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AIKEN — Everyone on Aiken County Council was in agreement.

There was no hesitation as the panel’s members raised their hands.

They voted unanimously March 17 to approve a resolution to oppose a bill recently introduced in the S.C. House of Representatives that seeks to wrest control of the Horse Creek wastewater treatment plant from Aiken County government.

The legislation, if it becomes law, would create a new nine-member commission, the Horse Creek Regional Public Service Authority, to oversee operations at the facility.

County Council’s action took place during the panel’s meeting at the Aiken County Government Center.

It followed a presentation by County Attorney Brad Farrar.

County Council Chairman Gary Bunker described House Bill 5321 as a “fatally flawed piece of legislation.”

All six House of Representatives members in Aiken County’s legislative delegation are sponsoring the bill along with Cal Forrest of Lexington and Saluda counties.

Farrar’s conclusions in his presentation were as follows:

• Act 542 of 1973, upon which H.B. 5321 is premised, was judicially declared unconstitutional in 1976.

• Even if Act 542 “were to be valid,” Sections 1A and 3 thereof don’t prohibit Aiken County from providing wastewater services within the county, “or continuing the services it now provides in that area.”

• Counties in South Carolina are “expressly authorized to provide wastewater treatment services” by the state’s constitution.

• Counties in South Carolina also are “expressly authorized to provide wastewater treatment services pursuant to” a section of the state’s Code of Laws.

H.B. 5321 “greatly invades county home rule and it also impacts the lives of a lot of people, the good folks who work for the county,” Farrar told County Council.

He said the resolution approved by the panel authorizes him to “submit a number of Freedom of Information Act requests to various entities,” including S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster and S.C. Secretary of State Mark Hammond.

In addition, Farrar continued, the resolution “is directing me to bring whatever action is necessary, whether it’s a declaratory judgment action or injunction or whatever, to try to prevent the takeover” of the Aiken County Public Service Authority, which is a department of Aiken County Government.

The resolution also “authorizes me to share with every other county and the South Carolina Association of Counties this particular issue,” Farrar said.

There was applause in Council Chambers after he spoke.

“It does look like we’ve got a slam dunk case,” said County Council member Mike Kellems.

He represents District 2, which includes New Ellenton.

County Council Vice Chairman Andrew Siders criticized the sponsors of H.B. 5321 for how they decided to handle what they perceived to be a problem.

“This is a situation where we identified issues with our PSA (Public Service Authority),” he said. "We’re addressing those issues with our PSA and moving forward in a pretty swift manner. And this really came out of left field.

“We found [out] that they were filing this, and they did not communicate with us at all,” Siders continued. “No one called us. No one told us about this … we didn’t know what was happening.”

Aiken County’s response will be “to fight,” Siders said.

The House Committee on Agriculture, National Resources and Environmental Affairs is scheduled to hold a hearing on H.B. 5321 in Columbia on March 24.

One of the bill’s sponsors, S.C. Rep. Bill Hixon, R-North Augusta, told the Aiken Standard that Aiken County had mismanaged the Horse Creek wastewater treatment plant.

“It’s been run wrong for a good many years, and they have not planned for the future,” he said.

The plant also is known as the Horse Creek Pollution Control Facility.

It has Beech Island address: 70 PSA Road.

With severe weather on the way, some schools are making changes to their schedules. We'll keep track of those changes here.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — A severe storm is expected to bring heavy wind, rain and possible tornadoes to the South Carolina Midlands on Monday morning.

As a result, some school districts are shifting their class schedules or moving to eLearning due to the storm's potential impact on their communities.

Here's what we're hearing from each county.

Aiken County

Aiken County schools will observe an eLearning Day on Monday due to forecasted severe weather, with employees working remotely and students having until March 27 to complete their assignments.

Calhoun County

Calhoun County Public Schools will have an eLearning Day on Monday due to forecast severe weather.

Clarendon County

Clarendon County Schools has announced that Monday will be an eLearning day due to expected severe weather. All schools and district offices will be closed. All activities are canceled. Assignments will be posted on Google Classroom. Students who face barriers to completing the assignments will be allowed additional time.

