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Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
New tech school investments to address increased enrollment, AI skills in manufacturing
Welders work to construct the Scout Motors paint shop in Blythewood April 10, 2025. Welding is among high-demand study programs at Midlands Technical College in Columbia without enough space to handle all who wish to enroll. (File photo by Jessica Holdman/SC Daily Gazette) COLUMBIA — For students hoping to study building and construction, Midlands Technical College has only 11 seats remaining in the program for the coming fall semester. The welding program is already at capacity. And a second enrollment surge in August is still expected, meaning additional incoming students will likely be waitlisted. The Columbia-based technical college hopes to fix its capacity problems with a building expansion planned over the next several years. More space for Midlands Tech students training for a job in the building trades and a Greenville Tech center that merges manufacturing and technology skills are among the largest projects for South Carolina's technical colleges in the 2025-26 state budget. Legislators spent $16 million on each. In all, the spending package sent to Gov. Henry McMaster last week provides South Carolina's technical colleges with more than $150 million in one-time aid for building projects, maintenance and renovations. (See information box below.) Training in automotive, industrial electricity, heating and cooling, as well as welding and construction have all seen a surge in demand the last five years, said Robbie Sharpe, who heads Midlands Tech's building construction program. 'Students are having to wait a semester or two just to get into these programs, because we just don't have any more space,' Sharpe said. 'Our programs are busting at the seams.' SC tech schools seek $5M to expand dual enrollment for high schoolers in poor, rural districts For more than a decade, industry and educators have struggled with how to address a shortage of new workers in the trades as existing employees reach retirement age. Now it seems that recruitment effort is paying off, as long as technical schools in the Palmetto State can find the space to train them. 'The market is there. The jobs are there. The placement is there for our students,' Sharpe said. 'They're making really good wages coming out of these programs with virtually zero debt. It's just, we're just at the end of our rope.' In the meantime, Midlands has raised enrollment caps and added night classes. For example, Sharpe twice doubled the number of seats available in the construction program for the school year that just ended — going from 20 seats to 40 seats for first-year students in the fall and then going from 40 seats to 80 seats in the spring. He filled all but five of them. They've also asked students to start with math and English courses that fulfill general education requirements as they wait for seats to open up in their trade-specific classes. 'We're out of all of our creative options, and this isn't something that's going to go away anytime soon,' Sharpe said. For years, Sharpe said, parents and educators were pushing high school seniors to pursue a four-year degree while trade education fell to the wayside. 'I've seen the mentality of students change over the last decade, but I've never seen this much momentum behind it,' Sharpe said. 'People now realize that these are not second-rate jobs. They're honorable careers.' While the cost of a bachelor's degree has soared, scholarship programs for technical colleges, such as the $5,000-per-year S.C. Workforce Industry Needs (WINS) Scholarship that comes on top of other financial aid, are covering students' full tuition. When they graduate two years later, those same students are walking into jobs that pay upwards of $50,000 a year starting out. SC colleges have frozen tuition for several years. University presidents say that's not sustainable. Legislators approved $91.4 million for WINS Scholarships in the coming school year: $57.2 million from lottery profits and $34.2 million from the general fund. 'Now we have to kick it in high gear to get caught up (to demand),' Sharpe said. The $16 million legislators included in the state budget that takes effect July 1 for Midlands Tech is expected to fully cover the cost of expanding an existing building to add more classrooms and workshop space on its campus near the airport in West Columbia. But it will take the college several more years to design the space and complete construction. While all of the state's technical colleges have trades programs, those at Midlands Tech and Greenville Technical College are among the largest in the state. At the Upstate tech school that feeds major employers, such as BMW, Michelin and Lockheed Martin, efforts are focused on building a new $41 million Center for Industrial Cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence. The state budget would cover $16 million of that cost. The purpose, according to Greenville Tech's spokeswoman Becky Mann, is to give the technicians who keep manufacturing lines up and running some expertise in cybersecurity and data science as artificial intelligence and other technologies become more ingrained in operations on the factory floor. 