“Transparency,” Interstate 73-Style

Ask any politician in the Palmetto state – from S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley on down – and they will tell you that the completion of Interstate 73 is of vital importance to our state’s $18.4 billion tourism industry.

They’ll also tell you its essential in evacuating residents from the Grand Strand in the event of a hurricane.

This planned corridor – which is eventually supposed to run from Myrtle Beach all the way up to Michigan – has been on the tip of South Carolina political tongues for years.

But is the need really that “vital?” And are there other, more cost-effective means of solving the same traffic problems?

The debate over I-73 ratcheted up last month when commissioners at the S.C. Department of Transportation (DOT) – which was ostensibly “reformed” four years ago – voted on the down low to approve $344 million in new bonded indebtedness. Over a third of that borrowed money – $105 million- will be devoted to an I-73 interchange in Dillon County, even though construction on the interstate itself hasn’t even begun in South Carolina.

Obviously, such an interchange isn’t a priority project – particularly given the extensive backlog of repair projects necessary to make our state’s roads and bridges safe again (an unfortunate consequence of DOT overseeing the nation’s fourth-largest system of state-maintained roads).

Also, three of the other four projects approved as part of this bond deal were not on the agency’s “priority” list either – prompting some to speculate that they were included as payoffs to other members of the commission to secure their support for the I-73 interchange.

In fact, a source close to the commission tells FITS that’s exactly what happened.

“After Chairman Danny Isaac (from Horry County) worked out a behind-the-scenes deal with the other commissioners to give them projects they wanted – so he could get the $105 million for the interchange – they caved,” our source says.

Great … and this is how a “reformed” state agency operates?

Not surprisingly, DOT commissioners were not eager to have their bond vote publicized – which is probably why they didn’t include it on the agenda for their April 21 meeting.

“The public does not have a say,” DOT commissioner Harrison Reardon told The Greenville News. “That’s for us as commissioners and we exercised our authority.”

Um, really?

If that’s Reardon’s attitude toward spending public money, then he should be removed from his post immediately. After all, that’s precisely the sort of arrogance that this agency was supposed to have been “cured” of four years ago.

Sadly, though, it looks like we are dealing with yet another case of “reform in name only” in South Carolina – a reshuffling of deck chairs on the Titanic, if you will. Despite its recent reform, the Department of Transportation remains a splintered, unaccountable island of waste and corruption – where merit-based decisions are subjugated to backroom political deals.

Watching over the whole process? S.C. Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman and Haley, who appear to have cut some sort of a deal regarding I-73. And of course Haley’s appointee to the board isn’t some limited government, pro-transparency reformer … he’s just another campaign contributor.

Rest assured, if our state’s leaders think that they’re going to pull this sort of stunt over on the taxpayers without us being the wiser (and without us stepping up to challenge them), then they are sorely mistaken.

To our discredit, we have not paid as much attention to I-73 as we should have.

That’s about to change …

If Haley won’t step up to protect the taxpayers on I-73, then we will …

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