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COLUMBIA: After nearly a year of discussion and three weeks of floor debate,
the Senate finally reached consensus Thursday on a property tax relief plan.
The Senate gave second reading to a bill that would give voters the choice
county-by-county of substituting increased sales taxes for property taxes.
The measure also raises the state sales tax by half a cent, to 5 1/2 cents,
to remove county operating costs from tax bills.
The vote at 8:45 p.m. came almost 11 hours after the session started.
Determined to reach an agreement Thursday, senators worked through lunch and
voted down three motions to adjourn and go home for the weekend.
One big hurdle remains. Opponents question whether the local option
provision would require changing the state constitution, and would therefore
need two-thirds approval. Senators said they would study the bill over the
weekend to figure out what they need to do. The Senate will meet in a
special session Monday afternoon to give the bill third reading and return
it to the House
"It's time to deal with what we can accomplish and not make it any worse,"
said Sen. Jim Ritchie, R-Spartanburg, who helped develop the compromise.
Senators zeroed in on the plan late Thursday, after days of voting only to
kill proposals. Many of them were only slightly different as Sens. Jake
Knotts, R-West Columbia, and Larry Grooms, R-Bonneau, tried time and again
to get their plans through.
Grooms said he felt as if he were in the movie "Groundhog Day," in which
actor Bill Murray repeats the same day over and over.
The Senate plan would exempt groceries and hotel accommodations from the
half-cent sales tax increase.
Revenue from the increase would remove all county operating costs from homes
valued at up to $250,000. Owners of homes worth more than that would pay
taxes on the difference. On average, county operations account for 27
percent of homeowners' property tax bills.
Voters could choose to increase their local sales tax more to cover school
operating costs and other forms of property taxes.
Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken, criticized the local option plan as a "far cry
from the relief citizens saw in the House plan."
The House plan, approved in February, would remove all local governments'
operating costs from owner-occupied homes, leaving only local debt.
It would also eliminate the sales tax on groceries. A 2-cent increase in the
state sales tax, to 7 cents, would help pay for the plan, estimated to be
$116.8 million out of balance in the first year.
Members of the NoHomeTax.org homeowners' group said the Senate plan does not
provide real relief. The group has been running radio ads pushing senators
to act.
"The South Carolina Senate is a farce," said Emerson Read, a Charleston
resident and chairman of NoHomeTax.org. "They've given us nothing."
Becky Fagg, a Lexington County resident, said homeowner groups want the
House plan and will insist House members stick to it when the bill goes to
conference committee.
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