'Greenville Technical College will merge these two, high-demand skill sets in the Center for Industrial Cybersecurity and Artificial Intelligence, so that cybersecurity skills and artificial intelligence analytics protect plants against cyberattacks while anticipating and addressing maintenance needs and problems before they have a chance to occur,' according to a statement from the school. The school cited IBM's Threat Intelligence Index, which has ranked manufacturing as the most targeted industry for four years in a row. The sector accounted for 26% of all cyberattacks worldwide in 2024, exceeding finance, insurance, and energy. Among other major projects at South Carolina's tech schools is a $15 million 'Technical High School Workforce Center' at Central Carolina Technical College. The money is meant to fund a partnership for a future technical high school in Sumter to give those student access to college programs offered by Central Carolina's Industrial Department, according to budget documents provided to the SC Daily Gazette. 'CCTC supports initiatives that expand access to technical education and strengthen our state's workforce,' college spokeswoman Nicole Miles wrote in an email. No other details were available. There are 16 technical colleges statewide. Here's a breakdown of how the budget doles out $150 million to 14 of them for projects, maintenance and renovations. Two schools receive nothing in one-time aid in the budget that starts July 1: Denmark Technical College and Northeastern Technical College. • Aiken Technical College: $6.7 million • Central Carolina Technical College: $23.5 million • Florence-Darlington Technical College: $4 million • Greenville Technical College: $24 million • Horry-Georgetown Technical College: $8 million • Midlands Technical College: $28.5 million • Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College: $7.9 million • Piedmont Technical College: $7 million • Spartanburg Community College: $9.2 million • Technical College of the Lowcountry: $1 million • Tri-County Technical College: $9 million • Williamsburg Technical College: $1 million • York Technical College: $4 million Source: Legislature's 2025-26 state budget summary control document
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Yahoo
South Carolina death row inmate fires attorney and asks court to expedite his execution
A man on South Carolina's death row has surrendered his appeals and fired his attorney. James D. Robertson, convicted of killing his parents in the late 1990s, wrote a letter to Chief U.S. Federal Court Judge Timothy M. Cain stating he intends to withdraw his federal appeal, relieve his lawyers, and represent himself. A court-requested attorney has until July to determine if Robertson is capable of representing himself. The request could lead to Robertson being executed before exhausting his appeals. Robertson was represented by Emily Paavola of Justice 360, a Columbia firm. According to court documents, Robertson killed Earl and Terry Robertson, both 49, with a hammer and a baseball bat in their Rock Hill home in November 1997. In the letter to the judge, Robertson said he relieved Paavola as his attorney because no attorney would withdraw his execution appeal. Robertson previously tried to withdraw his appeals in 2002. According to documents Paavola sent to the U.S. District Court, Robertson's request was due to mental illness, medical issues, and the loss of fellow death row inmates. Marion Bowman, executed by lethal injection on Jan. 31, was a close friend. More: Memorial Day weekend safety: Experts urge caution on the roads, at the grill, on the water Paavloa asked that the court delay a decision on Robertson's request so he could be evaluated. U.S. District Judge Mary Gordon Baker appointed Columbia-based attorney John L. Warren III to make sure Robertson is competent enough to represent himself. There have been five men executed in South Carolina since September. Mikel Mahdi was the last man executed on April 11. He died via firing squad. This article originally appeared on Greenville News: SC death row inmate fires attorney, seeks accelerated execution date
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
SC nonprofit got $800K grant to fight crime. Where did the money go?
