New Legislation Would Require Governor to Request Stimulus Money

State Sen. Vincent Sheheen, D-Camden, thinks he's got a way to end the stalemate between Gov. Mark Sanford and state lawmakers over accepting all of the federal stimulus money. He introduced a resolution in the Senate Tuesday that would require the governor to request the money. "This is passing a law that the governor is required to follow," Sen. Sheheen says. "We do this every year. It's what the General Assembly is supposed to do; pass laws that explain how our government will work."

Gov. Sanford and lawmakers have been fighting for weeks over the stimulus plan. The governor thinks it's a bad idea to try to fix a problem caused by too much debt by going into more debt. He's refusing to request $700 million of the money unless lawmakers use the same amount to pay down state debt.

In a new television ad, paid for by Carolinians for Reform, Gov. Sanford explains his opposition, saying, "For me, the easy thing would be to accept money handed out from Washington. But the easy thing isn't always the right thing. We've proposed a budget that responsibly addresses our state's critical needs, without more debt."

But lawmakers, including many fellow Republicans, are angry that the governor is refusing to request money that state taxpayers will have to pay back anyway. Without the money, they say thousands of teachers and law enforcement officers will lose their jobs. Sen. Sheheen says he's hoping his resolution will pass the Senate and House before a May 15 deadline for school districts to offer teachers contracts for the next school year.

"I am concerned about that and that's one of the reasons I wanted to find a mechanism that could let us quickly settle the issue, put it behind us, move forward, receive our tax dollars back into the state and let school districts know whether they can hire or retain the teachers that they need to for our children," he says.

His resolution could have passed the full Senate right away if it had received unanimous consent. It did not, so it now goes to a Senate committee.

Sen. Kevin Bryant, R-Anderson, says he'll vote against the resolution when it comes up. "If we pass a law to force him to take it, going the end around, it would probably be something that would have to be settled in court, hold up these funds for a long time anyways," he says. "My preference would be, as a legislature, let's cooperate with the governor, put some things in the budget such as paying down debt, cutting corporate income taxes. And then, in cooperation, then he would accept the money. Then there'd be no question this money would be available."

But Sen. Sheheen says his plan has a lot of support. "I'm optimistic that, by the end of the month, this resolution will pass and that we'll see an end to this whole dispute. It's really holding South Carolina back right now. As you know, we've got a tremendous unemployment rate. We need to be focusing on that, not whether we're going to accept our own tax dollars back into the state," he says.

Sheheen has announced a bid to run for Governor on the Democratic ticket in 2010.