South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Video: Gov. Nikki Haley, DEW Director John Finan, SWIB Chairman Mikee Johnson talk about putting South Carolinians back to work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TwU3E3mvPE

The State: Haley shakes up state’s unemployment agency

Workers will receive job assessments upfront as they apply for benefits

By KRISTY EPPLEY RUPON
http://www.thestate.com/2011/08/30/1951476/haley-shakes-up-states-unemployment.html
Gov. Nikki Haley is hoping a change in name and focus at the state’s OneStop Workforce centers will put more South Carolinians back to work.

Haley also said the S.C. Department of Employment and Workforce has started repaying more than $900 million in federal loans that it used to pay jobless benefits last year as unemployment soared.

The state’s 56 OneStop centers – where the jobless go to file unemployment claims and search for work – will be renamed S.C. Works, Haley said Monday.

Unemployed workers will receive job assessments upfront as they apply for benefits, rather than later in the process. The centers then will try to match workers and their skills with jobs that are available or retrain them for those jobs.

Haley said she remains focused on bringing jobs to the state for those workers to fill. The state’s jobless rate shot to 10.9 percent last month, up from its low this year of 9.8 percent in April. “I’m going to continue doing what I know to do, which is calling CEOs and getting them to come here,” she said.

Haley also said the state agency on Friday paid back $115 million of the federal loans. Another $68 million payment is scheduled for November.

By 2015, S.C. businesses should see “huge decreases” in the amount they pay for unemployment insurance premiums, she said. Those premiums were increased for many businesses to help repay the federal loans taken out to pay jobless benefits during the Great Recession.

Less than a week before Gen. Abraham J. Turner takes the reins of the S.C. Department of Employment and Workforce, Haley said she has replaced most of the members of the state Workforce Investment Board and appointed a new chairman, Mikee Johnson of Orangeburg. The move increases representation on the 28-member board from the business community and from the Legislature, Haley said.

Johnson said he intends to make sure that the majority of the federal money the state gets for work force training – $60 million last year – goes to preparing people for work and not administrative costs. He said only 40 percent of the money received last year went directly for job training.

John Finan, who retires Wednesday as the director of the state employment department, called the changes “a real step forward,” noting many of the members had been on the work force board for close to a decade. “It’s time for change.”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Greenville News: Gov. Nikki Haley wins praise for industrial recruiting effort
Governor, despite some stumbles, says she’s focused on job growth
By David Dykes | Staff Writer

He was on vacation in South Carolina, and it was 4:30 in the morning when J. Michael Luttig’s BlackBerry buzzed. He was up, drinking coffee and eating toast.

As he leaned over and picked up his BlackBerry, he noticed a text. It was from Gov. Nikki Haley.

“You’ve got a dynamic person with a force of personality and then just a singular commitment to economic development for the state,” said Luttig, Boeing Co.’s executive vice president and general counsel. “The word really is ‘force of personality.’ That kind of captures it.”

“She must work 24-7,” he said.

Luttig and other corporate and elected officials say Haley is establishing an aggressive economic-development plan as governor, with jobs as a centerpiece in the first year of her administration. They say the Indian-American mother of two is a charismatic newcomer who, despite her relative inexperience, is charging ahead on South Carolina’s behalf.

They say she does her corporate homework, calls chief executives directly and asks them what they need. …

Josef Kerscher, president of BMW Manufacturing, whose only North American plant is near Greer, said in a statement, “BMW has enjoyed a great partnership with each governor of South Carolina since our announcement in 1992. In our collaboration with Gov. Haley, she has been very accessible, both with our team here in South Carolina and in Munich. She is very willing to listen and learn about issues that affect our business and how she can help support our activities.” …

“She’s engaging. She’s focused. She’s energetic,” said former House Speaker David Wilkins, a Greenville attorney who has been in several meetings with Haley.

“She makes sure the company CEO knows that South Carolina wants you to invest in our state, that we want you to come here, that we have the right business climate, that we have the right people and that we have a governor who will remain interested in you once you commit to come and will stay engaged with you.”

“I would give Nikki an ‘A’ on everything that she’s done so far,” said Otis Rawl, the state Chamber’s president and chief executive. “From a business perspective, she’s been right there on all our issues,” including tort reform and incentives for companies to locate in South Carolina, he said.

One company said Haley’s assertiveness played a key role in its decision to establish a new production facility in Greenville County.

Amy’s Kitchen, a maker of natural and organic convenience foods, in May announced a $63 million investment expected to generate more than 700 new jobs over six years.

The company was recruited heavily by North Carolina, but “Nikki caught wind of that and she took it personally,” said Mark Rudolph, the company’s chief financial officer. …

Haley understands “the power of the partnership” between government and the private sector and “the interdependence of each on the other,” Luttig said. “She gets that.”…

“The truth is I sleep, eat and and breathe jobs in South Carolina,” she said. “That’s just how I am. I am constantly trying to figure out what industries we need to touch, who we need to follow back up with, what else needs to happen and there is kind of a method to my madness.”

She will remain relentless in her pursuit of jobs because they are important to large cities and small towns alike, Haley said.

“The press is giving me a hard time for announcing 50 jobs here or there and saying it’s not a big deal,” she said. “Ask those 50 people who got those jobs. It’s a very big deal, and every one of them is important to me. Every one.”

The entire story is available here.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Associated Press: Haley: Ask GOP candidates the tough questions

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Gov. Nikki Haley urged voters Monday to ask the tough questions of the Republican presidential candidates as they trek through South Carolina in the weeks and months ahead of the first Southern GOP primary. …

She said the large GOP field promises to provide the best policy debate ever seen in the run-up to a presidential election.

