Black, Green, McLeod, Heitzman become faces for pro- and anti-tax campaigns
by Reporting Students • October 30, 2014 • All Stories, Governing, People, Politics/Elections • 0 Comments
If Lexington County residents want to learn more about the county’s proposed sales tax increase, chances are their information will somehow have come from Talbert Black, Mike Green, Earl McLeod or Tiffany Boyce Heitzman. Those four surfaced as opinion leaders on the issue well before the campaigns heated up this fall.
Avery Wilks
Oct. __, 2014
Activists seeking to sway public opinion about Lexington County’s proposed sales tax increase surfaced even before the County Council approved the ballot measure this summer.
Talbert Black began working to prevent the tax in early 2013, and Mike Green followed suit later that year. Both soon created Facebook pages and began rallying other conservative activists.
Earl McLeod and Tiffany Boyce Heitzman emerged as leaders of the pro-tax side; the two were elected as co-chairs of the Penny for Pavement Coalition, which organized this spring to begin campaigning for the tax.
The four have campaigned for months, focusing in and around the town of Lexington, the county’s political center, while also coordinating outreach to other voters across Lexington County.
Talbert Black: Veteran conservative activist
This isn’t Black’s first crack at political activism. The 44-year-old from Lexington works as a software engineer for a company that makes vending machines.
Talbert Black, who started the Lexington County Citizens Watch Facebook page, held weekly meetings this spring to organize the opposition to the penny tax.
But after work, Black kicks his conservative activism into gear, sending out mass emails, attending committee meetings and typing up fliers and social media posts with talking points on the latest issues.
Black said his political leanings can be traced to his conservative, working‑class upbringing near Pelion. He said his parents taught him and his five sisters the importance of patriotism, civic involvement and independence from government.
Black traces his political involvement to the late 1990s, a few years after graduating from Clemson University, when he attended a concealed weapons permit class and wound up joining the now-inactive Grassroots Gun Rights.
It fascinated him, he said, to see how ordinary people working together could affect policy-making. He joined the South Carolina chapter of Campaign for Liberty in 2008 and became the group’s state coordinator a year later. Soon after, Black started the Palmetto Liberty PAC and joined Palmetto Gun Rights.
He’s also worked as a citizen reporter for The Nerve, a publication of the S.C. Policy Council which promotes limited government, free enterprise and individual liberty. Communications manager Barton Swaim marvels at how Black juggles it all.
“He just has this endless source of energy to push things on the political front,” Swaim said. “You could be forgiven if you thought there were two or three Talbert Blacks.”
Some of Black’s fellow conservative activists wonder if he ever sleeps, but they admire his tirelessness and efficiency. They saw it at weekly meetings he held this spring to coordinate opposition to the tax increase and to Lexington County councilmen Bill Banning and Frank Townsend, who had backed adding the referendum to the ballot.
| Audio Hear Earl McLeod talk about how traffic will get worse in Lexington if voters reject the tax. Hear Mike Green explain why he calls the tax increase “millions for pork” rather than “penny for pavement.” Listen to Talbert Black talk about why he’s gotten involved with protesting the penny sales tax increase. Listen to Tiffany Boyce Heitzman talk about what Lexington County has to offer and how the penny sales tax could facilitate further growth.Documents View a survey, filled out by Ned Tolar, that Talbert Black sent out to several candidates vying for Lexington County Council seats this summer. Read the final ballot for the penny sales tax increase. |
When Banning and Townsend were ousted in primaries this summer, Black took it as a victory.
Conservative activists in Lexington say Black’s veracity helps make him a go-to figure for people who don’t know what to make of the proposed tax increase or want to get involved.
“If he tells you he’s going to do X, Y and Z, he’s going to do X, Y and Z,” said Rich Bolen, a Lexington lawyer who has worked with Black to oppose the tax increase. “That’s very valuable in the political world.”
Black says the principles his parents taught him, such as self-reliance, are what motivate him today. He wants limited government and worries the tax increase’s proponents are looking out not for taxpayers but for government contractors who could benefit from the projects.
Mike Green: Unabashedly “ultraconservative”
Green, a 43-year-old real estate investor from West Columbia, has also become a go-to person for information and insight about the proposed tax increase as well as reasons to vote against it.
