SC Legislative Session Ends With Last-Minute Budget Passage

The South Carolina legislative session ended Thursday afternoon with a last-minute push to get a state budget passed.

The budget was stuck in the House at the start of the day, with Democrats blocking it because of its cuts to education and health care and some Republicans refusing to pass it because of abortion concerns. The budget allows the state health insurance plan to pay for abortions in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. Several Republicans want to stop state funding in cases of rape or incest.

House Minority Leader Harry Ott, D-St. Matthews, told House members, "This budget, according to the figures released, will cost between 2,100 and 3,800 education jobs across the state of South Carolina. This budget will force between 1,400 and 2,800 teachers to lose their job."

But House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Dan Cooper, R-Piedmont, says eliminating those cuts would mean a tax increase. "Without the cuts, yes, we'd have to find some way to raise revenue," he says.

After the House Republican Caucus met, the Republicans who had been blocking passage of the budget instead voted for it, with the understanding that the party will make a priority next year a bill to require a 24-hour waiting period for abortions and to work to end abortion coverage in the state health plan for rape and incest victims.

That sent the budget to the Senate, where it first looked like it might not pass before the 5:00 deadline. The first vote was a tie. But when senators took another vote, they passed the budget. It now goes to Gov. Mark Sanford for possible vetoes. Lawmakers have agreed to go back to Columbia June 15th to consider any vetoes.

"It's been an incredibly difficult session because of the budget situation," House Speaker Bobby Harrell, R-Charleston, says. "And in a very hard budget year we've written a budget without raising taxes and without raising fees."

He says lawmakers also passed several major bills:

--A cigarette tax increase of 50 cents per pack, the first cigarette tax increase in the state since 1977.

--Sentencing reform, a law that will lock up violent and repeat offenders for longer sentences, making room for them by sending non-violent criminals into alternative programs like drug treatment and restitution.

--Employment Security Commission reform. Lawmakers renamed the agency the Department of Employment and Workforce, made it a cabinet agency to make it more accountable, and restructured the agency.

A bill to ban texting while driving did not pass before lawmakers adjourned. Neither did a bill to take the driver's licenses away from teens who drop out of school, or a bill to legalize charity raffles.

Since this was the second year of a two-year session, any bill that didn't pass will have to start over next year.