Home Care In Hodges, SC

Thomas E. Hodges has been named interim dean of the University of South Carolina College of Education; he begins on July 1. Hodges succeeds Jon Pedersen, who served as dean of the college since 2016 and recently accepted a deanship at Oklahoma State University’s College of Education and Human Sciences.

“The College of Education has outstanding faculty and staff with innovative academic programming, robust research and rich engagements with communities and education stakeholders,” says Hodges, who currently serves as the college’s executive associate dean for faculty and academic affairs. “I think it’s an exciting time to lead this college.”

As interim dean, Hodges will work with the College of Education’s faculty to develop a new mission and vision statement. He also hopes to support and promote faculty research efforts; continue to adapt the college’s curriculum and approaches to meet the changing needs of students; and work to support the educational needs of South Carolina communities.

“We will continue to enhance our support for research, particularly around extramural funding,” he says. “We have ongoing reviews of all of our curricular offerings to ensure that we provide timely and needed courses, programs and modalities that best meet the needs of content and students. And we will also move forward with innovative projects and partnerships that serve educators, children and communities throughout South Carolina.”

We are fortunate to have a committed educator and leader with a passion for excellence prepared to serve as interim dean.

William F. Tate, UofSC Provost

Hodges began at the UofSC College of Education in 2012 as an assistant professor of mathematics education, before becoming an associate professor in 2015 and a professor in 2020. His research focuses on mathematics, and teachers’ conceptions and identities as they transition from teacher education programs into their first years of teaching. In July 2017, Hodges became the associate dean for academic affairs at the college, and in July 2020, he was named executive associate dean for faculty and academic affairs while also maintaining his role as the director of the South Carolina Teacher Education Advancement Consortium. Prior to his appointment as executive associate dean, Hodges also served as the interim department chair of instruction and teacher education and the coordinator of elementary education programs.

“I thank Dean Pedersen for his leadership at the university and in the state of South Carolina,” says William F. Tate, the University of South Carolina’s provost and executive vice president of academic affairs. “Professor Hodges will continue the important efforts of the College of Education in the region and state. We are fortunate to have a committed educator and leader with a passion for excellence prepared to serve as interim dean.”

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By Rev. Kenneth Hodges

My name is Rev. Kenneth Hodges, and I am a former State Representative for House District 121 (Beaufort and Colleton Counties). I am the pastor at Tabernacle Baptist Church in Beaufort, and I have heard from many community members about their concerns related to the luxury golf resort development proposed on Pine Island. This project would defy the Cultural Protection Overlay (CPO) zoning on St. Helena Island.

Golf course and resort developments have historically displaced Sea Island communities from North Carolina down to Florida. For more than two decades, the CPO has safeguarded St. Helena Island’s living Gullah/Geechee culture from this fate by prohibiting this type of development. The policy was written by and for the people and has kept the Island rural, allowing important cultural activities like farming, fishing, and hunting to continue thriving.

In June, Beaufort County upheld the CPO by denying a request to remove Pine Island from the CPO’s boundaries. Plans for three 6-hole golf courses were also denied by staff and the planning commission. The County Council listened to their constituents and arrived at these correct and logical decisions. The developer is now appealing those decisions and trying to negotiate a settlement.

Many Gullah/Geechee people have called St. Helena Island home for generations and continue to fight for their land. From my perspective, the community has made it clear through hours of public meetings, community gatherings, and testimony that golf courses, resorts, and gated communities do not mesh with St. Helena Island’s Gullah/Geechee culture and Sea Island heritage.

Moreover, we live in a society where everyone is expected to follow the laws, which are designed to protect the public at large. We do not enact these laws only to rewind them when it becomes inconvenient or because what is being proposed is not allowed. The County Council should hold the line and not waiver in their support of the CPO and Gullah/Geechee culture.

Finally, I leave you a verse from the gospel. Mark: 36-37 says “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

Rev. Kenneth Hodges is the pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church and the owner of LyBensons’ Gallery on St. Helena Island. He is the former State Representative for House District 121.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WBTV) – Seventeen-year-old Jack Hodges is a happy kid. He likes watching TV and playing games. He loves his mother.

These days he spends a lot of time at home with his mom, Beth Hodges, and an in-home caregiver.

Jack is non-verbal and has autism. He spent much of the past few years living in a group home under the supervision of the South Carolina Department of Disabilities and Special Needs.

