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State agriculture commissioner outlines budget requests including $2M school-food incentive and contingency for food-bank audit dispute
Summary
Commissioner Weathers outlined the South Carolina Department of Agriculture’s budget priorities before the Senate Finance Committee Natural Resources Subcommittee, including $1 million for laboratory and customer-service enhancements, $2 million more for statewide Certified South Carolina marketing, an $8 million federal-funds authority increase, and a contingency funding request tied to an audit dispute with a Columbia food bank.
Commissioner Weathers told the Senate Finance Committee Natural Resources Subcommittee that the South Carolina Department of Agriculture seeks recurring and one-time funding to expand laboratory, marketing and distribution services for farmers and to cover contingent obligations related to a pending audit dispute with a Columbia food bank.
Weathers told the committee the department’s recurring priorities include a $1 million request for customer-service enhancements to strengthen laboratory capacity and farmers-market operations and a $2 million increase for statewide marketing of the Certified South Carolina brand. The department also seeks funding to incentivize local school districts to purchase more South Carolina-grown products; Weathers described the idea as an add-on “incentive” on top of federal school-food funding and said the state’s share would be intended to encourage a shift toward local procurement.
The department asked for an $8 million increase in federal funds spending authority to manage an expected $23 million increase in federal grants it will administer, and requested funding for replacement vehicles and laboratory equipment after taking on additional responsibilities that transferred from the Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC).
Weathers described pilots to address food deserts and chronic-disease prevention through improved local food access, and said the agency’s agribusiness fund (an earlier $40 million appropriation) has committed roughly $26 million of the original appropriation to projects supporting South Carolina farmers and processors. He said the department invested about $4 million from that fund to increase small-processor capacity for meat and poultry, enabling more local product to enter school and institutional channels.
The department also presented a nonrecurring request for $3 million to support regional farmers markets and said it needs to replace roughly 30 vehicles and purchase equipment to handle higher laboratory demand in drought or other adverse years.
Commissioner Weathers outlined an unusual contingency request tied to an audit dispute involving Harvest Hope Food Bank in Columbia. The department said federal rules require accountability for U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) food purchase funds and that an administrative-law-court proceeding is pending to determine whether the food bank must repay unaccounted-for food dollars; Weathers said there is a hearing later in the month (date not specified). If the department is ultimately required to remit funds to USDA on behalf of the food bank, Weathers said the department may seek state contingency funding to avoid penalizing other food banks that receive USDA-distributed food through the department.
Committee members asked clarifying questions about coordination with universities and processors, the timing of the pending administrative law hearing, and the department’s plans to scale marketing and school procurement incentives. Weathers said the hearing was scheduled later in the month and that department staff were working with partners on procurement and marketing plans. No formal votes or committee actions were recorded during the presentation.
