HOLDING SPENDING IN CHECK PAVED WAY FOR TAX CUTS, REPAYMENT OF NEARLY $1 BILLION IN DEBT, DEFICITS
Charleston, SC – March 5, 2013 – Carrying two pigs into the Statehouse to highlight, and ultimately force repayment of, the final portion of the state’s unconstitutional deficit may be the best-remembered of former Governor Sanford’s at times lonely stands on spending, but it was one of many.
Through a series of vetoes, budget recommendations, and putting public pressure on the legislature, Sanford was eventually able to force repayment of nearly $1 billion in deficits and debts inherited when he came into office.
State budgets had traditionally been exclusively in the legislature’s “sandbox,” but Sanford jumped in when he decided to propose the first operational Executive Budget in state history. These budgets became an eight-year series of guidebooks for reducing spending, restructuring and modernizing state government. Those recommendations were not always well received by many in Columbia, but they paid real dividends for the taxpayer, such as when $260 million in vetoes were sustained in 2010 alone.
Sanford’s insistence on watching out for taxpayers won few friends when he took on the legislature’s “Competitive Grants” slush fund – a backdoor way in which legislators of both parties were able to send pork back to their district. Eventually, he succeeded in getting his veto of the program sustained, saving taxpayers $46 million per year.
For years, legislators had circumvented the accountability that would come with a transparent budget process through a secret process called a “pass-through.” Here they would put unallocated dollars in an agency budget, then tell the agency how to spend it after the budget had passed. Sanford signed an Executive Order eliminating pass-through spending for all the agencies in his Cabinet.
As well, his stand against the popular “Life Sciences Bill” effectively ended “bobtailing,” a practice where special projects were attached to unrelated bills, costing taxpayers millions. After his veto of the bill was overwhelmingly overridden by the legislature, Governor Sanford fought the practice all the way to the SC Supreme Court, and ultimately won.
“There were a number of times in Columbia where we took lonely stands on spending when it was anything but the popular thing to do,” Sanford said. “It’s certainly become fashionable to ‘talk the talk’ on cutting spending, but we’ve actually gone to bat time and time again to do it. Our record is one of consistently standing up for taxpayers, and given where we are as a nation, many have made the point to me that they want someone in Congress ready to fight that battle on Day One.”