His mother says his first years at the facility were good. But that changed a little more than a year ago, when he started suffering a string of injuries. He made repeated visits to the hospital, with a broken collarbone, an infection on his leg, a bite on his finger, among other injuries.

His last stay in the hospital stretched weeks. Doctors said he couldn’t go back to the facility because of the ongoing abuse. He couldn’t go home with his mom because Beth – a single mother – couldn’t care for her son on her own.

So he sat in a Charlotte emergency room until Beth could convince the state to give her the help she needed to care for her son.

Kimberly Tissot, president of Able South Carolina, helped Beth fight to get her son care.

“This is an issue,” Tissot said of the lack of care readily available for Jack.

“There are a lot more Jacks in the community as well,” Tissot continued. “Jack is not the only one who has experienced such difficulty with getting services.”

There are a number of agencies in South Carolina that play a role in making sure someone like Jack has the care he needs. But the primary state agency is DDSN.

The agency, which is governed by a board of appointed commissioners, is under fire.

An audit by the South Carolina Legislative Audit Council in March found a list of issues with the agency.

“The current Commission has overreached in its role, may have violated state law, and has exhibited inappropriate behavior,” the audit council’s report found.

A list of problems in the report include the following:

-Commissioners allows “certain Commissioners to micromanage the agency when there is a competent director in place”

-Commission “spends money frivolously for items solely for the Commissioners, such as separate logo from the agency’s new logo, new conference room chairs, frames for Commissioners’ pictures, and soundproofing three conference rooms, one of which is used for public meetings.”

-Commission “expends much more in per diem and travel reimbursements than in years past”

-”Has members who use their positions as Commissioners to access information or acquire assistance for their own family members.”

The Legislative Audit Council has said its investigation into the agency continues.

But the March report was enough for a top South Carolina senator to move to tear the agency down and rebuild it.

Sen. Katrina Shealy (R-Lexington County), who chairs the Senate Family and Veterans’ Services Committee, authored a bill this year that would move the agency under the governor.

“The only way that we’re going to help people with disabilities and special needs is to get rid of that Commission, put somebody in charge of disabilities and special needs and make them accountable,” Shealy said. “Because there is no accountability right now.”

In an interview with WBTV, Shealy called the state of services for people with special needs in South Carolina as “dismal.”

Shealy’s bill to change how the agency is managed easily passed the Senate but is stalled in the statehouse. The senator said the path forward is clear if things don’t change.

“We’re going to continue to not serve the people of South Carolina, and it’s only going to get worse,” Shealy said.

In a statement, DDSN Interim Director Constance Holloway said she could not comment on the findings of the audit report but downplayed its findings.

“To be clear, this report focused on agency structure and governance; it did not focus on the services we provide in conjunction with our providers,” Holloway’s statement said.

“DDSN remains committed to the safe and quality care of those who rely on our services,” Holloway’s statement continued. “We appreciate our providers for their service, as well as the families who voice concerns so we can continuously improve service delivery in South Carolina.”

Beth Hodges was stunned to hear the agency was defending its record of supporting families.

She had to fight to get the in-home help she needed to bring her son Jack home to live with her. While she fought, he stayed in a hospital emergency room, which was ill equipped to care for him.

“Jack, to them, I think, is a number and a case and not a person,” Hodges said. “Otherwise, someone would have paid more attention sooner.”

Copyright 2023 WBTV. All rights reserved.

Dominion Energy, the Virginia utility seeking to buy Cayce-based SCANA, has hired former S.C. Gov. Jim Hodges to lobby state lawmakers as they prepare to debate legislation that could scuttle the proposed $14.6 billion buyout.

Hodges is among nine lobbyists Dominion has retained to represent its interests in legislative fights, records show. Since Dominion announced the blockbuster deal Wednesday, Hodges and three others have been added to a team of five S.C. lobbyists that Dominion previously employed.

Dominion spokesman Chet Wade said Hodges and the three additional lobbyists were needed to help explain the utility’s point of view to S.C. lawmakers.

Some legislators have expressed skepticism about the SCANA buyout proposal and are pushing bills that Dominion says could kill the deal.

“This has drawn a lot of interest in the Legislature,’’ Dominion’s Wade said. “He (Hodges) is a well-known and well-respected individual. He understands even better than we do the issues that are important to the state.’’

Hodges could not be reached for comment Friday. His entry as a lobbyist could carry weight in the Legislature, where he has many contacts.

