Harvey Peeler

This year, we spent more time on the budget than few other times in South Carolina history. Some people have used that to make an easy joke at the expense of the General Assembly and our state, but the truth of the matter is actually good news. All too often, we hear of votes on bills major and minor by legislators who didn’t read the legislation. Americans were appalled when reports came out of Congress of representatives voting on the massive ObamaCare plan without knowing what was in it. We weren’t going to make that mistake.

The kick-start to this was one of the first accomplishments of the legislative session, passing roll-call voting. By addressing each section of the budget individually, we were able to discuss specifics of state spending in a way that wasn’t done before to ensure that every dollar you give government is spent wisely.

We are all facing tough times and our state budget has been hit hard by the economic decline. Now we are cutting into the bone and having to pick between essential services like education, public safety and health care. In this year’s budget we were able to balance those cuts and maintain adequate funding without doing too much harm to our state. We’re funding core government services without wasteful pet projects while paying down debt and cutting unemployment taxes on South Carolina businesses by $100 million.

I’m also happy to report the arrival of Amazon.com’s distribution facility to our state, and the investment and jobs that will follow. By exempting Amazon from collecting and remitting sales tax for five years, we’ve helped guarantee 2,000 jobs and $125 million in investment.

A major accomplishment that took a lot of hard work by myself and other conservatives was the passage of a comprehensive tort reform bill. You told us we had to act to protect our state’s businesses from high insurance costs and frivolous lawsuits, and we did.

We were able to get Benji’s Law fast-tracked, put on the Senate calendar and passed last week. What happened at Cleveland Park in March should never happen again — a family and a community shouldn’t have to go through what Benji’s had. And we shouldn’t abide such blatant negligence.

As always, I look forward to hearing from you. If you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me at harvey@harveypeeler.com. You can also visit my website at www.harveypeeler.com or call my Columbia office at 803.212.6430 for any constituent service needs.