Journal of the House of Representatives
of the Second Session of the 110th General Assembly
of the State of South Carolina
being the Regular Session Beginning Tuesday, January 11, 1994

Page Finder Index

| Printed Page 2710, Feb. 24 | Printed Page 2730, Feb. 24 |

Printed Page 2720 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

Q. What would you think would be the one or two major issues confronting the Public Service Commission in the next several years that you would like to help tackle?
A. Well, I think one of them is the one I just touched on, deregulation. I think we're seeing this in Congress, we're seeing it in -- throughout the federal government to approach this. You are going to have more and more competition. You're going to have deregulation to deal and contend with.

What you're going to have to do is temper the deregulation as I said before with competition otherwise, you better hold on to your wallet. You know, if you don't...

Secondly, probably the effect that the environment and environmental laws will have on electric utilities insofar as clean air, pollution and so forth. I think that's really going to be a tremendous problem in the next ten years. It already is as a matter of fact.
Q. I believe you're from Orangeburg County. They're now siting a place there, a coal fire generating plant near the town of Cope. One of the questions I've asked a number of the applicants is if you were on the Public Service Commission and you were making decisions about siting, what would be your approach to those environmental decisions? What would the balance be that you would seek to bring between environment and development, environment and jobs, et cetera.
A. Well, I really think that has to be tempered both from the public standpoint and the economy of the company standpoint. You have to have some balance there and I don't think you can go too far to the right or too far to the left.

I think all of you understand that the more you try to knock these things down, the more you're going to hurt your economy and unemployment and that's what we are all going to be hearing about.
Q. Mr. Hundley, are you familiar with the concept called generational mix?
A. Generational mix, are you -- and I'm asking you now. Are you talking about the nuclear mixed with the electrical utility and coal and gas and so forth?
Q. Right.
A. Yes, sir. Vaguely.
Q. How about construction work in progress?
A. No. That construction work in progress I am from one standpoint and that -- you take that in consideration in determining the rate base --
Q. Okay.
A. -- of a corporation.


Printed Page 2721 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

Q. What business interests have you had outside your work with Southern Bell?
A. I've been instrumental -- a participant in a restaurant corporation, the Southeast Restaurant Corporation which has franchise rights for restaurants throughout the southeast for Mr. Steak Restaurants. I have since sold my interest in that corporation.

I helped start a small restaurant in Orangeburg when I first retired from Southern Bell. I've purchased and sold rental property and other type real estate. I've dealt in buying stocks and securities and that's pretty much it.
Q. That's all, Mr. Chairman.
THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Hundley, do you think the day will ever come that utilities will not be regulated at all or should not be regulated?
A. Senator, I think we could possibly see that. This may be the last go round for the Public Service Commission. I think we could see that in the next decade.
THE CHAIRMAN: What, that utilities in no way would be regulated?
A. If -- I think if we have the balance of competition and the Legislature and the people in Washington are satisfied with that, I think we could very easily go to that.
THE CHAIRMAN: Any questions from any members of the committee?
SENATOR COURTNEY: Mr. Chairman?
THE CHAIRMAN: Senator Courtney.
EXAMINATION BY SENATOR COURTNEY:
Q. Mr. Hundley, I want to ask you about the securities again. I think you said that if you were elected you would put them in a blind trust or some other type trust?
A. I would do something that would be satisfactory from a legal standpoint and probably talk to the Attorney General's office to make sure there was no conflict in any way.
Q. Don't you feel that as long as you own those securities whether they're in a blind trust or whatever as long as you own them, you're going to have a conflict of interest there knowing that your actions could effect the value of those stocks?
A. It could possibly be construed as a conflict. That's the reason I mentioned the other alternative. If I left the securities in the trust that they're in now, I could -- it's pretty much -- they have a mutual fund for a portfolio of stocks. You have a bond fund, a guarantied interest fund. It's very similar to what most 401k's have.


Printed Page 2722 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

I could actually transfer it over into one of those funds and I don't have control over it anyway, but it would not be in anyway tied into Bell South Stock. Mine now is all in Bell South stock.
Q. But as long as you own Bell South stock whether it's in a 401K or what have you, your actions on the commission would effect the value of the stock, wouldn't it?
A. Possibly. You know, that would all depend on whether or not they had a rate case that came up that I had to make a ruling on.
Q. Would you be willing if you were elected to sell the stocks and completely absolve yourself from any kind of interest in this stock?
A. Actually, I'm glad there is no newspaper people here. I thought of selling the stock anyway because my stock right now is the same price it was when I retired in 1989 and I've thought about selling it.

