RIDGELAND - The S.C. State Ports Authority has no exclusive right to develop steamship terminals in South Carolina, attorneys for Jasper County said in a brief filed this week with the state Supreme Court.

"Surely the [State Ports Authority] does not maintain that it has the exclusive authority to own and operate all watercraft and railroads in the State of South Carolina," the document says.

The filing came in a dispute about who can build a $500 million steamship terminal on the S.C. side of the Savannah River.

County officials have worked for more than a decade to bring a port to the county.

When the county struck a development deal with a private port developer, the State Ports Authority sued and said it has the right to develop steamship terminals.

The agency's enabling legislation, dating to 1932, empowers the agency "to promote, develop, construct, equip, maintain and operate a harbor or harbors within this state on the Savannah River."

Jasper County says nothing in the law makes those powers exclusive and that the county has the right to build a termi-
nal under the state's home rule law.