By FITSNews || After debating for more than seventeen hours, South Carolina’s so-called “deliberative” body approved a $21.1 billion budget early Friday morning that includes just over $5 billion in general fund revenue, a record $7.8 billion in revenue from fees and fines and a record $8.3 billion in federal funds.
The spending plan is the largest in state history – and is nearly $1 billion larger than the $20.1 billion that was spent last year (lawmakers originally budgeted $20.7 billion a year ago, but mid-year budget cuts chipped away at that total).
Debate over specific amendments was bitter, with lawmakers arguing back and forth for hours over whether or not core government functions were being unnecessarily put on the chopping block in an effort to preserve wasteful pork barrel spending (short answer: yes … yes they are). And while the small band of fiscal conservatives in the S.C. Senate clearly lost the outcome (which given the Senate’s RINOcrat majority was never really in doubt), they won the debate.
The Senate budget now moves to a conference committee where it will be reconciled with the spending plan passed earlier this year by the S.C. House. A joint version will then need to be passed by both chambers before going to S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford’s desk.
The Senate has yet to post its online journal for Thursday/ Friday morning’s debate, but we’ll be sure to bring you the highlights/ lowlights as soon as that information becomes available.
One interesting moment in the debate occurred when S.C. Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer ruled a $6 vehicle registration fee out of order – one of several fee increases in the budget that Bauer was hoping to strike out. Lawmakers came back and overruled Bauer by a vote of 28-14, however, which will cost drivers in South Carolina an estimated $22.7 million dollars this year.
Bauer told FITS Friday morning that he was outraged lawmakers didn’t adequately fund law enforcement by making cuts elsewhere in the budget, choosing instead to rely on a fee hike.
“Instead of biting the bullet and finding a way to fund law enforcement, they decided to put a bunch of fees in there,” Bauer told FITS, adding that the vehicle registration fee was by no means an isolated incident.
“There are fees all over this budget,” Bauer said. “This is not the way the people want their business done. These (lawmakers) are going to go home and tell their constituents they didn’t vote to raise taxes, but they sure voted to raise fees.”
Stay tuned, we’ll have much more on the Senate budget coming soon …
By Say What? April 30, 2010 at 11:08 am
To approve a $21.1 billion dollar budget the entity would have to appropriate those funds from sources under their control. Your repeated attempts to say that our state lawmakers are increasing their spending based on funds that they do not control is pure crap as usual. You might be correct to say that the entire state spending is increasing but you have to identify who appropriates the funds and how their share of the total spending relates to the total. The bottom line, whether you and Ashley like it or not, is that the funds that our state lawmakers control via the funding sources they control has dropped dramatically. Even if your favor candidate, Ms. Haley, had been in office, the same thing would have happened.
South Carolina voters are smart enough to read through your BS on this issue. I would like to see you prove that the general fund budget (the only budget they control) as set by our lawmakers has gone up this year. If not, go on to another subject were you have some creditability. You don’t have it here!
By Brandon April 30, 2010 at 11:14 am
Is it me, or is Andre’ sounding alot like Mark Sanford.
By CNChapin April 30, 2010 at 11:38 am
The time has come for Atlas to shrug. Screw these greedy pieces of shit.
By baker April 30, 2010 at 12:05 pm
There’s no place designated for music discussion, so I’ll put it here — cool song you’ve got up today from the youtube.
By beetrave April 30, 2010 at 1:35 pm
$21.1 billion? Give me a break. When it comes to large state agencies, there is a question of how we count recurring funds from state revenues and money that comes from other sources (like the feds). But the entire state gov’t budget can’t really be discussed in these terms.
Yawn.
By Another Opinion April 30, 2010 at 1:37 pm
Bauer mentioning not enough funding for law enforcement? Is he trying to get out of more speeding tickets? What a joke.
Since the print-spend thing & hypothetical money is working so well for the nation, why not give it a whirl in SC? Our politicos in SC have done everything else. They’ve actually become quite adept at finding ways to rip off SC citizens.
Kudos to them for being so creative as to resort to fees & fines instead of calling it what it really is, namely ripping folks off. A pay-to-play thing it is, we pay, they play.
By FITSNews April 30, 2010 at 1:54 pm
The $21.1 billion IS appropriated by the S.C. legislature, it just COMES FROM DIFFERENT SOURCES.
Sure, a lot of the federal funding is targeted and includes match ratios to incentivize the state to appropriate it to certain things, but at the end of the day the lawmakers appropriate as they see fit.
See, they even say so themselves!
By Commonman April 30, 2010 at 4:12 pm
The RINO controlled Senate is a joke. I would imagine the final version of their bill includes a lot of lobbyist input and Pee Dee/Charleston projects and/or funding. Vote all the rascals out and start from scratch.
By Charles April 30, 2010 at 7:13 pm
But how can you call them RINOS and accuse them of being influenced by lobbyist. If lobbyist were not involved they would not be Republicans, and since they are calling themselves Republicans that would make them RINOS.
By Say What? April 30, 2010 at 10:20 pm
Flow through funds (federal funds)are not funded by nor are they under the control of SC lawmakers. The control for the use of these funds is set by congress and such funds are generated by federal law. I don’t even think that the SC general assembly can refuse such funds since they are directed toward an agency by the federal government. Also, there are hundreds of millions of federal dollars flowing through state agencies that are not reflected in the state budget because they are not flow through funds. These direct funds may even come close to a billion dollars or more.
This is not an uncommon practice in that millions of dollars flow through counties and cities without those governing bodies having any control over how they are spent.
The bottom line is that the budget controlled by our state lawmakers is less than six billion dollars and falling. The attempt to imply that they are growing our state budget is prue and simple BS as you well know.
By fitsnews May 1, 2010 at 7:37 am
“Say What,”
What about the $7.8 billion in money from fees and fines? You know, the fees and fines that the legislature approves and then specifically directs into different agencies? The money that is tinkered with every year in budget provisos?
That is being funded at a RECORD level this year.
-FITS
By Legal Eagle May 1, 2010 at 3:10 pm
User fees…what’s the big deal?
By Paula May 2, 2010 at 6:04 pm
Fees taxes all the same.