Hodges served a single four-year term as governor that ended in 2003. Before that, he was a longtime state representative and Democratic House leader.

Wade said Dominion retained the former governor as a consultant long before he registered as a lobbyist this week. Dominion moved into South Carolina about three years ago, buying SCANA’s natural gas pipeline network.

Now, the company is trying to buy SCANA, reeling from a nuclear construction fiasco that has halved its stock price and raised a chorus of criticism from customers and legislators.

SCANA, the parent corporation of SCE&G, abandoned building two nuclear reactors in Fairfield County last July after the utility and its junior partner, the state-owned Santee Cooper utility, had spent $9 billion on the effort. The joint decision left more than 5,000 people out of work and SCE&G customers asking why they had been billed almost $2 billion for reactors that would not be built.

A key concern for Dominion is whether the Legislature will kill portions of a 2007 law, the Base Load Review Act, which made it easier for SCE&G to charge its customers for the nuclear project before it was finished. The law also allows the utility to keep charging for the plant, even though it won’t be built.

As part of the proposed SCANA deal, Dominion offered to pay rebates of about $1,000, on average, to SCE&G’s residential customers, while cutting monthly power bills by $7. But Dominion insists it must continue to charge some nuclear-related costs to SCE&G customers over the next 20 years.

Critics say the rebate and lower rates are not enough to offset the almost $2 billion that SCE&G customers already have paid for the abandoned project.

Dominion’s nine-person lobbying team joins an already established team of lobbyists that SCANA employs to influence legislators, according to State Ethics Commission records. Those records show SCANA has eight legislative lobbyists, including longtime lobbyist Charlie Rountree.

In addition to Hodges, the lobbyists who registered to help Dominion this week are: Benjamin Homeyer, a former director of legislation for the S.C. House budget committee; John DeWorken, a lobbyist who represents the influential state Manufacturers Alliance; and Sunnie Harmon, who also represents the Manufacturers Alliance, according to state Ethics Commission records and the Energy and Policy Institute, a watchdog organization that tracks energy issues.

They join Dominion’s team of S.C. lobbyists, including former state Rep. Billy Boan, who served in the Hodges administration.

Many of the lobbyists, including Hodges and Boan, work for the McGuireWoods firm, which has represented Dominion on legislative matters in Virginia. Hodges is chief executive of the firm.

Dominion has through the years been a major player in Virginia political battles, spending $10.6 million since 1996 on various campaigns and causes, according to a story last year in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. The company’s political clout in Virginia is “overwhelming’’ the newspaper reported.

A Fortune 500 company headquartered in Richmond, Dominion is one of the nation’s largest energy utilities, with holdings from Virginia to New England and the Rocky Mountains.

John Crangle, a government watchdog with the S.C. Progressive Network, was skeptical that Hodges would carry any particular weight in the Legislature, noting he has been out of office for 15 years.

But, Crangle added, it’s clear why Dominion is beefing up its lobbying team.

“You know what Dominion is trying to do,’’ Crangle said. “They are trying to keep provisions of the Base Load Review Act that allow them to impose charges on people for that moribund nuclear reactor project.’’

This story was originally published January 5, 2018, 7:09 PM.

A new multi-family development, The Abbey, is planned for 15 acres on Haywood Road. To be built by Atlanta-based developers, Core Property Capital, the complex would feature 240 units and would be across the street from Papa's and Beer. Core Property Capital recently submitted an application for a land development permit from the CIty of Greenville. The Greenville Planning Commission will discuss the project at its Feb. 28 meeting.

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50 Most Influential

David LominackTD Bank

S.C. market president

David Lominack is South Carolina Market President for TD Bank and is responsible for commercial banking throughout the state. TD has continued its expansion across South Carolina and the regional hub on I-85 in Greenville now employees over 1,800 colleagues that support the organization from Maine to Florida. Lominack has been the driving force for TD’s significant community engagement across the state through its support of organizations and events such as TD Saturday Market, Artisphere, Metropolitan Arts Council, and the International African American Museum.

As a stalwart community supporter, Lominack has served on the boards of many organizations across the state. Currently, he is chair of the board for United Way of Greenville County and an executive committee member for the S.C. Chamber of Commerce. He is also a board member for Peace Center and Greenville Health System.

Lominack is also a Liberty Fellow and a graduate of Leadership Greenville and the Diversity Leadership Initiative at the Riley Institute at Furman.