Education lottery appropriations and uses

(A) There is appropriated from the Education Lottery Account for the following education purposes and programs and funds for these programs and purposes shall be transferred by the Executive Budget Office as directed below. These appropriations must be used to supplement and not supplant existing funds for education. Distributions from the Education Lottery Account must be made on a quarterly basis by the last day of January, April, July, and October of each year, beginning in July 2002 if the account has accrued more than $35,000,000 in net proceeds by that date. The Executive Budget Office is directed to prepare the subsequent Lottery Expenditure Account detail budget to reflect the appropriations of the Education Lottery Account as provided in the annual appropriations act. (B) The Commission on Higher Education is authorized to temporarily transfer funds between appropriated line items and between recurring and nonrecurring funds in order to ensure the timely receipt of scholarships and tuition assistance. (C) Annual net lottery proceeds and investment earnings in excess of the certified net lottery proceeds and investment earnings are appropriated and must be used and must be carried forward to ensure that all LIFE, Palmetto Fellows, and HOPE Scholarships created or supplemented by the General Assembly are fully funded annually. If the lottery revenue received is less than the amounts appropriated, the projects and programs receiving appropriations for any such year must have their appropriations reduced on a pro rata basis, except that a reduction must not be applied to the funding of LIFE, Palmetto Fellows, and HOPE Scholarships.