It's Friday, Feb. 6.
There are 14 weeks and 42 days left on the 2026 legislative calendar.
You're reading The State House Gavel, your daily reporter notebook by Maayan Schechter and Gavin Jackson that previews and captures what goes on at the South Carolina Statehouse.
Despite the dreary weather, Thursday was not mundane.
And, similar to other Fridays, we're dumping our notebooks out.
So let's get into it.
Notebook highlights:
- Post DUI debate, Senate now turns attention to charter schools and authorizers
- The deal with data centers
- A vibe check after the hemp bust in the House
Charters take center stage
Done with DUI and vape-related legislation, the Senate will turn its attention next week to the next legislative target: charter schools and its authorizers, which are by law, either school districts, the state's public charter system or colleges and universities.
Senate leaders told reporters in early January they planned to make S. 454, filed by Senate Education Chairman Greg Hembree, R-Horry, a top priority.
The legislation was filed last year, but is a yearslong effort, Hembree told reporters, to respond to questions about transparency and conflict and "authorizer shopping" in the charter school system.
The bill, Hembree said last month, is in a good position to move this year. That is helped by the fact that House Education and Public Works Chairwoman Shannon Erickson, R-Beaufort, has also identified charters as a top legislative priority.
Hear from Hembree, who spoke to reporters Thursday about the bill and whether any funding changes may occur:
Charter schools have grown considerably in South Carolina, especially after COVID as parents sought out alternative education options for their kids.
Charters are public schools, and receive state tax dollars on the state's per student formula.
Earlier this week, Chris Neely, the superintendent of the state's Public Charter School District, told a House Ways and Means panel when their schools return in the new school year, the district will have over 59 schools and more than 30,000 students, with a growing wait list of more than 6,000 families.
By 2030, Neely said enrollment is set to be close to 40,000.
After Limestone University, a private college and a charter school authorizer in Gaffney, closed last spring, Neely said his board accepted 14 transfer schools, which will become part of the district come July 1.
In six years, Neely said they've closed five schools that were "poor performing schools."
Neely told the Ways and Means members that he welcomes accountability, adding he hopes they support the Senate bill.
In particular, he advocated for the stoppage of "authorizer shopping," whereby unsatisfactory charter schools hop to another authorizer that will accept them.
"I'm hopeful that y'all will stop that practice this year," he said.
Though Hembree's legislation does not isolate any specific charter school authorizer, much of the attention this past year has been paid to the Charter Institute at Erskine.
In November, the state Legislative Audit Council released a report that included recommendations for legislation that, in part, drew attention to the Institute's travel, potential conflicts of interest, and fundraising and donations.
Cameron Runyan, the Institute's president and CEO, told the same Ways and Means panel that when school opens in the fall, the Institute will have around 37,000 students.
Runyan added the Institute will also be taking on five schools from Limestone, for a total of 10 new schools next year.
He also acknowledged the Institute has been the focus of news reporting over the past year, noting the Institute has made changes based on the LAC audit. That includes changes over its fundraising policy and its teacher development program, Teach Right USA, that he said is now separate from the organization and is independently funded and governed.
"We've got to have high accountability," Runyan said, also noting his support to stop "authorizer shopping."
Lawmakers ran out of time to as Runyan questions, previewing they have many more for Runyan at a hearing scheduled for Tuesday.
Other notable takeaways from the Senate on Thursday:
- In a unanimous decision, the Senate very quickly passed and sent to the House S. 880, a joint resolution that says if a legislator resigns on or before March 1 of this year, then the election to fill that seat will be held concurrently with the candidate filing and election schedule for all House members. So, the obvious question is: Who is resigning? Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, R-Edgefield, wouldn't say who and wouldn't say whether the member is of the House or Senate. "There's obviously a reason that we're doing the joint resolution," Massey said, adding it's not his announcement to make but the resolution will save taxpayer money by putting the election on the House schedule. While we're hearing possible names, all arrows point to a senator based on interviews with House lawmakers and that the bill originated in the upper chamber.
- Speaking of Massey, in a somewhat rare public rebuke of the state's chief executive in recent years, the GOP leader referred to the governor's office as "dismissive and disrespectful" toward the Senate as it relates to the chamber's screening process after the governor nominated Joel Anderson to run the state Department of Corrections. Massey told Anderson, who has been serving in the role as interim since former director Bryan Stirling left for the U.S. Attorney's Office, that his background and testimony were impressive, but wanted to send a message to the governor's office over the "pattern of dismissiveness and disrespect" the office has shown toward the Senate's role in advice and consent. Massey was one of four senators — the other three were Republican Sens. Sean Bennett of Dorchester, Chip Campsen of Charleston, and Matt Leber of Charleston — to vote against sending Anderson's nomination to the floor, which was approved in a 9-4 vote. You can listen to Massey's conversation with reporters below:
We asked the governor's office for a response.
“Governor McMaster enjoys a historic and productive working relationship with the General Assembly. As is his practice, his door is always open for any legislator, his mobile phone stands ready for their call," said the governor's spokesperson Michelle LeClair.
Limited data on data centers
Data centers have garnered significant attention in the state and across the nation as the somewhat secretive sites that provide the digital backbone to the internet and help back the explosive growth of artificial intelligence demands.
The growth, while a windfall to local tax bases, especially in rural areas, also puts weight on electrical grids and has posed concerns around a multitude of issues, including water consumption, sound, light and emissions.
South Carolina is not immune.
