The South Carolina Senate's $7 billion 2015-16 budget that passed last week included an amendment to send $4 million to counties affected by the February 2014 ice storm.
The 42-to-3 vote sends the budget back to the House before it will be signed into law by Gov. Nikki Haley.
Senators took time last week during budget conversations to discuss how to spend the extra revenue in the budget - money the state collected this year above its expenses.
Part of that amendment included a $4 million state match sent to the 22 local governments for ice storm expenses. Aiken County is set to gain about $1.6 million, the City of Aiken should gain about $100,000, and North Augusta is set to gain roughly $38,000.
Local governments for months have pushed the state to do what has historically been done for years in the aftermath of a natural disaster. Traditionally, local governments will handle more than half of the cost to cover storm recovery and emergency services after a disaster declaration is announced, and states then handle additional costs to take some of the financial pressure off the local governments and agencies.
After President Barack Obama signed a declaration in March 2014 to grant federal reimbursement to areas affected by the ice storm, Haley sent a letter in May 2014 to Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman and Brian White, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, outlining funding requests to agencies with expenses that had not yet been reimbursed. Haley requested about $16 million of additional, nonreccuring funds to go toward recovery and emergency costs of all 22 affected areas, including those for municipalities, and about $153,000 to go toward departments of public safety.
But those monies were never included in the 2014-15 budget until now.
"We had to fight for it," said Sen. Shane Massey, R-Edgefield. "It makes sense to me; if there is a hurricane, the state is going to step up and help the counties affected by those disasters. The ice storm was our equivalent of a hurricane."
Haley's Press Secretary Chaney Adams in March confirmed the governor would support matching Winter Storm Pax expenses in the 2015-16 budget.
Sen. Tom Young, R-Aiken, said, "Ultimately, any money for the ice storm cleanup is to assist local governments as much as local governments would not have to make up from local taxpayers. The state has historically contributed up to 50 percent when there's been a natural disaster," he said.
Young said this amendment, however, only includes a 25 percent state match - not the 50 percent of the costs many local governments wanted.
"The local governments had hoped that the state would pay half of that, but there was not a provision to pay anything in the budget up until it got in the Senate budget last Thursday," Young said. "The nonfederal share accounted for $16.4 million, and 50 percent of that would have been $8.2 million. So we got a little over $4.1 million, which is 25 percent of $16.4 million."
After the February 2014 ice storm that took down trees and cut electricity and power to thousands of homes in the county, Aiken County officials spent a total of about $33.2 million to pick up more than 1 million cubic yards of debris and enact recovery and emergency services. The City of Aiken spent just around $2 million. Aiken County has received federal reimbursement of about $22 million out of the expected $27 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, according to County Administrator Clay Killian. That left the County paying about $6.1 million out of pocket without the state's match.
The City received about $1.8 million from FEMA, leaving the City paying a few thousand dollars without a state match.
It's still unclear exactly how much extra revenue will come into the state; estimates by senators range from $25 million to $200 million, according to The Post and Courier. Although the final amount of cash won't be clear until the end of the budget fiscal year in June, Young said he's "fairly confident" these funds will be available.
"Our (Aiken County Legislative) Delegation worked really hard," said County Administrator Clay Killian referring to both House and Senate members.
"The challenge was, we had 22 counties that were declared a disaster, and that did leave 24 that wouldn't get any federal money," he said. "We were the hardest hit by far than the others, in relative terms ..."
Killian said he "wished they would have come up with 50 percent of the balance," but said he is "thankful."
Maayan Schechter is the local government reporter with Aiken Standard. Follow her on Twitter @MaayanSchechter.
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