UPDATED – Sanford Standing Firm In Unemployment Flap

S.C. Governor Mark Sanford is standing firm on his threat to forgo a routine request for federal unemployment funds until his state’s Employment Security Commission shapes up its act.

While we disagree with the governor’s methods in this case (and have stated so previously), you have to admire the guy’s consistency.

He’s willing to play Scrooge in order to make the larger point that millions of taxpayer dollars are being wasted each year on a bureaucracy that doesn’t accurately measure the number of unemployed South Carolinians, refuses to share the limited information it does gather and has displayed a stunning inability to manage its money, deliver benefits in a timely fashion and crack down on rampant fraud and abuse.

Yet as we wrote earlier this month, there’s really no way Sanford wins a PR fight in which he’s portrayed as effectively denying unemployment checks to some 70,000 South Carolinians.

With a “lead message” like that, who’s going to take the time to figure out that this is among the worst-managed, least-effective agencies in all of state government?

And in typical South Carolina fashion, of course, our Constitutionally-neutered chief executive can’t do a damn thing to bring its operations up to speed.

How come? Because lawmakers run the ESC – going so far as to elect one of their former colleagues to serve as Chairman of its board (at $109,000 a year).

Like everything else the legislature in this state touches – the system hasn’t worked.

In fact, the ESC’s poor financial management was noted in an audit two years ago, in which it was revealed that the fund’s annual revenue rose by 32% between 2002 and 2006, and yet its trust fund was reduced by half over that time period despite declining unemployment claims.

“Two years they knew this was going to happen, and yet neither the Employment Security Commission nor the legislature did anything about it,” Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer told FITS earlier today. “Their focus has been to build new buildings for themselves.”

The current spat started back in September, when the Employment Security Commission gave Sanford a week’s notice that it was running out of money.

Sanford agreed to request emergency federal funds at that time, but in a leter to ESC director Roosevelt Halley, he called the agency’s fiscal management “unprofessional and reckless,” which it is.

Told to submit to an audit and reform its wasteful, ineffecient ways, the ESC is still declining a state audit and refusing to provide accurate, detailed jobless data to the state agencies who need it most.

Which is why Sanford is making good on a threat that the ESC never thought he would have the temerity to carry out.

Needless to say, lawmakers (who have ignored ESC’s failings all these years) are pouncing.

In a press release written for them last week by legendary PR pro Bob McAlister, legislative leaders blasted the governor in no uncertain terms.

“Make no mistake, this is totally his decision,” said House Speaker Bobby Harrell. ”He can’t try to blame this on others like he usually does.”

“I’ve been in the Senate 28 years. Never have I seen a more heartless and cruel act by a governor,” said Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman.

The deadline for requesting the funds is tomorrow … should be interesting to see if anybody blinks.

WEB-EXTRAS:

Read Gov. Sanford’s Sept. 30 Letter to the ESC by clicking here.

Read Lawmakers’ release drafted by Bob McAlister by clicking here.

Read Gov. Sanford’s latest press release on the issue by clicking here.

Comments