SC Taxpayers Will Spend $10M Dollars This Year To Replace ‘Aging’ State Aircraft

South Carolina taxpayers will spend millions of dollars for a new state plane that Gov. Henry McMaster says is needed to replace an aging state-owned craft that officials use to fly to events but whose use some have questioned as an abuse of privilege.

The state Division of Aeronautics — the agency responsible for flying and maintaining state planes — will receive $10 million to replace to replace at least one, and possibly both, state-owned aircraft “that are nearly 40 years old and beyond their service lifetime,” under this year’s state budget. The allocation comes following controversy in recent years surrounding how some state officials have used the state’s air fleet.

“The stark reality is that both aircraft are on the verge of being grounded because they are not airworthy,” McMaster wrote in his executive budget summary, asking the Legislature for $10 million to “sell the current King Air 350 and purchase a safer used King Air 350.”

The flight department of the aeronautics commission operates and maintains two twin engine propeller jets, a 1983 King Air C90 and 1990 King Air 350. The aircraft are used for the conducting of official business by the governor, constitutional officers, members of the General Assembly, state agencies and universities.

Questions about how certain state officials have used the planes in the past have prompted some legislators to question policy involving the use of state aircraft, and whether the state needs any planes at all.

Under the current law, lawmakers, the governor and state agencies have the discretion to book flights on a first-come, first-served basis for anything they consider to be official state business. The S.C. Aeronautics Commission mans the aircrafts and tracks its logs but is not responsible for policing use of the planes — something lawmakers agree is an unfair expectation.

Two years ago, following reporting by The State that a prominent Richland County lawmaker used the state planes to travel to conferences at luxury resorts with his-then girlfriend at taxpayers’ expense, Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, R- Edgefield, led an effort to change the policy involving how lawmakers book state flights in order to prevent what he called an abuse of state resources and taxpayer dollars.

Under a state budget proviso, state planes are limited to official business, which is loosely defined to only exclude travel to or from legislative meetings, news conferences, bill signings and conferences.

Massey sought policy changes in 2021 that would require lawmakers to get the approval from the president of the Senate or the speaker of the House prior to booking a state plane, and would force a legislator’s guests, who are non-relatives, to pay commercial rates to tag along.

Those amendments, however, were rejected by the House, leaving in place the existing loosely defined proviso.

Are state planes worth the cost?

In 2021, following reports of abuse, McMaster ordered an updated cost-benefit analysis of maintaining or selling aircraft owned by the South Carolina Aeronautics Commission.

The report, which hadn’t been updated since 2014, found that the state spends $5,197 in operating costs for both planes per hour while in use. That number was down slightly from $5,655 in 2014.

Last year, while on the Senate floor, state Sen. Darrel Jackson, D- Richland, offered an amendment proposing to sell the state planes and use the money to charter private flights. While that plan cleared the Senate, it was later rejected in the House.

Echoing the report, and in favor of maintaining the state’s aircraft, state Rep. Heather Crawford, R- Horry, said in March that the state saves money in maintaining its own fleet compared to using charter flights because the cost to fly on the state planes is cheaper than chartered flights.

“The Aeronautics Commission has experienced a 12.5% reduction in total cost per hour for the King Air 350 and a 2.5% reduction for the King Air C90,” the report concluded. “When comparing these total costs per hour to the average of five charter services for common routes, the Aeronautics Commission’s costs were below market rates for flights that originate from Columbia, where the aircraft are based.”

The use of state planes has long been scrutinized.

In 2013 Clemson University came under fire for using the state’s planes far more than any other state agency, including the governor’s office, to aid in athletic recruiting. In response, a ban was put in place, restricting any school from using a state-owned plane to recruit athletes.

Although that ban was lifted in 2015, a budget proviso was added this year requiring colleges and universities to reimburse the state for using its aircraft for athletic recruitment for “all flight hours on an at cost basis, using non-general funds.”

Prior to the $10 million budget approval, The Post and Courier reported the director of the State Aeronautics Commission, Gary Siegfried, as saying that while the planes are indeed aging, an immediate replacement wasn’t necessary.

Siegfried was not available for immediate comment.

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