Budget and Control needs fixing

Posted on Mon, Nov. 26, 2007
Executive, legislative functions are blended

The S.C. Supreme Court's rejection, without comment, of a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the State Budget and Control Board doesn't mean the odd system isn't in need of fixing.

The board oversees billions in spending and borrowing. Because of its makeup, it is a legislative group performing administrative functions.

The board, perhaps unique to South Carolina, makes a mockery of a basic tenet of American government: the separation of powers in legislative, executive and judicial branches.

Set up during the administration of Gov. Strom Thurmond, the board consists of the governor, treasurer, comptroller general and two legislators, the leaders of the House Ways & Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee.

Thus, legislators are participating in an executive function, and now that Converse Chellis, a former legislator, is the replacement state treasurer for the disgraced Thomas Ravenel, the legislators again are in charge.

On the control board, Ravenel had voted with Gov. Mark Sanford and Comptroller Richard Eckstrom. After the Ravenel meltdown (he faces sentencing on cocaine charges), the General Assembly ignored objections from Sanford and others and named one of its members as treasurer.

Despite the court's rejection, the budget board is bad government because of lack of direct accountability to the voters, lack of clear lines of authority, and an excess of legislative control.

In most, perhaps all, other American states, budget and control board duties are performed in an administrative department or agency that is part of the governor's Cabinet. This is what Sanford has said he wants to see happen.

ChangeSCNow, which grew out of the governor's early efforts to map out a restructuring plan for the state, is right to go after the Budget and Control Board.

The board's attorney, Richard Gergel, noting the court twice previously upheld the board's legality, said, "The case never had any merit."

Evidently not, in the court's view. However, the spirit of the suit certainly has merit in attempting to equalize S.C. executive and legislative powers. Sanford should keep reminding S.C. residents of the problem.