All to Ourselves

We had it in Oconee from our Sheriff. You may recall December 1, 2005, when local authorities rounded up 31 Hispanic men, for basically being at Home Depot while being Hispanic. Now CNN Reports that Stillmore, Georgia has come under a much stronger type action from federal authorities. As a result, the main industry of the town is limping along at 50% capacity, unable to attract workers even after increasing hourly wages by 14%. Truth is, residents don't want to do this work. The immigrants were a needed resource, and, in turn, propped up a slacking economy in this small Georgia town. The plant may now relocate to a place with higher wages, meaning higher prices for all Americans, or may relocate South of the Border, meaning a net loss for the American economy. When we send all the immigrants home, where do we think those jobs are going?

They ain't comin' to the "Orkin tract" - What nobody says, although they're thinkin' it

Lack of educated workers. Insufficiently prepared site. Lack of "motivation" in the workforce. These are the reasons being thrown about as we try to figure out why Novartis went to North Carolina instead of Athens.

Athens-Clarke and Oconee Counties offered up a $61 million dollar package of incentives, according to the Athens Banner-Herald (Vaccine rejection delivers dose of economic reality, by Blake Aued,) to beat the Tar Heels' $44 million. Athens-Clarke County created an entire program for the purpose of providing educated workers. The site is on a highway with direct access to Atlanta, and a short shot from the one and only Centers for Disease Control.

Since 2001 (Clarke-Oconee tract packs mega-potential) this "tract" has been touted as the next great thing in the Athens metro, the Atlanta metro, Georgia, even the South. In the 2001 article, it is cited as "one of the most prime locations on the Eastern Seaboard." Why then, in all this time, is it still a vacant, empty, eyesore of a desolate intersection?

It might be that the foreigners who own this company weren't as thrilled as the Sheriff of Oconee County about our recent round-up of Mexicans at the Home Depot. Or could it be that the Swiss executives at Novartis weren't as excited about the emphasis we as a state have placed of late on banning gay marriage from our borders. Perhaps investors who need to attract and keep management and technical personell weren't as tantalized as we about the need to require additional ID's at Georgia's polls.

One might consider whether the Novartis execs pictured long days at work, or flying in people from other offices, or inviting potential clients to come visit their new digs, and wondered where they would stay (not in the non-existent hotels in Oconee County), where they would eat, (surely not at the Fire Mountain Grill or Cracker Barrel), or, at the root of this dearth, where they might share an after work cocktail. We may not realize it, but in most of the world, the concept of a "dry" county is archaic; a throwback to Prohibition, 'shiners, and revenuers chasing them through the hills. Once again, this may not be the "environment" to which those we would attract would be drawn.

Then again, maybe the recent, and nascent, wranglings about whether or not to fly the battle flag over the state house didn't have the same attractiveness to those who might be more concerned about the schools their children might attend to achieve the levels of success they have reached. Or could it be that coming to the one state that incarcerates its own people at one of the highest rates in the nation, a rate that is accelerating, is not high on the list of those who run a multinational high-tech business?

As those who run this state continue to one-up themselves on who can make more misdeeds into life-ruining felony offenses, on how we can keep "less desirables" from voting, or marrying, or feeling comfortable about staying in the state to live where they can form families, and not live under the shadow of a flag of oppression, they continue to give short shrift to the seemingly less sexy issues of education, infrastructure, and transportation. As long as we focus more on how to lock 'em up, or throw 'em in jail, and less on how to provide the citizens of the state with better choices for bettering themselves, those would bring opportunity our way will continue to go on knocking elsewhere.

The citizens of this great state have to make up their minds about whether we're going to look to our future or our past as our model for governance. Of late we've been looking the wrong way, and should not be surprised that is less than attractive to companies that are looking to the future. We need to wake up, and stop pandering to those among us who would return us to the "values" of an earlier time. I'll drink to that!