COLUMBIA --- South Carolina's second-in-the-nation unemployment rate and the issue of how to help the jobless vexed lawmakers last week and promises to create new worry lines this week.
The Labor, Commerce and Industry Subcommittee will take up a bill to restructure the embattled Employment Security Commission on Wednesday. Lawmakers last week touched on the bill, S. 391, amid discussions with agency officials over what they could do to more aggressively find the unemployed and match them with employers.
Bills on other matters will bring equally prickly debates:
- The Senate Medical Affairs Subcommittee will consider H. 3245, which would make the waiting period to receive an abortion after an ultrasound 24 hours instead of one hour. Opponents have said it creates an additional hurdle for poor women who must arrange transportation.
- The same panel will take up a Senate bill, S. 324, that sets a moratorium on creating new landfills and expanding existing ones until the start of 2011.
- Who should be in charge of protecting the Capitol complex is at the core of S. 576, which would transfer those duties from the Bureau of Protective Services, which is under the governor's power, to a proposed Capitol Police Force.
- Gambling rules would loosen up for charities under S. 560. The bill would allow nonprofits and charities to conduct raffles to further their causes.
- A Senate panel will consider lowering the minimum age to get a tattoo from 21 to 18 when it takes up S. 188.
Both chambers are taking furloughs this session to save money. Tuesday is the only day the Senate will meet on the floor, and senators will work in committees on Wednesday and Thursday. The House won't be in session this week.
The Senate Finance Committee will meet this week to discuss the $6.6 billion budget approved by the House.
Reach Sarita Chourey at (803) 727-4257 or sarita.chourey@morris.com.
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