Lexington Town Council’s attendance at the Municipal Association of South Carolina’s July 2025 annual meeting, town staff raises and bonuses, candidates’ roles on the Central Midlands Council of Governments, the town’s small business environment, town financial transparency documents and filing for candidacy in the town were some of the topics candidates spoke about during the Oct. 7 Lexington Town Council Candidate Forum hosted by Lexington Chamber and Visitors Center, the Lexington County Chronicle and the League of Women Voters.

Each of the five candidates—incumbents Todd Carnes, Ron Williams and Gavin Smith, as well as challengers Greg Brewer and Doug Leonard—were asked questions by the moderator, and each had the opportunity to respond.

Here is some additional information on some of the topics the candidates talked about.

MASC Annual Meeting

Lexington Town Council attended the July 2025 Municipal Association of South Carolina Annual Meeting (held in Hilton Head in 2025) along with 148 of 271 municipalities in the state, according to Charlie Barrineau with MASC.

“[C]ouncil had the money to go to Hilton Head and play golf,” Leonard said during the forum, after talking about town employee raises and bonuses (more information on that topic is later in this story). “Those types of decisions undermine culture and the morale.”

According to the MASC website, it “represents and serves the state's 271 incorporated municipalities. The Association is dedicated to the principle of its founding members: to offer the services, programs and tools that will give municipal officials the knowledge, experience and tools for enabling the most efficient and effective operation of their municipalities in the complex world of municipal government.”

Smith credits the idea for the town’s Youth Advisory Committee to council’s attendance at a MASC conference.

“The vacation we were alleged to take, those are actually Municipal Association of South Carolina conferences,” he said during the forum.

Barrineau provided a copy of the agenda from this year’s MASC annual meeting, which ran July 17-19. Thursday’s preconference sessions ran all morning through noon. There was also a welcome reception that evening, as well as an opening session.

On July 18, events ran all morning, starting at 9 a.m. through 11:15 a.m. Additionally, there was an event where attendees purchased lunch and heard from companies that aim to provide goods and services to municipalities.

The final day, July 19, wrapped up with an 11 a.m. session lasting just under an hour. Later, there was an awards luncheon and a Lowcountry boil in the evening.

Barrineau said that attendees managed their own free time.

The Town of Lexington paid $1,500 for council to attend this year’s MASC annual meeting, according to the Town of Lexington’s spokesperson.

Lexington staff raises, bonuses

Leonard said during the forum that town employees complained to him about staff raises and bonuses.

“I’ve got numerous complaints from town employees. You’re not going to serve citizens if you’re not giving your town employees merit and bonus raises, which they did not get last year,” Leonard said during the forum.

Lexington’s spokesperson told the Chronicle that employees were eligible to receive merit pay increases and bonuses this past year. “Town employees who met the eligibility requirement to receive a merit increase, received it,” she said.

Information was not provided regarding specific employees who received or didn’t receive an increase.

Central Midlands Council of Governments

The Central Midlands Council of Governments serves Fairfield, Lexington, Newberry and Richland counties. According to its website, the CMCOG provides a “regional forum” for local governments to address issues and seek planning help for regional transportation, infrastructure and other aspects.

It also “advocate[s] on behalf of regional governments, businesses, and citizens.” According to the South Carolina Councils of Governments website, “SC COGs are conveners, consultants and strategic solution providers. Each of the 10 COGs [including the Central Midlands Council of Governments] provides technical assistance, secures funding to address critical issues, and advocates at the state and national level for economic and quality of life improvements for our communities.”

Lexington County locals with a seat on the CMCOG are local elected officials and local residents.

The CMCOG’s Board of Directors, for Lexington County, includes Lexington Town Council candidate Greg Brewer, as well as Lexington Town Council incumbent candidate Todd Carnes, among others. CMCOG documents list Carnes as representing the Town of Lexington, while Brewer is listed as representing Lexington County.