In April 2023, a who's who of Richland County Democrats gathered at a sheriff's substation on the campus of Lower Richland High School to announce the kickoff of a local anti-crime initiative called the Community Cares Project. For too long, the rural communities of Eastover, Gadsden and Hopkins had been starved for resources and plagued by violence. But now, thanks to an $800,000 federal grant from U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, there was reason for hope. A small, politically-connected alumni group with a $45,000 annual budget and no apparent criminal justice track record would be leading the effort in partnership with the Richland County Sheriff's Department and several other local government and community organizations. The Lower Richland Alumni Foundation, run by then-Richland 1 school board chair Cheryl Harris and Columbia-based consultant Cleveland Wilson, had until that time been known for hosting gospel music festivals, awards galas and high school football tailgates. But with the Byrne Discretionary Grant in tow, the nonprofit set out to systematically study and redress the conditions contributing to all manner of crime in the Lower Richland area. 'This organization felt it was past time that we stand up and regain our community,' Harris told those gathered at the event. More than two years later, it's unclear how the LR Alumni Foundation is spending or has spent much of the federal award. Neither Harris nor Wilson responded to multiple requests for comment. And due to a series of filing extensions the organization received, it hasn't had to submit any annual financial reports since it began receiving the grant money. A public records request seeking information about the federal grant returned only a smattering of heavily-redacted documents. Two undated progress reports from 2023 are the only records the Justice Department's Office of Justice Programs provided that pertain to the organization's post-award activities. The self-reports, which are not corroborated with any documentation, contain lists of planning meetings the group said it held with community stakeholders at the outset of the grant period and more than 60 events and programs it launched or would be launching in the months ahead. In many cases, it's not clear what became of the initiatives or what role the LR Alumni Foundation had in financing, planning or executing them. The State Media Co. contacted individuals associated with each of the five community-led programs promoted on the alumni group's website and all eight of the public bodies or agencies identified as partners in the organization's grant proposal. The 11 that responded reported receiving an estimated $65,000 combined from the LR Alumni Foundation, between subgrants, payments for services and donations of supplies. Another $36,000 went to Harris as salary in 2023, according to a deposition she gave last year as part of a lawsuit filed by a former Lower Richland High School principal. The State could not account for the remainder of the grant money. Clyburn, who recorded robocalls supporting Harris and other Richland 1 incumbents in last year's school board election, defended his decision to steer $800,000 to the alumni group rather than a more established criminal justice nonprofit or law enforcement agency. 'I support Community Project Funding requests that will improve the lives of my constituents by responding to a demonstrated need in their communities,' the congressman wrote in an emailed statement that expressed satisfaction with the LR Alumni Foundation's anti-violence efforts. The thesis of the Community Cares Project was that law enforcement's frayed relationship with the Lower Richland community was making it harder to fight crime. Creating a 'culture change,' the organization explained in its grant proposal, could be accomplished by adopting best practices for community-based policing, collecting data on how those strategies were working and making adjustments, as necessary. The Richland County Sheriff's Department would be involved every step of the way — from providing the group access to years of detailed crime data for the creation of a 'hot spot' database to participating in listening sessions, focus groups and 'trust building' activities out in the community. During the deposition last May, more than a year after the Community Cares Project launched, Harris described the initiative as 'a project that I work on with Sheriff (Leon) Lott and others to keep the crime rate in Lower Richland down...' In reality, Lott said, the law enforcement agency was not 'heavily involved' in the project. The sheriff confirmed in an interview that members of the department assisted with a youth leadership program called Project L.E.A.D., but admitted knowing next to nothing about it. He said the agency was not involved in any other aspect of the Community Cares Project. 