Watch out world: The Palmetto is back
April 18, 2012
South Carolina weighs in with some huge job and investment-generating projects
By Mike Randle,
Publisher, Southern Business & Development
I remember when the South Carolina Department of Commerce (back then it was called the S.C. Development Board) was the most feared state economic development agency in the most competitive economic development arena on the planet; the American South. It was also the region’s most consistent even after Wayne Sterling left as Commerce Chief of Staff in 1994. Sterling, along with then-Gov. Carroll Campbell, was credited with recruiting BMW to The Palmetto State in 1991. That project remains the “Big Kahuna” in South Carolina more than 20 years later.
In the recently concluded winter quarter, the German automaker announced another massive expansion at its plant in Spartanburg County. This one is a mere $900 million investment. Anyone have a South Carolina-made BMW X3 or X5 model in the family parking lot? We do. And the only kid out of five that isn’t old enough to drive wants—you guessed it—an X3.
Wayne Sterling led South Carolina’s economic development efforts from 1988 to 1994. Experts in the field at the time predicted South Carolina would become less competitive after Sterling left. That wasn’t the case. South Carolina continued to be one of the most consistent economic development states in the South throughout the 1990s.
After leading economic development in Virginia under then-Gov. George Allen in the mid-1990s, Sterling came back to South Carolina in 1999. Things changed at Commerce when Sterling unexpectedly resigned during his second stint at running the agency in 2001. There was a “scandal” at the South Carolina Department of Commerce that the agency couldn’t seem to shake. From what we recall, it was centered on the amount of money Sterling and Commerce spent on golf and golf tournaments. Yes, Wayne liked to play golf, but no one turned more deals on a golf course than Wayne Sterling did. As a result of the scandal, the agency became politicized in 2001 and 2002.
Then in 2003, Mark Sanford came in as governor and Commerce was again at the mercy of politics. Sanford wanted to run Commerce on a shoestring budget, proclaiming, “When it comes to economic development in this state, I am going to put my Wal-Mart coat on.” In fact, Sanford even brought in Wal-Mart signs and such to Cabinet meetings after being elected because he wanted his state government to be run more like Wal-Mart. “When you think of state government, do you think value?” That’s what Sanford said in an article by the Post and Courier in March of 2003. Of course, Sanford had the financial scandal at Commerce two years earlier to build his case of practicing economic development on the cheap.
So for more than a decade of dominating economic development in the South per capita during the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, the South Carolina Department of Commerce was only a shell of its former self for the next 10 years.
I remember receiving a call from an interim director of some kind at Commerce and he wanted me to come over to Columbia and talk. He wanted my advice. I recall the date because it was the day of Strom Thurmond’s funeral procession in Columbia—July 1, 2003. In fact his funeral procession was going on in downtown Columbia as the interim director and I discussed what was going on at Commerce.
As I listened, there was a knock on the door. Peeking in was Frank Newman, a project manager at Commerce for ages. Frank said to the interim director, “Well, I’m gone.” I said to Frank, who I had known for quite some time, “Where you going Frank, out to lunch? I will go with you, we are nearly done here.” Frank said, “No, Mike. I am gone,” as in leaving Commerce.
I knew then the South Carolina Department of Commerce that I had known so well had changed. It was no longer the best and most consistent state economic development agency in the South. As for Newman, well, he is now working with Columbia-based Alliance Consulting Engineers as its Director of Business Development and I asked him recently about the good old days at Commerce. “We felt the old Development Board had an advantage over other state economic development agencies in the South because we did not operate from a Cabinet form of government,” Newman said. “It gave us more stability after a new governor was elected in South Carolina. We were less influenced by politics.”
Now it is almost 10 years later and things have changed again at Commerce. If 2011 and so far in 2012 are any indication, the South Carolina Department of Commerce is back and it is stronger than ever. Some of the most sought-after projects in the South over the last 15 months or so have been won by South Carolina. A sampling includes Amazon, Bridgestone, ZF Group, First Quality Tissue, Continental Tire, TD Bank and BMW’s $900 million expansion announcement in January. Together just those eight projects will ultimately create about 11,000 jobs. Of course, that doesn’t include the thousands of jobs Boeing created after beginning production of the 787 in North Charleston in late 2010.
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