S.C. lawmakers jump back on earmark bandwagon

BY RICK BRUNDRETT

The S.C. Legislature’s addiction to massive earmark spending apparently is a hard habit to break.

After taking a rare year off from making earmarked appropriations, the 170-member General Assembly collectively has proposed 475 earmarks costing taxpayers a potential maximum $467.23 million for the fiscal year that starts July 1, The Nerve found in a review of earmark requests by the two chambers.

The total works out to be about $84 for every man, woman and child in South Carolina, or about $173 for every estimated state income-tax filer next year.

Looked at another way, the $467.23 million is more than the proposed entire fiscal 2026-27 budgets of at least 90 state agencies or major divisions.

Under House and Senate rules, earmarks are special funding requests by lawmakers for specific projects or programs that didn’t originate with a written agency budget request or weren’t included in the prior fiscal year’s state appropriations.

Senators and House members over the years routinely have sponsored earmarks for their pet projects in their home districts – often with few details revealed publicly in advance, as The Nerve has revealed.

“Earmarks are the currency of corruption,” Rep. Jordan Pace, R-Berkeley, who is chairman of the South Carolina Freedom Caucus, said in a written response Monday to The Nerve.

Except for the current fiscal year that ends June 30, earmark spending typically has been a large collective fixture in recent annual state budgets. As an example, for the 2023-24 fiscal year, lawmakers approved 515 requests totaling $709.4 million. For the following fiscal year, legislators made 520 earmark requests totaling $435.1 million.

The Nerve’s latest review found that for the upcoming fiscal year, the 124-member House proposed 303 earmarks totaling $314.98 million, while the 46-member Senate made 172 earmark requests totaling $152.25 million.

The vast majority of the proposed earmarks for fiscal 2026-27 are for infrastructure, capital improvements, public safety, education or recreation projects in cities, towns or counties.

The average individual earmark amount out of the total maximum $467.23 million is more than $980,000, The Nerve’s review found.

Bipartisan wish lists

A six-member, House-Senate conference committee is expected to finalize an earmark list for fiscal 2026-27, plus work out any other differences in the proposed approximately $44 billion total state budget, which includes general, federal and “other” funds.

The proposed budget earmarks would primarily come out of more than $1 billion in existing and expected state surplus funds, House and Senate budget records shows.

And the overall surplus pot likely will be even larger going into the new fiscal year. The S.C. Board of Economic Advisors on Tuesday made its final state revenue forecast for the current fiscal year that ends June 30, projecting an additional $369.4 million in one-time funds that “will be available to the budget conference committee in preparing final recommendations for the General Assembly,” according to a press release from the state Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office.

Historically, lawmakers have been quick to spend surplus money when it becomes available. In a single budget amendment on May 6, House members in a 94-17 vote approved their latest earmark requests, tapping surplus funds.

Pace cast one of the 17 “no” votes.

“There are literally millions of reasons to vote against these earmarks,” Pace said in his written statement Monday to The Nerve, citing, as examples, $3 million for “an orangutan exhibit at the Greenville Zoo,” and $8 million for a “privately owned parking garage in Myrtle Beach.”

“More than all those individual terrible earmarks, in the aggregate, the House voted for these instead of property tax relief, referring to a Senate proposal to expand the homestead property tax exemption for seniors, which stalled in the House. “And the majority of Republicans in the House teamed up with every single Democrat to fund those earmarks rather than help seniors who are losing their homes.”

Members of the joint budget conference committee include Senate Finance Committee Chairman Harvey Peeler, R-Cherokee, and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bruce Bannister, R-Greenville.

The Nerve’s review found that Bannister topped all lawmakers in the total amount of proposed individual earmarks, with a collective $20.6 million in seven requests, several of which would be for projects in the Greenville area. Peeler came in 4^th in that category, having nine requests totaling $9.9 million, mainly for projects in the Cherokee and York county areas.

