Bill awaiting vote in S.C. Legislature could affect Pennies for Progress

York County is on course to vote on a new round of Pennies for Progress road projects next year. A commission is collecting information from county residents and drawing up proposals for a list to submit to voters in November 2017.

But depending on how state legislators in Columbia vote this week, the Pennies vote may be delayed.

In 2014, the Legislature changed the state law regulating county-level tax referendums to require local governments to hold the vote “at the time of the general election.” Previously, counties could schedule a vote on the referendum at any time; the last Pennies for Progress vote in York County was on Aug. 2, 2011.

But what counts as a “general election”? The strictest reading of that language would require a bond vote in an even-numbered year, aligned with either a presidential or midterm election.

That would require York County to either move up the next Pennies referendum to this November, well ahead of the current schedule to get the list finished, or push it back to November 2018, more than six months after the current Pennies tax is scheduled to expire.

A bill moving through the Legislature this session should ensure York County – one of a half-dozen counties with local sales taxes set to expire – can hold its next Pennies vote on schedule. H.5078 would define a “general election” date as “the Tuesday following the first Monday in November in any year.”

But York County Council Chairman Britt Blackwell is concerned that with less than a week to go in this year’s legislative session, the bill won’t be able to pass. Sen. Kevin Bryant, R-Anderson, had placed a hold on the bill coming out of the Senate finance committee on May 18, which makes it less likely the bill will come up for a floor vote before the Legislature adjourns Thursday.

Blackwell worries if a stricter version of the bill ultimately requires votes on even-numbered years, it would badly damage the county’s timeline for Pennies 4.

“We probably don’t have time to make the recommendations this year,” he said. “And if we wait another year, that’s just another burden on the roads.”

By the end of its seven-year life, the current Pennies for Progress is expected to raise $161 million for road work across the county. The program has spent around $500 million in total, after previous Pennies lists got voter approval in 1997 and 2003.

Sen. Wes Hayes, R-Rock Hill, is confident the bill will get through the Senate this week without compromising the county’s schedule. If necessary, the Legislature could revive the issue when it reconvenes next January before the 2017 election date, avoiding any chance Pennies’ revenue stream would expire.

“You don’t want anyone to have to take it off the cash register,” Hayes said.

If the Legislature doesn’t act, York County could still move forward with its planned date, said Josh Rhodes, a staff attorney with the Association of Counties.

He cites a 2013 case the state brought against Florence County over its penny referendum, arguing among other things the county’s November election date that year didn’t count as a “general election.”

The Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, sided with Florence, finding a county election in November counts as a general election, since it isn’t an unscheduled “special election.”

That decision should clear the way for York County voters to decide on a new round of Pennies before the current program’s expiration date, Rhodes argues.

“It’s basically a restatement of the settled law,” Rhodes said of the bill. “The court essentially said you can have a general election in an even-numbered year or an odd-numbered year.”

This story was originally published May 29, 2016 at 8:41 PM with the headline "Bill awaiting vote in S.C. Legislature could affect Pennies for Progress."