“This shows we are really about policy and we need to ask what we need to do to make our country great again,” she said during a bill-signing ceremony. “The main thing they have to answer is what do you do when your credit rating is falling and how do we get back to being the super power we need to be?”

Among other hard questions, the governor said, are the candidates’ positions on unions and how they would handle the National Labor Relations Board. …

“We need to ask them about the economy and what are they going to do about energy independence at a time when gas prices are going through the roof?” she added.

The entire story is available here.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

VIDEO: Gov. Nikki Haley visits Easley to sign higher ed reform bill

Anderson Independent Mail: Governor signs first of several planned higher ed reforms
By Anna Mitchell

http://www.independentmail.com/news/2011/aug/03/governor-signs-first-several-planned-higher-ed-ref/

EASLEY — Saying that the state of South Carolina is looking at higher education in a new way, Gov. Nikki Haley signed a bill into law Wednesday afternoon that will reduce the time and expense public colleges face when building new facilities or making major purchases.

This same bill — South Carolina Higher Education Efficiency and Administrative Polices Act — requires the state’s higher-education institutions to post all their transactions online. About half of the state’s schools, including Tri-County Technical College and Clemson University, have been doing so since early 2011.

Before putting pen to paper at the Easley campus of Tri-County Tech, Haley told a crowd of about 50 people that the bill’s passage marks an exciting day for transparency in higher education. In addition to spelling out every expenditure online — 800,000 transactions so far this year at Clemson University alone — the bill requires roll call votes in open meetings for any tuition increases.

Clemson and Tri-County Tech already take such votes in public meetings.

“All the schools stepped up,” Haley said.

Haley said she sees transparency in higher-education governance as working hand-in-hand with granting them more flexibility.

She said she also wants to move discussions about higher education from the expense and selectivity of some schools to the quality of the education and job prospects of graduates.

By January, she said, she plans to introduce a new funding formula for higher education that rewards schools with high graduation and graduate employment rates. Yet more flexibility in operations will be tied to this initiative, she said.

“The question is how can we go to a funding formula not based on football ticket sales or who graduated from where?” Haley said, adding later: “If you tie funding to performance, the students always win.”

Clemson University President Jim Barker joined the assembly of state legislators, school trustees, educators and fans of the governor who watched the bill’s signing. Also on hand was state Comptroller Richard Eckstrom, who praised Barker for taking a lead on funding transparency.

“In this new normal funding environment, we now have new tools,” Barker said. “So we can be more successful, more entrepreneurial. Without this legislation, we wouldn’t have had the same opportunity to save money.”

Abbeville resident Elizabeth Pickens brought her four young daughters, whom she home schools, to meet Haley and have their pictures taken with her. Her husband, David, said he took the afternoon off to drive up to Easley.

“We support Nikki Haley, and I wanted my four daughters to meet her,” said Pickens of the girls ages 1, 4, 6 and 8.

Dan Snipes, who lives in Anderson County’s Five Forks community, said he admired the governor’s work to make all arms of government work more efficiently. He is retired from the state’s probation and parole agency.

“There was so much to obey, we moved at a snails pace,” he said. “I used to compare it to running in two feet of molasses.”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Video: Statewide TV coverage of Gov. Nikki Haley’s congressional reapportionment bill signing

Video: Gov. Nikki Haley signs congressional reapportionment bill signing

The (Myrtle Beach) Sun News: Gov. Haley signs new district bill

By Gina Vasselli - gvassselli@thesunnews.com

Supporters of the Horry County-centered new 7th congressional district declared victory on Monday as Gov. Nikki Haley signed the congressional reapportionment bill into law. A crowd of about 75 people, many wearing the bright red “Pee Dee wants the 7th district” shirts they wore to redistricting events around the state and some carrying “we did it” signs, watched Haley sign the legislation, which will now go to the U.S. Justice Department for its approval. “You did this,” Haley said to the crowd. “You made this happen. The Pee Dee pushed for it. They asked for it. “They showed up in their red shirts. … The Pee Dee said the 7th belongs to us and we’re not giving up.” The district includes Georgetown County as well as the Pee Dee region, including Florence, Marion, Marlboro and Chesterfield counties. (To read the entire article, click here.)

-###-

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Post and Courier (Editorial): No way to fund schools
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2011/jul/19/no-way-to-fund-schools/

Gov. Nikki Haley didn’t fare too well on the veto front last month, as the Legislature overrode most of her efforts to cut the state budget. But one little-noticed veto that was sustained by the Legislature served as a needed restraint on school funding during tough economic times.

A proposal to allow a cash-strapped school district in Florence County to issue bonds to meet operating expenses was a recipe for financial disaster.

Florence District 4 needed $800,000 to pay its bills, primarily for health insurance premiums and payroll taxes.

At least two other districts, Colleton County and Hampton District 2, also were interested in going the bond route because of budget problems.

Even the Charleston County School District was interested in a similar measure.

But bonds are issued for capital improvements, and using them for operating expenses requires a legislative dispensation. Fortunately, the Senate sustained the governor’s veto.

As Sen. Shane Martin, R-Spartanburg, explained, using bonds to pay operating expenses is “almost like putting your light bill on your credit card.” He added, “It’s unsustainable.”

School districts have had a tough time living within their limited means during the economic downturn. Revenues have been down, federal stimulus money is gone and it’s the worst time to raise taxes.

The solution, however, isn’t irresponsible financial management, but belt-tightening, even when painful. Otherwise, districts are just borrowing trouble.

The governor’s veto sent the right message for fiscal restraint.