[0:01] Okay, it's now 5:30. I'd like to call
the uh
[0:07] March 9th Calvin County Council meeting
to order.
[0:11] Why don't you give us the invocation?
>> Let us pray.
[0:15] Dear Lord, please grant us wisdom to
move with the best path forward and may
[0:19] we make good decisions for the county.
Bless all the people that live here and
[0:24] work here. Amen.
>> Amen. Amen.
[0:28] They have approval. Motion for approval
of the agenda.
[0:31] » So move second.
>> Probably move in. Second. Any further
[0:34] discussion on that? All in favor? I
>> I likewise the eyes have it.
[0:42] » Any public comment? Look public
comments. Uh motion for approval of the
[0:46] minutes February 26, 2026 regular
meeting.
[0:51] » Someone move.
>> Second.
[0:52] » Publicly moved and second. Any
corrections or additions? All in favor?
[0:56] I. I
>> likewise the eyes have it. Under the
[1:00] appointments, we have the board of
zoning appeals reappointments.
[1:04] Somebody need to talk about that a
little bit. Y'all just y'all see the
[1:07] names they
>> Yes, sir. So, this is this is just
[1:10] reappoints for the board of zoning
appeals. We do have one vacancy for
[1:13] district one that needs to be filled.
This is a board that doesn't meet quite
[1:18] as often as something like the planning
commission. Um but it it does serve an
[1:24] important function. We actually
potentially have a request for a
[1:27] variance coming up in the next month or
two, but this is just reappoints for the
[1:32] existing members.
>> Richard, I think that's your
[1:34] appointment.
>> Can I ask a question?
[1:36] » Yes, sir.
>> Who was my appointment before? Richard,
[1:39] do you want to Who was on it? Do we have
any idea?
[1:41] » We'll have to get that back to you.
>> Thank you.
[1:45] » Well, we'll wait on you for that
appointment, which
[1:48] Okay. Under appearances, we have Miss
Ashley Kelly, director of board of
[1:53] registration and elections update. Mr.
>> Chairman, can we go ahead and reappoint
[1:56] the other ones in the meeting?
>> Oh, yeah. I'm sorry.
[1:59] » Excuse me,
>> Mr. Chairman. I move to reappoint the
[2:02] board that are on there.
>> Second.
[2:04] » Properly move and second that we appoint
the four board members
[2:08] and these these are reoccurring
appointments, Richard. They've already
[2:11] Yeah. Do we reappoint these um
individuals to the uh board of zoning
[2:15] and appeals?
>> That's what I'm thinking about.
[2:17] » Motion to second. All in favor. Did I
have a second?
[2:20] » Second.
>> All.
[2:22] » Any further discussion? All in favor? I
>> I likewise. Eyes have it.
[2:28] » Okay. So, Richard, we'll wait on you to
get that one.
[2:30] » There you fine.
>> Yeah. Under appearances, we have Miss
[2:33] Ashley Keller, director of voter
registration and elections update and
[2:37] information.
[2:43] » Good evening, council. I'm Ashley Keller
and I serve as your voter registration
[2:48] and election director. I'm here to
provide information regarding the 2026
[2:53] election cycle.
[2:58] Candidate filing for our partisans
office off offices will begin March 16th
[3:03] at noon and will close March the 30th at
noon. These offices include county
[3:09] council districts three, four, and five.
Our nonpartisan candidate filing will
[3:14] take place August 1st through the 15th
for school boards districts two and
[3:19] five. Petition filing must be submitted
on or before July 15th and this applies
[3:25] to the soil and water district and any
other races without party affiliation.
[3:30] Our statewide primaries will be held
June 9th. Early voting for the primary
[3:35] will take place May 26 through May 29th
and June 1st through June 5th from 8:30
[3:44] a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday.
We will be closed on the weekends and
[3:49] holidays. Our runoff will be held June
23rd with early voting on June 17th and
[3:54] 18th. The statewide general election
will be held November 3rd. Early voting
[3:59] for the general election will run
October 19th through October 31st,
[4:04] Monday through Saturday from 8:30 a.m.
to 6:00 p.m. Offices on the ballot will
[4:11] include governor, lieutenant governor,
secretary of state,
[4:16] state treasurer, controller general,
state superintendent of education,
[4:21] commission of agriculture, US senate, US
house district 6, and state house
[4:27] district 93. For each election, we will
operate three early voting center. The
[4:33] calum county economic development center
will serve as our central location.
[4:37] AMD will service the upper part of the
county. St. John Recreational Center
[4:41] will serve the lower part of the county,
but voters can utilize any of the voting
[4:46] precincts during early voting. We also
have a precinct location change for fall
[4:52] branch. The new polling location will
now be the Calhoun Reserve, formerly
[4:57] known as the Ponderosa.
In an effort to increase voter
[5:00] participation,
my office and the council on aging
[5:04] offers a program called request arrive
where voters can call, text, or email,
[5:09] and will arrange transportation to and
from the nearest early voting location.
