Committee reports favorably on reappointments to South Carolina Board of Social Work Examiners; one nominee disclosed past conviction and pardon

A Senate committee screening recorded favorable reports on three reappointments to the South Carolina Board of Social Work Examiners and captured extended testimony and vetting, including a candid disclosure by one nominee about a decades-old criminal conviction and later pardon.

Alicia Lane Alderson Nicks of Columbia was sworn in and described nearly 34 years as a licensed master social worker with prior work at the Department of Social Services and at the Department of Public Health (formerly DHEC). She said she would be honored to continue serving on the board; committee members moved and seconded a favorable report that the committee approved with proxies voting aye.

Jeffrey Robert Cameron, who identified himself as manager for social workers at Prisma Health for the Upstate, disclosed that on March 1, 2000, he was involved in a crash while at Clemson that killed a front-seat passenger. Cameron described pleading guilty to reckless homicide, receiving probation and a suspended sentence, completing probation, and receiving a pardon about ten years later. Cameron said his experience informed his decision to pursue social-work leadership and to hold practitioners to ethical standards.

"I plead guilty a year and a half later to this...reckless homicide and was given 4 or 5 years probation, 10 years suspended sentence and completed probation. Ended up getting a pardon 10 years later," Cameron said when describing the incident and its legal outcome.

Committee members praised Cameron's work and recovery; a motion for a favorable report on his reappointment was moved and seconded and approved with proxies voting aye.

Del Elaine Lancaster of Columbia likewise answered vetting questions in the negative and described a career in social work and current program supervision of transitional youth who had been in foster care; her reappointment also received a favorable report.

The transcript records the screenings, candid disclosures and committee votes but does not record any subsequent confirmation action in this meeting.