The big problem you've got when you sell it, I have to convert mine over into a self-directed IRA with a broker. I can't take any possession of any of it. I have explored doing that and certainly, I wouldn't -- I don't think I would object to that.
Q. So your answer is yes, you would sell it?
A. Yes. Yes, I would.
Q. You're Walter Hundley's father, I believe, aren't you?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. You should give him some of the same vitamins you take. You certainly hold up very well. Thank you.
THE CHAIRMAN: Representative Wilkes.
EXAMINATION BY REPRESENTATIVE WILKES:
Q. Mr. Hundley, what is the Twin Rivers Timber Corporation, I just noticed it.
A. It's a small landholding corporation in Norway, South Carolina. We've got some of the property there and it's CRP (phonetic) and the other we're diversifying and it's hardwood and pinewood type timber and we also use it for a hunting club.
Q. You have mentioned that you were involved in real estate. Do you rent any properties or lease any properties to any public utilities --
A. No, sir.
Q. -- at the present time?
A. No, sir.
Q. This 401K plan that you're talking about where you're holding your stock, that's totally separate from your pension plan, right?
A. Yes, it is. It's actually two separate trusts. The pension fund is in one trust and the 401 is in a separate trust altogether.


Printed Page 2723 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

Q. And the pension plan, you have no direction over the investment of those funds? I mean that's just a --
A. None whatsoever.
Q. That's --
A. That's an ongoing fund that I --
Q. Guarantied pension plan?
A. As a matter of fact --
Q. You know the checks come in every month whether they --
A. Yes.
Q. Whether they make a profit or not or what their rate of earnings are?
A. Correct.
Q. So I can't see where there is any appearance of conflict of interest there at all. In the other -- given the -- in my profession as an accountant, you know, there is a saying, and it's a true saying, that the appearance is sometimes just as bad as impropriety itself in the eyes of the public.

And again, you know, I'm glad to hear you say that if, in fact, it comes to that point that you could divest yourself of that stock because, really, I think the only way that one avoids the appearance of a conflict of interest is to, in fact, do that?
A. Sure. And I'm in full agreement with that.
Q. Good. Well, thank you, sir.
THE CHAIRMAN: Representative Kennedy.
EXAMINATION BY REPRESENTATIVE KENNEDY:
Q. Mr. Hundley, I see where you were a special agent for the FBI in 1959 and 1961. Can you tell me where did you serve your time?
A. Yes, sir. I began in Washington, DC and was transferred from Washington to Jacksonville, Florida. I worked on Special Investigations away from Jacksonville, but that was my home base. That was my assignment. I left after that and went with Southern Bell. At the time, I left I was under transfer to Jackson, Mississippi.
Q. Let me ask you this, Mr. Hundley, do you have any experience in supervising people?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. What is the largest group of people that you have supervised at one time?
A. I supervised approximately, and this is an estimate, approximately 125 to 150 claims and security people when I was head of Security and Claims in the state of Florida.
Q. Mr. Hundley, tell me how do you feel about Affirmative Action?


Printed Page 2724 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

A. I have had -- I've always been a proponent of Affirmative Action and as you probably know, the company I worked with was a leader in Affirmative Action.
Q. Thank you, sir.
THE CHAIRMAN: Senator Jackson.
EXAMINATION BY SENATOR JACKSON:
Q. Mr. Hundley, let me ask you a follow-up question that Representative Kennedy did ask concerning your service with the FBI. Just out of curiosity you said that your base was Jacksonville, Florida and at the time in which you left the FBI to go to work in the corporate world, you were scheduled to be stationed in Jackson, Mississippi?
A. Right.
Q. Were you involved in any Civil Rights investigations during those time periods?
A. I was involved -- in fact, everybody at that time was involved in civil Rights investigations. And as you all probably remember, that's the time when we made sure that everyone had equal rights and equal access to the schools, to the bus stations, et cetera, et cetera. I was active in those investigations as far as documentation and in insuring that those rights were enforced.
Q. You served under the late J. Edgar Hoover?
A. Yes, I did.
Q. Thank you.
THE CHAIRMAN: You may be excused, Mr. Hundley. Who is the next candidate, Mr. Couick?

