On Wednesday, the House rejected, by a vote of
47-71 a proposal to exempt Amazon from collecting the state’s 6 percent sales
tax at the point of purchase. After the vote, Amazon officials said that they
would no longer move forward with its plans for a distribution center in
Lexington.
Budget Week
Debate will continue in the Senate next week
beginning at 11:00am on Tuesday. The Senate spent this week debating the FY
2011-12 $5.8 billion state budget but did not get to 2nd
reading.
Labor Issues
This week,South
Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson and eight other state attorneys general
replied to a complaint filed against Boeing Corporation by the U.S. National
Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The complaint charges Boeing with the commission
of an unfair labor practice, but appears to do so without legal and factual
foundation. The board claims Boeing is prohibited from expanding production of
its planes beyond the reach of unions currently associated with its workers in
Washington State. South Carolina is a staunch right to work state.
Medical
School Expansion
The S.C. Commission on Higher Education (CHE) will begin their review
of the expansion of the University of S.C. Medical University to Greenville on
Thursday, May 12th. The CHE will also meet on May 19th and then wrap
up discussion with the final hearing and response on June 2nd.
Presidential Debate
The nation’s first GOP
Presidential debate will be held in the Upstate next Thursday, May 5th. The debate will be held at the Peace Center
for Performing Arts in Greenville and will be covered live nationally by Fox
News.
Redistricting
As we get
closer to the end of this legislative year, the issue of redistricting will
soon become a main topic of discussion.
To take a closer
look at the new Census data for South Carolina, please click here.
In addition, the SC House and Senate have set up websites to update the public
on the redistricting process. For more information visit http://redistricting.schouse.gov/
or http://redistricting.scsenate.gov/
Thank You
A huge “thank you” to Chairman Dan Cooper (Anderson) for his 21 years
of service to the State of S.C. Rep.
Cooper has served as the Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee since
2005. Today, he announced that he will step down from this post on June 29th.
Chairman Cooper has been one of the Upstate business community’s biggest
advocates and he will surely be missed.
Tort Reform
As the Senate gets closer to a vote on the budget,
the statewide business community is urging Senators to move forward with debate
on tort reform. The House passed, H. 3375,
a comprehensive tort reform bill in mid-February. Even though tort reform was
set for Special Order in the Senate in March, the Senate has only spent two
days debating the legislation.
Unemployment
Insurance
This week, Scenario
27, the Governor’s proposal, Scenario 27, gained traction as
the details became available. Right now, this scenario appears to be the “best”
chance at UI tax relief becoming a reality this legislative session. Timing
continues to be an issue, as there are only 5 weeks remaining.
As a summary, Scenario
27 does three things:
1) It would cut the
number of state benefit weeks from 26 to 20 weeks. The measure would provide
all employers in tiers 2-20 with 8 percent relief.
2) It would allow
employers the option of whether or not their seasonal employees could collect
unemployment benefits. Seasonal restrictions would allow for an additional 3
percent relief for all employers in tiers 2-20.
3) It would bond a
portion of the federal loan repayment for rate classes 13-20 in 2011 and 2012,
issuing revenue bonds and allowing those employers eight years to pay back the
bonds. This would provide 17 percent relief this year to those higher taxed
employers. Numerous bond attorneys have said the state can issue revenue bonds
for this purpose and efforts are being made to ensure that this plan would not
impact the state’s AAA credit rating.
Relief: Employers in
tiers 13-20 would see a 28 percent reduction in their SUTA taxes in 2011 and a
26 percent reduction next year.
*This proposal does
not require additional interest-bearing borrowing from the federal government
and it does not shift taxes between employers.
This past Wednesday,
the House unanimously passed H.3762, sponsored by House Ways and Means Chairman
Dan Cooper (Anderson). This bill does
three things:
1) Provides the Senate w/ a vehicle to attach a tax relief
amendment. In regards to relief, this
is a skeletal bill that was passed by the House before the May 1st cross over
deadline.
2) It would restrict
seasonal benefits and change the new employer rate from class 13 to class 12 to
remain competitive with neighboring states concerning job recruitment efforts.
3) It corrects what is
known as “the anomaly,” allowing approximately 2,700 businesses that had
positive cash balances during the last seven years to move from rate classes
13-20 to rate class 12 for this year only.
If this is enacted, all companies in tiers 1-12 had a positive balance
the past seven years and all companies in tiers 13-20 had a negative cash
balance.
Ways and
Means
Due
to Chairman Cooper’s resignation, the election of new Committee officers will
be held on Tuesday, May 3rd.
