Hartsville Messenger Endorsement

I usually only post events about the girls and leave grown up/adult “stuff” out of this blog, unless, of course, the girls are involved!  This post, however, requires an exemption and a special posting!  Read on!

EDITORIAL: In choice for mayor, solutions matter most

Innovation and ideas matter most in tough economic times. Without creativity, Hartsville will remain mired in its troubles. Hartsville needs solutions and someone who is willing to take a chance and think outside the box to tackle the city’s problems.

As some 150 residents saw last week at the mayor’s forum at Coker College, residents have two fine candidates for the city’s highest office. Both have business and government experience, have called Hartsville home for many years and have contributed to and love this community.

Pam Sansbury wants to focus on “common sense.” Her solutions for Hartsville’s finances include reducing salaries, cutting positions and trimming spending. She wants an outside firm to evaluate the city’s computer system to make sure payments and bills are posting properly, and she says the revenue loss seems suspicious and is worth investigating.

“It’s just like running a business,” she says.

Mel Pennington wants to “fundamentally change” the way the city makes money by creating a new stream of revenue with the broadband project he has worked on as vice-chairman of the planning commission. He says infrastructure technology needs to be added to the 2020 plan. He also wants to investigate the coming storm water rate increase before it hits in January. He says he looks forward to working with citizens and with state legislators to utilize all the assets (people) Hartsville has.

Sansbury’s main argument for her candidacy is her experience, that “she’s the only qualified candidate;” however, the current problems grew out of the decisions made during the time in which she served as finance director and on city council. She was in government when the utility fund was raided.

On recreation spending, Sansbury says the budget is bloated. Pennington questions the logic of cutting out one of the city’s gems. The department does charge separate rates for in-town and out-of-town residents.

For the controversial water bills, neither candidate sees the rates changing immediately. Pennington has a plan to address the problem in the long run by shifting the way the city raises money to a more market-based approach. Sansbury sees this as a reason to investigate the city’s revenue loss and monthly financial statements.

While Sansbury wants to start her administration off with a budget retreat in January, Pennington says he plans to start on Nov. 4 with a transition team and a “Day One Plan.”

Pennington already started a list of items to put on the agenda the date the new mayor will be sworn in, on Nov. 10. He said he intends to make the meeting a work session as it is intended to be.

While Sansbury says her retired status is an asset, her attitude didn’t reflect what that implies, that she will take on the job fulltime. She mentioned an open door policy at the Oct. 20 forum, but the hours she noted were minimal at best, just 2 to 3 hours per day.

She says she is focused on accountability and having a goal but only describes a corporate mentality of budget cuts and the elimination of positions.

Pennington focuses on the other side of the equation: revenue. Besides the broadband initiative, he wants to propose a tax rebate for agricultural land adjacent to the city. Once the land is developed, the tax rebate goes away and the city gains a commercial or industrial customer. He cites the Lowe’s on Fourth Street as an example of a property that could have been negotiated in this way.

Sansbury has good business sense and knows how the system works now and has worked in the past, but is that enough to drive the city into the quickly changing future?

If the job of a mayor is to lead, Pennington is the choice. He shows leadership and excitement. He energizes people and could use the mayor’s position as the bully pulpit it is to sway city council toward a goal. He comes to the table with new thinking, alternative, out-of-the-box ideas and, more importantly, real solutions.

His approach tackles the city’s problems from a new direction, and that new direction is what Hartsville needs.

The choice for Hartsville is clear. To go forward, voters must choose the candidate of entrepreneurial spirit over the candidate of comfortable experience.

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