Examining South Carolina’s massive proposed budget
While the 2021 regular legislative session ends this week, lawmakers are set to return to Columbia in June – possibly on three separate occasions – to address a number of matters as allowed per the end-of-session rules, or “sine die” resolution. The most immediate of these legislative responsibilities is passing the state budget, as the […]
What’s going on with Santee Cooper?
UPDATE as of 5/7/21: This week, the House voted to keep the option to explore selling Santee Cooper in H.3194, while adopting some of the Senate’s “reform” measures, including those that would increase lawmakers’ power over the utility. The Senate version of the bill does not contain the option of selling Santee Cooper. Because of […]
Bills update 2021: what passed and what to watch
Last week (Saturday, April 10) was the 2021 crossover deadline, which means bills that failed to pass one chamber (House or Senate) and cross to the other by this date would need a two-thirds vote to be considered. As this is the first year in a two-year session, bills that failed to meet this deadline […]
S.499 – Election law challenges & appointments
This bill (S.499) would establish that the House speaker and Senate president, on behalf of their respective bodies, have an “unconditional right” to intervene in a state court action that challenges: The validity of an election law An election policy The manner in which an election is conducted Similarly, in federal court, the bill adds […]
Lawmakers want fewer checks on higher education spending
Update: House lawmakers inserted language from the bill as a proviso in the state budget, which passed the chamber Wednesday. The budget bill now heads to the Senate. Under S.376, as passed by the Senate Education Committee, the state’s largest universities (University of South Carolina-Columbia, Clemson and the Medical University of South Carolina) would be […]
Diverting gas tax dollars to pay local officials?
On Tuesday, the South Carolina Senate passed a bill that would pay certain transportation officials (appointed by lawmakers) using their county’s local share of gas tax revenue. S.447 would pay each member of the Lee County Transportation Committee (CTC) $100 for each meeting attended, for up to fifteen meetings. This bill would also make the […]
Bills filed during 2/2/21 – 2/4/21
. Taxation/ Spending H.3790 – Appropriating an additional 4% of the funds received by the General Fund from admission taxes to the Dept. of Parks, Recreation and Tourism for exclusive use of the SC Film Commission until the Commission receives 46% of the fund’s admission tax annually H.3820 – Paying the Spartanburg County School District […]
Bills filed during 1/25/21 – 1/28/21
. Spending S.491 – Issuance of $550 million in General Obligation bonds (backed by every taxpayer in the state) for a Charleston Port expansion project H.3707 – Appropriating $45,000,000 to MUSC and $63,000,000 to DHEC from the Contingency Relief Fund (and another $100,000,000 to a vaccine reserve account) H.3770 – Authorizing the use of federal […]
Bills filed during 1/12/21 – 1/21/21
Education H.3611 – Creating a massive data collecting system that tracks children from preschool through the workforce (the data warehouse) the bill is nearly identical to what lawmakers introduced in 2019, which you can read about here H.3588 – Requiring students have one credit in computer science, math and English, and achieve a score of at least 22 […]
Bills to watch in 2021
Before convening the 2021 legislative session (which began earlier this month) lawmakers filed roughly one thousand bills in advance of the New Year, known as “prefiles”. These bills can offer a look into what the legislative priorities will be over the next few months. Below is a look at some of the most substantial bills […]
