By Jessica Holdman
SCDailyGazette.com
COLUMBIA — This month’s rise of Rep. Bill Herbkersman as the new chairman of a committee overseeing energy and banking bills in the House underscores a power shift in the Statehouse.
He makes the fifth legislator from Beaufort County to lead a key committee, two years after Republicans from the state’s southern corner took the top spot in the House for education, legal and regulatory issues.
Perhaps never before has Beaufort County — a mecca for wealthy retirees and golfers — wielded so much influence in the Legislature.
Beyond Herbkersman, newly elected chairman of the House Labor Commerce and Industry Committee, the other committee chairs who live in Beaufort County are Reps. Shannon Erickson, Weston Newton, and Jeff Bradley, and Sen. Tom Davis. Collectively, they have 88 years of legislative experience.
Then there’s Sen. Chip Campsen. While he lives in Charleston County, he represents much of Beaufort County and is the most veteran of the group, adding 28 years of experience alone.
They serve as the gatekeepers of their varying domains, setting the schedules and steering the agendas of their committees to decide what has a chance of becoming law.
‘Our season’
Throughout South Carolina’s history, power has shifted from one part of the state to the other.
Between 2005 and 2012, when the Legislature’s most powerful legislators were Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell and House Speaker Bobby Harrell, Charleston County ruled.
The center of power moved to the Pee Dee in 2014, when Rep. Jay Lucas of Hartsville became House speaker and already-powerful Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman of Florence also took the title of Senate president pro tem (a position that ceased to exist in 2019).
Now, it’s Beaufort County’s turn.
“It’s just our season,” said Erickson, R-Beaufort, who is starting her second term at the helm of House Education and Public Works. “We all decided to stay in the saddle long enough and keep working on things to the point we’ve built up an expertise.”
With 200 miles separating legislators in the chambers’ tip-top spots — Senate President Thomas Alexander from tiny Walhalla and House Speaker Murrell Smith from Sumter — the Beaufort County delegation represents a new concentration of strength at the committee level.
Leadership shifts south
These legislators represent districts that cover golf resort towns and retirement destinations that, while growing, sit outside the state’s traditional population centers. (Beaufort County ranks 10th most populous among the 46 counties.) They cross tidal marshes that are home to some 15 threatened and endangered species and end at the Palmetto State’s southernmost tip.
The county is something of a microcosm, Erickson said.
It’s home to some of the state’s most affluent residents, many of whom have moved to the Palmetto State from elsewhere and brought with them values that tend to be fiscally conservative but more socially moderate.
It also holds a culturally rich heritage, once the domain of enslaved West and Central Africans, known as the Gullah Geechee. Isolated on the area’s rice plantations, many were able to hold on to their culture. Sea Islands slaves freed by the U.S. Army formed and ran their own town amid the Civil War.
It’s home to national historic sites commemorating gains made by Black South Carolinians during post-Civil War Reconstruction, as well as the U.S. Marines training base on Parris Island and higher education institutions in the form of the University of South Carolina’s Beaufort campus.
And, like many of Beaufort County’s residents, the chairmen and chairwoman who call it home don’t hail from there.
Erickson grew up in the Pee Dee, while Newton came from the Greenville area and Herbkersman is from Richland County. Born in Alabama, Bradley moved to Hilton Head Island in 1979. And Davis, born in New Jersey, moved to Beaufort in 1985.
Which committees do they lead?
In the Senate, Davis has led that chamber’s Labor Commerce and Industry Committee since the start of the 2022 session.
First elected in 2008, Davis called the Beaufort delegation’s position “a privilege,” allowing them to elevate issues most important to the voters who elected them.
“You tend to be at the table when important decisions are being made,” he said.
But it’s also “a great responsibility,” Davis added, to equally serve residents statewide.
Campsen, an avid hunter and outdoorsman, has led the Senate Fish Game and Forestry Committee since 2012.
In the House, Newton — first elected in 2012 — will be running the Judiciary Committee for the second term. Much of the legislation considered by the Legislature goes through his committee. Basically, anything that changes state law could be sent his way, including proposals to ban abortions, legalize sports betting, loosen liquor laws or tighten criminal penalties.
Responsibilities of the committee led by Bradley, which traditionally reviewed agencies’ regulations, have been expanded in the last year to also look into the use of emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence.
