A core state agency gets into trouble, department heads come and go and the agency limps along until a new executive is hired to clean it all up. Meet Michael Leach.
Last year was a difficult one for residents of Charleston’s East Side, which saw its second deadliest year in the past decade. Four were shot and killed there between June and September alone.
South Carolina owns about 1,300 elementary, middle and high schools, which educate 750,000 children — some quite well, others horribly. Unfortunately, some senators seem more interested in subsidizing private schools than improving the schools we own.
If you read this newspaper, you’ll find many examples showing how the work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the nation’s foremost civil rights leader whose life and legacy we celebrate today, laid the groundwork for a more just and equitable society.
Brand new Summerville Mayor Rickey Waring is off to a fast start, with a big $6.5 million decision already in the books that promises to do several good things for the town.
If television in its infancy was a vast wasteland, then social media is currently a vast minefield, and the trolls are real, not just an ugly thing under the bridge in a children's storybook.
Just a day after half of its new members took their oath of office last week, Charleston City Council unanimously adopted the new flooding and drainage strategy to address the city's No. 1 issue. Here's why it matters.
In the private and non-profit sectors, people whose skills are in high demand can demand better pay than those whose skills are easy to find, and pople who do a great job get paid better than those who do just the minimum. That's only fair, and it encourages people to improve.
The new trade agreement that the United States and China signed on Wednesday benefits South Carolina exporters and greatly relieves investors.
One would think if the state and federal government were poised to spend more than $1 billion on a new project in the Charleston region, we would all feel a greater sense of excitement. We don't see that, and we think we know why.
Now that Okatie’s notorious “Mount Trashmore” has been excavated, state Attorney General Alan Wilson needs to go after whatever assets he can, including the land, to reimburse the taxpayers for the $4.5 million the state spent to haul away four acres of smoldering debris piled up to 90 feet high.
State law means lobbyists no longer wield influence with the SC Legislature through wining and dining, they’re increasingly using money to make their points at the local level, where there are no restrictions on their activites.
Wouldn’t it be cool if you could Google “Google incentives in South Carolina” and find out the details of the tax breaks Berkeley County gave the tech giant to open a data center there a decade ago? Well, you can't.
OK, Clemson lost 42-25 to Louisiana State University, but in the big picture, the loss does little to dim Clemson's remarkable run.
Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg ran on quality-of-life and livability issues, including further flooding fixes, addressing traffic congestion, creating affordable housing and improving public safety. And he need to make significant strides on them during his next term.
Completing a marathon without functioning legs or a wheelchair is almost inconceivable.
What’s fair and what’s right? Those are highly technical questions when it comes to the S.C. Public Service Commission setting rates for utilities to pay solar producers.
When the 2020 SC legislative session opens Tuesday, lawmakers need to improve education, settle on Santee Cooper, protect our natural resources, get state spending right and rein in abuse of office. Here's how.
The Greenville police chief was fired even though a prosecutor decided his special treatment of a suspect wasn't against the law, demonstrating one reason we have so many criminal sheriffs in South Carolina.
Less than two years after South Carolina lawmakers took steps to reign in homeowners associations (so-called HOAs), it's clear they have more work to do, specifically in clarifying when an HOA might foreclose to collect a lien.
President Trump’s measured restraint in his address to the nation on Wednesday was the right response to Iran’s mostly symbolic missile attack on two U.S. military bases in Iraq that harmed no one and did little serious damage.
With freshwater becoming ever more precious in Mount Pleasant, customers have a choice: Embrace conservation or pay dramatically more for water.
We’ve been nibbling around the edges of education reform in South Carolina, but finally we’re looking at a game-changer.
President Trump’s order to kill the commanding general of Iran’s special forces while he was in Iraq, likely plotting more attacks on American targets, has raised a host of problems for the president, America, Iran and Iraq.
If not for the heroics of a port pilot who intentionally grounded the capsized 656-foot Golden Ray on Sept. 8, the roll-on/roll-off ship could have shut down the Port of Brunswick indefinitely.
