Clock ticking as SC lawmakers head into final week of legislative session

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) - Medical marijuana, hate crimes, judicial reform, and energy expansion are all on the line this week at the South Carolina State House.

Those are among the bills that need to pass in the legislature by Thursday to stay alive, or else they die for the year.

State law requires the General Assembly to wrap up its work for the legislative session by 5 p.m. on the second Thursday in May, setting up a race to the finish when lawmakers gavel in Tuesday for their final week.

Thousands of bills have been filed over the course of the two-year session, ranging from many that haven’t gotten as much as a hearing to those that are just a vote away from reaching the governor’s desk.

So now lawmakers must decide which ones to prioritize as time winds down.

“We’re going to have plenty of work to do,” Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, R – Edgefield, said. “I think we’re going to have our hands full, just working through the calendar and dealing with whatever the House sends back to us.”

Among the bills awaiting a debate in the House are two major pieces of legislation that have already passed in the Senate.

The first would make changes to the process by which the legislature selects judges.

The other would merge six state health and human service agencies — the existing Departments of Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse Services, Disabilities and Special Needs, Health and Human Services, Mental Health, and Aging, plus the new Department of Public Health that will be created this summer, when the Department of Health and Environmental Control splits — into one.

The House has already passed its own version of that legislation, but one chamber must approve the other’s bill to send it to the governor.

Across the hall, senators expect to wrap up debate on a House bill that updates South Carolina’s name, image, and likeness, or NIL, law for college athletes.

Senators also have yet to debate a top priority this year from the Speaker of the House, an expansive energy reform bill.

But it seems that bill — which includes the authorization of a proposed partnership between state-owned Santee Cooper and privately-owned Dominion Energy to open a natural gas plant in Colleton County — is unlikely to move this week.

“Some of my members are ready to vote on that and authorize Santee Cooper to join in with Dominion, and that makes sense because they may save money, but others still want to hear some more. And we really didn’t have but one full subcommittee on it. It came to us late,” Senate Minority Leader Brad Hutto, D – Orangeburg, said. “I know the House seems to be pushing it, but I don’t see there’s any way we’ll get to it.”

Some senators have called for more time to study the issue in the off-session this fall.

“I am confident that we will get answers to our questions, we will be more confident in the information that we have, and that we will be in a position to go forward with some significant energy legislation early 2025,” Massey, among the most vocal proponents for pumping the brakes on this bill, said.

Bills that fail to pass both chambers by the time the session ends Thursday evening are dead and will have to be refiled next year.

Among the legislation likely to meet that fate are the bills to legalize medical marijuana and to establish a state hate crimes law.

But after Thursday, lawmakers will not completely leave Columbia for the year just yet.

They will be back for a special session in June to elect a new state Supreme Court justice and to wrap up work on bills that have already passed both chambers but have differences that need to be worked out, including the next state budget.

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