State senators and representatives shared their priorities with the media before the 2024 legislative session began this week.

The 2024 Legislative Media Preview was held on the Statehouse grounds Jan. 8, hosted in conjunction with the S.C. Press Association. The event allowed reporters to get insight into the priorities for the state Senate and House of Representatives along with caucus goals.

Those in attendance heard from most Senate committee chairs, who talked about their 2024 goals. 

Legislators will do their business this session under the gun, as all state senators and representatives will be up for re-election come November.

When asked by the Chronicle if this creates extra pressure to pass particular bills, Sen. Katrina Shealy (R-Lexington), one of two members of the Lexington County Legislative Delegation in attendance alongside Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey (R- Edgefield), said it always does, adding that going into election season, people always pay closer attention.

“They're just watching closely, but you can only do so much,” Shealy said. “You know, there's 46 of us, and one of us can stop something, so you can only do so much.”

The Senate has a wide variety of bills that could be up for debate covering a host of issues, with prominent topics including liquor liability reform, law enforcement- and gun-related measures, hate crimes, and education issues.

Other issues discussed included workforce development, ethics reform, reaching a consensus on a Critical Race Theory bill, wildlife bills related to wild turkey and blue crabs, mental health initiatives and more.

Liquor Liability 

More and more attention has been paid in recent months to a bill that was passed in 2017 that requires all businesses with beer or liquor licenses within the state to maintain a liability insurance policy that covers at least $1 million. Asheton Reid, director of community outreach of S.C. Venue Crisis, previously told the Chronicle that in order to maintain the police monthly insurance payments are averaging nearly $4,000.

Shealy told the Chronicle that this bill is something that the senate is going to seriously work on this coming year.

Both Lexington County and the state have recently  witnessed multiple restaurants close their doors – including one, Henry’s of Cayce, that specifically referenced the rising insurance costs as the reason for the bar and restaurant coming to an end – and a handful of others expressing concern over potential closures due to escalating prices of liability insurance. Reid previously claimed that more than 10 businesses have had to shut their doors as a result of the rising insurance costs.

Shealy, who chairs the Senate Family and Veterans' Services Committee, claimed there are Veterans of Foreign Wars posts that have a little bar on the weekends are also being affected by the insurance.

“They're making them have that large liquor liability, and that they're not gonna be able to still continue to serve liquor if that's the case,” she said. “We're gonna work on that and see if we can't get that changed this year.”

Rep. Bill Sandifer, chair of the House Labor, Commerce and Industry Committee, said that the effect the liability legislation has had is frightening. He said that it’s a critical situation reaching critical proportions.

Shealy told the Chronicle that you have to be optimistic about making the change, adding that if they aren’t optimistic and don’t change it people will go out of business or have to change their business model.

Education

Education was one of the hottest topics of the day, with both Senate Minority Leader Brad Hutto (D- Orangeburg) and Massey touching on the state's rural districts.

Hutto said the rural parts of the state have schools built in the 1930-40s that haven’t had the technology updates they should.

“We believe that every child deserves a quality education no matter where they live in South Carolina,” Hutto said. “We look forward to continuing efforts that we have had in the past two or three years to have some more funding in the rural areas for a school system.”

Massey also touched on the technological differences between school districts throughout the state, speaking of rural districts not having the same career technology opportunities as more suburban/urban districts. 

“A lot of these larger employers are hiring people out of high school because the Career and Technology Center’s have training programs for those children in high school,” Massey said, speaking on how Boeing and Michelin are hiring straight out of high school. “Well, that's great if you have it, but if you're in some of these other places that don't have that access, that's a big thing.”

“I do hope that we can focus more on ensuring that those children, those South Carolina children, have those opportunities to get the training and the skills they need to compete for those jobs,” he added.

Also in the calendar for the senate is a bill regarding charter school accountability. According to Sen. Greg Hembree (R-Horry), chair for the Education Committee, the bill will provide some oversight and structure to schools that are transferring from one authorizer to another.

He said this is an issue they have been dealing with when it comes to public charter schools, as they jump from one authorizer to another when failing to meet standards, making it difficult to hold them accountable.

Hembree also spoke about increasing teacher salaries, mentioning that they should be able to pay teachers what they are worth rather than paying everybody the same.

“Everybody in the building knows who the slackers are, it's just like any other job, it's not that there's lots of them,” he said. “It's demoralizing. When I think of your high performing teachers, the best of the best when they are getting the same pay increase as the one down the hall that everybody knows is not doing such a good job.”

Hate Crimes

Pursuing a bill addressing hate crimes was a commonly mentioned topic throughout the day. Hutto told those in attendance that the democratic party will continue to argue for a hate crime bill, adding that the state is one of two states that don’t have a hate crime legislature.

“I think most people would agree that all crime is bad,” Hutto said. “But crime that is targeted on a particular victim because of who they are and it's hateful, deserves an additional penalty.”

He added that the current bill doesn’t criminalize speech and thought, stating that a person has to commit a violent crime first.

“You got to be convicted of a crime first, and then proven to the jury that the basis for the crime was hate,” he explained. “Hate based on gender, race, religion, those factors, you don't get a new crime. You just get an additional penalty.”

Domestic Violence

Shealy said her committee is working on a bill that addresses domestic violence in dating. She added that the bill is currently stuck in the Senate, saying this is due to a few senators not agreeing that domestic violence can happen in dating and that it’s just family members and spouses.

Shealy also said her committee is working on an address confidentiality bill, so that the address of the victim is not available for the spouse or person charged with a crime against them.

“We did it for policemen and firefighters, I think we can do it for people trying to stay out of sight for domestic violence cases,” she said.

Law Enforcement and Guns

Massey and Hutto also dove into topics related to law enforcement and gun laws.

Hutto said that the state currently has a shortage of law enforcement officers, correctional officers, school teachers, nurses, social workers, and EMTs. He stated that there are times that there are situations in which a law enforcement officer answers over someone more suited for the situation, saying “many times it's not really a police officer situation but more of a mental health situation, a social worker situation, a counselor situation, an EMT situation.”

“We cannot expect our police officers to be all of those things, but we can expect them to recognize [those situations],” he said, adding that not every call is a crime.

The statehouse has made moves to help amend shortages among law enforcement, one of these being a recent change to allow 18-year olds to work within detention centers throughout the state.

Answering a question regarding excessive force, Massey said there are things they could do to improve the professionalism of law enforcement officers, mentioning legislation that was passed a few years ago regarding forms of excessive force.

“We cracked down on some of that now,” he said. “We did it in response to what was happening nationally.”

Massey also said they have ensured that law enforcement officers get more training to be better prepared for stressful situations.

In terms of gun laws, Massey expressed that the real issue is “are you going to require training and are you going to require regular background checks?”

Massey stated that he believes that responsible state residents should be allowed to carry. Hutto agreed with this, claiming that as a caucus, they believe that anyone who wants to use a gun lawfully is required to do that.

“I'm a Southern boy. I'm a big gun rights guy. I'm all for that,” Massey said. “But I do think that responsible gun owners need to have an understanding of how you hold the weapon. How do you load the weapon, how do you fire the weapon? There are too many people who don't have that basic responsibility and understanding.”