'I couldn't tell you what all they were doing,' Lott said. A sheriff's department spokeswoman wrote in an emailed statement that as part of Project L.E.A.D., deputies from the sheriff's Youth Services unit spoke to middle school and high school students about making good decisions, setting goals and mapping out career plans. The sheriff's department declined to grant an interview request with any of the deputies who participated in the youth leadership program, and referred all additional questions to the LR Alumni Foundation. 'While there are youth programs that are managed by RCSD, Project LEAD is not one of them,' Master Deputy Alexandra Salrin wrote in an email. Invoices show the LR Alumni Foundation paid the sheriff's department $4,455 over 13 months to supply deputies for the program, which was held at the agency's Lower Richland substation. The department does not charge outside groups to use the room where the program was held. Most of the LR Alumni Foundation's other public partners also reported having little to no involvement in the Community Cares Project. Of the seven other public bodies the alumni group identified as 'partners' in its anti-crime initiative, only two – the town of Eastover and the Richland County Recreation Commission – reported working with or receiving anything from the organization. The rest denied any involvement with the project, although Richland School District 1 said it let the alumni group use Lower Richland High School for a back-to-school event. Eastover Mayor James Faber said the tiny town of barely 600 people got $6,000 from the alumni group last summer to create a jobs program for middle school students. 'It was one of the best programs we ever had,' gushed Faber, who said about a dozen 12-to-14-year-olds worked in a variety of government settings, including at the library, the town manager's office and the judge's office. 'It's a program that's really needed.' The Richland County Recreation Commission reported receiving an unspecified number of computers, televisions and video gaming systems from the LR Alumni Foundation. The electronics were spread across four Lower Richland parks to create 'gaming zones,' where children could gather under adult supervision to play non-violent video games. Harris said in a speech last year that the alumni group's gift amounted to nearly $40,000 in gaming equipment. 'When we first wrote this grant, we were looking at making sure that the children of the Lower Richland community had things to do,' she said at a June 2024 ceremony where the LR Alumni Foundation was recognized for its donation. 'And I'm proud to say when I talk to folks such as Sheriff Leon Lott that this project has done exactly what we wanted it to do.' The gaming zone at Bluff Road Park was empty when a reporter visited late one afternoon in April. Park staff said the equipment is kept in storage unless a group of five or more people ask to use it and an employee is available to supervise their play. As a result, the gaming zone doesn't get much use outside of special events, staff said In addition to its public partners, the Community Cares Project worked with several small businesses to offer free music and photography lessons to local youth. Maurice Middleton, the owner of M&S Studios, said the LR Alumni Foundation supplied 10 keyboards and paid his company to provide three sessions of joint piano and voice classes, beginning in Fall 2023. The classes met twice weekly — once at the C.R. Neal Dream Center in Columbia and once virtually — for a total of four weeks during the summer and eight weeks in the fall and spring, he said. In total, Middleton estimated he and his partner trained between 40 and 45 children. 'They were well behaved and like sponges ready to take in everything you had to offer,' he said. Middleton, an Orangeburg County music teacher, couldn't recall what the LR Alumni Foundation paid his company, but said it wasn't 'astronomical.' 'It was enough for the company to survive,' he said. Around the same time, Rodney Williams, of Creative Images Photography in Columbia, partnered with the alumni group to offer free digital photography classes. The weekly classes met for six weeks in the fall and winter of 2023, and included lessons on exposure, lighting and composition, Williams said. 'It was a general how-to to get them interested in it,' he said. Williams estimated he was paid a few thousand dollars for teaching the classes, but couldn't remember exactly what the LR Alumni Foundation compensated him. A third instructor who led an alumni group-sponsored drummer's academy did not respond to requests for comment. The Community Cares Project also supported two children's camps that ran simultaneously last summer at church facilities in Eastover and Hopkins. The 10-week summer camps, free for children ages 5 to 13, offered math, reading and creative writing enrichment, a computer lab, Bible study and other activities, according to promotional flyers. Sandra Cook, the pastor of Church of Restoration and Transformation in Eastover, ran one of the camps and members of the LR Alumni Foundation ran the other. Cook declined to speak with a reporter about her relationship with the alumni group and said she couldn't divulge how her camp, the ABBA Center, was funded. She has, however, thanked the LR Alumni Foundation on Facebook for its support of her camp and appeared in a documentary the alumni group produced last year to promote its work in the community. In the film, Cook said the nonprofit provided funding for her staff and paid for the camp's educational software. 