May 11 -15, 2009

Friday, May 15, 2009

Conservation Bank gets $2 Million! {action item}

The Conservation Bank received $2 million dollars plus operating expenses in the budget that has passed the Senate and the House! This critical funding will allow the Bank to live up to its obligations and maintain the relationships that have protected more than 152,000 acres since 2002. For every State dollar the Conservation Bank has received it has produced 6 dollars in land value by leveraging state dollars with local and federal funds. A 6:1 return on investment is impressive for any state funded program.

Please take the time to thank your Senators and Representatives for protecting this important conservation tool!

Senate Approves Building Codes Reform Legislation!

H.3550 by Representative Harry Cato (R-Greenville) and others that improves energy efficiency standards for new residential construction and renovations was given its third and final reading in the Senate this week! Now the bill is enrolled for ratification and on its way to the Governor’s desk soon. H.3550 deletes outdated energy standard language from our state law and establishes the 2006 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) as the state energy standard for residential construction and renovations. The simple changes H.3550 accomplishes are estimated to cost about $600 for each new home, but the average annual energy savings is estimated to be $400, so the payback to consumers would be less than two years. Thanks to the support of a diverse group of more than fifty stakeholders including conservationists, green mortgage companies, realtors, developers, energy efficiency and building code associations, South Carolina will make great strides in energy efficiency beginning this summer. Thank you to our bill sponsors, committee chairmen in the House and Senate, and each of you who played a part in ensuring passage of this great bill! Your efforts made all of the difference.
Contacts: Patty Pierce and Ben Moore


Landfill Moratorium Dies in House Agriculture Subcommittee

This week, a House Agriculture Subcommittee chaired by Representative David Hiott (R-Pickens) adjourned debate on S.324, the landfill moratorium by Senator Gerald Malloy (D-Darlington), effectively killing the bill for the year. As amended in the Senate, the landfill moratorium was to remain in effect until December 31, 2010, or until a taskforce convened by the Department of Health and Environmental could make recommendations for improving the excess capacity issue that has resulted in the proliferation of applications for “mega” landfills in South Carolina. The Landfill Capacity Task Force’s recommendations were presented and approved by the DHEC board in April, four months ahead of schedule. They reduce capacity from 42 million tons annually to 10.8 million tons annually, a monumental reduction that would not have happened without the Senate’s support of a statewide moratorium. House Agriculture Committee members cited the adoption of the new regulations as evidence that the moratorium was no longer needed.

While the new regulations are a vast improvement over the existing ones, the conservation community believes they are vulnerable to a legal challenge by the waste industry because they represent a substantive change to the pending regulations approved by the DHEC board in August that reduced capacity to 29 million tons. It could also be argued that DHEC did not follow Administrative Procedures Act guidelines in promulgating the change from 29 million tons to 10.8 million tons. The conservation community advocated for an amendment to the moratorium that would have reinstated it until new regulations could be properly promulgated in the event of a procedural challenge resulting in a return to the status quo of 42 million tons of annual capacity. This would have shut the door on mega landfills in South Carolina for good. Unfortunately, our efforts were blocked by the waste industry. Only time will tell whether these new regulations will withstand a challenge.

While there are only three legislative days left in 2009, we are in the first year of a two year session, which means that S.324 remains in the House Agriculture Committee. We have been reassured by Committee leadership that it can be brought back up next year in the event that the regulations are challenged and thrown out, opening South Carolina back up to “predatory dumping.”
Contact: Heather Spires

Great Annexation Reform Bill Approved by House Subcommittee

This week the House Special Laws Subcommittee Chaired by Representative Thad Viers (R-Horry) approved H.3253, a great annexation reform bill by Representative Bill Herbkersman (R-Beaufort) and others, after receiving comments from the bill’s primary sponsor and key stakeholders. Over the past three years of work on annexation reform, this is the first time a bill that includes all of the conservation community’s reform priorities has moved forward, so we want to thank the Special Laws Subcommittee for their leadership on this important land use issue! H.3253 would accomplish the following: redefine statutory standing for 75% and 100% annexation proposals in order to empower citizens and entities that could be negatively impacted by the proposals to challenge them; add public notice requirements for 100% annexation proposals to provide communities at least 30 days to review and react to annexation proposals and public hearings on these proposals are also included; require a ‘plan of services’ for all new annexations to be published at least 30 days prior to consideration of the proposal that would explain how a municipality would provide water, sewer, fire, police and ambulance services, for example, to the newly annexed; require annexations to be consistent and compatible with local comprehensive land use plans so county, municipal and regional plans that are costly to taxpayers to implement would not be undermined by new municipal annexations; and limit shoestring annexations of remote properties by requiring shared borders with an annexing municipality and that the proposed area to be annexed be urban.
H.3253 will be considered by the House Judiciary Committee in the 2010 legislative session, so Rep. Viers has charged all stakeholders to work over the summer and fall to reach consensus on the key provisions in the legislation. The other members of the Special Laws Subcommittee include Reps. Seth Whipper (D-Charleston), Vida Miller (D-Georgetown), Laurie Funderburk (D-Kershaw), and Mike Sottile (R-Charleston).
Contacts: Patty Pierce and Patrick Moore.