(Columbia-AP) March 12, 2003 - State agency heads told Governor Mark Sanford how they have weathered budget cuts Wednesday at their second Cabinet meeting.
     
The meeting was the first held open to the media. The Cabinet meeting was closed to the public.
     
At the Public Safety Department, Director Boykin Rose says the agency has found ways to save $335,000 by combining and reorganizing some administrative programs.
     
The Labor and Licensing Department has cut back from four deputy directors to one, and the Department of Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Services has reduced its office rent by about $50,000.
     
Director Burnie Maybank says the Revenue Department has slimmed down from two deputy directors to one.
     
Sanford encouraged newer agency heads to follow the example of Insurance Department Director Ernst Csiszar, who has reduced his staff by about a third from 120 employees. The
insurance budget has been trimmed to $4.4 million from $6.7 million.

The governor says he opened his second cabinet meeting to reporters because he says he believes in "open government." He says the decision did not come because of public scrutiny.

Sanford was criticized by the South Carolina Press Association and the Society of Professional Journalists when he held his first Cabinet meeting behind closed doors last month. Sanford said then that public officials need to work on issues in private so they could speak freely.

The association asked Sanford how citizens can stay informed when they are excluded from the meetings. At a January briefing, Sanford said public officials needed to work out deals in private so they could speak freely, something he says the media could prevent happening.

Sanford says he has spoken with a number of governors and has not found one who opens cabinet meetings, but the Council of State Governments says cabinet meeting are open in at least nine states across the country.

The governor says he hopes the open meetings will serve as an example to other organizations, groups and lawmakers considering closed door proceedings.

Sanford's spokesman Will Folks says Tuesday that Sanford is committed to open and accountable government. Folks says Sanford doesn't want to send the wrong message to local governments.

The first meeting of Sanford's 13-member cabinet was February 12th, and, for the most part, it was meeting behind closed doors. Sanford spokesman Chris Drummond said at the time the cabinet would meet in private, because "it's not a public body."

Columbia media attorney Jay Bender said then the state Freedom of Information Act requires such meetings to be held in the open, especially when the cabinet discusses the state budget crisis.

updated 4:56pm by BrettWitt