SC lawmakers are back and without masks for 2022 session

By Jeffrey Collins

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — South Carolina lawmakers open their 2022 session on Tuesday with the familiar problem of the COVID-19 pandemic and a more unfamiliar problem of bank accounts bursting with money.

Both the House and Senate are expected to gavel in at noon Tuesday, meeting for 18 weeks through mid-May in the second year of their two-year session.

Any bills that don’t pass will die and the 124 members of the House all face reelection starting with primaries in June. The next state Senate elections aren’t until 2024.

Lawmakers will be determining how to spend more than $5 billion in extra tax money generated by growth, surpluses left over when the economy didn’t crash as feared after COVID-19 and federal pandemic aid and penalties paid to the state for failing to meet deadlines to remove nuclear material.

The House and Senate are keeping their public galleries and balconies closed but have not announced any other changes to the 2022 session even with the rapid spread of the omicron variant. Masks aren’t required in the House or Senate and meetings are being held in person, although many are also streamed and people who worry about the virus are encouraged to watch and participate virtually.

It will be the first session for new Senate President Thomas Alexander. The Republican from Walhalla took over in December after the death of 40-year Senate veteran Hugh Leatherman shook up the body’s leadership.

The Florence Republican ran the Senate Finance Committee for more than 20 years. Former Senate President Harvey Peeler, a Republican from Gaffney, stepped aside from that role to take over the powerful Senate committee that handles the state’s spending.

There were no leadership changes in the South Carolina House.