County again considers Project S

Jeremy Nash news-herald.net

Loudon County Commission will consider in June a payment in lieu of tax agreement that it initially approved in April.

A local company wants to consolidate at the old Fowler Furniture building near the Watt Road exit of Interstate 40/75. Commissioners were presented a resolution Monday to make Project Strength official.

“The initial agreement was very informal, it was kind of a rush, a push to go ahead and give them an opportunity to get going,” Rollen “Buddy” Bradshaw, county mayor, said. “The agreement itself, the resolution itself is more formal and much more binding than the original vote that was taken.”

Bradshaw said the resolution would be the “authority to put the signatures on the line and make it permanent.”

He asked Loudon County Economic Development Agency Executive Director Jack Qualls, who was present Monday, to add language to the resolution outlining money and a timeframe for the agreement.

Qualls said he would make the revisions.

Commissioner Van Shaver took issue with the resolution as presented Monday.

“Normally we have a fixed number in any resolution that says this is what they will pay every year for the next five years,” Shaver said. “This one doesn’t have that, and it’s got a lot of language. ... Normally these PILOT resolutions have a fixed amount of money for whatever, for five years, 10 years, this how much we’ll pay, fixed, you don’t have to even think about it. So this one doesn’t say that. It just says it’ll pay 50 percent of the ad valorem property taxes. I don’t know what that means.

“What if they don’t bring in $16 million of improvements to the building?” he added. “Then we don’t get half of our property tax. You got to have something solid you can sink your teeth in.”

According to the resolution, the company expects to incur $16 million in capital expenditures and create 50 jobs with an average salary of $46,000 per year.

Project Strength would pay $39,608 annually for five years at 50 percent tax abatement combined on real and personal collected. According to a summary, the unnamed fabrication company is headquartered in Knoxville and has locations in Monroe and Loudon counties with a combined 100 employees.

The agreement would be contingent on the building being purchased and includes job creation requirements and clawback provisions equaling $792 annually for every new position not created.

Bradshaw believes the PILOT should go into effect “pretty quick” if approved in June.

“They’re anxious to get up and going,” he said. “I think they’ve maybe moved a little bit of equipment in, they’re not up and going yet, but in anticipation of the ultimate signing of the resolution, so they’re anxious to get going.”

Shaver said he would still be a “no” vote.

“Right now we’re losing $800,000 a year in PILOT agreements,” Shaver said. “Boy, what a difference that would make if we had that money this year instead of having to give it away in PILOTs. Whether there’s anything gained by the PILOT, the company is already there, they’re moving in, so obviously the PILOT’s not holding them up.”

Committee to disbandA few months after commissioners established a committee to help with courthouse addition specifications, the county will look to disband it at the June meeting.

Commissioners in March approved the courthouse construction program committee comprised of seven people, including four commissioners, one county purchasing employee, one circuit court clerk employee and one Loudon resident.

“I think that it’s needed to be disbanded at this point with the fact that the budgets are being put together,” Kelly Littleton-Brewster, county commissioner, said. “There’s not going to be a need for that committee. It’s going to slow up the process of getting decisions made on how the inside of the courthouse is going to look in the near future, so that was the whole idea of it being disbanded.”

Littleton-Brewster was on the committee and the one who initially pushed for it to be formed.

The disbandment was initially put on the March workshop before concerns over COVID-19 caused postponement. The matter was not discussed in April.

“The process would slow down tremendously due to the fact that there was going to be more than one commissioner on that committee, too,” Littleton-Brewster said. “We would have had to publicize our meetings and it was just going to slow down the whole process. Our main goal is to try to get the courthouse completed as quickly as possible so that we can move on.”

The committee had not met.

“That’s going to be purely up to commission,” Bradshaw said. “I think with it being on the back burner right now for the time being at least upcoming fiscal year 2021 that it makes sense. Maybe come revisit when the time comes when we look at the true — when we’re ready to really take a step forward with the annex.”