Saturday, December 21, 2024
The S.C. House will vote on H.3374 this week, a bill that would severely restrict revenue for the local government fund.
State law, passed in 1991, requires the S.C. General Assembly to return 4.5% of last year’s state general fund revenue to local governments.
However, in many budget years, the S.C. General Assembly has passed a one-year exception to the law allowing it to send back to local governments less than the mandated 4.5%.
It appears the S.C. House is fully intent on dumping approximately 50% of the current state road network onto the backs of the counties.
Reading into H.3579, the bill that has the most support among S.C. House members, the intent becomes quite apparent.
While it has been said repeatedly in the media that counties would have the option to accept the roads from the state, this isn’t quite true.
The S.C. General Assembly appears to be waging war on local governments based on some of the proposed bills gaining traction in this session.
For an assemblage whose members cry like babies when they perceive the federal government interfering with South Carolina’s own particular definition of state’s rights, the S.C. General Assembly has no compunction when doing exactly the same thing or worse to its local governments.
Hypocrisy thy name is South Carolina legislators.
The S.C. House plan to fix roads is still in the planning stages, but the politics in it resembles the best thoughts of Niccolo Machiavelli.
Rep. Gary Simrill, R-York, will, reportedly, introduce the plan next week. Simrill chaired a special committee over the summer and fall that developed the plan.
Highlights of the plan include lowering the state’s gas tax at the pumps from its current 16.75 cents to 10.75 cents, but it would add a six percent sales tax to gas sales at the wholesale level. Not only would the wholesale tax be passed on to the consumer by being added to the price of gas at the pump, but it would increase overall gas taxes paid by the end consumer. (If you reduce a tax by 6 cents, but add back a 6 percent tax, any price over $1 per gallon results in a tax increase. Low as gas prices are right now, they are still considerably more than $1.)
We finally know the secret plan of Gov. Nikki Haley to fix the state’s roads.
Haley announced her three-part plan to fix state roads during her State of the State address two nights ago.
The three-part plan is – increase the state gas tax by 10 cents over three years, decrease state income tax rates by 2 percent over 10 years and restructure the Department of Transportation from a legislative appointed agency to a governor appointed agency.
A citizens’ alliance is pushing S.C. General Assembly members to fix S.C. roads before the infrastructure collapses completely.
The S.C. Alliance to Fix Our Roads (SCFOR) is increasing online efforts to make the peoples’ voices heard in Columbia.
With the new legislative session just underway, SCFOR hopes to increase grassroots efforts contact state and local leaders to demand a plan to fix our roads.
The east/west divide in Horry County is evidently creeping into discussions about project priorities by the Ride III Committee.
This was as inevitable as it is unhelpful.
Western area representatives on the committee appear to be looking for another fixed percentage of Ride III funds to be allotted to paving dirt roads.
Last October, during her reelection campaign, Gov. Nikki Haley told South Carolinians that she had a secret plan to fix the state’s roads she would announce after the election.
When the election was won, Haley said she couldn’t divulge the road maintenance plan until the New Year, but it would be obvious in her budget.
When Haley’s budget was made public last week, there was no money or plans to fix the state’s roads.
A plan being discussed in the S.C. House to transfer state roads to counties will accomplish nothing in the way of improved maintenance.
Put forward by Rep. Gary Simrill who is chairing the House Transportation, Infrastructure, and Management Ad Hoc Committee, the plan would transfer approximately 50 percent of currently state maintained (or unmaintained as the case may be) roads to county responsibility.
Simrill’s proposal has some talk about fully funding the local government fund and increasing “C” funds, which are a small percentage of state gas tax revenues given back to the counties through County Transportation Committees.
Several groups in Horry County are already making plans to oppose a Ride III referendum.
While specific reasons for opposition differ among the groups, they can all be gathered under the general umbrella of opposition to special interest projects.
One group opposes spending any money on the I-73 folly. Another opposes the SELL road on the south end of the county and a third opposes using Ride III money for the rerouting of U.S. 501 in Myrtle Beach.
Speak Up…