Ports Authority plan offers best chance for Jasper County

Guest columnist

By TOM DAVIS

Sen. Tommy Moore came to Jasper County on Aug.26 to criticize Gov. Mark Sanford for “failing to resolve the stalemate between the county and the State Ports Authority over control of the port site.” Moore’s assessment of the situation in Jasper County made it very clear that, as one news story reported, he is “less than intimately familiar with the details of the port project.”

The impediment to a shipping terminal in Jasper County is not a stalemate between the county and the Ports Authority. That was resolved months ago by the S.C. Supreme Court in favor of the Ports Authority. The problem now is getting the land, owned by the Georgia Department of Transportation, back into South Carolina hands. This will be difficult since Georgia is doing everything in its power to keep the land from being developed into a terminal that competes with the Port of Savannah.

Moore should have taken the opportunity to remind the Ports Authority that its chances of getting the land back will vastly improve if it avoids the mistake made by Jasper County in 2003. The county’s plan then was to condemn the land for the purpose of leasing it on a long-term basis to a private stevedoring company, in return for that company’s commitment to build and then operate the new terminal.

Engaging the private sector and its capital to develop a shipping terminal is excellent public policy. After all, it is what our competitors are doing in Virginia, Florida and Alabama and what the port authorities of 45 of the 50 largest container ports in the world have done. And it is also true that if the Ports Authority expects to compete in the 21st century, then it will need to start tapping into the vast reservoirs of private money available for terminal development.

But Jasper County requires a different approach since the land is owned by the Georgia Transportation Department and a condemnation action must be successfully prosecuted. The county’s condemnation effort failed because its plan relied on a private company’s capital and operational expertise and, as a result, did not meet the “public use” condemnation test. As the S.C. Supreme Court reminded the county, “the power of eminent domain cannot be used to accomplish a project simply because it will benefit the public.”

The bottom line is this: The Ports Authority will have to use its public resources to acquire, develop and operate the proposed new terminal in Jasper County. Any plan that relies upon a private company for those things will fail to meet the “public use” test and allow the Georgia DOT to slip the condemnation noose a second time.

Ironically, the ability of the Ports Authority to commit the necessary public resources in Jasper County depends on its solicitation of private capital to build its new terminal at the former Navy base in North Charleston. Fortunately, unlike in Jasper County, there is no legal restriction on a private company financing, developing and operating a new terminal at the Navy base — that land is already owned by the Ports Authority, and there is no need to meet a “public use” condemnation test. If the Ports Authority develops the Navy base terminal with private money — which it can easily do — then it will be able to devote its public resources to the Jasper County terminal.

And at Gov. Mark Sanford’s urging, the Ports Authority is doing precisely that. It is negotiating a deal to develop the new terminal at the Navy base with private money so that it will be able to bring its public resources to bear on condemning and developing the Jasper County site.

The stakes in this matter are high. The Port of Charleston’s capacity is exhausted, and we have lost — and continue to lose — millions of dollars in shipping business to other states. A new terminal in Jasper County would increase our state’s shipping capacity and boost the economy of a county that has been shamefully ignored by the state for far too long. It is important that all our public officials — including Moore — become familiar with the details of this project and forgo the political rhetoric.

Mr. Davis is a Beaufort attorney and a former member of the South Carolina State Ports Authority. He is an adviser to Gov. Sanford’s re-election effort.