Last week, House Speaker Bobby Harrell spoke to the Greenville Urban League and sounded once again his theme that under Gov. Mark Sanford, South Carolina’s economy is a mess:
State Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell said Thursday night that when the Urban League of the Upstate focuses on "empowering communities and changing" lives, it is doing what every South Carolinian should do for "the third-worse economy in the country."
…Harrell said education is critical, but it is "a subset of the economy." He stressed the importance of improving education, especially test scores, statewide.
He said President Clinton had it right when he ran with the theme: "It’s the economy, stupid."
"I may be a Republican and he a Democrat, but he got that right," Harrell said.
"Our duty is to raise the standard of living for the people who are living here."
Back before the 2006 gubernatorial election, the speaker was going around the state saying that Mr. Sanford’s Commerce Department was falling down on the job. He stressed that he wasn’t seeking the governor’s job, and he wasn’t — then. But in 2010, there will be no Republican incumbent.
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>> He stressed the importance of improving
>> education, especially test scores,
>> statewide.
The fact that we have an electorate who buys that bull is why we end up with the educational system we have. All we’ve heard for the past X years is that test scores are improving… so where’s the impact on the economy, stupid?
Irrespective of the 2010 election, Speaker Harrell is doing an excellent job in promoting the hydrogen economy in Columbia and South Carolina. He and Senator Setzler have introduced comprehensive legislation to make South Carolina competitive in fuel cells. I think entering the knowledge economy is critical to creating jobs and raising our per capita income.
^^^ WOW!
I would love to know what all that is about. Sounds scandalous.
I love Mayor Bob’s catch phrases. Knowledge economy. What the heck is that, exactly?
Raising the per capita income is easy. Get a bunch of rich people to move here. Per capita figures go up.
Plus, there’s tons of downtown living space at $250-400k per to live in. Hope they don’t have kids or are counting on the public schools though.
Mayor Bob is one of the reasons I gladly packed up and moved out of Columbia to Lexington. The only reason he wants to raise the per capita income is so that he can rubber stamp more pet projects for the city council. Along with the Richland County council, people are fed up and gladly moving across the river.
Bill B., I am impressed with what’s happening downtown. NE is crazy from the explosive growth. Maybe a small handful of you are crossing the bridge. That’s hardly a negative reflection on the Richland County or City governments.
Trajan, Information Age…global based society…inter-connectedness…increased know how as a resource vs traditional resources…
Richland County Council talks a good game about wanting to have careful, people friendly growth in NE Richland County but their actions show they really have no intention of doing anything to jeopardize the already too explosive growth – the crime in NE Richland County is becoming unbearable. Thanks for nothing Richland County Council members!