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Email This ArticleOn Monday, S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford announced the appointment of state Sen. Scott Richardson, R-Hilton Head Island, to South Carolina's Military Base Advisory Committee, which was established last month by the governor.
Sanford, in a press release Monday, said Richardson's "marketing and public relations background brings another needed dimension to this committee's efforts."
State Rep. Bill Cotty, R-Richland-Kershaw, also received an appointment to the committee Monday.
"I'm grateful to both of them for joining our effort to protect South Carolina's military bases," the governor said.
Richardson and Cotty, along with the committee's chair, S.C. Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom, are the only legislators on the nine-member body. The remainder of the committee is made up of retired military generals.
The new round of federal base closings outlined by the federal government's Base Realignment and Closure Committee is expected in 2005. Previous rounds in 1988, 1991, 1993 and 1995 affected 451 installations.
South Carolina was hit twice during those rounds, losing the Myrtle Beach Air Force Base in 1991 and the Charleston Naval Base's almost 20,000 government jobs in 1993.
"Our military community represents anywhere between 30 percent and 35 percent of the economic base in the (city) of Beaufort," Richardson said. "Just as with all of our military bases in South Carolina, that's a critical asset that we've got to be creative in protecting."
According to a recent study completed by the University of South Carolina Beaufort and Georgia Southern University the Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island and the Naval Hospital Beaufort in 2002 contributed about $450 million to the local economy.
"We've had (the bases) here for years and they've been very good neighbors," Richardson said. "É It would be very devastating for us to have to start over from scratch."
Contact Ian Leslie at 986-5529 or .