Mike Green, who started the Stop penny tax in Lexington Facebook page, calls the penny tax “millions for pork” because he thinks some of the proposed projects are unnecessary fluff.
“If I need information about that penny sales tax, that’s who I call, Mike Green,” said Wilma Storey, a Lexington business owner who met Green roughly four years ago at a county Republicans meeting.
Green lists his politics as “Ultraconservatism” on his Facebook page, views he says stem from his Winfield, West Virginia, upbringing. Green says his parents didn’t drink or smoke but often took the family to church three times a week.
His interest in politics, he said, comes from his grandmother, who lived nearby and worked for former West Virginia Gov. Arch Moore Jr. and the Republican Party.
Green moved to South Carolina to attend Bob Jones University and became involved with the GOP in 1994 as the director of outdoor advertising for David Beasley’s successful gubernatorial campaign. He estimates he’s worked on about 20 campaigns, some as a project manager for Starboard Communications, a Republican political consulting firm in Lexington.
Green began opposing the tax increase in September 2013, right after he learned that not all the money would pay for road improvements. He calls it “millions for pork,” rather than Penny for Progress, because of what he sees as frivolous projects on the final ballot.
“I’m against all the pork that’s in this,” said Green, adding later that he opposes government growth. “What else would you call a cultural center in Pelion?”
Earl McLeod: Mr. Home Builders
McLeod hates being stuck in traffic. He says it’s gotten to the point where “it’s simply miserable.”
McLeod, executive director of the Home Builders Association of Great Columbia, lives near Lake Murray and commutes along U.S. 378. But he often finds himself in logjams, chewing a straw to ease his frustration.
Earl McLeod, the executive director of the Home Builders Association of Greater Columbia, supports the tax hike because he is tired of Lexington’s traffic congestion and thinks the proposed projects would support economic development.
“I waste a tremendous amount of time just sitting in traffic,” he said.
McLeod, a Florence native who has lived in the Midlands for over 30 years, said he’s adjusted his schedule to avoid Lexington’s notorious congestion, leaving home some days as early 6:30 a.m. and waiting until after 6 p.m. to return.
McLeod said Lexington has had traffic problems since he moved there about 15 years ago, and he expects they will only worsen as the county grows.
Those concerns, McLeod said, led him to join the pro-tax campaign in its infancy this spring; the potential benefits of the other projects, like sewer system modernizations and expansions, solidified his support.
“It’s hard to build a house without a bathroom,” he said.
Like Black and Green, McLeod has experience campaigning. He holds a political science degree from Francis Marion University, worked on U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond’s successful 1978 campaign and managed John Napier’s successful campaign for Congress in 1980.
Mike Crapps, who chaired the Penny for Progress commission and supports the tax, says McLeod and Heitzman were natural choices to lead the pro-tax team. Crapps said he admired how McLeod kept local home builders upbeat during the recession.
“Those kinds of people are going to be the ones that say yes when they see something that can really make a difference, Crapps said.
Tiffany Boyce Heitzman: Looking to leave a legacy
Heitzman, who runs the Greater Irmo Chamber of Commerce, has lived most of her life in Lexington County. So have her parents and grandparents.
If any of her three children want to move away when they grow up, that’s fine, said Heitzman, 34.
Tiffany Boyce Heitzman calls herself a “Lexington County girl” and says the proposed penny sales tax would ensure Lexington remains a place her three children want to live when they grow up.
“But I would love for my kids to grow up in Lexington County just like I did and build their families here.”
The proposed tax increase would help deal with Lexington County’s growth so they want to stay in the area, she said.
“This could be the most important thing that I see in my lifetime,” she says. “This might be our one chance to change our county for our children.”
Lexington Mayor Steve MacDougall said the pro-tax side was looking for the most respected and trusted names in the county to help lead the tax-increase campaign. Heitzman said she doesn’t consider herself influential but that she just wants to provide Lexington’s voters the facts so they can decide for themselves.
“Telling the truth will take you a long ways in life,” said Heitzman, who says she works about four hours a day on the campaign. Much of that is spent preaching the tax’s potential benefits to civic groups and community leaders across the county.
The goal, Heitzman said, has been to show that the tax increase will be “transformational for Lexington County” and clear up misconceptions about things such as its cost and duration.
“It’s about my family and the future of Lexington County,” Heitzman said. “This is where I was born and raised.”