“I worked with Develop Lexington County Responsibly, our Save Lexington S.C. team, and went to those work sessions and went to those meetings to make sure that our voice was unified, loud and clear,” Brewer said during the forum. “It got those concurrency issues passed. Now there is some gaps between density and lot sizes, etcetera, between the [municipality] and the county. We want to remove the loopholes for this, and I’ve got put on the COG unanimously by the county council as a result of those efforts. But that’s a very small sliver and tactical bureaucracy in the COG. It needs to be in concert with the state legislatures.”

Carnes then said during the forum that he was appointed to the CMCOG at about the same time as Brewer, around a year ago.

“I’ve never seen Mr. Brewer at one of those meetings,” Carnes said. “I actually took the time to look at the attendance sheets, and Mr. Brewer has missed 45% of the COG meetings over the last 20 months, and 90% of the ones he attended, he attended by Zoom. I’ve been there 10 or 11 times now. I’ve never seen him personally there, so I mean you really have to … show up. There’s about 30 or 40 people on that board.

“You gotta build relationships. It’s across five counties and that’s where hundreds of millions of dollars flows through from the federal government to local jurisdictions, and so if you get appointed to something like that, and you don’t show up, it’s really hard to mobilize the money.”

Brewer then called the CMCOG a bureaucracy.

“Let me give you some inside scoop on the council of governments,” he said. “The major decisions get made in executive session. You feel like you’re just a fixture that has been put in there. I have had debriefs with Charli Wessinger and Darrell Hudson after those COG meetings. … [Carnes wasn’t] in those discussions.”

In 2024, according to the attendance sheets provided by the Central Midlands Council of Governments, Brewer attended meetings on Jan. 25, Feb. 22, March 28 and May 23, totaling four out of eight meetings since his appointment.

Carnes was appointed to the CMCOG in February 2024. He attended meetings on Feb. 22, March 28, May 23, Oct. 24 and Dec. 12, totaling five out of seven meetings since his appointment.
In 2025, Brewer attended three out of five meetings. He attended a Feb. 27 meeting via Zoom, an April 24 meeting via Zoom and the May 22 meeting. May 22 attendance, whether it was through Zoom or in person, was not specified.

In 2025, Carnes attended five out of five meetings. He attended Feb. 27 in person, March 27 via Zoom, April 24 in person, May 22 (again, Zoom or in person was not specified) and Aug. 28 in person.

Lexington’s small business environment

One of the most talked-about topics at the forum was the town’s small business environment.

“The town has got to be easy to work with for the business owners,” Leonard said. “I would create a position called a business concierge, and they would interface directly with businesses and learn what their needs are then go to the town and say, ‘Hey, how can we make this work?’”

Smith said during the forum that establishing a concierge for businesses was an idea from the Small Business Advisory Committee’s survey, the results of which were available at the time of the forum.

When the Chronicle asked the town spokesperson if there is currently a liaison-type role between town council and small business owners in the town, the spokesperson said the position of economic developer has been employed by the town since 2012; that position reports to the town administrator.

“You should hire a dedicated business liaison,” Small Business Advisory Committee Chair Matt Thompson told Lexington Town Council at the Oct. 20 work session. “I’m talking a concierge of sorts. Now, I have actually heard people say we have that now, but I don’t think you do. You have people that will help, and they are super helpful, but you don’t have a dedicated person that will walk with the business owner through the process to different departments, etcetera. You have people that will tell the business rep what to do, and we are thinking that if someone would actually help them do it, and that is certainly pro-business.”

Thompson, during the Oct. 20 work session, told council about the results of the committee’s first-ever survey sent to all businesses in the town for whom the town had an email on file.

“We wanted to also make sure that we understood the types of businesses operating in the town of Lexington, as well as hear from those business owners, so our next step was to construct a survey,” Thompson said during the meeting. “We received a ton of feedback, as you might imagine, both positive and negative, which was to be expected.”

A town spokesperson told the Chronicle that the survey, sent in September 2024, garnered 143 responses. For the May 1, 2025, to April 30, 2026, business license year, the town has issued 3,260 business licenses.

The survey, according to a document assembled by the committee, focused on “[p]erceptions of the overall business climate within the Town of Lexington, [e]xperiences with and impressions of Town departments, [c]ustomer service interactions with Town staff [and g]eneral sentiment around the Town's support of and responsiveness to the business community.”