There are 30 of these data centers in the state, with little known about them, including the $1.3 billion expansion of a Google data center in Berkeley County and a new $2 billion for two centers in Dorchester County.
And more data centers are planned.
- Marion County Council fast-tracked a fee-in-lieu tax agreement for a $2.4 billion data center, known only as “Project Liberty,” in January. Capital B, a nonprofit news outlet focused on Black communities, recently quoted state Sen. Kent Williams, D-Marion, who is also deputy county administrator, saying the project could eventually bring in $28 million a year in revenue for the county, which has an annual budget of $25 million.
- Another data center has been proposed in Colleton County. While Marion County enjoys proximity to the Great and Little Pee Dee Rivers, the Colleton center would be near the protected 350,000-acre ACE Basin. In November, Colleton County Council amended its ordinances to add data centers as a special exception to the general land uses within rural communities, including the ACE Basin and its headwaters. And on Thursday, a bipartisan group of the Colleton County legislative delegation — that includes Fish, Game and Forestry Committee Chairman Chip Campsen, R-Charleston — sent a letter to county council urging them to oppose the proposed data center campus on Cooks Hill Road.
All of this has prompted Sen. Tom Davis, a Beaufort Republican and chair of the Labor, Commerce and Industry Committee, to file S. 867, a comprehensive data center bill.
The bill seeks to create a regulatory framework for data centers and forms the so-called Data Center Development Office that would oversee siting and environmental standards.
A 10-person Data Center Industry Advisory Committee of ratepayer and environmental advocacy groups, industry members, local governments and state regulators would advise the group. The Public Service Commission would have jurisdiction over electricity consumption and utility rates.
The bill would also mandate, Davis said, that costs associated with energy generation and upgrades related to data centers would not be borne by other ratepayers.
Under the bill, all data centers would have to adhere to mandatory light shielding, vibration reduction and sound limit requirements. There would also be required buffers between protected wildlife areas.
“We have to put guardrails on this,” Sen. Michael Johnson, a York Republican and subcommittee chair who is handling Davis's bill first, said Thursday.
How long that will take? To be determined.
Read more:
- SC Daily Gazette: SC legislators denounce Lowcountry data center while mulling regulations for the industry
- The State: SC residents push back on data center growth. Will state regulate AI-warehouses?
What mellowed the hemp bill?
Confusion, emotion and a long day led to a perfect storm Wednesday that derailed the hemp-derived consumable bill, H. 4759.
We won't get into the full detail of how the day went.
You can read about it in our Thursday's Gavel here.
But the bill that would regulate hemp-derived consumable products was a House GOP Caucus priority and after an hourslong floor fight, the bill was sent back to the committee where it originated.
So, what happened? Here's what we heard:
- First, in our conversations with House members, we heard there was some confusion over what exactly the bill did and what it would outlaw, with some believing it would prohibit CBD products. The bill's sponsors said it would not, and an amendment passed onto the bill exempted such products, as some forms have helped South Carolinians who suffer from seizures.
- Add freshman Dorchester Republican Rep. Greg Ford's 28-page amendment and personal story about his son's medical issues, and many lawmakers, who had not heard the story before, were moved.
- Some veteran House members told us the debate was reminiscent of former House Speaker David Wilkins's era (1994-2005), when bills were heavily debated and changed on the floor as the two political parties were closer in membership numbers.
- Ultimately, a House GOP Caucus bill, a priority for leadership which we were told was discussed beforehand in caucus meetings, saw its support collapse on the floor, frustrating members who thought the bill had more support to push through.
The next obvious question? Is the bill dead?
It's only February, and sending legislation back to a committee — especially in the final year of a two-year session — is never a great sign. But there is always H. 4758, another much more restrictive hemp consumable bill that still sits on the floor and can always be amended.
Meanwhile, a Senate subcommittee on Wednesday next week will take up H. 3924, which easily passed the House last year with broad support. The bill requires hemp-derived consumables only be sold in stores with valid alcohol licenses and prohibits sales and consumption to those under 21.
Other House takeaways:
- The chamber passed H. 3551, filed by Rep. Brandon Newton, R-Lancaster, which says money earned by election managers and poll workers is exempt from state income taxes
- The House amended and passed S. 405, sponsored by Senate President Thomas Alexander, R-Oconee, which raises the age for homicide by child abuse
- Another Senate bill that in part allows the social services department to license fictive kin and relatives in adoptions using certain standards, S. 415, sponsored by Sen. Tom Young, R-Aiken, passed the House
Statehouse clips from around the state
- McMaster and Trump endorse 3rd potential candidate for SC agriculture commissioner (SC Daily Gazette)
- SC lawmaker to hit the brakes on legislation to allow Citadel to hold more outdoor stadium events (Post and Courier)
- SC gov’s son, McMaster Jr., sits out attorney general’s race. Here’s what he said (The State)
- S.C. Senate passes DUI crackdown bill (WIS)
- Wealthy SC landowners fight to protect beach houses from rising seas (The State)
- V.C. Summer nuclear plant shuts down for ‘unscheduled’ maintenance, Dominion says (Post and Courier)
- House approves tax break for poll workers as SC struggles to recruit enough of them (SC Daily Gazette)
- Head of SC arts state agency to retire this summer, interim successor chosen (Post and Courier Free Times)
- SC charter schools stranded by Limestone shutdown will close this summer (Post and Courier)
- EMT blood draws and stiffer penalties. SC Senate overhauls state’s DUI laws (The State)
