In 2020, the citizens of Senate District 16 elected me to serve Tega Cay, Fort Mill, Indian Land, and Lancaster. Serving in the Senate for the past three years has been an honor, and I truly appreciate the faith entrusted in me. The South Carolina Senate returns to Columbia next week to begin the legislative session. The legislature meets from the second Tuesday of January to the second Thursday of May each year. While we can be called back during the other months by the Governor, we only have about 16 weeks to accomplish our goals.
What are our goals, you ask? The Senate met in our annual caucus meeting in December and laid out a plan to address some key areas before the end of February. Here is a quick look at some of those topics:
• Parental Access to Prescription Information. Earlier this year the Atrium Hospital System announced that it would no longer allow parents to “access prescription information for children between the ages of 12-17.” This notification was based on a North Carolina law that requires that certain medical information about minors be kept from their parents. I drafted and filed legislation in late November to stop this from happening. S.882 simply states that a “parent or legal guardian of a minor must be immediately notified if the minor is prescribed medication by the health care provider prescribing the medication.” This bill will be one of the first bills passed by the Senate.
• Judicial Reform. Currently, judges are elected by the legislature. Before the legislature can vote on them, candidates must go through the Judicial Merit Screening Committee (JMSC) to be vetted. Issues have arisen over legislators serving on the JMSC and judges feeling intimidated by those legislators. Reform along the lines of no legislator may serve on the JMSC, where all members of the JMSC are limited to a single term of 4-years, and where the Governor has a say in appointing some of the members of the JMSC is needed.
• Medical Marijuana. The Senate passed a medical cannabis bill in 2021, but it died in the House. I have a feeling it will get another shot sometime in early 2024.
• ESG Pension Protection. The bill pending in the Senate, H.3690, would prohibit the State from investing in companies using the pension system, who use ESG (Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance) criteria to assess another organization’s business practices. The bill will require that an investment made in our pension must be made on “pecuniary factors and is not being made to promote, further, or achieve any nonpecuniary goal, objective, or outcome.”
• Work Experience for Teachers. Senator Tom Young filed this bill, S.305, which will allow an individual with prior work experience in a field (biology for instance) to teach that course and be paid at a commiserate level based on their years of experience.
Are there other priorities, yes, but these bills will be focused on during the first five to six weeks of the session. From lowering taxes to teacher raises to funding improvements on our roads and bridges, a lot of other things will also happen next year. This is the first of what I hope to make a weekly column outlining a few of the things the SC Senate tackles this year. I also do a weekly email Newsletter detailing all of my votes on every bill. If you are interested in receiving that, email me at [email protected].
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