COLOMBIA, SC (AP) – The South Carolina Senate Thursday passed a bill that clarifies the state superintendent’s power when she takes over schools or school districts that are considered insolvent.
The bill has been debated intermittently for more than a week and has almost become the first test of the new Senate rules to make it easier to take questions to a vote in a body that has long respected letting senators talk as much as they want. a problem. Successful motions to limit the debate take place at most once a year.
But with Republicans winning three seats in the 2020 election to now have a 30-16 lead, they passed new rules in January to make it easier to pass a coagulation motion and end long debates.
Senator Mike Fanning opposed the bill, offering a series of changes that were not approved this week. The Fairfield County Democrat who calls himself an education champion was the subject of last year’s solitary vote.
But instead of having the clot invoked again, he agreed this week to limit himself to three amendments on Thursday and take five minutes each to explain them.
The bill approved on Thursday would result in the resignation of a local school council in cases where the superintendent received approval from the State Board of Education to take over a district. The governor, the district county legislative delegation and the superintendent could then appoint an interim board that serves at least three years and until the superintendent or the Board of Education decides that the district has improved enough to return to local control.
Current superintendent Molly Spearman has asked the bill to turn many of its current procedures into law when it takes over a struggling school or district, said Senate Education Committee Chairman Greg Hembree, R-Little River.
Spearman told him that a school board with permission to remain in place after a takeover of the state “can be a genuine obstruction to a community that is trying to change the school board,” said Hembree, comparing him to a team player who tries to solve his own player.
Most of the 2021 bill was part of a larger education bill that passed the Senate 41-4 last year, before the pandemic cut the session short.
Fanning felt that this year’s bill took control out of a local council.
When his 15-minute total for his three amendments was over, Fanning appeared to appeal to the assistant senate secretary, but received no additional time.
Fanning, who complained that his Democratic colleagues did not give him enough help on educational issues, did not even get other senators to join him to ask for individual votes for his amendments. Instead, they were rejected with senators shouting “yes” or “no”.
“We have already decided to vote on all this and not even do the normal courtesy of raising hands for roll-call votes. but at least I hope you pretend you’re listening to me for a few minutes, ”said Fanning as his five-minute clock started on one of his changes.
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