LR5 chair used district email to urge colleagues’ election defeat, faces ethics charges
The chairwoman of the Lexington-Richland 5 school board will face formal ethics charges over allegations she misused her district email account to campaign for the defeat of her school board colleagues, and for failing to report income for a number of years.
Jan Hammond will face 15 counts of violating South Carolina’s Ethics Acts, according to documents from the S.C. Ethics Commission.
The commission, which polices elected officials in South Carolina, investigated the allegations based on reporting from The State that, prior to the 2020 election, Hammond used her district email account to encourage residents who contacted her about school concerns to vote against other members of the school board.
“We HAVE to change the board,” Hammond told one parent who had written on Sept. 15, 2020, about the district’s COVID-19 reopening strategy. “The opportunity is here on November 3. (Then board chairman Michael) Cates in Lexington needs to be voted out and (Robert) Gantt in Richland needs to be replaced. Beth Hutchison’s seat is up but she is not running. (Rebecca Blackburn) Hines and (Catherine) Huddle in Lexington and Matt Hogan in Richland is great.”
According to the charges handed down by the Ethics Commission, Hammond sent eight separate emails between August and October 2020 encouraging her correspondents to either vote for or against a school board candidate in the upcoming election.
After the 2020 election flipped the board’s balance in favor of members critical of the previous majority’s cautious COVID-19 strategy and their financial management of a 2008 referendum to renovate and build new schools, Hammond was chosen as the board’s new presiding officer.
The Ethics Commission has advised that state law says “No person may use government personnel, equipment, materials, or an office building in an election campaign” or “use or authorize the use of public funds, property, or time to influence the outcome of an election,” definitions the commission has said govern the use of public email accounts.
Hammond said at the time that using her district email account did not constitute government equipment under the law.
The State has reached out to Hammond for her reaction to the ethics charges. In a response to the Ethics Commission that was sent from her personal AOL account, Hammond blamed the situation on the “100’s of emails” board members were receiving daily about the controversy over its COVID policy.
“I did answer 3 individual emails,” Hammond said in her response. “None of these 3 were initiated by me nor did I give any permission or statement to share my answer with anyone. I answered honestly and truthfully as to how we could ‘help our students and schools.’ My first thought was the students.”
While she bemoaned the “great political strife” caused by the pandemic, “I did not feel that my emails rose to the level of influencing the outcome of an election,” Hammond said. “Instead I saw it as my obligation to answer the questions asked of me by very concerned parents.
“I want you to understand the obligation I felt as an elected school board member in this unprecedented situation we were all dealing with,” she writes. “The pandemic brought an unusual climate of fear, stress and anxiety for everyone, especially to parents who were concerned about the learning loss of students, as well as the social and mental consequences of closing our schools. A whole new light was placed on our schools and the school board.”
Hammond also faces charges she failed to report income on her statement of economic interest. She reportedly failed to report her husband’s income for four years on her statements from 2018 to 2021. She’s also accused of not reporting income she received as a school board member in 2019 and 2020. In 2019, Hammond also failed to report her income from her job as a school teacher in Lexington 2, the ethics charges allege.
Hammond’s emailed response included with Ethics Commission documents did not address the missing information in her economic reports.
Charges against the Lexington-Richland 5 school board chair are scheduled to be heard in a public hearing on April 21 at the S.C. Ethics Commission at 201 Executive Center Drive, Suite 150, Columbia. If convicted, Hammond could face $30,000 in fines plus administrative fees.
This story was originally published February 22, 2022 at 2:42 PM.
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