House Speaker Murrell Smith, R-Sumter, ranked behind Bannister in The Nerve’s review, with six requests totaling $14.9 million for Sumter city or county projects. Smith also was among five Republican House members who collectively made a separate $7.9 million earmark request for a National Medal of Honor Leadership & Education Center.

Democratic lawmakers made plenty of earmark requests as well, The Nerve’s review found. Rep. Jackie Hayes, D-Dillon, for example, led all lawmakers in the total number of individual requests – 14 totaling $2.9 million – mainly for Dillon city or county projects. Senate Minority Leader Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg, made nine requests totaling $3.9 million for projects in Orangeburg County and other counties in his district, while Sen. Kent Williams, D-Marion, made nine requests that would cost a collective $4.2 million, mainly for projects in his home county.

Hutto and Hayes are the Democratic members on the joint budget conference committee.

Overall, 105 out of 124 House members and 39 out of 46 senators – plus six Senate budget subcommittees as groups – were listed as earmark sponsors, either individually or collectively with other lawmakers, The Nerve’s review found.

Big ticket items

Below are the 10 single most-expensive House and Senate earmarks, as well as each funding sponsor, as described in the chambers’ respective earmark lists for fiscal 2026-27. Seven $5 million earmarks tied for 9^th place, including two of them for the same apparent project.

Horry County – Hwy 544 Socastee Bridge Resurfacing: $10 million. Sponsors: Reps. Heather Crawford, R-Horry; Val Guest, R-Horry
City of Myrtle Beach – Downtown Public Infrastructure: $8.25 million. Sponsor: Rep. Case Brittain, R-Horry
National Medal of Honor Leadership & Education Center: $7.92 million. Sponsors: Reps. Murrell Smith, R-Sumter; Kathy Landing, R-Charleston; Joe Bustos, R-Charleston; Tom Hartnett, R- Charleston; James Teeple, R-Charleston
Myrtle Beach Cable Landing Site Prep: $7.5 million. Sponsor: Rep. Bannister, R-Greenville
SCTAC (South Carolina Technology and Aviation Center)-Defense Aircraft Paint Hangar: $7 million. Sponsor: Bannister
City of Mauldin – Multipurpose Stadium: $6 million. Sponsor: Rep. David Vaughan, R-Greenville
City of Sumter – Water & Sewer Rehabilitation: $5.3 million. Sponsor: Rep. Murrell Smith
City of Florence – Water & Sewer Infrastructure: $5.2 million. Sponsor: Rep. Phillip Lowe, R-Florence
City of Columbia – Congaree Riverfront District: $5 million. Sponsors: Sens. Ronnie Cromer, R-Newberry; Darrell Jackson, D-Richland
University of South Carolina – Congaree Riverfront District Project: $5 million. Sponsors: Reps. Nathan Ballentine, R-Richland; Chris Hart, D-Richland; Todd Rutherford, D-Richland
Spartanburg County – Daniel Morgan Technology Center: $5 million. Sponsor: Sen. Shane Martin, R-Spartanburg
Greenville Arena Special Purpose District – Renovations: $5 million. Sponsors: Sens. Karl Allen, D-Greenville; Jason Elliott, R-Greenville; Ross Turner, R-Greenville
Institute of Public Policy: $5 million. Sponsors: Senate K-12 Education Budget Subcommittee
USC Beaufort – AI Innovation Institute: $5 million. Sponsor: Rep. Jeff Bradley, R-Beaufort
City of Beaufort – Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park: $5 million. Sponsors: Reps. Shannon Erickson, R-Beaufort; Michael Rivers, D-Beaufort; Mark Smith, R-Berkeley
Children’s Hospital Collaborative: $4.5 million. Sponsors: Senate Health and Human Services Budget Subcommittee

The Nerve’s review found that $260 million in proposed earmarks, or more than half of the total maximum $467.23 million, would flow through the following five state agencies: Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism ($93.37 million); Department of Transportation ($44.64 million); Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation ($43.83 million); Department of Public Safety ($40.71 million); and Rural Infrastructure Authority ($37.47 million).

