raise its gas tax?

A: The current plan, which I think will eventually pass and the governor will sign it, is to take $200 million in recurring fees, and bond that to create $2.2 billion, and use that to make much-needed improvements on our bridges. I think we’ve got a bigger problem than $2.2 billion, but $2.2 billion is a good start. And we can do that $200 million in fees without having to raise the gas tax. It may come up in the future, but this is a major start without having to look to the gas tax.

The initial bill that restructures DOT also does $400 million in recurring funds. That bill went back to the House and they took out the funds and just made it a restructuring bill. That bill is in conference committee now. The plan we’re working on is to take the $2.2 billion roads bill and combine it with the restructuring bill and make it one bill. The governor has said she will sign that if the money and restructuring are together, and I think the General Assembly would like to see that.

The restructuring basically lets the governor appoint the board for DOT, and then the board will chose the head of the agency, similar to how DHEC and others are run. It also puts the infrastructure bank under the DOT, in that any projects they approve have to be approved by the DOT board as well. You have a clear line of accountability from the governor to the board to the head of the agency, as opposed to the way it is now, with the head of the agency appointed by the governor and the board elected by the General Assembly, and the infrastructure bank is kind of on its own. There’s a general consensus that that needs to change and come under the governor.

Q: A bill reforming the state’s ethics laws is now close to passing. Does it go far enough in policing legislators, proposing punishments, and regulating money in politics?

A: Like everything on ethics, is it exactly the way I would have written it? No. But I think it’s the strongest bill we could get through the General Assembly, and it is a major step forward. Currently we have no independent oversight in the House and Senate. That would have the ethics commission investigate complaints involving House and Senate members. Then they would make their reports to the House and Senate committees, because under the constitution, they’re responsible for policing the House and Senate, just like under the constitution, the judiciary polices the judiciary.

But this does bring in independent oversight, and if the committees disagree with the independent oversight group, then the findings of the group become public. That’s key, because it brings to light the possible ethics violation. Any fine or other disciplinary matter is relatively minor compared to the issue going public.

The attorney general can and will bring charges against violators, and (former House speaker) Bobby Harrell’s just the most recent example. We’ve had others over the years where the attorney general has stepped in against violators, and some ethics violations can be prosecuted criminally. That could be a case where if the committees didn’t want to take action, the attorney general could. But a lot of those ethics complaints are criminal violations already.

Of the major things that still need to be done, (dark money) is the one we haven’t been able to address yet. It’s been the Wild West in South Carolina. None of the groups that get this soft money have to report who they are, how they got the money or how they’re spending the money. We can’t limit how much they can spend or raise, but we can make them report who they are, where they got the money and how they’re spending the money. And I think that’s what the voters have a right to know.

Q: The next Senate will have to address the Supreme Court’s decision on education funding in the Abbeville case. How can the state improve rural school districts?

A: I’ve been the co-chair of a committee working on the Abbeville lawsuit in the Senate, and we’ve got a number of things working their way through the General Assembly, so we have a good chance of getting that lawsuit favorably resolved soon. And more importantly, it makes some much needed changes to improve our schools in the poorer, rural areas, some of which were the plaintiff districts in the lawsuit. The three main areas we’ve identified are:

1) quality teachers – It’s really hard to get quality teachers into some poor, rural areas in South Carolina. We’ve got rural teacher recruitment measures that will pay off student loans to try to get teachers to go in and teach in some of these rural areas. That’s an initiative the governor has very much been involved in and that I think is needed.

2) the quality of facilities in some of these poor, rural areas. Most districts pay for facilities through local property tax, usually by bonds. Some districts have such little property tax value that they don’t have the wherewithal to raise the money. What we’re looking at is something similar to the infrastructure bank, so some rural areas will have the ability to come to the state to get help for needed facilities.

3) transportation. Students are spending two to three hours one way to get to school. They’re already exhausted before the school day starts, because they don’t have enough buses or enough drivers. This year we’re putting substantial money into new buses, and raises the money paid to bus drivers to once again try to raise this problem in the state.

On the teacher initiative and bus driver initiatives, that’s paid for out of the growth in revenue we had this year. The school facilities would be paid for with bonding.

This story was originally published May 15, 2016 at 4:00 PM with the headline "Climer challenges Hayes: Youth vs. experience in Rock Hill Senate race."