'I stand here today to testify of the greatness that came out, not only for the ABBA Center, but for the community of Eastover,' she said in the documentary. In addition to classes and summer camps, the LR Alumni Foundation also has touted its sponsorship of several church and school-related events, including Field Day, a competition between schools in the Lower Richland cluster; Unity in the Community, a church festival with food, music and games; and Generation of Gospel, another local nonprofit's music workshop. It isn't clear what level of support the organization provided to any of the events, which all appear to be annual functions with multiple sponsors. In July 2023, Richland County awarded the LR Alumni Foundation a separate reimbursable grant to expand its Community Cares Project. The alumni group proposed using the $156,000 American Rescue Plan Act grant to create five year-round 'educational learning centers' in the Lower Richland area. Local students struggling with COVID-related learning loss could visit the centers to receive rigorous tutoring, learn test-taking strategies and develop the skills necessary to succeed in college and the workplace, according to the organization's proposal. But the LR Alumni Foundation struggled to justify its tutoring center expenditures to the county, which ultimately redirected most of the group's grant award to other projects. Emails show that only two of the centers ever opened, and The State found no evidence that either operated anything like the 'Sylvan Learning Centers style' locations described in the LR Alumni Foundation's proposal. Unlike Sylvan, which bills itself as the world's largest private employer of certified K-12 teachers, hardly any of the alumni group's tutors were licensed educators. Many of them, including Harris and her children, had close ties to the alumni group, documents show. Moreover, a review of grant reimbursement requests submitted to the county raised the possibility that the alumni group's tutoring centers and summer camps were actually the same thing. If confirmed, it would mean county grant money was used on an unauthorized project, in violation of the grant agreement. Documents show the tutoring centers and summer camps were housed at the same church facilities, employed the same people and used the same educational software. The LR Alumni Foundation also frequently conflated the camps with the tutoring centers in its communications with Richland County. Emails show Wilson, the alumni group president and administrator of the ARPA grant, referred to the group's 'camps' or its 'summer camp' employees when discussing the tutoring centers and often sought reimbursements for summer camp-related expenses. Expense reports he filed with Richland County identify the group's employees as 'tutors' or 'instructors,' but the supporting documentation he attached makes clear they worked at the summer camps. In fact, all of the payroll reimbursement requests he submitted for the Hopkins tutoring center were supported by either a staff sign-in sheet labeled '2024 Community Cares Project Summer Camp' or by checks cut to summer camp workers. In one case, Wilson included a summer camp flyer advertising a cookout, outdoor games and prizes in a grant reimbursement packet he submitted to the county. Among the supporting documents he provided was a $349 receipt from the Party Spot in Irmo, a purveyor of inflatable bounce houses and character costumes for children's birthday parties. The receipt showed that on June 19, 2024, Harris purchased an inflatable hoop, sack race, 'Tug A War' and jumbo versions of UNO, Jenga and Connect 4. Two days later, the LR Alumni Foundation's Facebook page shared a photo gallery from its Hopkins summer camp that included pictures of an inflatable basketball hoop, a tug-of-war setup and giant UNO and Connect 4 games. While it's common for grant projects to evolve over time, a grantee must negotiate any changes with its granting body and codify them in a formal modification agreement, said Mike Chamberlain, CEO of the Grant Professionals Association. None of the documents obtained by The State in response to public records requests indicate the LR Alumni Foundation ever sought or received permission to spend its county grant award on the summer camps. Both Richland County and an auditing firm