By SARITA CHOUREY
BEAUFORT TODAY COLUMBIA BUREAU

COLUMBIA -- Both Republican Tom Davis and Democrat Kent Fletcher, who are running for the 46th state Senate seat in the Nov. 4 election, lay claim to being the jobs candidate.

“I am the candidate who stands for bringing new, higher-paying jobs to Beaufort County, while at the same time protecting our unique quality of life,” Davis said.

That’s not just campaign-trail rhetoric, insists the former chief of staff to Gov. Mark Sanford. Davis said his agenda would be a continuation of his public service involvement over 23 years of living in Beaufort County.

Davis defeated state Sen. Catherine Ceips, R-Beaufort, in the district’s Republican primary.

Repeated efforts this week to reach Fletcher were unsuccessful, but his campaign manager, Joan Bryan, said Fletcher links job creation and public education.

“When it comes down to it, it’s the economy,” she said. “You can’t get a decent job unless you have a decent education. It’s all intertwined.”

She said Fletcher’s work as an enrollment counselor for the University of Phoenix in Savannah, Ga., puts him in a unique position to champion education and help individuals leverage it for a better livelihood.

“He sees people coming to his office every day who are trying to improve their lives because they realize a better education will improve their economic advantages,”Bryan said.

But while both campaigns stress jobs, Beaufort County, which makes up the bulk of the district, is doing better than most, according to the most recent unemployment data from the S.C. Employment Security Commission.

At 5.9 percent, Beaufort County had the second-lowest unemployment rate of the state’s 46 counties, far lower than the 7.6 percent statewide unemployment and below the country’s rate of 6.1 percent.

Bruce Ransom, political science professor at Clemson University, said it’s not enough for a district to have a relatively low jobless rate. The goal should be creating jobs across a variety of sectors with a higher average wage than the district’s current average wage, he said.

“That is not to say we want to move away from the hospitality industry,” Ransom said. “But bringing in the (Jasper) port facility, bringing in other jobs, that would bring a more diverse economy.”

Ransom’s assessment appears to parallel Davis’ agenda.

For Davis’ part, warming up the employment climate “means diversifying our economic base and advancing pro-business policies that attract private capital like the billions of dollars that private companies want to spend building a new port on the Savannah River in Jasper County.”

To safeguard the area’s quality of life, Davis said his agenda will stress preserving open space and rivers and helping local governments manage growth.

“I negotiated the Jasper Port agreement for our state with Georgia, and I have given hundreds of hours of free legal work to protect open space,” said Davis, who was a member of the S.C. State Ports Authority.

Sarita Chourey can be reached at (803) 727-4257 or sarita.chourey@morris.com