SC senator asks why rejected McMaster agency chief has new state job with same salary
Gov. Henry McMaster’s pick to lead a state agency last year who eventually was rejected by the state Senate should not be earning the same salary while an employee at another S.C. department, one South Carolina senator railed on the floor on Thursday.
The State reported Wednesday that Stephen Morris, a longtime friend of the governor, took a job effective Jan. 14 with the state’s Health and Human Services Department as a temporary grant employee, earning $111,649 — the same salary he earned while leading the state’s Department on Aging.
An HHS spokesperson told The State this week that Morris was not required to take a pay cut as part of his transfer.
“We’ve got agency heads in some places that aren’t making $111,000,” said state Sen. Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg, who stopped short of specifically saying on the Senate floor what, if anything, the Senate would do about Morris’ pay.
Health and Human Services said it hired Morris to meet “an immediate need of the department,” helping to find sites for staff and training as the agency’s volume of daily benefit applications has required the agency to find additional space, a spokesperson said.
An agency spokesperson said Morris’ background in commercial real estate and local government are consistent with his new duties.
From 1977 to 2015, Morris worked for Colliers International South Carolina. He also served on Richland County Council, including as the county’s economic development committee chairman, from 1993 to 2001.
Hutto added, “I say to Gov. McMaster, for 95% of what you’re doing, keep up the good work. But if we see something that we disagree with, we won’t hesitate to make the light shine upon it.”
Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, R-Edgefield, seconded his colleague’s remarks, asking that they be included in the journal.
Senators have been especially sensitive to Morris after voting his nomination down last year, only to find that the governor requested Morris stay put at the Office on Aging while the governor’s office vetted his successor.
Lawmakers had asked why Morris should be the Aging director after questioning his qualifications for the job, workplace morale and a decades-old discrimination claim made by a former county council colleague.
In retaliation, last year the Senate hijacked a bill to give $115 million in tax breaks to lure the Carolina Panthers’ practice facilities and operations into South Carolina by attaching a measure to curb the governor’s authority to appoint nominees to run high-level agencies and keep them there without the consent from the Senate. The Senate gives final approval to the governor’s Cabinet nominees.
The Senate eventually agreed to lift its objection, sending the Panthers’ bill to the governor for his signature.
This year, the Senate also approved McMaster’s new Aging director nominee, Connie Munn.
This story was originally published February 6, 2020 at 1:13 PM.
