Three counties, one project

Cumberland, Morgan, Roane combine efforts for industrial park

CLAYTON HENSLEY
business@knews.com
Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Roane, Morgan and Cumberland counties are joining resources to build an expansive industrial park that developers are betting will compete with neighboring counties to attract large operations.

Officials representing the three counties broke ground Monday on the 1,100-acre project named Plateau Partnership Park that will be built in two phases.

Construction on the park’s Phase 1 is under way on the south side of Interstate 40 in Cumberland County at Westel Road, where 780 acres are located.

Another 335 acres are adjacent to Rockwood Municipal Airport, most of which are in Morgan County and will be part of Phase II.

None of the site is in Roane County, which wasn’t a major issue for Roane officials.

Plateau Partnership Park sits on land once owned by the Bowater/Hiwassee Land Co. The counties’ three commissions won nearly unanimous approval for a $2.5 million dollar bond plan to buy the 1,100 acres.

The Roane, Morgan, Cumberland partnership is marketing the park as ideally located logistically because of its access to rail, interstate and air transportation.

“This gives us the ability to get back into the game, to market to large property users,” said Leslie Henderson, head of the Roane Alliance, Roane County’s economic development agency.

Plateau Partnership Park has been a dream of local economic developers since August 2004. And they are daring to dream big.

“We aren’t looking to locate small industry or create five or 10 jobs. We are looking to locate something big,” said Morgan County Executive Becky Ruppe.

In August 2004, Ruppe assembled the mayors of Roane and Cumberland counties to discuss the project since more than 280 acres of it are in Morgan County in an area just a couple of miles from I-40.

Ruppe said Morgan County residents have talked about needing roads as an avenue for economic development.

Rick Meredith of Tennessee’s Economic and Community Development department said regional partnership is something that’s needed across the state.

“I think these three counties and all their leaders have said ‘we can do this,’ ” Meredith said, noting that his department already is marketing the site.

Once the property information is gathered, it will go onto the state’s Web site. In addition, as site preparations move forward, the state will help leaders with grant applications and other assistance.

The park will give Roane County a new type of industrial inventory.

“We can now say we have 700 plus acres contiguous,” Henderson said, adding that that tract also is flat, which is hard to come by with East Tennessee’s hilly terrain.

Henderson will be visiting China soon, where she is expected to market the new park as well as existing sites in Roane County.

She said China needs to invest its wealth outside the country and also needs to get closer to its customer base. She cited South Carolina’s new Heier refrigerator plant as an example of how the Chinese may play a role in East Tennessee’s future.

For Cumberland County Mayor Brock Hill, the park is the culmination of years of hard work by dozens of people.

“We are ready to face whatever challenges may come ahead of us,” Brock said.

Although none of the park will be in Roane, the county’s mayor, Mike Farmer, said he and many Roane leaders see the project as an important step in shaping economic development in Roane County.

“We share risks; we share assets; we don’t have a lot of flat dirt in Roane County and Brock seems to have an abundance of it,” Farmer said.

No tenants have been recruited to the park yet, but bulldozers are clearing the site for Phase 1 off Westel Road in view of I-40. The land already has water and sewer infrastructure and a number of roads left from Bowater’s ownership.