Former NC State Commerce Secretary Fain, a Hendersonville native, dies at 80
RALEIGH - Former state Commerce Secretary Jim Fain, who in the 2000s helped North Carolina bring in companies from the pharmaceutical, financial services and aviation sectors, has died at age 80.
Fain — the state’s primary economic recruiter during Democratic Gov. Mike Easley’s eight years in office — died June 7 at a hospice center in Raleigh, his son, John Fain, said June 9. He had been in declining health over the past year, the family said.
Fain was a native of Hendersonville, where his family was owners of the Times-News newspaper, according to his obituary on a funeral home website. He received degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A burial service will be held on June 15 at Christ Episcopal Church in Raleigh. Fain’s wife, Peggy, died last year. In addition to his son, Fain is survived by a daughter, Catherine, and a brother.
A longtime First Union and Wachovia area bank executive, Fain first joined the state Commerce Department in 1999 as an assistant secretary in Gov. Jim Hunt’s administration. He was elevated to Easley’s Cabinet in 2001 during one economic downturn and left as the 2008 Great Recession was ramping up and Easley’s second term ended.
In between, the state attracted a host of new companies that helped counter the loss of manufacturing and textile jobs overseas. They included Merck in Durham; Honda Jet in Greensboro; and Credit Suisse and Fidelity Investments in the Raleigh-Durham area. During Easley’s final year in office, the Global TransPark in Kinston finally landed a major tenant: aircraft component supplier Spirit AeroSystems.
Fain ”was very proud of that moment,” John Fain said. His father later briefly became TransPark president and continued as an economic development consultant. He also helped found the North Carolina Coalition for Global Competitiveness in 2013.
Dan Gerlach, who was Easley’s budget adviser, credited Fain for improving North Carolina’s attractiveness to companies looking to build or expand through his efforts to overhaul the state’s chief financial incentives tool. The General Assembly passed legislation creating the Job Development Investment Grant program, which began in 2003 and remains in place today.
Gerlach said Fain helped create JDIG, which closed North Carolina’s disadvantages with economic incentives and remains a national model.
Fain’s “tireless work and direct advocacy with companies ... made a real difference,” Gerlach said.
This article originally appeared on Hendersonville Times-News: Hendersonville native, former Commerce Secretary Fain dies at 80
