COLOMBIA, SC (AP) – The South Carolina House agreed Tuesday to reopen bids for a private company to buy the state concessionaire Santee Cooper and, in the meantime, replace the entire board that runs the power company.
The House voted 89-26 on the latest bill to reform or sell the agency, an effort that has been slow to reach the finish line because of lawmakers who think the state cannot do a good enough deal, the loyal to an agency formed in the Great Depression to bring energy to rural areas of the state and due to the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The bill now goes to the Senate, where all of these difficulties are further amplified.
The House proposal creates a commission of three senators and three members of the House who can request and accept any offer to buy Santee Cooper in the next 10 years. Any proposals would have to be approved by the entire General Assembly.
The bill immediately terminates the mandates of all board members who run the Santee Cooper board, launching them as new members are confirmed. It also requires that new board members have experience with public services, engineering, accounting or law.
The proposal also gives regulators more voice in Santee Cooper’s fees if it is not sold. The board now sets the rates.
Some lawmakers have long said the state needs to get out of the energy business, a position that gained more support after Santee Cooper lost billions of dollars by investing as a minority partner in two nuclear reactors that were never completed in the past decade.
Opponents of the bill said Santee Cooper had made changes and that the state had spent more than $ 14 million in the past two years on tenders to buy Santee Cooper. An outside group evaluated the offers and suggested that one from Florida’s NextEra Energy was the best. Lawmakers were not impressed by the proposal.
“We have been through this. We plow that land, “said Republican Representative Sylleste Davis, whose district is in Moncks Corner, where Santee Cooper is based.
Davis and others suggested removing the sales committee’s language from the project and leaving the components of the renovation. but he lost those votes.
Santee Cooper heard calls for change and they get high marks for reliability and have the lowest rates in the state, said Rep. Russell Ott, D-St. Matthews.
“Last year, Santee Cooper did some right things,” said Ott.
But the House leadership does not see it that way, saying that a vote against the bill is a vote to agree with Santee Cooper’s poor progress.
House Speaker Jay Lucas said after the vote that he expects the Senate to accept it quickly.
“I did not hide my contempt for Santee’s current leadership and the need for his immediate replacement. I have also repeatedly called for more transparency and accountability in the way Santee Cooper sets fees. Today, the House has vigorously fulfilled both issues, ”said the Republican president of Hartsville in a statement.
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Follow Jeffrey Collins on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JSCollinsAP.