the county used for grant compliance declined to comment. Richland County paid the LR Alumni Foundation an initial $44,000 reimbursement for tutoring center expenses in June 2024. But within a couple months, county officials were raising questions about 'discrepancies' in the organization's filings and the lack of supporting documents, emails show. Initially, the concerns were confined to the alumni group's paperwork — allegations that numbers didn't add up, invoices were missing and duplicate payments had been submitted. But by November, officials were questioning the group's compliance with several grant requirements and the validity of expenses the county already had reimbursed, emails show. County officials wanted to know: Was the organization adhering to the Fair Labor Standards Act? One employee reportedly worked 17 11-hour days in a single month and earned the equivalent of just $6.41 an hour, according to documents the LR Alumni Foundation submitted. Other employees worked more than 40 hours a week without overtime pay or were paid amounts that didn't correspond to the number of hours they worked, the group's records show. Why did the alumni group pay people in 2024 for work they reportedly performed years earlier? Reimbursement requests the alumni group filed for at least five tutoring center staffers, including Wilson, sought payment for work performed before the grant was awarded. Why was the organization seeking reimbursements for individuals it did not employ or pay? Some of the tutors were employees of the Church of Restoration and Transformation in Eastover, and were paid by the church, not the LR Alumni Foundation, documents show. Did the tutoring sessions provided by church employees have a religious component, in violation of the grant agreement? Nothing the alumni group submitted for reimbursement identified the tutoring centers as religiously-focused, but the organization's summer camps advertised Bible study and daily devotions. Videos from the camps shared on social media show children reciting prayers and singing Christian music. Wilson, who paid himself $55 an hour to manage the tutoring center grant, attempted to allay Richland County's concerns, emails show. He explained that tutors were not hourly workers, but instead had agreed to work for $400 a week, regardless of how many hours they worked on any given day. Some tutors, Wilson wrote, had worked in 2022 and 2023 'with hopes of being compensated in the future.' After grant funding became available in 2024, they were paid for their past work, he explained. Wilson denied the tutoring was infused with religion and told county officials the alumni group sought reimbursement for the church's expenses because the church and its affiliated ABBA Center were LR Alumni Foundation partners. His explanations failed to satisfy Richland County, which denied all of the alumni group's subsequent reimbursement requests. 'After reviewing the provided materials, we regret to inform you that we are unable to process your request,' Richland County budget director Maddison Wilkerson wrote to Wilson on Dec. 27, before running through a litany of issues with the requests he'd submitted, including some for which the county had already reimbursed the group. The county reallocated nearly three-quarters of the LR Alumni Foundation's awarded funds to other projects, but did not attempt to recover the roughly $20,000 officials acknowledged in emails had been paid out to the alumni group in error, spokesman Todd Money said. Instead, he explained, county officials 'reconciled' the improper payouts with allowable expenditures from the group's subsequent reimbursement requests. A review of the LR Alumni Foundation's pre-Community Cares Project finances revealed an organization largely reliant on public dollars that has struggled to manage its money and fulfill its charitable aims. Between 2020 and 2022, more than 80% of the LR Alumni Foundation's revenue came from discretionary spending directed by state and county lawmakers, records show. The group sank most of its money each year into a gospel music festival that, while ostensibly a fundraiser, cost more than twice what it raised from parking and ticket sales, according to financial filings. Since the LR Alumni Foundation's only other source of revenue was another annual fundraiser that lost money, the organization consistently ran deficits, records show. The group only dug out of its financial hole due to the pandemic, which forced the cancellation of its money-losing fundraisers, but didn't stanch the flow of government dollars, documents show. As a general rule of thumb, charity watchdog groups recommend nonprofits spend at least 65% of their money on program activities and no more than 35% on fundraising and administrative expenses. The LR Alumni Foundation flipped that maxim on its head, spending nearly 80% on fundraising and only 18% on charitable programming, or roughly $6,600 annually, documents show. Discrepancies in the alumni group's reports also raise questions. In one case, the LR Alumni Foundation filed a budget document with the S.C. Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism that contained substantially different information than the annual financial report it submitted to the S.C. Secretary of State. Both documents covered the 2022 calendar year, but none of the numbers matched. Lower Richland Alumni Foundation 2022 financial reports by Zak Koeske on Scribd The document filed with PRT, which has administered state budget earmarks designated for the alumni group's Diamond Festival in four of the last five years, reported revenues and expenses that were about 130% higher than those contained in the Secretary of State report. The more detailed PRT document showed the LR Alumni Foundation paid Harris ($26,630) and Wilson ($13,689) more than five times what it spent on charity ($7,599), in stark contrast to the $0 the alumni group told the Secretary of State went toward 'salaries or other compensation.' When asked whether PRT had noted the financial discrepancies when processing the nonprofit's earmarks, a spokeswoman said the agency didn't have the authority to audit earmarks or the entities receiving them. According to the transcript of her May 2024 deposition, Harris denied under oath that she'd been a paid employee of the LR Alumni Foundation prior to 2023. When the attorney deposing Harris presented her with the PRT document indicating she'd been paid more than $26,000 by the organization in 2022, she questioned the document's accuracy, but did not deny being compensated. Harris went on to explain that the money she received was likely a reimbursement. 'When we book flights and whatnot, a lot of times I use my cards because I have American Airlines, etcetera, things like that,' Harris said, according to the transcript. 'There's a lot of travel involved, so it's mileage. Computers and stuff like that I've had to buy for various things.' It's not clear from the transcript why a local alumni group would reimburse its vice president for air travel, or why she would have traveled on LR Alumni Foundation business so much in a single year. At the 2022 IRS mileage reimbursement rate for charities, Harris would have had to drive 190,214 miles — more than 520 miles per day — to qualify for a reimbursement the size she claimed to have received. Harris told the attorney questioning her that the LR Alumni Foundation should have records related to her 2022 expense reimbursement requests, but it's not clear from the transcript if she provided them or was asked to do so. Two days after the deposition, she amended the economic interest statement she'd filed with the S.C. Ethics Commission 15 months earlier to clarify that she had been paid by the LR Alumni Foundation in 2022, records show. The alumni group has not, however, amended its 2022 annual financial report on file with the Secretary of State.
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Business leaders say they're tired of being villainized, used as ‘an ATM' by lawmakers
Business leaders in Annapolis said a proposed tax on services makes the state less business-friendly. (Photo by Bryan P. Sears/Maryland Matters.) Business owners gathered in Annapolis on Wednesday said they are tired of being villainized by the same lawmakers who view them as a source of easy money. For the second consecutive year, business owners arrived at the state capitol to oppose a proposal to impose a sales tax on services. The late-filed, pared down proposal would raise as much at $940 million next year — and $1.4 billion by fiscal 2030 — by imposing a 2.5% sales tax on services provided by a specific set of businesses to other businesses. They aired their grievances over the course of a day that began with a late-morning news conference followed by hours of testimony before House and Senate committees where more than 400 businesses signed up in opposition. 'One of the most frustrating aspects of this debate is hearing legislators refer to businesses as bad actors, or stating that they're not paying their fair share,' said Kimberly Prescott, founder and president of Columbia-based Prescott HR, at the morning event. 'Let me be clear: The businesses that I work with are not bad actors,' she said. 'They're hard-working employers that do the right thing for their employees and their communities. This kind of rhetoric discourages business owners from staying in Maryland, let alone expanding here.' Prescott and others said businesses are at a breaking point. In recent years, they've weathered a pandemic. The state has increased the minimum wage and imposed mandates for paid leave and other programs. Many of those mandates require professional services to ensure compliance — the same services targeted by the proposed tax, said Rebekah Olson, CEO of the Maryland Association of Certified Public Accountants. 