PERSONAL DATA QUESTIONNAIRE SUMMARY

1. Mr. Robert W. Hundley
Home Address: Business Address:

132 Orange Parish Retired

Orangeburg, SC 29115

2. He was born in Orangeburg, SC on October 12, 1933.
Social Security Number: ***-**-****.

3. S.C. Driver's License Number: *******.
S.C. Voter Registration Number: 6434342.

4. He was married to Nancy Riehs Hundley in July 1979. He was divorced from Evelyn Wannamaker Richards on March 17, 1958. He


Printed Page 2725 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

was divorced from Jane Atkins Hundley on June 7, 1976. He has four children: R. Walter Hundley, Jr., age 40, (Chairman, State Workers' Compensation Commission); Lyndon Young Hundley, age 32, (Kislak Mortgage Corporation); Michael Stephenson Hundley, age 31, (Boeing Corporation); Charles Atkins Hundley, age 28, (Bennigans Restaurant, Mgr.).

5. Military Service: US Air Force active duty from 1956 to 1959, reserve unit until 1966, Rank of Captain, Honorably Discharged in 1966.

6. He graduated from the University of South Carolina in 1954; in 1960 he earned a LLB from the University of South Carolina Law School.

9. He was a Special Agent of the FBI (1959-1961). From 1961 until 1989 when he retired, he was employed at Bell South Corp in the areas of security and claims and as a legislative liaison.

10. He was the secretary-treasurer of Twin Rivers Timber Corporation in Orangeburg, SC.

19. He served as a special agent for the F.B.I. from 1959 to 1961.

27. Civic, charitable, etc. organizations: Chamber of Commerce, Jacksonville, Florida; Governor's Private Security Advisory Committee Member, State of Florida; numerous local, state, and national law enforcement and security organizations.

29. Five letters of reference:
(a) Henry, R. Sims

Orangeburg, SC
(803) 534-2641
(b) Harry C. Wannamaker III
Orangeburg, SC
(803) 534-1118
(c) The Honorable Virgil Duffie
Director of Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation
Columbia, SC
(d) Dr. Bert V. Gue
Orangeburg, SC
(803) 534-5929


Printed Page 2726 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

(e) Frank Farnum
Vice President, First Union National Bank of SC
Orangeburg, SC 29115

30. At-Large.

MR. COUICK: Mr. Chairman, the next candidate is Mr. Clayton Baker Ingram. Mr. Ingram, if you'll raise your right hand please.
CLAYTON BAKER INGRAM, having been duly sworn, testified as follows:
MR. INGRAM - EXAMINATION BY MR. COUICK:
Q. Mr. Ingram, you go by Clayton or Baker?
A. Clayton.
Q. And you've been through this screening some four or five years ago, I guess, is that correct?
A. Four years ago.
Q. Your driver's license indicates that you live at 1215 Harvey Street, Columbia, South Carolina, 29201. Is that your correct current address?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. And that's in Richland County; is that right?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. Mr. Chairman, we've had an opportunity to review Mr. Ingram's credit report and also his report from SLED. Both are clear. There are no negative entries.

Mr. Ingram, what is the reason that you wish to serve on the Public Service Commission?
A. I wish to serve on the Public Service Commission for many reasons. One of them is and probably the overriding one is that I believe that I can offer the commission fresh perspective and strong leadership for the future, the next four years, and if it so fits, four years after that depending on how that goes, there are a number of issues facing the commission probably beginning this year and definitely moving into the next four years, which are going to require some new perspective, some innovative thinking, a knowledge of new theory of administration and judgment.

And I feel that I have sort of come up with some of the new trends and could offer my leadership and my innovation to these areas that are going to be so critical in the next few years.
Q. What are one or two of those areas, Mr. Ingram, specifically that you think would be coming up?
A. Probably if I had to categorize the three most important, not in any order in South Carolina, transportation is going to be one. I mean, in


Printed Page 2727 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

Columbia and in Charleston, the utilities that are now running the public transportation such as it is, consistently wishing to be released from those fields and to some degree the municipalities tend to agree with them.

One of the things that we're going to have to look at is what the trade off would be. How can we release the utilities from this endeavor that they have held for so long to turn it over to the municipalities? One thing that I would look at is what would the trade off be, how would they assist the municipalities in making this transition. And I would also want to assure the municipalities would have concrete evidence that they could offer continuity of service at a fair pricing to the people that depend on this.

Probably one of other ones would be the new telecommunications industry. So much new innovation, new technology is going to be available to us in the next few years that we are going to have to take a whole new look at what the regulation of this is.

Telephone -- the existing telecommunications industries are right now saying go slow with allowing competition, but at the same time let us increase what we're doing while ones that want to come in are saying, well, we need to speed this process up because we need to be allowed into the market.

