COLUMBIA - Ten years ago, Gov. Carroll Campbell's three-year fight for restructuring state government was on the verge of clearing the General Assembly in a struggle that played out amid fears of public corruption and lack of accountability.

A power-stingy General Assembly that controlled boards and commissions was poised to give up a third of its influence to the governor's office.

This year, with a General Assembly no more eager to give up power, Republican Gov. Mark Sanford said he would pick up on restructuring where Campbell left off. "He saw what I see," Sanford said.

Sanford said state government is a "dysfunctional system" that costs too much to run and doesn't do its work as efficiently as it could.

The effort, however, has been low-key. "What he's on the verge of here is getting a major reform without major controversy," Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, said.

Still, "it's a three-year process," says McConnell, whose Senate Judiciary Committee is handling key elements of the plan.

Campbell's restructuring plan took two legislative sessions, reaching his desk in June 1993. Sanford says he hopes to get his plan through by next June. That way, the process of changing the state constitution would be on the ballot in 2004.

Sanford has assuaged some of restructuring's toughest Senate foes, but he still has an uphill battle.

McConnell, for example, says he hasn't seen any improvement in state government from Campbell's restructuring. And, state Sen. John Land, D-Manning, said he worried about giving that many appointed posts to the governor with the potential for change every four years.

McConnell and Land say they do support key parts of Sanford's restructuring plan, including eliminating some constitutional officer positions.

Campbell launched his restructuring effort by appointing a 38-member panel in the wake of Operation Lost Trust, a federal sting that nabbed lawmakers selling their votes.

"Comprehensive reform generally has a moment in the sunshine," says Blease Graham, a University of South Carolina political science professor who was on Campbell's restructuring panel. "If it can be accomplished in that moment, it's done."

Campbell found such a moment, he said.

Although there's no scandal to stoke Sanford's restructuring fire, the state's budget problems are worse than a decade ago, and that could win votes.

Still, Sanford says, restructuring "is not a sensational issue, it's not one that's going to cause people to get real heated. ... You're not going to be able to have an emotional train that's running to bring about change."