What’s Hot in the Hopper

The South Carolina General Assembly will officially convene for the 2015-2016 session tomorrow, but Statehouse staff have already been hard at work drafting legislation for the “pre-filing” period, which is now complete. While some pre-filed bills are dropped in the hopper purely for shock value and will never see the light of day, others are indicative of broad support and will be up to bat as early as next week. Here is a quick review of bills that fall into the categories that the Forum has identified as the key drivers of South Carolina’s future growth and competitiveness as a state.

On education, some legislators just want to spend more...and idea that is being repudiated even by the South Carolina Supreme Court, as we saw in the recent Abbeville decision. Others want the constitution to require a “high-quality” education rather than a “minimally adequate” one or to make the currently elected Superintendent of Education a Gubernatorial appointment. Then there are bills to establish a Board of Regents for higher education, operate K-12 schools year-round, raise teacher pay, extend bus transportation, expand wireless internet access, and delay implementation of new education standards.

But the Education bills we like best are: those that expand the school choice tax credit from those currently eligible (children with Exceptional Needs) to all children trapped in poverty. We also like the bill to make that same Exceptional Needs temporary budget proviso a part of permanent law.

What are other proposals we hope to see? Our Top Ten calls for incenting excellence in teaching, strengthening charters, providing more paths to certification as a teacher, and reforming education governance among other bold reforms. We would also like to begin a statewide conversation on the need for Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) like those in Arizona and Florida. Here is a new article from the journal National Affairs on this transformative policy proposal.

On taxes and fiscal issues, there are bills to protect the capital reserve fund, to enact a Fair or flat tax, to require audits of municipal governments, to eliminate corporate income taxes, to increase the homestead tax exemption, to raise the car sales tax cap, to stop additional fees, to go to a biennial budget, and to allow a wider range of investment for state employee pension plans.

The tax and fiscal issues we really like are those that promote fiscal fitness: an analysis of the state level of dependence on federal funding, more transparency in tax incentives for attracting businesses, reduction and elimination of the state income tax, an earned income tax credit for poor South Carolinians, and state spending limitations.

On energy, there is legislation to encourage development of offshore wind research and development. An “all of the above energy” policy is important and as our Offshore Opportunity report shows, oil and natural gas exploration would also be transformative for our economy, and should be encouraged.

On healthcare, we see attempts to nullify the ACA and some attempt at needed Certificate of Need (CON) reform, but few true state-based innovations to increase access and lower costs have been filed.  It’s also critical that legislators remain vigilant against any expansion of our broken Medicaid system, for the many reasons outlined in our research on the issue.

On labor and business, and a bill has been filed to prevent public officers or employees from organizing or striking.  One interesting note is that as our research shows unionized workers actually earn less in South Carolina than their non-unionized counterparts.

On transportation and infrastructure, there are a number of bills to raise the fuel tax, focus resources on repairing existing roads, send any newly found money only to the highway fund, and restructure the transportation (DOT) commission. Look for more on this from the Forum soon.

Please let us know your thoughts on these and any other public policy issues. We are here for you and look forward to keeping you updated on how these issues develop and could impact you and your family in 2015 and beyond.