First elected in 2014, Bradley became chairman after the 2022 elections of what now goes by the long title of Regulations, Administrative Procedures, Artificial Intelligence and Cybersecurity Committee.
Erickson, first elected in 2006, is in charge of the committee that reviews legislation involving education, from early childhood to college, and highway safety. Bradley is her first vice-chairman on the Education and Public Work Committee as well as chairman of its K-12 subcommittee.
‘A proven leader’
Then, during this month’s post-election organizational session, Herbkersman was moved from House Ways and Means — where he led the subcommittee overseeing health agencies’ budgets — to Labor Commerce and Industry following the election loss of its chairman.
As expected, legislators on the committee made Herbkersman chairman.
The Bluffton Republican will handle proposals on rules impacting the banking, insurance and utility industries, but also matters more broadly impacting businesses across the state.
“It’s funny how that shifts,” Herbkersman, a 22-year veteran of the House, said of the new powerhouse of legislators from the Beaufort area.
Herbkersman takes over the role from Rep. Bill Sandifer. The Seneca Republican chaired the committee for 16 years before losing his House seat to his primary challenger, Adam Duncan, this past June.
Historically, the committee known as LCI has seen very little turnover, said Fred Green, president of the state Bankers Association who has spent a large amount of time in front of the committee.
Green called Herbkersman “insightful,” “accessible” and someone who wants to listen to all perspectives on an issue. He’ll also be leading a committee with 10 other new members, which Green views as advantageous “because they won’t have preconceived notions.”
Herbkersman said he took the position because he felt the committee “needed a new direction.” He intends to take a less heavy-handed approach as chairman, giving subcommittees more autonomy.
Asked why he wanted to leave the budget-writing committee to lead LCI, Herbkersman cited his business background. He and his wife founded a sporting goods store, Cycle Centers Inc., and a pair of housing and urban development companies operating in the Southeast.
“Bill is a proven leader with the vision and a fresh perspective to guide the committee in a powerful direction — one that will focus on business-friendly policies and legislation to fuel South Carolina’s booming economy,” Speaker Smith said in a statement. “I have no doubt that under his leadership, the LCI Committee will tackle the critical issues facing our state and continue to make South Carolina a great place to do business and to live.”
Energy and the environment
How to address the state’s growing electricity needs will be a major charge of Herbkersman’s as he shepherds hallmark energy legislation championed by Smith. It will be a focus of his committee when legislators return in January.
Being on the coast also gives Herbkersman and other Beaufort-area residents an appreciation for “just how fragile our environment is,” Davis said, and sensitivity to the impact commercial development has on nature.
Those who live there want the power production necessary to keep the state’s economic engine turning, Davis said, but they also lean into clean energy options. Davis thinks that will be reflected in Herbkersman’s approach.
Erickson previously served on the committee, back when a joint effort to expand the V.C. Summer nuclear plant by state-owned utility Santee Cooper and the now-defunct South Carolina Electric and Gas Co. was still expected to happen. It wasn’t until after she left the committee that the project would be abandoned amid cost overruns and fraud.
“He’s got a completely different landscape,” Erickson said as Herbkersman steps into the role.
Spokespeople for both Dominion Energy and Duke Energy spoke of the importance of the committee to their companies.
“The committee understands the critical need for new energy resources, and they understand Dominion Energy’s obligation to serve all of our customers,” said Dominion spokeswoman Rhonda O’Banion, “Just as we do, we expect that they will want to hear all sides of the issue as our legislators make the best decisions to meet growth in demand for energy in the fastest growing state in the country.”
“The fact the Speaker has entrusted this significant leadership role to the new chairman shows how important the future of energy is to him, this body and our state,” Duke spokesman Ryan Mosier added.
Working together
Many in the Beaufort County delegation also expect their leadership roles to intertwine.
Herbkersman said he plans to work alongside Bradley, who wants to use the AI arm of his committee to sort through state regulations, looking for outdated or overlapping rules.
Erickson expects Herbkersman will throw support behind a workforce initiative coming out of her education committee, meant to inform students about the schooling and skills needed to fill in-demand jobs.
And Davis said he and Herbkersman share similar views on rolling back some of the licensing requirements for certain occupations to make it easier for workers seeking jobs in those fields.
Editor Seanna Adcox contributed to this report.
Jessica Holdman writes about the economy, workforce and higher education. Before joining the S.C. Daily Gazette, she was a business reporter for The Post and Courier. S.C. Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
