Lawmakers Return for 2016 Legislative Session: Video
Columbia, S.C. (WOLO) — It’s back to business for South Carolina Lawmakers.
Senate members spent the opening day remembering the late Senator William O’Dell.
Meanwhile, the House read in prefilied legislation.
Topping agendas on both sides of the aisle are repairs to the state’s roads and infrastructure.
“The estimates are hundreds of millions of dollars. Everyone knows we had a deferred maintenance problem before the flooding we now have additional damage on top of that and no defined plan on how to fix it,” says Rep. Krikman Finlay (R).
While they agree that repairs are needed lawmakers have differing ideas on addressing the issue.
Rep. James Smith (D) says,”We ought to pass something that will establish, in the end, a reliable long term funding source that’s going to address the infrastructure needs in our state.”
But Rep. Finlay explains, “We need to decide the long term funding I think we need to break the Department of Transportation into a maintenance department and a new roads department.”
Another hot topic hitting the floor is education inequities.
The state’s supreme court issued an ordered requiring legislators to develop a plan to improve the education system.
Rep. Smith tells ABC Columbia, “We need to do that this year. We have the funding to do that in terms of focusing on the reforms of how we fund schools I think there’s some solid ideas on how to do that.”
