As a reminder, I voted in favor of Amazon both times.

Amazon.com is one of our nation’s biggest success stories in business in the past two decades. It was founded at the beginning of the Internet age, survived and thrived during the 1990s tech bubble, and this year jumped from No. 100 to No. 78 on the list of the Forbes 500.

Amazon.com wants to create 2,000 jobs in our state, and the deal brokered by former Governor Mark Sanford has created a stir among South Carolina residents.

The Sanford Administration negotiated a deal with Amazon that included giving the company a “safe harbor” from collecting sales tax on sales to our residents – the same deal we extended to QVC several years ago. The House voted the measure down in April and Amazon announced it was leaving before it created a single job here.

Extending the safe harbor means there is no cost to the state budget.

It is not uncommon for the General Assembly to make some mistakes.  What is even more uncommon is for us to fix them.  This week the House reversed course and overwhelmingly approved the extension to the safe harbor provision; giving the safe harbor to Amazon.

Some estimates are that Amazon will not have to collect as much as $2 million in sales taxes. In return, South Carolina will gain at least 2,000 jobs – jobs that pay $33,000 with health benefits and retirement. In return, the company will invest at least $125 million in our state. In return, economists believe at least 1,500 other jobs will be created in the Midlands from workers at the Columbia airport, to UPS, to your local grocery store. In return, the state will end up collecting at least $3 million in new income taxes each year.

Before we reversed course this week, many House members did not have all of the facts. This is partly because of the way the deal was negotiated, and because of the fact that most of the General Assembly didn’t know about the deal until ground had already been broken on the facility in Lexington County. Promises were made to Amazon to pass significant legislation with very little contact with the General Assembly beforehand. Most of my Republican colleagues seriously object to the way the deal was brokered, and current Governor Nikki Haley has said such deals will not be made in the future.

But promises were made by the State of South Carolina to Amazon, and if we are to continue to compete for jobs in the future, we must keep our word. CEOs of companies across the world are watching how we deal with this issue. It put the entire House in a difficult spot.

It is obvious that without the safe harbor sales tax protection Amazon will not invest in South Carolina because they have options. The free market was in full swing when state after state began to pick on South Carolina’s carcass hoping to attract Amazon jobs and investment. Other states are waiting in the wings, eager to attack us on a variety of potential economic development deals. They understand full well that Amazon jobs, payroll, and infrastructure investment would have promising reverberations throughout their fragile state economies. 

More important, it was evident to them that Amazon will sell tax free into their states, and throughout the country, until Congress seizes the initiative to make uniform changes in Internet tax policy.  This is the lesson of three weeks ago.

To be clear, Amazon will continue selling its products to South Carolinians sales tax free because the U.S. Supreme Court gives them that protection. They sell to us now from distribution centers in states around the country and are not required to collect the sales tax. The only question we have to answer today is whether or not Amazon will bring 2,000 jobs and $125 million.

South Carolina’s General Assembly had a rare opportunity to fix our mistake and learn from this lesson.  The mistake was to assume Amazon was bluffing and that they would invest in South Carolina even if we denied them what we as a state promised and the U.S. Supreme Court guarantees them. 

The House made good on those promises this week, and the legislation now goes back to the Senate, where senators will have to concur or reject the Amazon deal.

There will be a time and a place to reject potentially unfair tax incentive deals. It was not proper to draw a line in the sand when promises had already been made. Our good word was at stake.

As our state works to recover from the recession, we are not in a position to reject more than 2,000 jobs when there is ZERO direct cost to the state budget.

South Carolina has a long history of making destructive economic decisions based on regional jealousy. Our regional naval-gazing has it roots in our very founding when Charleston suppressed the number of Upstate delegates to our state constitutional convention in 1790. We have been fighting ever since.

 Even now, when our economic situation requires unity of purpose, we succumb to regional jealousy. We see it in the opposition when different parts of the state try to attract a BMW, Boeing or Southwest Airlines. We heard it in the recent defeat of the Amazon incentive package where real jobs were lost. We are witnessing it now in the opposition to the expansion of Greenville’s medical school.

 Do not be mistaken, our medical school expansion will create economic opportunity for years to come. More importantly, it will be the foundation for the development of specialized centers treating a multitude of ailments. A good example can be seen in the movement disorder center currently being considered at Greenville Hospital System, a project in which I have great personal interest.

 Like actor Michael J. Fox and political writer Michael Kinsley, I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s at a relatively young age. My diagnosis followed hard upon the death of my first child from hemophilia complications. In the space of three months, I became acutely aware of the need for specialized healthcare in the Upstate.

 Upon my diagnosis around six years ago, I was referred to Chapel Hill for treatment until my neurologist took a new position in Philadelphia. She then referred me to an excellent doctor at MUSC who I see twice a year. Fortunately, I have done well with my condition in spite of the limited contact with my doctor.

 I am aware that I am not the only medical traveler from Greenville. Others in town travel to Duke or Emory depending upon their condition. I know parents who regularly drive to the hemophilia treatment center in Columbia so their children can receive comprehensive care. While we have fine doctors in Greenville, we travel to benefit from the advanced medical specialists found in these other cities.

 I understand the need for specialized treatment centers, not just for Parkinson’s, but for a host of conditions. I know that patients benefit from more frequent consultations with related specialists who can advise on lifestyle choices, exercise, diet and other preventative actions. I believe that when patients and caregivers gain more control over the disease, they gain hope.

The Greenville Hospital System and USC School of Medicine have committed the resources to make the medical school expansion a reality. However, legislators from other parts of the state have expressed concern over our ability to support a medical school. They even tried to form a study committee – a sure way to mothball any idea.

Fortunately, our future rests not with the General Assembly but with the Commission on Higher Education who will vote on this issue in May. The Greenville legislative delegation has actively supported the expansion. We are hopeful that the Commission will affirm our request. They should know by now that when Greenville commits to a project, we do it right. We understand what can be accomplished with unity of purpose. We know how to expand the greater good.

In our meeting this week, the very last piece of legislation considered by my Agriculture Subcommittee was the bill to make collards the official vegetable of the state. This bill was sent to us after being passed out by the Senate – ahead of tort reform and SUTA reform, by the way.

We hold subcommittee hearings to hear testimony and determine the need for the legislation in question. In the case of the collards, nobody showed up to testify on its behalf. So, I made the motion to adjourn debate.

Given the reaction by several members of the General Assembly and The State newspaper, you would have thought that I had adjourned debate on a major economic development bill. Apparantly, collards carry weight in the Midlands.

If people wonder what’s wrong down in Columbia, the collard bill might provide some clues.