Legislative Updates 2025

Protecting Land & Water | Advocacy | Balanced Growth

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Legislative Updates 2025 - Week 8: March 3 - 7

Highlights:

Budget Week begins, catch up on last week’s budget briefing
Transferrable Development Rights bill (H.4146) introduced in House
Spartanburg Senator Josh Kimbrell pushes for Concurrency bill
Other land use bills on the move
Hearings continue on the SC Energy Security Act (H.3309)

Happy Tuesday,

The House Budget week is already underway, which usually means long days of debating the Appropriations Bill (H. 4025) on the House Floor. We’ll keep a close eye as the process unfolds to ensure budget provisions that prioritize conservation agency funding remain. You can find our preview of those conservation budgets here.

In preparation for this week’s House floor votes, the House Ways and Means Committee hosted a budget briefing Thursday. You can access the presentation slides here, access additional budget documents here, and learn more about our budget priorities here.

With the House focused on the budget, there's still plenty to report as we enter into the second half of the legislative session. Read below for a rundown of which bills are moving.

Sustainable growth tools gain traction

South Carolina continues to experience rapid growth, ranking as the fastest-growing state in the US in 2023 and reporting $8 billion in economic investment in 2024. Consequently, some local governments are struggling to accommodate that growth and are turning to measures such as development moratoriums. In other areas, lawmakers are witnessing their communities transform almost overnight and, as we discussed several weeks ago, they are calling for additional tools local governments can employ to balance that growth.

Transferrable Development Rights Bill gains support in House

Last week, Representative Mark Smith (Berkeley) filed H. 4146 — a bill that would authorize and encourage local governments to voluntarily adopt Transferable Development Rights (TDR) programs. This is a bill we discussed in depth last year as another tool to help local governments accommodate growth in accordance with their Comprehensive Plan.

This bill encourages local governments to voluntarily adopt Transferable Development Rights (TDR) programs that could be customized to fit local needs, such as protecting farmland and other environmentally sensitive areas, while guiding development where infrastructure already exists and where density is best absorbed. You can read about how these programs work here.

A companion bill has already been introduced in the Senate by Senators Michael Johnson (York) and Ross Turner (Greenville).

Concurrency Bill (S.227) receives hearing

Last Wednesday, March 5th, the Senate Labor, Commerce, and Industry Subcommittee took up the Concurrency bill (S.227), which empowers local governments to adopt ordinances that ensure infrastructure keeps pace with new development. The strictly permissive nature of this bill captured the attention of committee members such as Senator Josh Kimbrell (Spartanburg), who touted this bill as a means to helping manage explosive growth in Boiling Springs. While the subcommittee did not take action on the bill, we expect them to meet again and continue the conversation.

If you want to listen to great dialogue about how our state can manage growth, I encourage you to watch the hearing by visiting the Video Archives page of the Statehouse website.

Other land use bills on the move

The Low-Income Housing Property Tax Exemption bill (S.125), which adjusts tax credits for properties owned by nonprofit housing entities based on percent ownership in the property, has passed the Senate, was introduced in the House, and has been assigned to the House Ways and Means Committee.

The Farm Annexation bill (S.264), which prevents annexation of farm properties without consent from the property owner, followed suit and passed the Senate as well. It has also been assigned to Ways and Means, which we expect to start taking up bills again after getting the budget out of committee and through the floor voting process.

More News from the Statehouse

Energy bill (H.3309) talks continue

In a welcome break from the contentious Tort Reform debate, a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee continued its hearings on the SC Energy Security Act (H.3309). Advocates for clean energy and ratepayer protections, including a resident from the Canadys community, continued calls to strengthen the permitting process – not gut it by creating loopholes, impossible timelines, and reduced public engagement. Hearings are expected to continue in this subcommittee until substantial amendments are drafted that preserve protections for ratepayers and communities and that balance the scale for all energy sources – including solar and battery storage.

Lawmakers focus on regulatory cuts

Also on our radar is the Small Business Regulatory Freedom Act (H.3021), which passed the House unanimously last week and was framed as a means to remove outdated or burdensome regulations. This bill establishes a Regulatory Review Committee to initiate a 25% reduction in regulations across all state government agencies. It also requires that for every new regulation that an agency proposes, the Committee must identify two regulations to remove. The bill would also sunset all 80,000 South Carolina regulations and put the onus on agencies to prove that each one is needed, creating an immense administrative burden on agencies and increasing the risk of weakening protections for public health and the environment.

The Week Ahead

We are not anticipating much committee work related to our conservation priorities, but this can always change! In the meantime, we will be talking to lawmakers to advance our goals and watching the budget process play out on the House floor.

Now that the session is in full swing, stay tuned for opportunities to get involved and learn more about the legislative issues that affect our daily lives. We’ll continue to keep you informed on their progress and ways to get involved throughout the legislative session!

Be well. Until next week...

Megan Chase-Muller

State Policy Director

mchase@upstateforever.org

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Upstate Forever is a nonprofit conservation organization that protects critical lands, waters, and the unique character of Upstate South Carolina. Over the past two decades, we have worked to protect the natural assets that make the Upstate so special — our farmlands, forests, natural areas, rivers, and clean air. We are committed to ensuring that our communities are vibrant and retain their green spaces, outdoor heritage, and unique identities in the face of rapid development and significant sprawl. Our vision is an environmentally healthy, economically prosperous Upstate that offers a high quality of life now and for future generations.

For more information, visit our website at upstateforever.org or send us an email.