Catherine Templeton's 'buzzsaw' of state employees cost SC $1.2 million

After a nurse alerted her Columbia bosses that tuberculosis threatened children in a Greenwood County school, the state agency she worked for took more than a month to test children for the dangerous disease.

Then, facing outrage from parents over the state's slow response, the director of the state Department of Health and Environmental Control fired the nurse, saying the veteran state worker had not done her job.

Catherine Templeton’s decision to terminate the nurse eventually cost the state about $150,000 to settle a wrongful termination lawsuit.

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But it wasn’t the only costly personnel decision the Mount Pleasant labor lawyer made during her short stint in state government.

Since 2011, S.C. taxpayers have paid nearly $1.2 million to defend and settle legal actions against Templeton by 11 state employees that she — or one of the two state agencies that she was in charge of — fired, records show.

Campaigning as a "conservative buzzsaw" — unafraid to cut state spending and state workers' jobs to save taxpayers' money — Templeton points to having "fired 100 bureaucrats" as an example of why voters should elect her.

But Templeton's penchant for firing state workers comes with a price.

▪ Three African-American Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation employees — their jobs eliminated in 2011 when Templeton shut down an office, cutting more than 50 positions — brought federal civil rights claims against Templeton and the agency. After their jobs were axed, the employees alleged they were offered lesser jobs with lower pay. Meanwhile, less experienced white colleagues were offered better jobs.

The most experienced state worker of the three — a 20-year veteran of the agency — took the new job that she was offered. But she later sued Labor, Licensing and Regulation again, alleging retaliation when she was passed up for 18 state jobs for which she said she was qualified.

Combined, the legal actions cost the state $720,000, including $42,500 paid to two of the employees whose jobs were eliminated.

▪ Another Labor, Licensing and Regulation employee — a veteran of more than a decade — sued when he was fired after "cultural awareness diversity training." The fired employee said he asked the instructor, "At what point are we allowed to acknowledge our own faith or country?" At the time, Templeton said the staffer's job was to investigate nurses and hers was to ensure employees were "fair and able to separate their personal and professional biases." The state spent $44,989 for its legal defense and paid another $70,000 to the ex-employee.

▪ When Templeton moved to the state Department of Health and Environmental Control, dismissals there cost the state at least $300,000 in settlements and legal fees.

Asked whether the $1.2 million the state paid to resolve the lawsuits was well spent, Templeton campaign manager R.J. May said it was only a fraction of the money that Templeton saved taxpayers while in state government.

“A hit dog hollers," May said of Templeton's critics. "When Nikki Haley asked Catherine Templeton to clean house and clean up corruption in two of the state’s most bloated agencies, Catherine did it."

Templeton says she cut DHEC's budget by $68 million in her first 18 months, making the agency more efficient. But her campaign could not provide a breakdown of those cuts. Her successor, Catherine Heigel, said DHEC was underfunded and unable to provide basic services when she took over from Templeton. Among the shortfalls was money for the agency's dam-safety program, later blamed for worsening damages from the disastrous 2015 flood.

Templeton "stands behind her (personnel) decisions," May said. "The (state's) big government Insurance Reserve Fund chose to settle (the suits). It’s another agency Catherine Templeton will take a buzzsaw to when she gets to Columbia."

'Scorched earth' leadership style

Templeton's tenure in state government, spent leading two state agencies as a member of then-Gov. Haley's Cabinet, offers insights into how she might govern if elected, critics say.

State Sen. Brad Hutto, an Orangeburg Democrat, said the more than $1 million paid by the state to employees fired by Templeton fits her management style.

"She had just a sort of scorched-earth way when she terminated people,'' said Hutto, one of only three senators to oppose Templeton's confirmation as DHEC chief in 2012, after she had spent a year leading the much smaller Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation. "The state had to come in and pay for it.''

During Templeton's short stint at the state labor department — from January 2011 to March 2012 — the agency eliminated 80 jobs. However, the agency offered 43 of those employees other jobs. In Templeton's tenure at DHEC — from March 2012 to January 2015, shortly before she stepped down — the agency fired 119 employees, including 83 for misconduct and 36 for unsatisfactory job performance.

So far, Templeton's four Republican opponents in the June 12 primary for governor have not targeted her firing practices while a state agency chief. Cutting the size of government is popular among GOP voters.

However, in a jab during Wednesday's debate, Upstate businessman John Warren said the state "doesn't need a buzzsaw" as governor. "We can get that at Home Depot." 

S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster's campaign instead has focused its aim on the $124,000 in no-bid consulting fees Templeton was paid over a five-month period by DHEC and the state Department of Revenue after stepping down as DHEC chief.

Nurses blamed for DHEC's failure

Some of Templeton's actions at the state agencies that she led were justified, even critics say.

At DHEC, she pushed out some of the agency's longest serving leaders. For years, they had been criticized for their lethargic response to environmental problems.

Still, some of Templeton's firings came across as heartless.

Soon after taking charge at DHEC, Templeton fired nine employees from the agency's coastal division, saying their jobs were not necessary. Among those fired was a pregnant staffer.

During a 2012 hearing before state senators, Templeton said her priority was taxpayers.

"I don’t want to get personally involved with those people because it will stop me,'' Templeton said in response to questions by senators about her relationship with agency employees.

The fired DHEC employees who drew the most attention — and criticism of Templeton — were those caught up in the tuberculosis outbreak at a Ninety Six school. More than 50 students tested positive for the disease, which can be fatal if left untreated.

Templeton fired three of DHEC's regional tuberculosis specialists for, she said, their failure to act after they learned that a school janitor had TB in early March. She continued to blame those state workers later that year, saying they were responsible for the poor response to the crisis by the department that she led.

But those workers said they did act, testing a dozen people at the school for tuberculosis, then asking DHEC's Columbia office for additional help. Led by regional tuberculosis manager Malinda Martin, they requested permission to test more school children. That request languished for more than a month with DHEC officials in Columbia, records show. Only in late May 2013 did DHEC decide to test more students.

The workers fired were: nurse Latrinia Richard, a 13-year DHEC veteran who was supervisor of the agency's Greenwood County health office; Anne Ashley, the tuberculosis case manager for McCormick and Abbeville counties; and Martin, a nurse and regional tuberculosis official who had worked for DHEC since the early 1990s.

Efforts to reach the three ex-DHEC workers were unsuccessful. However, all had received praise for their efforts at the state agency, records show.

After the nurses filed wrongful termination suits against DHEC, saying they had been scapegoated, the state paid Martin $100,000 and Richard $75,000. Including legal costs, the state paid more than $300,000 defending and settling those and other DHEC cases.

Of the workers who sued DHEC, Martin — the regional TB manager — had the most difficult time after Templeton fired her, said Spartanburg lawyer John Reckenbeil, who represented the nurses in their lawsuits against the state agency.

It took time for Martin to find work, Reckenbeil said. “She felt extremely depressed."

She now works in an Upstate hospital.

Martin “had been a nurse her entire life, and she was subjected to a situation that was unprecedented," the lawyer said. "She had the best intentions for her patients, which were the kids.’’