“When asked what the Town or Town staff could do better to support local businesses, the most frequently cited concern-by a wide margin-was traffic, with 68.4% of respondents selecting it as a top issue,” the document continued. “This was followed by concerns about business taxes (30.8%) and the need to simplify business processes (29.3%), both of which point to broader frustrations around the cost and complexity of doing business within town limits.

“Additionally, nearly one in four respondents (24.8%) expressed a desire for better business education, particularly for new or first-time business owners. Others highlighted the need for the Town to find more proactive solutions (23.3%), and to foster more open dialogue (16.5%) with the business community. A smaller group pointed to the importance of stronger partnerships, though this was mentioned less frequently. Together, these findings suggest that while many appreciate the character of doing business in Lexington, there are critical operational and logistical pain points particularly around traffic, policy complexity, and communication that deserve focused attention as the Town continues to grow.”

Lexington’s financial transparency documents

Town financial transparency was also talked about at the forum.

“Transparency is a huge problem that the citizens have, and one of the things that we need to do is we need to make sure that it’s simple financial transparency,” Leonard said during the forum. “If you go to the website now, there’s an accounting novel, and if you want to figure out how the money is spent, you have to do forensic accounting.

“The citizens do not have the time to sit down and read that for three to four hours. There needs to be a very quick weekly, or monthly at minimum, report on here’s the income, here’s the debits. You know, everybody will say, ‘Well, the U.S. has a $31 trillion deficit. Ask anyone on this board, what's the deficit or what's the surplus, [and] no one tells you. The citizens need to know how their money is being spent.”

Smith then mentioned the Transparency Center on the town’s website.

“Is it perfect? It’s not perfect, but none of us are, however, we do have a transparency center where you can go and get tons of information about the town, and I’m very proud of that,” Smith said about the online portal.

A Town of Lexington spokesperson told the Chronicle the town does not have a deficit.

On the town’s website, financial publications include annual budgets, an annual comprehensive financial plan, lists of funds, month-end financial reports, an independent auditor’s presentation and more.

Filing for candidacy in the Town of Lexington

The Town of Lexington is composed of a mayor, mayor pro-tem and five council members; everyone is elected at-large, according to the town’s website. This means all council members are elected to serve all of the town, not specific districts.

At the forum, Brewer advocated for term limits as well as districted seats.

“Residents are asking a question: ‘Why is it that so many of these other municipalities in the county of Lexington have districted seats?’ This is not a news flash. There are many former council people that have asked for this to make sure that neighborhoods are not underrepresented or overlooked,” he said, adding that current council members’ home addresses not being spread out enough across the town could contribute to unequal representation.

Brewer told the Chronicle that districted seats and filing fees are “barriers” to locals running for local office.

“If you broke the six seats into districts, it would be 1/6 the cost [to campaign] because you’re only covering your district,” he said, adding that the cost to file is a “hardship” for those wanting to run.

According to the Lexington County Voter Registration and Elections office, the filing fee for the Town of Lexington is $630. Nearby municipalities cost less than or equal to $100.

The City of Columbia’s filing fee for mayor is $1,000, and the fee for running for a council seat is $530. Gilbert is the only town in the county with no filing fees.

Carnes said during the forum that there are positives and negatives to districted seats.

“This is a decision that should be made by the citizens; it should be made by a referendum given to the citizens and let the citizens decide,” Carnes said. “The good thing about being at-large scenario is you’re responsible to every citizen. And so you can’t neglect any area of town. You have to be responsible for every area of town.”

Election Day is Nov. 4 and the full forum video can be viewed on the Lexington Chamber and Visitors Center’s YouTube.

Source correction: In this story's original publication, and in print, it was written, per information initially given to the Chronicle, that "Smith said during the forum that establishing a concierge for businesses was an idea from the Small Business Advisory Committee’s survey, the results of which were not available at the time of the forum." This story has been updated to reflect that the survey results were available through the town's website at the time of the forum.