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House OKs budget
5/9/2008 12:24 AM   0 comment(s) on this story E-mail this story to a friend

By JIM DAVENPORT
Associated Press
COLUMBIA -- The South Carolina House approved final amendments to a $7 billion budget Thursday after agreeing to many of the cuts the Senate adopted last month.
The amended budget heads now to a conference committee for the Senate and House to work out differences.
House Minority Leader Harry Ott said Democrats had a victory in keeping the House from increasing spending for college research projects by cutting $10 million from K-5 education programs.
The House had originally set aside $30 million in grants for endowed college research programs at Clemson University, the Medical University of South Carolina and the University of South Carolina.
But in April, the states economic forecast showed the state would collect less in taxes than expected, prompting the Senate to cut $180 million from the budget, with half of that in a reserve fund typically used for one-time spending programs. The Senate cut the grant program to $10 million, but House leaders wanted to double that by tapping public school spending.
Public schools should be the priority, Ott said. "We thought that was not a good use of dollars."
Ott still had concerns about the reserve funds spending plans.
The $90 million cut left $34.5 million in that reserve. The Senate put $21 million into covering rising school bus fuel costs, $10.5 million into an early childhood education program and $3 million into paying for Novembers elections.
The House dropped the $10.5 million and instead spent nearly $5 million on a new high-speed data network for research universities and hydrogen fuel research; $5 million on tourism grants; and $1 million for dredging around the states ports.
Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman called taking money from public education for projects "the most appalling thing I've ever heard come out of any legislative body."
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Cooper defended the spending on hydrogen research.
"They're for economic development for the future," he said.
And Cooper says the state needs to continue promoting tourism, a key segment of the economy, in spite of tough budget times.
Some of the public education reductions Leatherman cited are covered elsewhere in the budget by shifting money around, Cooper said. He noted $14.4 million was taken from an account set up to build a new state farmer's market. They also stripped $10 million from a competitive grant fund used to cover water, sewer, economic development and tourism projects.
Cooper noted that public schools end up with $95 million more in the budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1. But most of that is tied to annual increases required by law in what the state pays on a per-pupil basis for education.
Elsewhere, public schools took $34 million in reductions to a host of programs, including those for the academically gifted, preschoolers with disabilities and the arts. Spending there is directly linked to the state's slumping sales tax collections.
And with diesel fuel prices staying above $4 a gallon, the state is likely to fall short on money for the basics of covering the costs of getting students to schools.
"I expect they'll probably be running a deficit next year unless they find money from other accounts," Cooper said.
The Senate didn't wait for the House's final action on the bill before voting to reject the amendments and send the bill to a conference committee. Leatherman said "there's no way under the sun" the Senate would accept the House's changes.
Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell said the House was "trying to take this thing and turn it into a legislative grocery bag."



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