The Woodrow Wilson Family Home in Columbia has joined other historical sites across South Carolina in presenting a more inclusive, complete story of those who lived and worked there. That's a good thing, especially as many of the state's historic plantations are facing online boycotts of the…
However many accidental hunting deaths occur in South Carolina this year, it will be too many.
The corporatization of medicine has made it easy to forget that the Medical University of South Carolina is a university, not just a hospital, and that it’s a government agency, not a private business.
Few parts of South Carolina have grown as rapidly as Mount Pleasant, and that's why its Town Council members should approve a new comprehensive plan before them.
As the Charleston region continues to see a dramatic building boom, local governments must ensure their fire inspectors are keeping pace with it all.
Today, more than half of all South Carolina voters are women: some 1.8 million, or 54 percent, to be exact. A century ago, none were, but soon a Constitutional amendment would change things for the better.
Americans did not solve their problems with health care in the 2010s. But the 2020s promise to be a decisive decade for addressing them. The big question is how.
Business owners, even more than individuals, tend to say their taxes are too high, even if they pay far less than what they’d pay in other communities or states.
Summerville’s ARK House was among the winners of South Carolina's budget lottery this year. Despite the good work of ARK and other budget winners, the Legislature should stop this sort of minimally scrutinized spending.
The latest figures from the Census Bureau confirm that South Carolina is a good place to live. It was the nation’s sixth-fastest-growing state in 2019 and 10th fastest for the decade that ended Tuesday. In the past 20 years, we have added more than 1.2 million people.
Happy New Year! Here are some of our biggest ideas for making South Carolina a more prosperous, equitable and livable place in 2020.
From education to the economy to promising steps to improve our quality of life, the past year brought South Carolina and many of its communities some good news.
Bay Point Island on Port Royal Sound is suited for ecotourism, but more like day trips, not a luxury resort where guests are pampered in dozens of permanent “villas.”
No rational person could have predicted, a year ago, that 2019 would end with three pairs of tiny S.C. school districts finishing up the details of mergers.
Salaried employees who work for businesses and nonprofits are used to getting extra duties piled on top of an already-full workload without an increase in compensation — usually in their field of expertise, but sometimes not. Many are used to being pressured to give to their employer’s favor…
Charleston County’s potential sale of the former Naval Hospital in North Charleston looks like a promising outcome after a series of expensive mistakes that cost taxpayers millions of dollars.
The Charleston area is wrapping up one of the best economic years in its history.
There’s power in breaking little habits. It helps you struggle against bigger ones.
Cleaning up coal-ash pollution is a big deal. It’s a potent form of water pollution, and coal ash is invariably stored in pits and ponds along some of our most vulnerable waterways.
When a medical practice loses or settles a lawsuit alleging malpractice, you can bet it’s going to examine what it did wrong and how it can make sure that doesn’t happen again. If the rate of losses climbs by 50 percent in just five years, it’s probably going to double down on those question…
The Trump administration’s final guidance on Opportunities Zones is out, and perhaps the biggest takeaway for the Lowcountry, specifically the Neck Area, is that the rules will make it easier for investors to develop vacant land and “brownfields,” or polluted properties.
The Gospel according to Luke was not written by a witness to the birth of Jesus. In fact, St. Luke probably never even saw Jesus. Rather, he studied the written accounts of the birth and life of Jesus, interviewed the eyewitnesses and compiled all the information into the best-known account …
South Carolina has thousands of Revolutionary War stories just waiting to be shared with a broader audience. Thankfully, there appears to be more energy than ever to bring these stories — and a hugely significant slice of the state’s history — to light, but all of us have a role to play.
We’re sure the nonprofits that received the leftovers from Gov. Henry McMaster’s inauguration fund were delighted by the early Christmas gift. They all seem to be worthy recipients of charitable donations.
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz said Wednesday he is investigating whether the “basic errors” he found in FBI applications to conduct surveillance of the Trump campaign have been repeated in other applications to the federal court overseeing foreign intelligence surveil…