[5:15] Additionally, voters can now request
absentee ballots during this election
[5:19] cycle. And I will also like to remind
everyone that any voter who will be 18
[5:24] years old by November 3rd is eligible
and can register to vote in this
[5:29] election cycle. If you have any
questions, please feel free to contact
[5:33] my office. Thank you for your time and
the work you do in servicing the
[5:37] citizens of Khung County. Thanks.
>> Thank you.
[5:40] » Thank you.
>> Thank you. Anybody had any question for
[5:43] Ashley?
Thank you, Ashley.
[5:48] Uh, now we have U Brad Little John,
finance director, updates and
[5:53] information. Mr. Little John,
[5:57] » first off,
>> council, thank you for your time. Uh, my
[6:00] name is Brad Little John. I've been
serving as your director of finance
[6:03] since September. Uh, briefly run you
through my background and then we can
[6:07] talk about a little highlight, some
highlights that we have already since
[6:10] I've been on board. Um, I'm originally
from Gaffne, South Carolina. uh
[6:14] graduated with the University of South
Carolina in 2006. My first job out of
[6:18] school was actually working for the
Lieutenant Governor's office. So I was a
[6:23] um a senior financial accountant there.
Uh moved to Atlanta. Uh started working
[6:29] for the Georgia Institute of Technology
as an accountant there. Uh switched over
[6:33] to the public industry. uh worked for
healthcare IT for around seven eight
[6:39] years before moving over to uh private
equity for about six or five years five
[6:44] or six years. Uh from there I moved to
the uh state of Georgia working for the
[6:49] department of revenue as a consultant
for them before coming on board to
[6:52] account. Um I did my like I said I did
my undergrad at the University of South
[6:57] Carolina, my masters at Georgia State
University and uh happy to be here
[7:01] working for you all and uh it's been a
pleasure and uh just to give a couple
[7:05] highlights we've recently finished our
24 audit. We're in the process of
[7:09] finishing our budget 25 audit and also
in the process of preparing our 27
[7:14] budget which I'm sure you all are aware
of. So like you thank you for your time
[7:19] and I appreciate it.
>> Thank you.
[7:21] » Thank you.
>> Glad to have you board. Anybody have any
[7:24] questions?
>> I'm just glad to have you aboard.
[7:27] » Okay. Thank you.
[7:30] » Moving along. Richie down to you.
>> Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And
[7:36] kind of tag it on to for what Brad said
and it is nice to have a finance
[7:39] director uh here uh working through the
budget. Uh we're preparing everything
[7:44] started actually budget meetings uh this
week with individual departments and uh
[7:48] we'll be compiling all that information
with the finance office and getting that
[7:52] ready for for your budget retrieve. Um I
I am hopeful we're hopeful with with
[7:58] finance staff this year that we will
have the audit completed by the
[8:03] extension deadline of March 31st which
be the first time in a number of years
[8:07] that we've been able to get there. Uh
we've implemented a lot of financial
[8:11] policies and procedures and with with
Brad and his staff's help we're going to
[8:17] get the rest of those wrapped up and
hopefully we're going to be in much
[8:20] better shape going forward.
uh also along audits. You may remember
[8:26] probably year and a half ago now when we
started talking about the transitions in
[8:31] the fire service uh working through that
uh I guess January of of last year we
[8:37] talked about having independent single
audits of all of the fire department and
[8:42] so next council meeting on the 23rd of
March Steve Blake will be here. He's the
[8:48] gentleman that's been helping us with
our internal audits. He's the one that
[8:51] was providing
the the review of all of the fire
[8:55] department's audits. Uh he's going to
come on the 23rd and present that
[9:00] information to council. Um, one caveat
to that, uh, you've got on your your
[9:07] desk there, uh, some attorney, um,
correspondence, but then behind that,
[9:14] you've got the forms that were sent to
all of the fire departments, uh,
[9:19] requesting the information that Mr.
Blake needed to perform his audit
[9:22] procedures. We have received all of
those and all of those are completed and
[9:27] those will be presented to you at the
next council meeting minus the old San
[9:32] Run fire department. Uh we have not been
able to get that information yet. We
[9:36] were advised by representatives there
that communications with them needed to
[9:41] be through their attorney. So our
attorney is doing so. Um I do not know
[9:45] the time frame on that as far as getting
that information. It is required to be
[9:50] provided to us. They received government
funds. So they are are required to
[9:54] provide that information as soon as our
attorney can either get that or whatever
[10:00] the next steps need to be get that
information and Steve will come back and
[10:04] wrap that up. What I did not want to do
is with our upcoming audit findings and
[10:09] going into the budget season I didn't
want to delay him coming to give you all
[10:13] of it whenever we were able to finish
that up. So you're going to get the
[10:17] existing all the ones that are already
done. They'll come do that. he'll make
[10:20] that presentation, uh, talk about, uh,
things that need to be improved, things
[10:25] that, you know, were good, weren't good,
etc., just like a normal audit would be.