'This bill is a tax on compliance itself,' Olson said. 'Hiring a CPA to ensure you're meeting your tax obligation? Now taxed. Paying for payroll services to ensure your employees are paid appropriately and on time? Taxed. Bringing in a consultant and new software to actually implement this very bill? Now taxed.' Mary D. Kane, president and CEO of the Maryland Chamber of Commerce, said the bill is yet another hurdle thrown up by lawmakers. 'Instead of creating opportunities for businesses to recover and grow, the state is continually using them as their ATM machine,' Kane said. 'This is our moment because we've been taxed enough.' A Department of Legislative Services analysis released Tuesday said that House Bill 1554, sponsored by Del. David Moon (D-Montgomery), and the identical Senate Bill 1045, sponsored by Sen. Shelly Hettleman (D-Baltimore County), highlighted 12 services that would be hit by the new tax, raising $940 million in fiscal 2026. Tech services and consulting account for 66% of the total in the first year, the analysis said. Both the House and Senate hearings Wednesday featured moments of tension and drama. Moon said the bill is one option to address the state's ballooning budget deficits: The state faces a projected $3 billion gap for fiscal 2026, which doubles to more than $6 billion in fiscal 2030. And those estimates came before President Donald Trump's administration began its sustained, rapid-fire series of cuts of federal spending and employment. Maryland stands to lose more than any other state as a result of Trump administration cuts, Moody's Ratings reported this week. Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) said those cuts could spark a 'Maryland recession.' Lawmakers have less than four weeks to craft a state spending plan, even as they brace for more federal budget and a potential shutdown. 'This sucks, right?' said Del. Joe Vogel (D-Montgomery), a member of the House Ways and Means Committee. 'We're here in this position not because of what we're doing but rather because of the consequences of an administration in D.C.' The crowd objected, with many speaking over Vogel, saying 'No' and preventing him from finishing the sentence. House Ways and Means Committee Chair Vanessa Atterbeary (D-Howard) gaveled the session back to order, calling for attendees to restrain themselves or be removed. Moon, while testifying on his bill, turned at one point to speak to an audience filled with business owners, many of whom clearly favored a budget solution involving cuts. 'To the folks that were just groaning: I feel that groaning I totally get it,' Moon said. Atterbeary asked him to not address the crowd, but Moon continued, saying that lawmakers are also making 'billions in cuts.' 'I promise you we are doing billions in cuts. I promise it. They're slowing the Blueprint [education reform plan]. There's billions in cuts. More are coming. We have to make a decision with what to do with what's left,' he said. 'The unemployment rolls are doubling by the moment. It's going to be folks — employees and contractors — coming through the system. We know that for a fact. The $280 – $350 million [revenue reduction] that was announced by the Board or Revenue Estimates was a floor. It's a floor. It was not factoring in whatsoever any private sector cuts,' Moon said. 'Big cuts are coming to Maryland, rest assured.' In the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, Vice Chair Jim Rosapepe (D-Prince George's and Anne Arundel) sparked a tense exchange with the owner of a small IT business when, after hearing from a panel of opponents, he asked for suggestions to balance the budget. 'If we don't do this [service tax], we need to come up with about $1 billion in cuts beyond what the governor has proposed or other revenue,' Rosapepe said. 'So, I'd appreciate to know what billion-dollar revenue source would you suggest we substitute for or what billion dollars of cuts you'd suggest.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE Darren Clark, owner of Clark Computer Services, said the sales tax proposal would 'stifle' small businesses. 'You're doing a transaction versus thinking long term,' Clark said. 'With all due respect, we are thinking long term,' Rosapepe replied. Rosapepe later said he would not ask again, but left the question open for opponents to answer. 'I'm asking all the witnesses if they don't want this … I personally would like specific suggestions of alternative revenue sources or cuts,' Rosapepe said. 'I think if you were sitting in my business with 40 employees you might have to start letting go, you'd think a lot differently,' Clark said. 'But you're sitting up on your perch and you're thinking this is easy. Most of us are operating on thin margins already. You're going to make it worse.' It was at that point, Senate Budget and Taxation Chair Sen. Guy Guzzone (D-Howard) ended the exchange. 'We're going to move on,' Guzzone said.
