Southern Palmetto Chamber Honors Regional Leaders at 48th Annual Gala

Mary Brown built Just For You Home Care into a company that employs more than 200 people across Allendale, Bamberg and Barnwell counties. Monday night, the Southern Palmetto Regional Chamber of Commerce made that footprint impossible to ignore, presenting Brown with the Community Impact Award at its 48th Annual Gala.

The event drew more than 120 attendees to the new Fairfax Community Center, where chamber CEO Bob Snead recognized Brown for "being such an incredible community advocate." In a region where a single mid-size service firm can anchor entire neighborhoods of working families, 200 jobs is not background data; it is a structural fact about the local economy, and the chamber's highest honor put that reality center stage.

Fairfax Mayor Butch Sauls framed the evening in terms that went beyond the award program itself, telling the audience the gala was "more than a celebration; it's a testament to the vision, hard work and unshakable spirit of those who refuse to settle for anything less than growth and greatness." Elected officials from across the three-county footprint used the platform to push regional collaboration as a concrete development lever, not ceremonial language.

Public engagement reinforced the event's civic weight. The awards program drew 787 public votes, a level of participation that signals genuine local investment in recognizing the private employers who show up consistently in communities that larger economic programs routinely pass over.

Bamberg Mayor Corey Ramsey provided live entertainment, and Treasie's Snack Shack handled food service alongside the broader catered meal. Sponsors included Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, Weigh to Go, Just For You Home Care and the Town of Fairfax.

The venue itself carried its own significance. The Fairfax Community Center, newly opened, proved capable of hosting a regional gathering of this scale, establishing it as a practical site for future business-to-government conversations around workforce pipelines, joint grant applications and employer retention strategies across a three-county corridor where every major private-sector hire counts.