Fairfield County

Fairfield County School District will be closed on Monday due to forecast severe weather, with no eLearning. The missed instructional day will be made up on Monday, May 25.

Kershaw County

Kershaw County School District is shifting to an eLearning Day on Monday due to forecast severe weather, with all school buildings, offices, and afterschool activities closed or canceled. Middle and high school students will receive assignments in Canvas by 11 a.m., while elementary students will receive theirs on Tuesday. All students will have five school days to complete their work.

Lee County

Lee County School District has designated Monday as an eLearning Day due to forecast severe thunderstorms with high winds and heavy rainfall, and all staff members are expected to remain available during normal work hours.

Lexington One

Lexington County School District One is switching to eLearning on Monday, with campuses closed and all afterschool activities canceled due to a forecast of severe weather, including damaging winds and possible tornadoes. Employees are asked to work from home, and students will have five days to complete their eLearning assignments.

Lexington Two

Lexington Two will close all schools and offices on Monday due to forecast severe weather, with all afterschool and evening activities also canceled. The district will communicate updates by Monday afternoon regarding the status of school on Tuesday, March 17.

Lexington Three

Lexington County School District Three is switching to an eLearning Day on Monday due to forecasted severe weather. Students will have no work on Monday but will receive make-up eLearning assignments on Tuesday, with all work due by April 2. All afterschool events are canceled.

Lexington Four

Lexington Four schools are not scheduled to be in session on Monday.

Lexington-Richland Five

While schools and offices in School District Five of Lexington & Richland Counties are already closed on Monday for a previously scheduled holiday, employees who were scheduled to work will transition to remote work due to forecast severe weather.

Newberry County

The School District of Newberry County will close all schools and offices on Monday due to forecast severe weather.

Orangeburg County

Orangeburg County School District will observe an eLearning Day on Monday due to forecast severe wind conditions, with all afterschool programs, extracurricular activities, and athletic events canceled. Students should follow the eLearning procedures previously communicated by their schools.

Richland One

Richland One has announced that all schools and offices will be closed on Monday due to the severe weather forecast. School officials said this will not be an eLearning day. All afterschool activities on Monday have also been canceled. The Richland One Rising Stars Awards Ceremony is also canceled.

Richland Two

Richland Two will cancel classes on Monday due to forecasted severe weather and high winds. All district buildings and offices will be closed.

Saluda County

Saluda County schools are monitoring the weather forecast but have not made any changes to school schedules at this time.

Sumter County

Sumter School District has designated Monday as an eLearning Day due to forecast severe weather, with all schools, offices, and activities closed or canceled, and the day will not need to be made up. Lessons will be posted on Schoology, and students who are unable to participate due to power outages or limited internet access will be allowed to complete assignments at a later time.

COLUMBIA — Wastewater capacity in this region, from Aiken County to Edgefield and Saluda counties, has now become a state issue.

All six House of Representatives members in Aiken County’s legislative delegation have sponsored a bill that would, if it’s eventually signed into law, wrest control of the regional Horse Creek wastewater treatment plant away from Aiken County government and instead bring it under the purview of a new nine-member commission.

“It’s been run wrong for a good many years, and they have not planned for the future,” Rep. Bill Hixon, R-North Augusta, said of Aiken County’s handling of the Horse Creek facility.

Hixon is one of the sponsors of H.B. 5321, introduced March 4 and now residing in his own House Committee on Agriculture, Natural Resources and Environmental Affairs.

Aiken County representatives Bill Taylor, Bill Clyburn, Charlie Hartz and Melissa Oremus, along with Cal Forrest of Lexington and Saluda counties, are also sponsors on the bill.

Horse Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant is run by Aiken County Public Service Authority, and the PSA counts nearly a dozen major customers, including the cities of North Augusta and Aiken. In turn, North Augusta also has previously sold sewer capacity to Edgefield County, which itself has sold to Saluda County.

And though the facility is currently operating at just 60% or, in the next three years when its expansion comes online, just 46 percent, there’s still the very large matter of reserved, or committed, capacity — that's for new development projects that have been approved even if they haven’t manifested on the ground in actual construction.

Account for that, and there isn’t much left to dole out for new development beyond this. It’s an issue that led to Aiken County losing out on what was to have been a $185 million investment by House of Raeford for a chicken processing plant in large part because the city of Aiken couldn’t promise the company the sewer service it needed.

