The former State Planning Board, State Board of Housing, Building Council of South Carolina, South Carolina Commerce Development Board, South Carolina Intra-Coastal Waterway Commission, South Carolina Board for Promotion of External Trade, and Natural Resources Commission and their successor the State Development Board having been abolished, the director shall have the following additional duties formerly imposed on such boards, commissions and councils:

(1) State Planning Board:

(a) to confer and cooperate with the executive, legislative and planning authorities of the United States and of neighboring states and of subdivisions thereof;

(b) to promote interest in the understanding of the problems of state planning; and

(c) to cooperate with the United States and any of its agencies in the planning, conservation, utilization and development of state resources and in the planning of its public works programs and to act, when so designated, as an agency of the United States, or of any agency thereof.

(2) State Board of Housing: to perform the duties imposed upon him under Title 31 of this Code;

(3) Building Council of South Carolina: to promulgate and recommend to the General Assembly of the State a building code for adoption;

(4) Commerce Development Board:

(a) to purchase, hold, use, lease, mortgage, sell, transfer, convey, assign, pledge or otherwise to acquire, encumber or dispose of any property, real, personal or mixed, or any estate or interest therein, including, but without limiting the foregoing, stock in any corporation;

(b) to employ attorneys upon such reasonable basis of compensation as may be agreed upon, or as he may determine, commensurate with the services rendered or to be rendered to the end that no excessive or unreasonable fees or compensation shall be allowed;

(c) to build, acquire, construct and maintain power houses and any and all structures, ways and means necessary, useful or customarily used and employed in the construction of highways, in the construction and operation of railroads and in the manufacture, generation and distribution of electricity and any and all other kinds of power, including power transmission lines, poles, telephone and telegraph lines, substations, transformers and generally all things used or useful in the manufacture, distribution and purchase of power and electricity; provided, that electric current produced shall be used by the director and that none of it shall be sold;

(d) to acquire or to build, construct, equip, maintain and operate one or more railroads with any motive power, one or more highways or other methods, means or ways of commerce or transportation or of communication, telegraph or telephone lines, electric lines, pipe lines, commissaries, houses, camps, lakes, fills, dams, reservoirs, ditches, drains, roads, tunnels, culverts, bridges, conduits, shops and depots and equipment; provided, that telegraph or telephone lines shall be used by the director and that no telegraph or telephone service shall be sold to the general public;

(e) to engage in the business of a common carrier of freight or passengers for hire;

(f) to build, construct, equip, maintain and operate, or cause the same to be done, a railroad or a highway connecting the existing lines of railroad at Walhalla, South Carolina, and at or near Maryville, Tennessee, or as near to such points as practicable and to do every act and thing necessary or proper to accomplish that result and to secure improvement of such existing lines connecting the same with the Atlantic seaboard;

(g) to transport goods, freight, mail, passengers and intelligence for hire and to fix and collect proper charges therefor;

(h) to construct or establish parks or playgrounds for the use, benefit, recreation and amusement of the people of this State under such rules and regulations and subject to such charges as it may establish, determine or fix, with all necessary or proper appurtenances, roadways, lakes, reservoirs, pipe lines, wires, buildings or other structures and equipment which it may from time to time deem desirable;

(i) to take such steps as may be proper to prevent and control soil erosion and floods in the areas served by it;

(j) to cooperate with the United States to promote the national defense;

(k) to develop and increase commerce, intrastate, interstate and foreign, by shortening and improving existing routes, by constructing new routes and facilities and by equipping, maintaining and operating or leasing the same, or causing it to be done, by procuring or endeavoring to procure a reduction in freight, passenger, power, light, water, telegraph and telephone rates and tolls and by any other means or method which shall tend so to do and securing to the people of this State the annual saving of large sums and an improvement in their living conditions and general welfare;

(l) to cooperate with the health authorities in the areas served by it to the end that the public health may be improved and disease and suffering reduced;

