One of Aiken County Council’s July 15th public hearings took an unusual turn when the Council voted 6-2 to table a proposed ordinance to amend the manner in which it conducts business; for now voting on the side of The People. Most notable among the proposed changes are practices that could marginalize citizen engagement with their elected representatives.

(Editor’s note: Aiken County residents Vicki Simons and Don Moniak commented during the public hearing. Their full comments can be read here.)

by Don Moniak
July 22, 2025

On July 5, 2025, Aiken County government published a public notice in the Aiken Standard to announce the County Council’s July 15th Public Hearings. One of the public hearings was vaguely titled:

Ordinance Amending Chapter 2, Administration, Article II, Council, “Generally,” “Standing Committees,” “Rules of Procedure,” and “Preservation of Council Actions.”

Chapter 2 of the Aiken County Code governs the administration of county business. Article II addresses how the County Council conducts its business. It contains seemingly innocuous, routine rules, including the Order of Business during meetings, publication and distribution schedule of agendas, composition of committees, and completion of meeting minutes.

Most important to County residents– Article II defines the rules for concerned citizens to engage with, provide input to, and obtain information from their elected representatives on the County Council.

Presently, the four facets of these rules of public involvement are:

1. The open public comment period known as “The Informal Meeting of the Whole;” where citizens are alloted three minutes to speak to Council on any issue not already on the agenda. This is oftentimes the most informative and problem-solving portion of the meeting.
2. Public hearings; where citizens are alloted five minutes to address proposed ordinances.
3. Public presentations of up to fifteen minutes, if requested at least five days in advance.
4. The publication and distribution of County Council’s meeting agendas and associated documentation–collectively known as “the agenda packet.”

The Amendments, or Lack Thereof

On July 14th, the County Administrator’s office publicly released Council’s agenda packet for the July 15th meeting. According to the agenda, details of the Chapter 2 amendments were on pages 46-64.

On examination of those pages , details of the proposed amendments to Article II were absent. No strikeouts were present to indicate the language that was being stricken, and no text was underlined to indicate additions. Only the final amended version was presented.

To determine what changes were proposed, Council members and concerned citizens were required to cross-check the final amended ordinance with the existing ordinance.

Aiken County resident Vicki Simons discussed this oversight during the Public Hearing. She described how legislation routinely involves markings to show changes to South Carolina law–underlined text for additions and strikethroughs for deletions—before pointing out that “this ordinance is completely devoid of these markings.”

She went on to state that “this lack of transparency reflects badly on both Aiken County Government and the Aiken County Council.”

Marginalizing Citizen Input

One of the changes was easy to detect, and it was the most egregious. If the amendments were approved, county residents would have to wait until after any scheduled closed-door Executive Session—which can last for more than an hour—in order to present their ideas, thoughts, and concerns during the “Informal Meeting of the Whole.”

Article II, in its present form, places the Informal Meeting of the Whole towards the end of the meeting, but prior to any scheduled, closed-door Executive Session. The proposed amendments include reversing that order, so that people who come to speak to Council about a myriad of issues—-i.e. noise and light pollution, bad roads, stormwater runoff—would have to wait an additional undetermined length of time to speak their mind.

Ms. Simons addressed this issue by reminding Council that Aiken County is larger than the state of Rhode Island and “it takes considerable effort for Aiken County residents from outlying areas to attend meetings in person.”

She described the proposed reversal of the order of the Executive Session and IMOTW in two ways. First, she stated, “I strongly oppose this change because it would codify a marginalization of the very people whom you were elected to represent!”

After describing how people had to wait for more than an hour during the April 15, 2025, meeting for an Executive Session to end, she explained, “forcing people to wait to speak on matters important to them may be considered a form of censorship that undermines their Creator-endowed right of freedom of speech.”

Article II also allows for individuals or groups to request, in advance, time to make a presentation on their subject of choice to Council for up to 15 minutes during the Regular Meeting.

Officially, any public presentation must be on the regular meeting agenda; currently item 12 in the Order of Business. In practice, Council has been ignoring this rule for years by scheduling presentations either during committee meetings or work sessions. While work sessions tend to have large time windows to allow for 15-minute presentations in spacious Council chambers, committee meetings have very narrow time windows and are held in the tight confines of relatively tiny conference rooms.

Even though public presentations are uncommon, the amendments would result in further marginalization. The new timing would arguably censor citizens by shifting their presentation time from better-attended regular meetings held in spacious Council chambers to poorly attended committee meetings held in relatively tiny conference rooms—thus preventing a larger audience from hearing the message of presenters. Since Council still refuses to livestream its meetings or keep detailed meeting minutes, any message would, in practice, be largely unheard and lost in the largely inaccessible audio archives of Council meetings.

No Amendment to Improve Timely Information Access

The release of agendas determines how much time citizens have to be fully informed about what is actually being proposed at Council meetings.

Presently, Article II dictates that agenda packets be distributed to Council members on the Friday before the regular meetings, which are generally held on the third Tuesdays of the month, as well as the first Tuesdays from January to June.

However, these agenda packets are not made available to citizens and the media until the day before the meeting. Although Article II dictates that the packets must be released by 8:30 a.m. on Mondays, that is rarely the case. While this timeline meets the letter of the Open Meetings section of South Carolina’s Freedom of Information Act, it clearly violates the spirit of the law by withholding completed agendas and agenda packets over the weekend.

There is no proposed change to allow citizens access to agendas and agenda packets on the same day Council members receives theirs—meaning that residents will still have to wait until the day before meetings before being able to review the large amounts of information pertaining to public hearings and other Council business.

The Vote

When it came time to vote, Councilman Mike Kellems made a Motion to Table the agenda item and send the proposed ordinance back to the County Administrator’s office for rework. Council then voted 6-2 to table–choosing to demand better information prior to moving forward on the ordinance amendments. This will require another public hearing.

The six who voted to table were Council members Ron Felder (District 1), Mike Kellems (District 2), Landon Ball (District 4), Sandy Haskell (District 5), Phil Napier (District 6), and P.K. Hightower (District 8).

Voting against tabling were Chairman Gary Bunker and Councilman Danny Feagan (District 3).

What is Next?

The effort to amend Article II is likely to return during the next Council meeting this August 19th. Aiken County residents can share their opinions on the rules governing citizen input and access to information by contacting Chairman Gary Bunker and their elected Council representative, or by attending the August 19th meeting and addressing the issues directly to Council.