By Andy Brack | Some of the biggest issues for the legislature this year look like they could come back as big issues next year, according to veteran Statehouse observers.
With less than two months left in the 2015 legislative session, it’s not clear whether state lawmakers will pass significant legislation on matters they stressed were important at the beginning of the year: toughening domestic violence laws, providing more money for road maintenance and repairs, and reforming state ethics laws.
“They haven’t really been able to get it together,” notes College of Charleston political science professor Gibbs Knotts.
To be fair, the tough often only get going when it gets tougher in South Carolina politics. In other words, lawmakers hunker down at the end of the session to rush to finish things as the political heat starts rising. It happens every year.
But the legislative record so far this year is think. After three months of work, lawmakers have ratified 19 bills into law. Two major measures — to make the state adjutant general’s office appointed instead of elected, and to authorize raffles by charities — were perfunctory as voters approved them in the 2014 election. Other bills that became law require mandatory furloughs at embattled S.C. State University to save some money and to allow the state grand jury to take up human trafficking cases. And if you were wondering, lawmakers also approved a measure that makes October become “Italian-American Heritage Month.”
Here’s a quick look at the status of three major policy areas that are unresolved:
Ethics reform
The Senate spent a lot of time last year grappling with ways to make campaign finance and reporting laws tougher as an ethics scandal embroiled then-House Speaker Bobby Harrell. In the end, they didn’t reach a compromise over whether legislators should sit on a reformed state ethics commission. And Harrell got dumped as speaker after resigning, admitting misconduct and pleading to six misdemeanor charges of illegally using campaign funds.
In January, it looked like ethics reform was on the fast-track to passage. The House passed a handful of independent bills on various changes, which caused the Senate to complain that it would be tough to handle lots of different bills. So the House combined its measures into one bill, which now sits with the Senate, again is bogged down on the issue of lawmakers serving on the ethics commission.
At present, Sen. Kent Williams, D-Marion, has a block on the House bill, said Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Larry Martin, R-Pickens. And until it’s removed, little can be done unless senators get the bill put up as a special order, which is tough in the waning days of a session, particularly with domestic violence, road funding and the budget on the agenda.
“My view of it is that legislators can’t be on the panel that reviews serious ethics complaints,” Martin said. “But there’s a difference of opinion about that still.”
Road funding
With South Carolina having more than $40 billion in road maintenance and repair needs over the next 15 years, lawmakers know they have to do something to steer more money to roads. To fail, they understand, might make the state less competitive economically because businesses don’t want to move goods on poor roads.
Three plans have emerged. Gov. Nikki Haley’s $350 million-a-year plan includes a gas tax hike of up to 10 cents per gallon along with a big income tax rate cut. House leaders have pushed a $427 million-a-year plan that raises the gas tax and boosts a sales tax cap on vehicles to $500, but has limited income tax cuts. And an $800 million-a-year Senate plan calls for a 12-cent per gallon gas tax hike, other hikes and no cuts.
The House is expected to take up its plan on the floor in the next two weeks. The Senate continues to grapple with its plan, making it likely that nothing will be ready in time for the end of the session.
Still, more money for roads is doable, Martin says, but Haley, who seems to have drawn a line in the sand about offsets for tax increases, may be a key.
“You’ve got the governor out there with a pretty huge stake in the debate insofar as what she’s willing to accept,” he said. “It doesn’t appear there’s a consensus at all that’s been reached about that.”
Domestic violence
There’s a tug-a-war between the House and Senate over strengthening domestic violence laws.
Earlier in the session, the Senate passed a measure that would toughen domestic violence laws, including keeping guns out of the hands of folks accused of the crime. The House isn’t as sure such a move is necessary and is working on its own bill.
From a procedural standpoint, the House, which should debate domestic violence on the floor in the coming week, has two options. It can strip the Senate bill it has received of Senate language and replace it with House-approved language. That would mean the Senate would receive the same actual bill number — even though language was different — and allow it to take up the measure quickly, which likely would lead to it being sent to a House-Senate compromise committee to work out a deal.
Or, the House can send its own bill to the Senate for consideration. But that would cause the Senate to send the whole thing through its committee structure, which may be enough of a delay to keep anything from happening this session.
A House staffer was mum on which option the House is expected to take. If it sends a House bill, look for real firestorms of criticism and a lot of finger-pointing between chambers.
What’s next?
Knotts says there may be two reasons that Columbia’s leaders haven’t been able to get it together this year.
First, House Speaker Jay Lucas and the top Senate officer, Senate Pro Tem Hugh Leatherman, are new to their roles. While they’re experienced in dealing with legislation in their respective chambers, their new roles also focus on getting the chambers to work together, he said.
Second, the S.C. General Assembly is starting to be affected by the same gridlock that has paralyzed Congress on the federal level. Republicans in South Carolina may control the House, Senate and governor’s office, but they’re not cohesive, Knotts said. And opposition Democrats are acting more like an opposition party instead of working together to get things done.
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