South Carolina Statehouse Blog

Dear Friends:

Today at noon the second session of the 118th General Assembly convenes and this will begin my second year representing the people of Kershaw and Richland counties from District 79. Thank you for the opportunity to be your voice at the State House. It is my goal to provide honest and consistent leadership on the issues that impact the lives of South Carolinians.

In keeping with my mission, I wanted to provide you a quick update about what’s on tap for this legislative session. Issue number one is our state’s struggling economy. We have more than 600,000 South Carolinians out of work right now. Many of them have stopped looking for jobs in our state. Additionally, we have a state budget in crisis. Over the last 7 years, we have run budget deficits totaling $2.3 Billion. This year alone we may have to trim another $500 million from our state’s woeful budget. This means even more programs and services will have to be cut and/or eliminated. No agency or organization will be spared from some kind of reduction.

Some will ask, why is our budget in such bad shape? Is it only the economy causing this crisis? Unfortunately it is not just the economy that has driven our state budget into the ditch. The thing that has brought our state budget to its knees is years of irresponsible fiscal policy and poor budget management. We have years of bad public policy lumped on top of worse public policy that has resulted in a financial crisis of the basic functions of our government. One of these basic functions is providing a quality educational system for our children to learn and grow. With our state’s bad tax policies we have not put our teachers in the best position to prepare our children for the changing economy in the 21st century. I personally think it’s immoral not to provide our children with the best opportunity to succeed in the future. I think we owe it to the next generation to be better stewards of the future.

Nonetheless, I am hopeful that this year we will be able to address these issues and pass meaningful legislation that will work to move South Carolina forward. I have met with business, education and community leaders who all agree that its time we work together to move South Carolina forward. It is simply time that partisan bickering and loyalties are set aside so that we can accomplish this shared goal of bringing progress to South Carolina. So, here are my priorities for 2010:

Better Tax Policy: The State of South Carolina has struggled to have a fair and balanced tax system. We have huge inequities in our tax system. We have compounded those inequities with bad public policy like Act 388 which is a property for sales tax swap that created a funding crisis in our schools, overtaxed small business and stifled economic development in our state. There isn’t a leader on either side of the isle that I have met with over the legislative break that wants Act 388 to remain the law as it is today. We all are in agreement that this was bad tax policy and it is Act 388 that is preventing South Carolina from generating the necessary revenue to fund the basic rights and services that our citizen’s demand of the state, such as education and making sure our local government and First Responders have the resources needed to protect the safety of the public. Equally important, Act 388 is crushing existing business in South Carolina and preventing future business from growing in our state. It will require major changes in our tax code to solve the crisis created by 10 years of irresponsible tax policy that has been compounded by Act 388.

In March, we are slated to receive the results of the Tax Realignment Commission (TRAC). Last year we passed a bill that tasked a panel with doing a study of our tax structure here in South Carolina (except for Act 388, which is half of the tax structure), as the results of this study come back our state will have to look into ways of correcting this ineffective maze.

The State Budget: The major task of the Legislative Session will be to pass a prioritized budget that allocates funds to our most vital state agencies and departments that directly impact the people of South Carolina. There will be tough decisions that will have to be made in this bad budget year. The goal is to do no more harm than has already been done.

Jobs and Employment: In a state where we have had record unemployment we must find ways to encourage and produce jobs for the people of South Carolina. Putting people back to work has to be a primary goal of each elected official. It is our job as leaders who have been elected to represent our respective districts and communities to help create job opportunities for our constituents. We have started this process with the securing of Boeing Airlines to SC. Now we must improve the coordination and the effectiveness of our unemployment and workforce development programs. It’s pointless to have these programs if we can’t get people to new jobs. Additionally, we also need to help our small businesses in South Carolina. We have to remove the burdens on these businesses and provide them better incentives to expand and create more jobs in our state.

Transparency & Accountability: There is an old saying in church, “What is done in the dark must come to the light”. This saying is fitting for what needs to happen in our state government. There are too many things that happen each day of the legislative session that most citizens never find out about until long after its over. We must have more transparency and accountability in our government. I have always been a strong proponent of shining the light on our government process so citizens can know about the decisions we make and how we vote on the issues. I am proud to say that I co-sponsored and voted for a rule change in 2009 that requires more on the record voting but many votes are still done anonymously and are never recorded, particularly on the committee level. That’s right, we can’t go online and see how our legislators vote in committee meetings. As you would assume, there are several votes that happen long before a bill gets to the floor of the House of Representatives and I think its important to see the entire voting record.

These are my priorities, but I am sure there will be several others that will emerge during the 6 months we are scheduled to be in session. I invite you all to be as involved as you can be in our government. Please contact me if you have issues or ideas you would like addressed and I urge you to participate in other ways.

You can watch us on the Internet at www.scstatehouse.gov, where you can choose a video feed, or you can come into Columbia and visit in person. I am always glad to see District 79 residents at the State House.

I thank you in advance for taking time to be part of the process and for allowing me the honor of serving you and our state government.

Sincerely,

Rep. Anton J. Gunn