LAURINBURG — After a few years of unanswered questions, some investigation may finally begin providing answers for taxpayers who are now saddled with 10 years of repaying a $575,000 loan to the state at $57,500 per year.
The loan is the result of two approved state loans that were lost after apparent mismanagement by the county’s Economic Development Corporation.
The first project goes back to 2017, when Edwards Wood Products entered into an agreement with Scotland County to apply for a grant to help purchase a new fire system (water tower). The agreement was made and Edwards Wood Products promised to create 70 more jobs at their plant. However, work was begun prior to the completion of the necessary paperwork.
“The grant specifically stated that work could not be started before the grant process was completely finalized,” Commissioner Tim Ivey has previously stated. “However, Edwards had already begun on the project and had invoices from previous work.
“In this situation, Edwards paid for the project on their own. In May of 2019, Edwards and the county entered into another agreement to create a railroad spur on their property,” added Ivey. “This was the grant request for $575,000.”
Once again, work was started early and the grant was pulled for a second time.
Since the initial announcement of the debacle by Economic Development Director Mark Ward during a Scotland County Board of Commissioners meeting in June 2020, commissioners have been relatively silent about the issue. And when some commissioners spoke about the situation, they defended Ward and the process.
But now, it looks like that is about to change.
Thanks to Commissioner Darrell “B.J.” Gibson requesting the board insist on finding more detailed information on what went wrong, the process to dig deeper into the issue has gained traction.
During its meeting on Tuesday, the board decided to form a committee to seek out answers. The committee will be made up of three board members: Commissioners Clarence McPhatter, Whit Gibson and Ivey.
“I am very happy with the plan for the subcommittee that will handle this matter for the citizens,” said Darrell Gibson. “In my quest, I wanted to gain more information and justice by bringing the matter to the table. I, along with a few other commissioners, gained knowledge that we didn’t previously have.
“It is my hope that the committee will help clarify for our citizens where things went wrong in this matter, particularly in the mismanagement on the county government end and develop a recommendation to ensure we don’t find ourselves in this position again,” Darrell Gibson added. “I hope that when the committee is complete we can host a town hall specifically for this purpose to share details with the community and move forward.”
According to Darrell Gibson, most conversations at this point have been very surface level, giving little detail.
“It’s important to me for the committee to be thorough and detailed,” Darrell Gibson said. “I think any and everything associated with this matter should be reviewed by this committee and conversations should be held with all interested parties to help give the citizens a much clearer picture of why they are being held to this unnecessary deficit.
“We serve at the pleasure of our citizens and being transparent with their tax money, in my opinion, is most noteworthy,” added Darrell. “If a mistake was made, county government officials must own that, make necessary reprimands and establish protocols to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”
Darrell Gibson said he is hoping the process of getting answers does not take too long.
“In my opinion, this shouldn’t take long at all to get started,” said Darrell. “It may take some time for the committee to comb through the information, but access should be granted rather quickly to all information.”
Ivey said he echos Darrell Gibson’s thoughts and feels this committee is long overdue.
“While I don’t think anything was done wrong legally, it still occurred and cost the people of this county $575,000,” said Ivey. “I hope to put the full timeline out as to what happened and when it happened, as well as hold anyone responsible accountable.
“I volunteered for the committee to get to the bottom of this issue finally,” added Ivey. “This will be a broad deep dive into what happened, from start to finish. We will be looking at emails, contracts and meeting notes etc.”
Ivey said he would hope the full report can be brought back to the full board by November.
JJ Melton can be reached at [email protected].
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