A cross-burning incident in the fall led Conway leaders to pass a hate crime resolution on Monday evening.
Conway City Council passed the resolution unanimously, which means the city is encouraging state leaders to enact a hate crime law. This is separate from a city ordinance.
City leaders have said that the city is limited in its ability to create an ordinance because the city handles misdemeanor charges that are punishable by up to 30 days in jail and can carry a fine. Higher-level charges with harsher penalties are dealt with at the circuit court level, or the federal level in some cases.
Marvin Neal, 3rd vice president of the South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, encouraged city council members to explore an ordinance instead of a resolution.
鈥淐ontinuing to put a patch on it isn鈥檛 the way to go,鈥 he said during the public comment portion of the meeting before city council took a vote. 鈥淗umanity is humanity and hate is hate.鈥
Neal encouraged council members to go to the governor with their concerns.
Councilman Larry White agreed.
鈥淲e need to do something other than just the resolution,鈥 White said, adding he would like to see a 鈥渓eague of cities鈥 write to South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster.
Though the cross-burning incident happened in unincorporated Horry County, Conway and Myrtle Beach leaders have discussed how to respond to the incident.
The cross burning happened the day after Thanksgiving and was directed toward the Williams family after multiple disputes with the neighbors, Monica Williams said. The couple, who live in Charlotte, bought the house in 2021 as a retirement home. Williams said the neighboring couple, Worden Butler and Alexis Hartnett, have harassed and intimidated them repeatedly, including chasing off a surveyor and other workers from their property and hurling racial slurs toward the family including when police responded to the cross burning.
In Columbia, a statewide hate crime bill was introduced following the 2015 Charleston church shooting where nine people were murdered by a white supremacist at a bible study. The statewide bill would add harsher penalties for felonies where the crime is motivated by bias toward someone鈥檚 race, religion or sexual orientation. Passed by the South Carolina House of Representatives in 2023, the bill stalled in the senate and has not been brought up for debate this legislative session.
For misdemeanors like the Conway-area cross burning, a statewide bill would have no effect, which has led to discussions among municipalities about enacting a local ordinance which would provide for harsher penalties of hate-motivated misdemeanors. The idea came up at a January Myrtle Beach City Council meeting when city leaders were asked by a member of the city's human rights commission to consider introducing a hate crime ordinance.
Conway's resolution calls for the General Assembly and governor to immediately enact a hate crime law.聽
The resolution states that the city of Conway "rejects and condemns all groups and individuals whose ideologies are based on hate, violence, divisiveness, and intolerance."
It continues, stating that the city promotes a safe and quiet environment for all of our residents and visitors and is committed to promoting a community that is unified, where people of different races, religions, sexual orientations, and ethnic backgrounds resolve together to overcome the challenges of its past and become stronger and more inclusive.
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