Dirty, rotten scoundrels of S.C.

If you’ve never seen the comedy movie “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” you’re missing out. It features movie icons Steve Martin and Michael Cain as two competitive bachelors who prey upon wealthy single women to con them out of their money. Both shysters refine their tricks to accumulate significant wealth, and the outrageous lengths they go to achieve the scam make for some truly hilarious situations.

Here in South Carolina, we have our own set of scoundrels. Unfortunately, they’re conning taxpayers and there is no humor involved in these scams. Senate President Pro Tem Hugh Leatherman (R-Florence) is the most powerful politician in the state and South Carolina Department of Transportation (SCDOT) Commissioner Mike Wooten is one of the most powerful bureaucrats. Both are using their influential positions to swindle us out of more of our hard-earned money through a gas tax hike. And both are using the transportation system to help themselves and their families at our expense.

Leatherman uses his position to leverage the power of high-level appointments. As president pro tem and finance committee chairman, he is a member of the Joint Transportation Review Committee (JTRC) with influence over who gets appointed to the SCDOT Commission – the board that decides what roads get fixed, when and by how much. In fact, Leatherman’s son-in-law, a lobbyist for the transportation industry, was unanimously appointed to the commission just last year.

The senator’s family has also benefited from his position of power in other ways. Leatherman founded Florence Concrete Products Inc., a company that services road and bridge projects. Amazingly, Florence Concrete has received contracts worth over $30 million from the SCDOT. Better yet, the company has been granted “Disadvantaged Business Enterprise” status by the state, and now has an even bigger leg up on competitors for multi-million dollar contracts. Was this coincidence or cronyism?

Mike Wooten is also a powerful man. He was a former director on the board of taxpayer-owned utility Santee Cooper. As the current vice chairman of the Transportation (SCDOT) Commission, he’s responsible for billions of taxpayer dollars. Wooten is a major political donor with access to the state’s most powerful politicians, including local state Rep. Stephen Goldfinch. And, not coincidentally, he’s also president of a large engineering firm, DDC Engineers Inc., that counts local and state government entities as clients.

A few months ago, Wooten attempted to stop the SCDOT’s internal auditor Paul Townes from investigating fraud within the agency. He went so far as to threaten Mr. Townes’ job and was quoted at an oversight hearing as saying “…either Mr. Townes needs to understand the wishes of his boss, the Commission, or he needs to find another job.”

Just a few weeks later Mr. Wooten was in the news again – this time for holding an unethical, secret meeting with fellow elites to cover up a damning study regarding the controversial Interstate 73. His reason for withholding public information: “As you know, timing is everything, and we don’t need to give the intervening groups time to produce the drivel they will put out questioning the results.”

Wooten clearly doesn’t believe in government transparency or citizen input.

Remember, Mike Wooten is president of an engineering company that “does a lot of road projects” and has clients that include government entities such as Horry County, Santee Cooper and the State Infrastructure Bank. If the politicians pass a gas tax hike, we pay more at the pump and government entities that hire DDC Engineers Inc. get more of our money.

So how did these scoundrels accrue so much power? Our State representatives and senators voted them into powerful positions. Because local legislators are responsible for appointing Wooten and senators for electing Leatherman, our representatives must be held accountable for this unethical behavior.

At the end of “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” the woman Martin and Cain thought they were playing for a fool was actually playing both of them. The good news is that citizens have the ability to overpower scoundrels like Leatherman and Wooten. The gas tax hike will be one of the first discussions as the legislature reconvenes this month.

Contact your state representatives and senators today and tell them to vote “no” on all plans that include a gas tax hike. Tell them that insiders like Leatherman and Wooten don’t deserve any more of our hard-earned money, and they should enact reforms that make our government more accountable and transparent.

This story was originally published December 28, 2015 at 7:23 AM with the headline "Dirty, rotten scoundrels of S.C.."