What a waste

Filed Under News, Uncategorized

Ham-fisted budget cut reveals yet another example of South Carolina’s inefficient state government

South Carolina legislators have more power than most. In most states, the governor has a wee bit more power to carry out the duties of the executive branch.

In fact, one study has said South Carolina government has created the fourth-weakest executive branch in the nation.

The result is a plodding, ineffective, wasteful state government-by-committee that is holding the state back economically and otherwise.

Yet, for all the power South Carolina legislators have, they accept very little of the responsibility.

The state Budget and Control Board voted last week, for instance, to cut the state budget 3 percent across the board — no matter how important one agency is over another, or how strapped for cash.

Gov. Mark Sanford and others, us included, believe big budget cuts ought to be targeted, so they make sense. These one-size-fits-all cuts are like taking a meat cleaver into microsurgery.

Such decisions should have been made by the legislature, in special session if necessary. Across-the-board cuts are taking the easy way out and doing the most damage.

Sanford noted that, while education and correction officials will be hard-hit, a program bringing German politicians to South Carolina for a visit will remain untouched.

Sanford says the move will put corrections officials $8 million in the hole. Cuts to education will amount to nearly $80 million.

Local school boards may end up holding the bag. But you can’t blame legislators. They weren’t around!

It’s difficult to hold South Carolina legislators to account even when they’re in session: The South Carolina Policy Council reports that the state Senate tallies roll-call votes only 1 percent of the time on bills that pass either chamber, and the House only 8 percent of the time. The rest of the time, votes are muddled together anonymously as a mass voice vote in which no one is accountable.

That’s apparently how they like it.

Well, not all of them: State Sen. Shane Massey, R-Edgefield, says he will get four of his colleagues to join him in calling for roll-call votes on every bill that spends public money until the rules require it. Good for him!

Meanwhile, Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, is working with other legislators to permanently require roll-call votes on bills that spend tax dollars. Let’s hope they get it done.

South Carolina would then finally join the rest of the Southeast in holding legislators accountable for their votes: According to the South Carolina Policy Council, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi all mandate roll call voting on final passage of all bills; Tennessee requires it on all bills; and North Carolina mandates roll call votes on second and third reading of revenue bills. South Carolina requires roll- call votes only on a handful of matters.

Why is such accountability important? Well, it directly affects your pocketbook: Last April, the South Carolina House approved a 2 percent state pay raise on a voice vote — despite the looming budget deficit now requiring cuts of 3 percent across the board.

But wait! When, after a public outcry, another vote was taken — this time by roll call — the pay raise went down to defeat. Funny how daylight changes one’s ability to see.

Any lawmaker not willing to register an identifiable and recordable vote in public should not hold elected office.

The Augusta Chronicle
August 17, 2008

Posted August 18, 2008 

Comments

Leave a Reply




website stats