It’s an issue that meant Edgefield County has had to deny a new senior living facility. It’s one, too, that could have caused trouble for Fox Creek Middle School — until Edgefield County’s biggest user, the federal prison, was taken off Horse Creek and its usage diverted to the city of Edgefield.

According to Hixon, this maneuver freed up about 270,000 gallons per day for Edgefield County to then support Fox Creek.

The legislation now introduced is the result of what Hixon said is years of mismanagement of the Horse Creek treatment plant by Aiken County Public Service Authority.

The bill would dissolve that Authority and create in its place the Horse Creek Regional Public Service Authority with representation from the three counties the treatment plant services. Five of its board members would come from Aiken County, three from Edgefield County and one from Saluda County, the split determined by each county’s relative usage of the plant.

These members would be appointed by the governor based on recommendations by a majority of the state legislators who represent them. The bill stipulates that no more than five of the nine members be elected officials.

And if the bill becomes law, the proposed date for control of Horse Creek to transfer over to the new Authority is Sept. 30 of this year.

Aiken County Council Chairman Gary Bunker said he and others with Aiken County are opposed to this legislation.

Bunker said it also came as a surprise that such a bill would be introduced now when the county over the past two years has approved procurement after procurement for improving the treatment plant, including what’s now a $70 million expansion of it that will increase its total capacity by 30% to 26 million gallons per day.

Bunker credits Aiken County’s Brian Sanders, who took over as county administrator in summer of 2023, with pushing for upgrades at Horse Creek, Bunker also offering the candid statement that the facility had been “run into the ground.”

No spares on its parts, and continual issues with the most recent major overhaul, a $50 million state investment into the carousels that serve as an integral component to treating wastewater.

And the reality just a couple years back that the plant was “one pump away” from presenting major operational problems.

Bunker wasn’t able to give a clear picture for how the facility was run prior to Sanders taking the lead on it.

What is known is that operational rates — what citizens are seeing reflected in their own water bills — had remained flat for at least 12 years, from 2012 until mid-2025 when the first of two rate hikes came through.

Nor had the charge for the treatment plant’s customers — city of Aiken, city of North Augusta et al. — been changed over the years, something that meant sticker shock: what had been 49 cents a gallon will now cost $10.89 a gallon.

Though a 2,250% increase, that new rate merely pulls Aiken County PSA up from cheapest of the bunch in the state South Carolina to middle of the pack, according to data given by the county’s consultant on the plant expansion.

But it’s that combination of a sudden increase in cost with the situation of not having unallocated, uncommitted sewer capacity to promise new development the service it needs.

It’s meant that in North Augusta, the city is now having to prioritize commercial development, wielding what sewer capacity it has left as an incentive for economic investments.

For the city of Aiken, it’s led to a requirement, finalized March 9, that new development pay for the added capacity that the city council has authorized it purchase from the Horse Creek expansion, some 1.5 million gallons at a price of $16.3 million.

Aiken County’s Bunker said these decisions are all choices made at the retailer level: Bunker likened Aiken County’s position to that of a wholesaler and its customers to that of retailers, selling the wastewater capacity they’ve purchased to developers or, in North Augusta’s case, to Edgefield County for it to then sell to developers.

These “retailers,” Bunker said, approved new development over the years based on capacity they had purchased and that was still available, and the rate of those approvals has now dwindled what they have left to give.

Hixon, though, said it’s a consequence of what he said is historically poor management of the plant.

“There’s growth in this region. We need more capacity, and there isn’t capacity,” he said. “We could get the finest industry to want to come here, to Aiken or Edgefield or Saluda, and we’d have to tell them goodbye.”

Hixon said he sees this new legislation as offering a benefit to Aiken County: it takes the treatment facility off the county’s hands, he said.

Bunker said he sees it differently. It takes local control from a local operation in having its board appointed by the governor based on input by state representatives, he said.

Hixon’s committee is scheduled to have a hearing on the bill March 24, during which representatives of Aiken, Edgefield and Saluda counties, as well as the cities of Aiken and North Augusta, have been invited to testify.