‘Don’t Look Here:’ Another Lowcountry Financial Scandal?

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The recently elected Jasper County, South Carolina treasurer is calling for “miles more transparency and openness” from county council members and staff in the wake of apparent efforts to silence him from speaking out.

Michael Thomis Skinner – who ousted 20-year incumbent Verna Garvin to win this post last July – says a recent move by officials to audit his office is “nothing less than an attempt to smokescreen significant county fiscal and operational problems that sorely need to be addressed.”

“In effect, they seem to be saying, ‘don’t look here;’ Well, I have looked, and it’s not that great,” Skinner said.

Skinner, who in the past nine months has brought an additional $1.1 million into county coffers from interest income never previously earned, was responding to an unusual March 12, 2024 council meeting which called for a “special audit of the treasurer’s office” for the period July 1, 2023 to February 29, 2024, representing only the time Skinner has been in office.

In his letter to the press regarding the new audit, council chairman Marty Sauls alleged that he and his colleagues had received information about “errors and missteps” regarding county receipts, disbursements and other operations.

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“Those problems — and many others like them — could have been remedied on day one,” said Skinner. “When I ran for office, I did so on the platform that our taxpayers needed more and better, and that the state of treasurer’s office affairs was leaving the county behind. That message obviously resonated with the voters, who elected me after too many years of being fed up with the way business was being done. What I didn’t expect was the degree of non-cooperation I’ve received from the people who’ve been running the county government all this time.”

In particular, Skinner pointed to internal efforts to seemingly prevent him from accessing information from Garvin’s administration. That included the alleged shredding of documents, records wrongly reported as missing as well as orders to county staff not to talk to the new treasurer.

“I feel like I’m in the middle of some strange conspiracy to hide, confuse and impede,” said Skinner.

Upon taking office, Skinner found financial files crammed into a leaky storage facility holding mildewed boxes, missing and scattered cancelled checks, bank and tax statements and other important financial files littering a tiny, unprotected room.

Skinner said he’s receptive to an audit if the county decides to spend the money – but insists it needs to be done accurately and fairly to provide any value at all. Limiting the scope of the treasurer’s office review to just the nine months he’s been in office “in my opinion smacks of other motives” he said, “especially when so many of the very real existing problems have gone unaddressed for decades.”

Even the choice of the auditing firm represents a potential conflict of interest. The Baird Audit Group, LLC, has been representing Jasper County with a number of accounting services for the past 17 years.

“Perhaps the real problem is that county council and staff just don’t want to hear what I’m saying,” said Skinner. “Maybe they’ve grown far too comfortable doing things the old ways and accepting the many inefficiencies and ultimately higher tax dollars that go with it. Instead of a smoke screen personally attacking me, wouldn’t the county council and the taxpayers they represent be better served addressing the real problems I’ve already found? That was, after all, why I was elected.”

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Skinner cited a frightening lack of internal controls including bounced checks and even personal checks concerning county business written by the former treasurer to a relative.

It goes deeper, said Skinner. He referenced a recent failure by the county to fully comply with two Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests seeking documents and vital emails that Jasper County Attorney David Tedder has apparently refused to produce, internal departmental transfers of funds without explanation and outright refusals to cooperate from other county staff members.

Skinner holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Technical Management, a business degree from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University (ERAU), was 2018 Instructor of the Year at Savannah Tech, a senior executive and educator at the Savannah Technical College, has been recognized by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and is a retired Marine with multiple tours of overseas service.

“It’s long-since past time for a change in how Jasper County is run,” said Skinner. “That’s what I ran on, and that’s a message that was obviously receptive to voters who are tired of increasing taxes and the difficulties of doing even simple business with their own county government. I’ve tried to be as accommodating as possible to the county council and staff, but I’ve been met with nothing but what seems to be resistance and disappointing obstruction simply because I wouldn’t just shut up and accept what was left of this office.”

“I’m not giving up. Jasper County taxpayers deserve more,” he said.

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