Pickens County Council struck a compromise position Monday night on the issue surround the election of the newest member of the Six Mile Rural Fire District board of trustees when it appointed Scott McCall, won was the top vote-getter in last month’s advisory election, while promising to review the procedures governing such elections.
“We have some issues surrounding the election process, and we’ll work in the future to see if we can’t make that better,” Council Chairman Neil Smith said after Council seated McCall and newly elected members of eight of 11 other rural fire boards on a 5-1 vote, with Councilman Ben Trotter voting against the motion.
“In Six Mile, most of the objections were about the process, not the individual,” he continued. “We decided to accept that advisory election and honor the appointment, but we’re goint to take a close look at the process.”
The Six Mile election had proven to be controversial after McCall, a former volunteer fireman and first-time candidate, garnered 86 votes to 79 for challenger Gary Elder. Several people, including board member F.M. Caddell, cried “Foul!” because of alleged irregularities with the voter sign-in list and with circumstances surrounding the election.
Both Caddell and Six Mile resident Junius Smith presented to County Council copies of that voter sign-in sheet, and Smith outlined other objections to the election itself.
However, Council declined to get involved in those issue in making the appointment.
Even Caddell, whose own election two years ago was greeted with cries of irregularities, sounded somewhat conciliatory.
“I think it’s fair,” Caddell said Tuesday morning. “I don’t know him, but I’m told he’s a good man, and I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt here. I’m going to work with him. All I really want to do is to do it honest and get (the Town of) Six Mile out of the rural fire business.
“I support County Council,” Caddell continued, “and I believe Council is going to address the issues of these fire departments in the near future. When they get it addressed and straightened out, I’ll be one happy camper. I don’t care who’s elected as long as they try to do the right thing, and if he does, I’ll work with him.
“But if he wants to keep things going the old way, we’re going to butt heads,” he added. “And I’ve got a hard head.”
Council Chairman Smith agreed that it didn’t matter who sat on the rural fire boards as long as they work to follow the law and the process that has been put into place regarding rural fire protection.
“It’s obvious that we have issues on the process of these advisory elections,” Smith said, “and that’s something we will deal with. But, again, these elections are just advisory. The reality of it is that we don’t really have to have advisory elections. We can just appoint ourselves.”
As far as the current appointment, he said, no purpose would have been served by declining to seat McCall.
“The issue we had last night pertained to irregularities and differences of opinion,” Smith said. “All the comments we heard about McCall were positive. Now, the problem was that if we went back and said we were going to have another election, when you have 50 percent supporting one candidate and 50 percent supporting the other, we’d be right back in the same situation.
“Plus,” he added, “if we didn’t have the mechanics set up for the election, we’d repeat the seame problems, and we just don’t have time right now to correct the things that need to be corrected.”
Smith noted that if any openings should happen to arise on that board before the next scheduled election n such as a death or resignation n Council would probably look at appointing Elder to the position, rather than having a special election.
And, he said Tuesday morning, the damage to the existing process may already be irreversible.
“I’m not sure advisory elections are going to survive all of this,” he said. “We’re not really getting people to focus on what the fire districts’ overall mission is versus people focusing on their own agendas. Even if they get appointed, though, that doesn’t mean they can do whatever they want to do. They serve at the pleasure of Pickens County Council.
“It’s like the Six Mile Rural Water District,” he said. “They say they’re not in the fire business, they just provide water” (a reference to an ongoing discussion about the provision of fire hydrants for subdivisions in the area.)
“That’s not the question,” Smith added. “They haven’t done it in the past 20 years, but the question is what do the people in that district want their mission to be for the next 20 years?”
In addition to appointing McCall to the open seat in Six Mile, Council made the following additional rural fire district board appointments based on the results of recent advisory elections:
- Central n Re-appointed George Reid
- Dacusville n Re-appointed Don Holloway and Peggy James.
- Easley n Re-appointed Billy Grant.
- Holly Springs n Re-appointed Mitchell Cassell and Austin Cater.
- Liberty n Appointed Keith Culbreath and Timothy Black.
- Pumpkintown n Re-appointed Gaston James and Dan Evette.
- Rocky Bottom n Re-appointed John Sarpy, appointed Frank Masters and Jimmy Masters.
- Vineyards n Re-appointed Jim Miller and Chuck Schultz.
Crosswell, Pickens and Shady Grove had not reported election results to County Council in time for Monday’s round of appointments, and Council will address those appointments at a later meeting.
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