South Carolina

South Carolina

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FY2027 (proposed)
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FY2025 (enacted)
FY2024 (enacted)
FY2023 (enacted)
FY2022 (enacted)

Proposed Budget - Fiscal Year 2027

On January 12, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster proposed a fiscal 2027 budget that recommends $42.8 billion in all funds, an increase of $3.6 billion, or 9.2 percent, over fiscal 2026. The general funds portion of the budget totals $14.0 billion, an increase of $791.7 million, or 6.0 percent, compared to fiscal 2026. The governor’s budget assumes net general fund revenues of $14.0 billion, an increase of 4.0 percent over the fiscal 2026 appropriations act. The budget recommends setting aside a total of $1.4 billion, equal to 10 percent of actual fiscal 2025 general fund revenues, into the General Reserve Fund ($984.0 million) and Capital Reserve Fund ($421.7 million). 

Proposed Budget Highlights 
The governor’s proposed budget makes investments in the state’s roads, cuts the income tax, strengthens rainy day savings, and raises teacher pay. Other priorities addressed in the budget include making higher education more affordable, expanding the full-day four-year-old kindergarten program, and conducting a population growth study for the future. 

Tax Policy Changes

• Cuts the top rate for individual income tax from 6.0 percent to 5.9 percent.
• Provides recurring funds to implement a $2,000 nonrefundable individual income tax credit for individuals employed as sworn law enforcement officers, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians beginning in tax year 2026.

Education 

• Increases State Aid to Classrooms through the General Fund and Education Improvement Act (EIA) recurring revenues to increase the minimum starting teacher salary from $48,500 to $50,500 and increase every cell in the minimum teacher salary schedule by $2,000.
• Provides increased funding through recurring and surplus revenues for instructional materials, school safety grants, and summer reading camps.
• Allocates additional recurring general funds and lottery revenues for the Education Scholarship Trust Fund to fund 20,000 scholarships.
• Provides surplus revenues to expand full-day 4K in private centers that have available slots for children whose family income is 300 percent or less of the federal poverty guidelines.
• Directs EIA revenues to provide free, nutritious breakfast to all students regardless of income.
• Provides funds to multiple post-secondary scholarship programs and need-based grants while freezing college and university tuition for in-state resident students for the seventh consecutive year; funds are provided for tuition mitigation.
• Infrastructure, Economic Development and Disaster Aid
• Recommends nonrecurring funds for the newly created South Carolina Public Assistance Program, a state program to support disaster recovery for localized hazard events that do not meet the thresholds for a federal disaster declaration.
• Provides nonrecurring and recurring funds for roads, bridges, and interstate projects.
  Allocates lottery and nonrecurring funds for industry needs scholarships, high-demand job skill training equipment, and the support of training needs for companies through readySC.

Health and Social Services

• Directs funds for Medicaid maintenance of effort, along with Medicare premiums for elderly and disabled Medicaid recipients.
• Increases funding for home- and community-based services in response to increased utilization, acuity, and enrollment.
• Allocates funds for services to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
• Directs funds for inpatient mental health services and mental health crisis stabilization teams, substance addiction recovery services, and transportation contracts for mental health evaluations at state facilities.
• Provides recurring funds for changes in federal funding match requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
• Program (SNAP) and nonrecurring funds for modernization of the SNAP eligibility system.
  Allocates recurring funds for foster care services including increasing provider rates for foster care parents. 

Conservation and the Environment

• Provides nonrecurring funds for land conservation via the Department of Natural Resources, Forestry Commission and Conservation Bank.
• Directs nonrecurring funds for agriculture through Farm Conservation Grants.
• Provides nonrecurring funds for beach renourishment grants.
• Allocates nonrecurring funds to statewide mitigation projects through the Office of Resilience. 

Law Enforcement and Public Safety

• Recommends nonrecurring funds for Sheriff Local Law Enforcement Grants.
• Provides recurring funds for law enforcement officer step increases.
• Allocates recurring funds to the Department of Corrections to hire additional staff and address inflationary increases in operating costs. 
• Directs recurring funds for the Domestic Violence and Mental Health Program expansion.

Other Priorities

• Includes a budget proviso directing the issuance of a request for information to identify the scope, expectations, and costs for developing one or more comprehensive analyses to measure the impacts of the 10- and 20-year projected population changes, including affects on major infrastructure systems and essential government services.
• Provides recurring and nonrecurring funds to create a dedicated fund for Aid to Fire Districts.
• Provides recurring and nonrecurring funds to create an Office of Statewide Data, to be led by a Chief Data Officer, with the primary role to improve the management, transparency, and utilization of state data across all state agencies.
• Allocates recurring funds for the State Health Plan with no resulting employee premium increase.

Proposed Budget Information
Fiscal Year 2027 Budget Proposal 

Statement of Revenues 

Budget Presentation 

Governor’s Press Release

Revenue Forecast