Tiencken, 50, said the decision to step down from the helm of the country's third-largest state-owned power company was personal and did not involve political pressure, despite a disagreement last year with Gov. Mark Sanford.

His resignation will be effective Feb. 1.

Tiencken hopes to join a private law practice and specialize in energy, public policy and governmental issues. He wouldn't say which firms he has been talking to, but he said he has a few offers and the decision is "imminent."

"The why is that it's a time in my life when I simply made a career-change decision, and I'm looking forward to an opportunity to be in private practice," Tiencken said. "It has absolutely nothing to do with policy or the governor or anything else."

The board of directors hopes to name a new chief in the next few weeks. A general announcement will be sent by the end of the week to the utility's two executive vice presidents: Bill McCall Jr., chief operations officer, and John West, chief legal officer. Both men are longtime Santee Cooper employees and likely successors to Tiencken.

J. Calhoun Land IV, vice chairman of the board of directors and chairman of the human resources committee, said the board would likely question employees interested in the job at the next directors' meeting Jan. 26. Land said he thought the board would prefer to hire someone from within the company.

"We're just trying to go the most apparent route first," he said. "You know what you're going to get for all practical purposes. If we go outside, we'll have to hire a headhunter and they're going to bring in highly polished, highly prepared candidates that no one knows."

West, who hadn't been contacted by the board yet, said it was too early to say whether he would seek the CEO post. West was hired by Santee Cooper about 13 years ago as general counsel. He didn't make a presentation to the board when the CEO job was open in 2000.

McCall, who was hired by Santee Cooper 32 years ago as an entry-level engineer, could not be reached for comment.

Chairman of the Board T. Graham Edwards, Tiencken's predecessor as CEO, said Monday he is not interested in the job.

Land also said that he didn't think Sanford would influence who the board chooses to succeed Tiencken.

In midsummer, Sanford had an in-depth budget review meeting with Tiencken and other Santee Cooper board members. Looking to fix the state's financial crisis, Sanford asked if the utility could contribute more to the General Fund.

Santee Cooper directs 1 percent of its gross operating revenue to South Carolina coffers. In pushing for a bigger contribution, Sanford argued that Santee Cooper's relatively cheap power is equivalent to a form of subsidy because the utility benefits from tax breaks as a government agency.

Tiencken and Edwards, chairman of the board, told the governor that Santee Cooper's mission, since its founding in the 1930s, has been to provide inexpensive power for residents and the electric cooperatives it serves. They said the utility couldn't give more money back to the state without violating its charter.

"We're not operating a business," Tiencken told Sanford at the meeting. "We believe that we're performing and doing what we should be doing and how we should be doing it."

In mid-December the Santee Cooper board, with nine out of 11 members appointed by Sanford, approved a one-time, $13 million payment to the state -- money that will come from real estate sales, not higher electric rates.

Tiencken first announced his intention to resign in a closed-door meeting Dec. 23. The board was surprised by the news and asked him to reconsider. Tiencken wasn't offered any incentive to stay, and he said that any such offer would not have affected his decision.

Tiencken agreed to rethink his resignation and left the country for a 10-day vacation in New Zealand, which he had planned months earlier. The board had a second closed-door meeting the day after Christmas and tentatively scheduled yesterday's meeting for Tiencken to give his final decision.

"I can speak for the entire board and anybody in the world that knows you, how you will be missed and how much we appreciate all you've done," board member Vernie E. Dove Sr. told Tiencken.

Wall Street analysts agree with Dove about the strength of Tiencken's character and leadership. While many power-company bonds have been downgraded the past few years, Santee Cooper's debt has some of the best ratings of any U.S. utility.

Tiencken, who is making about $300,000 a year at Santee Cooper, said he would be available in a consulting role to help with unresolved issues.

Tiencken grew up near Santee Cooper's Monck's Corner headquarters, where both of his parents worked until retirement. After graduating from the College of Charleston and getting his law degree from the University of South Carolina, Tiencken worked as an attorney for Berkeley County.

Tiencken joined Santee Cooper as one of four general counsels in 1989, just after Hurricane Hugo blew through. In his first few months, Tiencken worked hard to secure disaster-relief money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

During his tenure as CEO, he pushed for the state's first green power initiatives, electricity-producing turbines that run on methane gas given off by decomposing landfill garbage.

Click here to return to story:
http://www.charleston.net/stories/011304/bus_13santee.shtml