At the same time, you're going to have to look at will these technologies and will these changes benefit a few people who can use them at the expense of the majority of people who will be paying for them. And in addition to that, will urban areas not benefits so much as -- or will they benefit more than the rural areas.

And then finally deregulation of power utilities, with the technology that we have now and with business clients that we have now, by the end of the decade, certainly not before, there is probably going to have to be some kind of a change in the way the competition or the absence of competition is done now with the Energy Policy Act of 1992 clearing the way for states to deregulate the transmission of power.

More and more, I think the large users of energy are going to be clamoring for some competition and for the deregulation, so that they can shop and make contracts for power and then wheeling -- the transmission of one company's power through another company's territory over their lines for a fee is going to be a big area. And this all is going to have to be studied very closely, but -- in the future.
Q. Why not go to wheeling and some other deregulation?
A. Several reasons at present. We couldn't just go to it at once.
Q. There is no big bang theory that works in --


Printed Page 2728 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

A. No. It's going to have to be a slow deliberative process that's going to have to find a certain time and area when this could all happen.

You have, for instance, the problem of the stranded plant. That is, companies that are currently building facilities to generate more power could under deregulation find a lot of their customer base eroded and no need for that additional generating capacity.

There is the problem of the stock of the companies. Currently utility stock is a pretty safe investment. Those investors could under competition stand to see their work plummet. Utilities could go bankrupt, something that has never been on the agenda before.
Q. But isn't that part of all supply and demand and free enterprise and the right to succeed and the right to fail?
A. It should be and I think that the monopoly status of utilities has been classically the exception to that rule. One of the market failures in the past, it's been the problem of we can't have competition because we can't have lines running all over each other. That's not so much the problem any more as regulating the competition, being able to establish territories, rates for transmission of power and who can use it.

Also there is a problem of once a customer leaves a certain utility and buys power elsewhere, it's going to have to be determined what the utility's obligation to him is in the future, say, if they could not buy power from that company for some reason. Currently, utilities say that once they've left us, we have no obligation to serve them again. That's another aspect.
Q. What about retail wheeling? I mean we've talked a little bit about that. Is that possible? Is it physically possible to have retail wheeling in South Carolina?
A. I suppose it could be, but that's much more difficult than the large consumer wheeling their power to another plant.
Q. But what's the difficulty? Where does that factor come from in that case?
A. The proliferation of individual buyers attempting to buy power one from one company and one from the other.
Q. Couldn't you just rent the lines, though, and pay that to one company and buy the power from somebody else?
A. It's a little more complicated than that, I'm sure. I can't give you all the specifics of the individual wheeling of power, but certainly more complicated than the large buyer.
Q. You were talking about informational explosion awhile ago or the revolution. Fiberoptics are kind of a term of art and what everybody wants to aim for. Should that person in rural Chesterfield County pay for


Printed Page 2729 . . . . . Thursday, February 24, 1994

fiberoptics if all they do is use their telephone to handle local business and make one or two calls a week when they've already got a good coaxial line in the running?
A. That's always one of the challenges. The large number of people paying for something that a small number use to some degree that's done anyway with people who don't use a facility that is available to a company, subsidizing with their rates to a degree. That's just something that's going to have come under study. The day is coming, but the evidence is not all in.

They should not have to subsidize it, I think, to their detriment. But once again we have to draw the line again as to where that is.
Q. You work now for the South Carolina Organ Procurement Agency. I take it that's body organs, not --
A. Right.
Q. -- musical organs?
A. Right. And that's -- I'm no longer with them. I'm not with Lifebridge Foundation.
Q. You're with the what now?
A. Lifebridge Foundation.
Q. Tell me a little bit about the Lifebridge Foundation.
A. That's a nonprofit, educational foundation also dedicated to propagating organ donations in South Carolina.
Q. Where did the funding for the Lifebridge Foundation come from?
A. It's private. Private donations.
Q. And how did you solicit private donations?
A. Currently, there is not a large degree of solicitation. And I'm the main funding for that as of now.
Q. Would you ever see the situation where you would be soliciting funding while a member of the Public Service Commission?
A. No, sir, I do not.
Q. Would you continue your interest in Lifebridge if you were to be elected to the Public Service Commission?
A. If so, only on a small consultative basis. Ultimately, I hope to turn it over to someone else anyway.
Q. The Ingram Siblings Corporation, the partnership, please tell me a little bit about that.
A. That's my brothers and sisters and I own a retail commercial property in Cheraw, South Carolina. We hold it jointly.
Q. What type of property is that? I mean what kind of businesses occupy it?


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