COLUMBIA, S.C. (WSPA) – The South Carolina legislative session ended for the year at 5:00 Thursday evening, with several bills passing at the last minute. Bills to give military retirees a tax break, to shorten the legislative session, and to ban police ticket quotas got approval at the end of the final day and are heading to Gov. Nikki Haley’s desk.
Lawmakers say the session was a success overall because they did address the state’s top priority—doing something about roads and bridges. “It’s not a cure-all, but it is a giant step forward that we were able to pass a plan that would put $4 billion to use to fix, repair, and expand our roads. It was big,” says Sen. Larry Grooms, R-Berkeley, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee and a member of the conference committee of senators and House members that worked out the final plan.
The plan will send $215 million a year to the SCDOT from the state’s General Fund budget. The SCDOT will use that money to borrow more than $2 billion. Doing that will free up other money the DOT has, which puts the entire amount available over $4 billion. About $2 billion will go to expand Interstate highways to ease congestion, $1 billion will go to replace 399 bridges that are structurally deficient or obsolete, and $1 billion will go to resurface existing roads.
But roads are also one of the biggest disappointments of the session because the plan lawmakers passed is for 10 years and does not include an ongoing, stable source of new money for roads. Sen. Karl Allen, D-Greenville, says, “I think we need to bite the bullet and put adequate revenue, even if it calls for raising the gas tax, into a stream that will stop our crumbling roads.”
The House passed a bill that included raising the gas tax, which is one of the lowest in the nation, but Gov. Nikki Haley said she would veto it, so senators didn’t pass that plan.
On the last day of the session, lawmakers also passed the “Tucker Hipps Transparency Act.” Hipps was a Clemson student who died in 2014 when he fell from a bridge during a fraternity run. The act would require public colleges and universities to report any infractions that fraternities and sororities commit by posting them online.
Other highlights of the year that lawmakers point to as accomplishments include:
–A bill to ban abortions after 19 weeks, which Gov. Haley has already signed into law
–A 2 percent pay raise for teachers in the state budget, along with raising by $130 the amount the state spends on each student
–Money for more school buses
–Creating Domestic Violence Fatality Review Committees, which will investigate all deaths that result from domestic violence to look for ways to prevent future ones
–Requiring all high school students to get instruction in how to perform CPR and how to use an Automated External Defibrillator
Ethics reform was one of the legislature’s top issues, but lawmakers did not pass a bill by the time they adjourned. However, ethics reform bills are still in conference committee so they can be taken up when lawmakers come back starting June 15th to consider any vetoes by the governor.
Bills that did not pass include one that would have required refugees to register with the state and would have held groups that sponsor refugees liable for any crimes refugees commit. Another bill that died would have required people who are transgender to use the bathroom, locker room, or changing room of the gender listed on their birth certificates.
