Sumter school board Area 8 runoff is Tuesday, Nov. 17

Area 8 was the lone Sumter school board race from Election Day where no candidate achieved more than 50% of the vote; therefore, the top two vote-getters are set for a Tuesday runoff.

Three school board incumbents already won from Nov. 3, and the final incumbent, Phil Leventis, fell short of the 50% plus one vote threshold requirement to win with 47.9% of the total vote in Area 8. Now, he will face challenger Sherril Ray, who was in second place with 31.9% on Election Day.

Runoff votes are relatively new in Sumter County since the county legislative delegation only moved nonpartisan school board races - meaning free from political party affiliation - to majority voting in 2022. Before that, Sumter school board candidates could win election to the full board by simply having the most votes on Election Day even if that total was well below 50%.

Delegation members made the change, they said, because school board races are some of the most critical in Sumter County, and they considered it essential for a winning candidate to achieve at least a majority vote, even if that required a runoff after the general election.

Registered voters in all six Area 8 precincts are eligible to vote Tuesday at the five precinct locations, or polling places, even if they did not vote on Nov. 3, according to Sumter County Voter Registration and Elections Office Director Pat Jefferson.

With just one race on the ballot, voting in the runoff should be a relatively quick process, she added. All polling places will be open Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

WHERE IS AREA 8?

Area 8 for Sumter school board is mostly within the City of Sumter limits to include western and northern portions of the city. Roughly half of the western suburbs in the city are in the area. Major roadways include Wilson Hall Road, Loring Mill Road, Patriot Parkway and others.

The school board was previously seven single-member districts, but also in 2022 the delegation reapportioned them into nine single-member districts and created Area 8 at the time.

PHIL LEVENTIS

Leventis, a former state senator for 32 years from 1980 to 2012, has served on the board for an abbreviated term of about 20 months and since March 2025 after winning a special election for the Area 8 seat in late February of that year.

Former Area 8 Trustee Jeff Zell had won a state Senate race in November 2024, requiring him to vacate the school board seat.

Leventis is retired from a career in the U.S. Air Force and the South Carolina Air National Guard and was also a small-business owner.

As far as his campaign platform, he said previously based on his career and broad experience that he "adds a good eye on the district financial matters" and other items requiring focus.

In light of Sumter School District's annual deficit for fiscal 2026 that ended on June 30, Leventis said he thinks a lot of attention needs to be targeted on the budget now as is always necessary given it is by far the largest budget in the county at about $170 million.

Another asset he thinks he brings to the board is being willing to "call something out" when he thinks it's wrong.

Leventis added that he has always thought "it's important to ask difficult questions."

In that regard, concerning the board's budget process in the spring for the current fiscal year, he abstained during both readings because he said the entire process was "opaque" to him and lacked the necessary time and detailed focus.

Additionally, several times he called out board Chairman Shawn Ragin for his perceived conflict of interest in serving as a trustee while he also had been approved by a state authorizer to open a public charter school in Sumter in the near future. Many community members also expressed dismay that Ragin continued to serve on the school board after winning approval from the Charter Institute at Erskine to open Rise Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute (RISE) in April 2025.

Ragin's board term has just concluded now because he did not seek reelection earlier this month.

Leventis previously noted that during Ragin's two-year term as board chair, there were two new state laws passed by the General Assembly. One prohibits a state charter school authorizer from approving charter school applications submitted by local school district board members.

Another new law bans school districts from having minimum grade floors for students that Ragin tried to implement in 2025 six months after the previous school board removed the floor.

If reelected in the runoff, Leventis said last week he is "looking forward to new leadership on the board that is much more responsive to each and every board member, but also to the superintendent."

On rezoning attendance lines, or realignment, he is for the concept to benefit all district students after a master facilities plan is conducted by district administration and the board.

Ragin and board vice Chair Brian Alston essentially prevented a master plan from getting off the ground during their leadership term, favoring instead a rezoning plan from 4.5 years ago to move forward. That realignment plan, which they both voted for in April 2022, would balance schools' enrollments by shuffling students from higher-enrollment schools in the City of Sumter to lower-enrollment schools in the outlying rural areas.

On Ragin, Leventis said in September that "he single-handedly held up the master plan by not emphasizing it and putting it forward."

