| Senate Passes Budget |
| The state Senate has passed South
Carolina's $5 billion budget. But questions remain whether some taxes and fees may be increased to pay for education and health care programs. The Senate's budget is $200 million less than the House version. But it may not stay that way for long. Senators are planning to take up a bill that could increase the state's cigarette tax by 53 cents to 60 cents a pack, increase traffic ticket fees and raise the state's sales tax. Each day they debate, it costs taxpayers about 70 thousand dollars. Your money may not being spent wisely. The minutes of a recent Monday special session showed. The special session began at 1:30 and the budget was on everyone's mind, but just six minutes later it was time for a break. Senators reconvened at 1:58 to resume the budget battle and recessed a full 12 minutes later. This break was not to exceed 10 minutes. The 10 minutes turned into nearly 4 hours. They reconvened at 5:58. It was business as usual until just past 7:30. A grand total of 119 minutes. Lexington Republican Senator Jake Knotts defends the day by saying, "It was a strategy plan to let them know we were getting down to business." Democratic Senator Darrell Jackson says, "Senate operates a different. We meet personally with groups and try and work a compromise so we don't debate and argue on floor". Each day the Legislature meets it cost's taxpayers about 70 thousand dollars. The question remains why didn't lawmakers already have the private session out of the way before Monday so they could get down to business. Senator Knotts says "It's a matter of we should have done this three weeks ago." Senator Jackson says" I didn't want to come back Monday and in retrospect probably could have waited until Tuesday." Meanwhile, the House is waiting on the Senate budget and hoping they see the budget before the end of the week. The senate insists they will meet the deadline. Time is of the essence and hopefully they will spend more than 119 minutes on the floor. If you feel the Senators time can be better spent, click on the newslinks portion of our website. |