In a written statement Monday to The Nerve, DOT spokeswoman Jennifer Timmons said the agency “did not request” the proposed $10 million in the House’s state budget version to resurface the S.C. 544 bridge in Horry County – the single listed most-expensive earmark in The Nerve’s review.

Three other top-10 earmark requests – the Myrtle Beach Cable Landing Site Prep ($7.5 million), SCTAC-Defense Aircraft Paint Hangar ($7 million), and City of Columbia – Congaree Riverfront District ($5 million) – were proposed as part of the S.C. Department of Commerce’s fiscal 2026-27 budget.

Separately, the House approved a $5 million earmark appropriation for the Congaree Riverfront project through the University of South Carolina, though it’s unclear whether that amount would be on top of the other $5 million earmark for the same apparent purpose.

As for the proposed $7.5 million earmark for the Myrtle Beach cable project, The Nerve in a 2022 story reported that Commerce Secretary Harry Lightsey told state budget writers then that part of approximately $80 million in surplus money could be used for a “landing” facility in Myrtle Beach for an underwater cable that Google, which has a data center in Berkeley County, planned to stretch through the Atlantic Ocean from South America to South Carolina.

In a written response Monday to The Nerve, Commerce spokeswoman Dorothy Weaver said the three earmark requests for next fiscal year, including the $7.5 million cable project, were “not budget requests of Commerce.”

Speaking on behalf of the Rural Infrastructure Authority (RIA), Weaver also said the proposed $5.3 million and $5.2 million House earmark appropriations in the RIA’s budget for the cities of Sumter and Florence, respectively, for water and sewer projects there didn’t originate with the RIA.

Lack of transparency

In his written budget veto message last June for certain expenditures in the current fiscal year, Republican Gov. Henry McMaster cited lawmakers’ earlier stated “intention not to include any earmarks at all in this budget.”

“Finally, I applaud the General Assembly for their remarkable evolution and the strides made with the disclosure of earmarked appropriations, which were previously shielded from public scrutiny or debate,” he said. “After decades of overriding gubernatorial vetoes of innocuous sounding appropriations inside of which earmarks were hidden, members of the General Assembly in the last three years began disclosing – at my request – the sponsors and recipients of earmarked appropriations, as well as the merit, activity, function, or purpose for which each earmark was intended.”

McMaster also issued an executive order last June aimed at increasing accountability and transparency for state agencies that have earmarked appropriations, including requiring agencies to make publicly available all disclosure reports required under an annually renewed state budget proviso for nonprofit organizations that receive those funds.

But there is no state law requiring earmark transparency during the budget process itself. Although the publicly available House and Senate earmark lists for the upcoming fiscal year identify the sponsors and amounts of the earmarks, there are no included details of the projects to be funded other than short descriptive phrases of the purpose.

Under House and Senate rules, a form or statement containing information about requested individual earmarks, including an explanation of the program or project to be funded, must be filed in advance with the chambers’ respective budget-writing committees.

The Senate earmark list for the proposed fiscal 2026-27 state budget isn’t posted on the Legislature’s website; Senate Clerk Jeff Gossett released it to The Nerve upon request for this story. The House list is posted on the website under the heading, “FY 26-27 Member Request List – House Amended,” but was done so only after the House passed its amended version of the state budget earlier this month.

The South Carolina Policy Council – the parent organization of The Nerve – has recommended a change in state law requiring that lawmakers request their earmarks in writing to the chairmen of the respective House and Senate budget-writing committees disclosing the sponsor’s name, the date of the request, the amount, a description of the project, the state agency through which the money would flow, and the full name of the recipient entity.

“Additionally,” the Policy Council said, “earmark requests should be posted to a designated location on the Statehouse website within 24 hours of the request, creating a real-time earmark transparency dashboard for the public.”

Brundrett is the news editor of The Nerve (www.thenerve.org). Contact him at 803-394-8273 or [email protected]. Follow The Nerve on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) @thenervesc.

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