McMaster poised to sign bill to avoid SC government shutdown, fund COVID-19 response
South Carolina lawmakers on Tuesday adopted an emergency measure that now keeps state government funded past June 30 and spends millions of dollars more to respond to the state’s COVID-19 outbreak and response.
As of print deadline, Gov. Henry McMaster was expected to sign the legislation into law on Tuesday.
For the second time over the past month, the S.C. House and Senate adopted legislation typically passed when budget negotiations hit a wall, sending $155 million in one-time surplus dollars to a COVID-19 reserve account and another $25 million to the Medical University of South Carolina to help the state’s public health agency with statewide coronavirus testing.
Tuesday was lawmakers’ first time back to the state Capitol since early April when they failed pass two emergency measures to keep state services funded and to outline when lawmakers would return to work. That deal broke down over a debate that revolved around the future of Santee Cooper, the state’s debt-saddled public utility.
State House leaders have since attempted to work out their differences behind the scenes, without having lawmakers return to crowded chambers as the positive number of cases of coronavirus have continued to climb.
Lawmakers will return to the State House in September to pass a new budget, and take up any matters passed in either chamber.
Most legislators Tuesday took their assigned seats on the House and Senate floor despite social distancing guidelines.
But many Republican and Democratic lawmakers wore masks, some wore gloves and at least two House members — state Reps. Annie McDaniel, D-Fairfield, and Eddie Tallon, R-Spartanburg — wore face shields.
Lawmakers are slated to return to the State House to pass a new budget in September.
The legislation passed Tuesday has major implications for state government.
Under legislation signed by McMaster Tuesday, state agencies and universities can now furlough employees. The state’s colleges in particular been hit hard because of COVID-19 as university officials attempt to offset millions of dollars in losses after moving classes to online and returning money to students.
And it spends up to $15 million to ensure poll workers and voters are safe in the June and November elections.
Lawmakers made several unsuccessful attempts to further tweak the legislation.
State Rep. Wendy Brawley, D-Richland, asked her colleagues to attach an amendment that would expand absentee voting for all upcoming elections, covering voters who are trying to avoid contracting the novel virus.
That effort failed.
And a handful of Republican lawmakers from the Upstate voiced concern that contact tracing, a process the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control has used for years to help stop the spread of diseases, will impede on privacy and could even result in forcing people to self-quarantine.
“Part of my concern with this entire situation ... (is) if these contact tracers were to get out of hand or to ruin our Fourth Amendment and invasion of privacy, that kind of stuff,” said state Rep. Stewart Jones, R-Laurens. “So, I am very concerned about bringing any more power to any part of government in this House. I think we need more freedom.”
House budget chairman Murrell Smith, R-Sumter, sought to reassure lawmakers Tuesday the bill would not mandate anyone to self-quarantine, leaving that option to a person contacted by a DHEC tracer.
“That is not the role of the government in South Carolina or in the United States,” Smith said.
This story was originally published May 12, 2020 at 2:52 PM with the headline "McMaster poised to sign bill to avoid SC government shutdown, fund COVID-19 response."
