Highway commissioners' relatives hired at DOT

COLUMBIA, S.C. - Two Transportation Department commissioners say there is nothing improper about their relatives working for the agency.

Both workers are classified as temporary and work about 20 hours a week, according to the department. One makes more than $50,000; the other just less than $30,000.

Commissioner Marion Carnell of Ware Shoals told The Greenville News he asked agency officials earlier this year to interview his nephew Marvin C. Carnell. Commissioner Bobby Jones of Camden said he didn't ask anyone at the department to hire his daughter. She has worked their since 1999.

State ethics laws do not bar hiring relatives of agency board members as long as the board member does not take action that causes the hiring, according to Herb Hayden, executive director of the State Ethics Commission.

Marvin Carnell was hired as an information technology specialist in February, according to records provided to the newspaper under the state Freedom of Information Act. Susan Jones, a former teacher, helps direct a department training program.

Neither would discuss their jobs and agency executive director Elizabeth Mabry did not respond to questions about their employment.

Susan Jones has an annual salary of $50,457, said Michael Sponhour, a spokesman for the State Budget and Control Board. Carnell earns just less than $30,000.

A friend of Commissioner Marion Carnell was hired about the same time as the commissioner's nephew and makes a little less, working roughly the same hours. Fred Teeter Jr. is a customer service representative in the department's Greenwood office.

Teeter said the commissioner had nothing to do with his hiring.

"I don't know that making a telephone call and asking someone to interview and give them consideration if they're qualified would fall into the definition of cause," Hayden said. "(But) I'm sure it always makes it questionable in some folks eyes."

John Crangle, executive director of the South Carolina chapter of the government watchdog group Common Cause, is one of those people.

He said "cronyism," such as the hiring of Carnell's nephew, is pervasive in state government and should be addressed with law changes or an ethics code.

"A commissioner really should not be in the personnel business in the sense that they are involved in the recruiting and evaluating and trying to hire relatives and friends," Crangle said.

The agency, which manages about 42,000 miles of state roads and hundreds of millions of dollars, has about 5,000 employees, including 83 temporary workers, according to the department. Some temporary employees were hired as far back as 1999, according to department records.

Carnell said he merely asked officials to give his nephew a chance. "I said, 'I would love for you to interview him and, if he's qualified, I'd appreciate you giving him serious consideration,' " Carnell recalled telling agency officials. " 'But I still want you to hire the best qualified person for the position.' "

Carnell also said he did not ask officials to hire Teeter, a former telephone company lobbyist. Carnell said they got to know each other when Carnell was a South Carolina House member.

Jones said he and his daughter discussed her department job in 1999, which then involved visiting schools to talk about keeping the roads free of litter. He said he did not try to influence agency officials to hire her.

"It had absolutely nothing to do with me," Jones said. "I didn't go to anybody and say, 'Will you please hire her because she needs a job?' If she hadn't gotten the job, she was satisfied in the classroom. She had a good teaching situation."