http://www.beaufortgazette.com/local_ne ... 4715c.html

Beaufort County leads state in growth
Published Thursday November 16 2006
By TIM DONNELLY
The Island Packet
Beaufort County's booming construction industry, along with a demand for landscaping jobs and service industry workers is attracting an increasingly larger number of Mexican immigrants, according to the new University of South Carolina immigration study released Wednesday.
The county's Mexican immigrant population has grown from 2,168 in 1990 to 11,912 in 2005 by U.S. Census estimates, according to the study. The population has grown 45 percent just since 2000.

"They wind up going where they go because of jobs," said Elaine Lacy, the author of the study and director of research initiatives at the university's Consortium for Latino Immigration Studies.

Beaufort County has the third-highest Mexican immigrant population of the 15 counties surveyed, after Greenville and Spartanburg.

About 70 percent of the 181 immigrants interviewed for the study were undocumented. Lacy said the study found the population is largely self-propagating: Immigrants go where the jobs are, but they also congregate where they know people.

"It's job opportunities and also those connections," she said. "A very, very high percentage of people that came here said they have friends and family" in the area.

Illegal immigration has turned into a household debate in Beaufort County recently as the County Council considers an ordinance that would revoke the business license for anyone who knowingly hires illegal immigrants. The proposed ordinance has been applauded by some residents who say the area is being overrun with undocumented residents, and criticized by others who say it is largely unenforceable and has racist undertones.