Society Hill hires new Chief of Police
Hoyt Campbell speaks to Society Hill Town Council
Photo by Jana E. Pye
By Jana E. Pye, Editor, editor@newsandpress.net
Mayor Tommy Bradshaw announced at the December town council meeting that Society Hill has a new police chief, and his duties will begin the first of January.
Bradshaw said he selected David Young out of a pool of six candidates for the position.
According to Bradshaw, Young is a 23-year veteran of the Darlington County Sheriff’s Department, having previously served as a part time police officer in Town of Society Hill in 1992. As Captain of the Criminal Investigative Division of DCSO, he manages the day-to-day operation of the unit of 11 criminal investigators, two crime scene investigators and two victims advocates. He also manages the General Sessions case files and general sessions court for sheriff dept, manages case assignments, manages and conducts internal affair investigations.
Bradshaw said that his decision was based on his managerial skills and his desire and enthusiasm to lead the Society Hill Police Department. Young joins Lt. Gillespie, and will be hiring a part time police officer to extend the coverage of Society Hill as the budget will allow.
“He will take a cut in pay to come here,” said Bradshaw.
In other business, Bradshaw said that he and Shawn Hans, who provides janitorial services for the town of Society Hill, met on Saturday to assist inmates from the Darlington County Detention Center to spruce up the town park.
Community members including Melissa Birch helped string lights at the park including the historic canon.
The town will be working on some electrical issues at town owned buildings and locations, including the river landing, and installing new lighting outside of Town Hall and the Rescue Squad building.
Hoyt Campbell, Director of the Darlington County Election Commission spoke to council members about increasing their filing fees for municipal elections, adopting the 1% full of filing. All other municipalities in the county will also be increasing their fees. With the new fee, the filing fee for council members will increase from $40 to $48, and the fee to file for mayor will increase from $75 to $144.
Campbell said that if the Darlington fee had been higher in the last election, the city could have made $1800 as so many people had filed for council and mayoral seats.
In other business, the council learned that the audit was completed for the town, and will be prepared for the January meeting.
The Light it Up Christmas Decoration Contest will be held Monday December 19, with cash prizes going to the winners.
Bradshaw said that he seeks to form a committee for the town Christmas decorations, to repair older fixtures and insure that all the brackets are on the poles well ahead of the season. He thanked Brandon and Michelle Wilson for their help in getting the decorations up.
Denise Douglas asked that the town consider doing a tree lighting ceremony to herald in the season.
Brandon Wilson asked if the town could find out when the debris from Hurricane Matthew would be picked up, as he had seen it removed from most places in the county already. “We don’t want to get forgotten.”
The next regular meeting of the Society Hill Town Council will be January 10, 2017 at Town Hall beginning at 6:30 p.m.