(m) to fix, alter, charge and collect tolls, freight and other charges for the use of the division's facilities or for the services rendered by or for any commodities furnished by it, at rates to be determined by the director, such rates to be at least sufficient to provide for payment of all expenses of the director under this subsubparagraph (4) of this section, the conservation, maintenance and operation of its facilities and properties, the payment of principal and interest on its notes, bonds and other evidences of indebtedness or obligation and to fulfill the terms and provisions of any agreements made with the purchasers or holders of any of the division's notes, bonds or other evidences of indebtedness or obligation;

(n) to have the power of eminent domain;

(o) to acquire by purchase, gift, condemnation or in any other manner any lands, waters, water rights, riparian rights, flowage rights, rights of way, easements, licenses, franchises, engineering data, maps, construction plans or estimates or any other property of any kind, real, personal or mixed, necessary or useful in carrying out any of his powers;

(p) to borrow money, to make and issue negotiable notes, bonds and other evidences of indebtedness and to secure the payment of such obligations or any part thereof by mortgage, lien, pledge or deed of trust on any or all of the division's property, contracts, franchises or revenues and to make such agreements with the purchasers or holders of such notes, bonds or other evidences of indebtedness or with others in connection with any such notes, bonds or other evidences of indebtedness, whether issued or to be issued, as the director shall deem advisable and in general to provide for the security for such notes, bonds or other evidences of indebtedness and the rights of the holders thereof;

(q) to endorse or otherwise to guarantee the obligations of any corporation all of the voting stock of which the division may own or acquire;

(r) to mortgage, pledge, hypothecate or otherwise to encumber any or all of the division's property, real, personal or mixed, facilities or revenues as security for notes, bonds, evidences of indebtedness or other obligations;

(s) to borrow money from the United States or any corporation or agency created, designed or established by the United States;

(t) to exercise the powers and to do the things authorized by subsubparagraph (4) of this section either by and with his own efforts and resources or to procure or to cause the same to be done by the United States or any agency or instrumentality thereof, by any one or more of the states affected or their political subdivisions, agencies or instrumentalities, by any private corporation, association or individual, contractor or otherwise or by the joint efforts of any or all of them or by cooperation with any or all of them, having in mind that the primary objective to be achieved is the construction, maintenance and operation of the railroad, highways, lines of communication and other facilities authorized by this subsubparagraph, regardless of the particular method, manner or agency by or through which the same may be done, and to do any and all acts and things and to make any and all agreements or contracts necessary thereunto, including also the power to lease the whole or any part of the division's facilities or to contract or agree upon a particular method, manner or agency of or for the maintenance or operation of such facilities;

(u) to make, alter and repeal reasonable rules and regulations governing the use of the division's facilities and to fix and collect the charges, tolls, prices or rate of compensation it shall receive for the same, but nothing herein contained shall prevent the director, when in his opinion the public interest will best be served thereby and when the division's financial condition will permit, from allowing the use of its parks, places of amusement and recreation, roads, highways and the like, to be designated by the director from time to time, free of charge or at a merely nominal charge for the benefit of the people of this State;

(v) to sell or otherwise to dispose of any surplus property which the division may acquire and which the director may decide is not needed; and

(w) to have all additional powers, not inconsistent with this article, that are vested by law in common carriers of freight, passengers, electricity and intelligence for hire and in corporations generally.

(5) South Carolina Intra-Coastal Waterway Commission: to perform the duties imposed upon it by Chapter 5 of Title 3 of this Code;

(6) Board for Promotion of External Trade:

(a) to compile surveys showing the nature and extent of the natural resources and of the manufactured products and raw materials found or produced in the State which may move in domestic or foreign commerce; and

(b) to determine the areas throughout the world where commodities and products of this State may find advantageous markets and secure perfection of arrangements between citizens of this State and producers and consumers in other areas whereby there may be carried on greater interchange of commerce.

(7) Natural Resources Commission:

(a) to select a label, have it copyrighted and registered in the United States copyright office, which label shall in the judgment of the director be used to advertise the chemical and other contents of food products grown in South Carolina or to advertise other articles;

(b) to promulgate and register the conditions upon which such label may be used and fix the charges for such use; and

(c) to promulgate information furnished by the South Carolina Research Laboratories and other educational institutions and such other information as has bearing upon value of South Carolina products.

HISTORY: 1993 Act No. 181, Section 244, eff July 1, 1993.