Whitescreek,

I have the same questions as you. Thanks for bringing this up.

While all those millions invested outside the county are a concern—a big concern!—the environmental impact is more worrying. Most winds here are west to east or southwest to northeast. The industrial park's air-borne by-products would affect Roane County directly, far more than the counties that would get the revenue.

Already air quality in parts of the county is a concern; I remember reports of high levels of some pollutants in Rockwood and downwind of the Kingston plant. I remember reading that asthma, etc., levels have risen over the decades.

Is there an environmental impact analysis? What protections would this agreement provide for the downwind peoples of Roane County against any increase in air pollutants?

-- OneTahiti

I must be content to maintain my obvious role as the Poster Boy for Dumbassity :-)

What I tried to say - and probably will STILL not wind up saying - is that there is more than one kind of revenue to a county. Property tax is one kind, and usually one of the first kinds that comes to mind. But there are more ways than property tax for an area to benefit financially from a growth in business or industry. Every growth in business or industry also brings with it people who have to buy food somewhere, who have to find housing somewhere. Not all those people who might work at some place in this park will necessarily refrain from contributing financially to Roane County.

I agree that it's not as much (hence not as good) as receiving ALL the income possible from a given tract of investment land. But receiving some additional revenue seems to me to be an improvement over receiving no additional revenue.

Has it happened yet? Nope. I'm dumb, but not totally dumb... Future income is like many other things - it's not a certainty. Much in the world of investment is not a certainty (are there good stockbrokers that will tell you otherwise?).

I'm not arguing that this will somehow become the financial sugardaddy for Roane County. I bet it won't. But I personally don't see it as wise to expect ANY industrial park, any business park, any business, or any industry to be the county's sugardaddy financial savior.

I can't show you revenue streams right now. I can see where potential ones are. I think that in the history of the county, one of the problems has been that there has been too much of a demand for instant gratification (show me the money right now or forget it!) as opposed to a willingness to accept that not all investments - even good investments - make scads of money up front. So the county had failed to be PROGRESSIVE enough to engage in investment for the future, and has failed to do so in favor of demanding situations that make money right now or refusing to try anything else.

We know how well Roane County has done financially by its past practices. My mama taught me that a good definition of insanity was doing the same things the same ways and expecting different results. I'm just saying that maybe we oughta consider being progressive enough to look at some different ways, and not chucking them in the dustbin out of hand because they don't provide us with a contractual agreement for X Million dollars in the first 6 month of operation.

This may fail, it may be an astounding success, or it may wind up somewhere in the middle. But we know where we were going financially with our old tried and true financial practices of being parochial and insular.

And the beat goes on...

RB