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COLUMBIA -- The Senate's majority leader said Thursday that any additional money for the state's transportation agency must be paired with reforms, mirroring comments last month by the House speaker and Gov. Mark Sanford.

Sen. Harvey Peeler's comments came as lawmakers prepared committees to study an upcoming, year-long review of the giant agency, which maintains more than 40,000 miles of roadway in the state with a $1 billion budget and a 5,000-employee work force.

Lawmakers last year asked for a performance audit of the state Department of Transportation after DOT Chairman Tee Hooper alleged mismanagement and following newspaper stories about the agency's spending and hiring.

The Greenville News last year reported that the agency bought Chevrolet Tahoe SUVs for four of its executives; paid a highway commissioner $111,000 in between his board terms for public relations work that included writing letters for the agency's executive director; and paid Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer $130,000 for a tenth of an acre and a storage building, more than twice the amount it initially offered him.

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The agency also spent about $250 million on two private consulting contracts for a seven-year accelerated construction program, The News reported.

DOT Executive Director Elizabeth Mabry in June declared the agency was in a "transportation funding crisis" and asked lawmakers to increase annual funding by more than $1 billion over the next decade.

Almost all of DOT's money comes from the fed- eral government or state gas taxes, which haven't been raised since 1987.

Peeler, a Gaffney Republican who will chair the Senate Finance Committee's study of the findings of the Legislative Audit Council, said he wants to keep an open mind about DOT's management until he reads the report. But he said changes are needed.

"I also feel the need of some reform and restructuring over there," he said. "The governor has his thoughts (about reforms), and the Legislature has its thoughts. But something has got to be done. Hopefully this report will shed some light about what needs to be done."

Last month, House Speaker Bobby Harrell proposed finding $200 million in additional annual funding for state transportation work. But he said the money should come with reforms at DOT.

The governor has said repeatedly that the agency should fall under restructuring, to make it more accountable. Sanford said that in 47 other states, the governor appoints either the transportation agency's director or its board.

In South Carolina, the governor appoints the board chairman. The other six members are appointed by the Legislature.

Also Thursday, the chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee announced the creation of a second committee to study LAC's findings.

Sen. Greg Ryberg, an Aiken Republican who chairs the Senate Transportation Committee, said his subcommittee, chaired by Sen. Larry Grooms of Berkeley County, will have "no restrictions" on its examination of DOT and the report.

"I encourage the subcommittee to leave no stone unturned and no idea unexplored in its effort to improve the operation of the agency that builds and maintains our roads and bridges," Ryberg said.

Ryberg and Peeler said they believe the committees can complement each other rather than overlap. Peeler said he thinks his panel will look more at issues of funding.

Earlier Thursday, the Legislative Audit Council voted to accept a revised version of the DOT audit report a month after board members asked that parts of it be rewritten.

The report by the Legislative Audit Council is expected to be publicly released during the first couple of weeks of November, said LAC Director George Schroeder. Schroeder said the report may run 60 pages, two or three times the normal length of LAC reports.

"It's certainly one of the LAC's most thorough audits," he said.

He said the revisions concerned factual problems raised by DOT officials.

"Essentially, the report is as it has been since the auditors finished the first draft," he said.

The report has already been the focus of closed-door meetings of the DOT commission.

Officials privy to the report are barred by law from publicly discussing it until its release.