House budget committee finishes work

By JIM DAVENPORT
Associated Press

COLUMBIA - A $6.3 billion budget and a couple of related spending bills are heading to the House floor.

The House Ways and Means Committee wrapped up work Wednesday morning on the spending package for the fiscal year that begins July 1. It puts new Highway Patrol troopers on the road, adds more nursing home beds for the state's aged and gives state workers a 3 percent raise.

But now comes a two week period when Gov. Mark Sanford will lobby legislators to dump much of the new spending in the legislation.

Sanford has been persistently urging legislators over the past few weeks to follow his budget priorities and principals. That included limiting spending to $5.9 billion by applying a cap on government growth, giving taxpayers a rebate of around $400 a household and repaying all the money raided from trust accounts during lean budget years.

The Ways and Means package avoids the cap Sanford wanted by not counting much of state public school spending or Medicaid programs and by using a supplemental bill packed with hard-to-vote against items, including nursing home beds.

The shortcomings Sanford sees left him sparring in the media and behind closed doors with legislators. That continued Wednesday.

After the committee's approval of three spending bills, Sanford released a statement saying "whether spending is in one bill, spread over three bills or spread over thirty bills, this budget is actually growing government by more than 11 percent on top of last year's budget which grew state government by 9.1 percent."

The budget also is at odds with a House Republican promise to pay back all the raided trust funds and curb government growth, Sanford said.

But it wasn't all sniping and fighting. Sanford said he met with Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Cooper on Wednesday morning to talk about possible budget amendments when floor debate begins.

On Tuesday, Cooper had said he had no plans to talk with Sanford about the budget.

The governor also called on the "many good conservatives in the House" to help him amend the spending package.

The budget package didn't clear the committee unanimously. Rep. Rex Rice, R-Easley, voted against the $6.3 billion budget, the $130 million supplemental bill and $102 million in spending from a rainy day account that wasn't needed in this fiscal year.

"I feel like we need to put some limits on ourselves and how much we spend," Rice said. "I don't think we have done that."

Legislators shouldn't be spending everything they can, Rice said. "We're running the biggest business in the state and every one of us sits on the board of this business," he said.

Some lawmakers already are preparing amendments. For instance, the House Democratic Caucus on Wednesday proposed increasing the state tax on cigarettes by 32 cents a pack, to 39 cents, to provide health insurance to more than 100,000 uninsured residents.

The initiative, part of a standalone bill and budget amendment, would help small businesses with fewer than 75 workers provide health care to their employees, said House Minority Leader Harry Ott, D-St. Matthews.

To qualify, employees and their spouses could earn up to 200 percent of the federal poverty rate, which is $32,180 for a family of three and $38,700 for a family of four.

Lawmakers have been reluctant to increase the state's tobacco tax, now the nation's lowest. Indeed, Rice proposed raising the tax to 37 cents a pack Tuesday, but his amendment failed with a 13-7 voted.

Still, Ott is hopeful.

"When we have an opportunity to take care of 40,000 children in this state, it's more important than politics," he said.

Frank Knapp, president and CEO of the state Small Business Chamber of Commerce, said affordable health care for employees is his group's top priority this year.

Clente Flemming, president of South Carolina Community Bank, said only 10 of his 25 employees can afford health care.