Georgia, South Carolina Seal the Deal on Port

By Dan Chapman, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Nov. 10–Gov. Sonny Perdue joined his South Carolina counterpart Friday to announce a rare, bi-state partnership to jointly build and operate a port on land Georgia owns along the Savannah River in Jasper, S.C.

Putting aside years of legal acrimony — and decades of economic development competition — Perdue and Gov. Mark Sanford agreed to create a port on 1,400 acres of barren land on which Georgia now dumps muck.

Friday’s announcement firms up previous commitments to create the Jasper Ocean Terminal from scratch within 15 years to handle the explosion in Asian trade. Significantly, the two oft-competing neighbors will forgo litigation to build one of the region’s most promising economic development engines.

In light of Georgia’s 17-year “water war” with Alabama and Florida — and with regionwide transportation, growth and environmental problems in need of resolution — any bi-state cooperation is welcome, observers say.

The Jasper port “will mean benefits for Georgia, South Carolina and the entire southeastern United States for generations to come,” said Perdue in remarks at the Savannah International Trade and Convention Center.

The ports authorities of Georgia and South Carolina are already investing billions of dollars to upgrade terminals in Savannah and Charleston. But with trade between China and the East Coast expected to continue to explode — Savannah has notched double-digit growth each of the last five years largely because of Chinese imports — both states see the need for another port.

In 2000, a maritime company offered to buy the dredge site from the Georgia Department of Transportation and develop a port with Jasper County. When GDOT refused to sell the site seven miles from Savannah, Jasper condemned it. In 2005, the South Carolina State Ports Authority tried to wrest the property from Georgia.

Earlier this year, a South Carolina judge ruled that South Carolina has first rights to condemn the land. Within two months, Perdue and Sanford had brokered a deal for the port.

Friday’s agreement establishes both states’ ports authorities as co-tenants of the new terminal. Each will pony up $3.5 million to buy the land from GDOT.

Another $3 million each is pledged to run a tax-exempt Joint Project Office to undertake environmental and feasibility studies and to solicit federal and private funds to build the port.

The states will share costs associated with dredging and deepening the Savannah River. The office, and its six-member board, will seek approval from the South Carolina and Georgia legislatures for the creation of a bi-state authority to run the port. Congress must approve any interstate compact.

“The joint port was a smart move for both states who needed to find detente instead of continuing to battle into the unknown,” said Keith Mason, who served as then-Gov. Zell Miller’s chief of staff in the 1990s.

“It creates an air of certainty and stability in public policy, which is helpful to the overall business climate of both states.”

The port deal follows last month’s agreement between the states to resolve a long-simmering dispute over withdrawals from the Upper Floridan aquifer, which provides drinking water to Hilton Head, S.C., as well as coastal Georgia.

South Carolina blamed Georgia for pumping too much water from the aquifer and, in the process, allowing saltwater to seep into the underground water source. Georgia agreed to cap Savannah-area water permits and reduce withdrawals by 5 million gallons a day by the end of 2008.

Harmony between neighboring states has been fleeting in recent years.

In 1995, South Carolina pulled out of an eight-state Southeastern compact governing the disposal of low-level radioactive waste. Four years later, then-South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges tried to stop 35 states, including Georgia, from shipping low-grade nuclear waste to a disposal facility in Barnwell, S.C.

Southern states have fought like alley cats over auto factories, including Kia Motors, which is building one outside LaGrange.

“We’ve gotten to where states do not work well together. When they do, it’s remarkable,” said Paul Hardy, an attorney with the Carl Vinson Institute of Government at the University of Georgia. “They should work more together because there are so many things — ecological-, environmental- or transportation-related — that don’t pay attention to boundaries.”

Like water. In June, South Carolina sued North Carolina over its intent to keep millions of gallons of Catawba River water from flowing into the Palmetto State. And the Catawba fight pales in comparison to the war over the Chattahoochee River among Georgia, Alabama and Florida.

Mason, an Atlanta attorney, said bi-state deals on resources such as water are more difficult to reach than some far-off project, like a port. Both, though, demand action in a rapidly changing world.

“We’re in a global marketplace where our competition is India, China, Thailand, Japan and Germany,” he said. “Boundaries are important, but you have to deal with reality.”

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