[10:30] And so, he'll be making that
presentation on the 23rd. Um, as far as
[10:35] getting the other one done, I I don't
have an answer on that until we can get
[10:39] some more communication from their
attorney and uh, see what needs to be
[10:44] taken on the next steps there.
Um,
[10:48] that's it for the the audit, fire
department audits. That's it for that
[10:51] piece. Uh, what I do want, we've got,
you know, we're getting into spring.
[10:55] We've got a lot going on. One of the
things I wanted to talk about was some
[10:58] of the upcoming events. Uh, we've got
quite a few um both for fun events and
[11:04] some not so much fun. We've got the city
run spring cleaning coming up in March
[11:09] 14th. This is the second year um that
we've done that. Hopefully there won't
[11:14] be rain this year on that event.
Hopefully it'll be nice and sunny. Um,
[11:18] one of the not quite so fun things,
March 17th, uh, date is coming up
[11:23] quickly. Um, that's when property taxes
go to the delinquent tax office and a
[11:27] penalty is added. So March the 17th is
is kind of a key date on that. Uh, next
[11:33] on April the 9th, we've got our
countywide litter pickup schedule. uh we
[11:38] invite and and ask everybody that can
participate in that to do so. You can
[11:43] reach out to us um to get supplies, uh
litter grabbers, um bags, vest, uh if
[11:52] you community groups, church groups,
anybody wants to get together and do
[11:55] that. They communicate that with us
after they picked it up, we'll actually
[11:58] go collect the bags, uh get a total
count and bring that together. We
[12:04] typically report that to Palmetto Pride.
It helps us with applying for grants and
[12:08] stuff as well as uh cleaning up sides of
our roads. April the 10th uh be the
[12:14] second year for the St. Matthews Town
Gayla that the county also participates
[12:19] in be on April the 10th. Uh Purple
Martin golf tournaments on April the
[12:24] 14th. And then the Purple Martin
Festival, April 17th and 18th, a Friday
[12:30] night and a Saturday along with the town
dance on the n on the 17th, the night of
[12:35] the 17th. Uh there'll be bingo, town
dance, food trucks, and everything like
[12:39] that for the town. And then the uh
parade and festival um parade starts at
[12:44] 10:00 a.m. on the 18th and then the
festival is from 11:00 a.m. to 3 p.m. Uh
[12:50] our um master of our ceremonies will
Grand Marshall. Thank you. Uh for this
[12:57] will be our Senator Zel will be the
grand marshal for this year's parade and
[13:02] festival. So we're excited about that.
Looking forward to that.
[13:06] » And that is all I have. And any
questions?
[13:09] » Okay. Anybody got anything?
>> Yeah. M Mr. Chairman, could I ask if you
[13:14] could get us an organizational chart of
your administration with all the names?
[13:18] » Yes. And also um I mean I know we've had
some personnel changes and position
[13:24] changes and all that kind of stuff and
any additional duty assign you know so
[13:29] that we know who we
>> Yes sir.
[13:31] » need to be dealing with. Uh I don't
remember the last time we've had one.
[13:34] Has it been a while or
>> it's been a couple years? Yes sir.
[13:38] » And I'm glad you mentioned that because
um I do need to update that. I've I've
[13:42] communicated it with all of you. um
haven't really communicated it
[13:47] throughout the rest of the organization
yet, but we did make some some tweaks to
[13:51] the organizational chart and we have
since I've been here, we have not had a
[13:56] deputy administrator since I've been in
this position. Uh we are not going to
[14:00] necessarily fill the deputy
administrator position, but what we are
[14:03] do is uh what we are doing is appointing
two assistant administrators. Um and
[14:09] that will be uh Shayla Jenkins and
Brandy Robertson. So, I'll get that
[14:14] organizational chart update and get to
you before.
[14:16] » It just helps when you're out of the
building and we know we need to and we
[14:20] need to know who to go to.
>> Absolutely.
[14:22] » Okay. Thank you.
>> Yes, sir.
[14:24] » Okay.
>> Any other councilman?
[14:28] » No, sir.
>> I I just would like to uh thank Mr.
[14:32] Lawson uh for the job you did down there
and protecting us. Sometime we needed
[14:37] it. I I appreciate what all you've done.
I understand this is going to be the
[14:41] last.
>> Yes, sir. Thank Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[14:44] Thank all we are.
>> Thank you.
[14:45] » Thank you.
>> Are you still going to be working for
[14:47] the county or you just
>> No, I'll be retired.
[14:49] » Okay.
>> 25 years.
[14:51] » Yeah, we we would like I would like to
make a presentation to you plaque or
[14:56] something. Thank you for your time. I
wish you could come back at the next
[14:59] council meeting
>> and uh we'd like to present that to you.
[15:03] » Appreciate the job that you did for
>> Thank you, Deputy Lawson.
[15:07] » Nobody have anything else? uh entertain
a motion for adjournment.
[15:11] » So move
>> or a second move and second. Any further
[15:15] discussion? All in favor? I
>> I was likewise the eyes have it.
[15:20] » Thank you everyone for coming.
>> Thank you. Stay.