Rembert-area Sumter County Councilman Carlton Washington, who often involves himself in Sumter School District and board affairs, has been outspoken in support of that rezoning plan that would nearly triple the enrollment of Rembert-based Rafting Creek Elementary School.

When the realignment effort from 2021-22 was presented to the public in public information sessions in early 2022, it created outcry from district parents, especially those living in the City of Sumter.

SHERRIL RAY

Ray was a career educator in Sumter's public schools for more than 40 years. For 30-plus years, she served in the former Sumter School District 2, which was under the leadership of Superintendent Frank Baker for 19 years.

Ray's last school-level role was when she was principal at Lakewood High School from 2004 to 2013. She then became the consolidated district's hearing officer from 2013 to 2017.

Her campaign platform, she said, is achievement, accountability with district finances and board action because not much has been accomplished in recent terms.

Ray served four years with Baker, the Rev. Daryl McGhaney and current trustees Brian Alston and Matthew "Mac" McLeod as a trustee 2018-22 and was part of the board majority that tried to reopen Mayewood Middle School in 2019. After the move, then-state Superintendent Molly Spearman placed the district on a "Fiscal Emergency" declaration for violating its own financial recovery plan at the time. A previous board had closed the school less than a year earlier.

The declaration basically locked the district's finances under the state Department of Education's oversight for two years. Ray said this fall at community meetings that school board candidates attended that she still supports that decision and added she is against closing any rural schools "since it destroys the community."

"You have got to have a community school," she said. "That is very important."

Ray was a member of the board's realignment committee to rezone the district's attendance lines during the COVID-19 pandemic, even though the district did not have any schools with overcapacity issues. Baker was the committee's chairman, and the study involved an outside consultant.

At the time of the April 2022 vote for the rezoning option to move forward, she voted for a delay or phased-in approach with implementation that would also allow a new district superintendent to have some say on the implementation process.

The rezoning option approved would have moved 32% of all district high school students to a new school and 17% of all district students. For various reasons, the full board has never implemented it since then.

Ray told The Item recently that the public outcry on realignment then was because people don't like change.

At a Sept. 10 community meeting in Mayesville, she said part of her campaign focus and moving forward will be to help Area 8 residents understand that realignment will be good long term.

"I am going to do all I can to help my area, the city people, realize that realignment is not going to hurt," Ray said. "In the end, it's going to help everybody. You do have a lot of people who are opposed to it because people don't like to change, but it can be done."

She then referenced during the 1990s when the former Sumter School District 2 decided to build and open the two new high schools in the county - Lakewood and Crestwood High School - and people were upset with the concept. In the end, though, Ray said it has turned out well.

When she spoke to The Item in mid-October for the newspaper's original Area 8 race story, she said that realignment could take a different look now with different variations because the first study is essentially outdated. Ray added that "the original plan to move that many high school students probably isn't a good idea."

Ray added she would like to see Sumter High remain a bigger school.

Regarding older, dilapidated schools in the City of Sumter, she favors closing those schools - if it is deemed necessary - and moving those students to outlying rural schools in the county that are in better physical condition. She favors that approach instead of potentially building new schools in the city.

"We may have to end up closing some schools, but it might not be rural schools," Ray said.

Carlton Washington also favors that approach, and he endorsed her during her campaign for the Area 8 seat, even though it is outside his Rembert-based district.

Washington also endorsed McGhaney in Area 4 in the eastern portion of the county over Tarah Cousar-Johnson. Cousar-Johnson won on Nov. 3 with 57.7% of the vote.

Ray added that she also supports a board master plan concept now to go along with realignment because so many variables are involved in such a detailed process, even though in the previous rezoning initiative such planning was never considered by board members.

In March 2019, the nine-member board that included Ray voted unanimously to select Penelope Martin-Knox as the district's superintendent. She started July 1, 2019, and then 2.5 years later in December 2021 Ray was part of the five-member majority who were against granting her an extension.

Martin-Knox was scheduled to serve through June 30, 2022, but in late February of that year, Ray was part of the same five-member majority that tried to speed her exit with an impromptu motion to remove her as superintendent immediately with pay to conclude her term.

Martin-Knox was against those conditions, and a judge ruled a few weeks later that the motion violated the state's Freedom of Information Act and the full board was forced to hire her back to conclude her term.

Ray said she still supports that decision and added that it was in the best interest of the district.