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Guest column: The beginning of hopeful change in economic development

Posted at 12:50 am February 21, 2013
By Oak Ridge Today Guest Columns 1 Comment

By Pat Fain and Leslie Agron

On a cool Monday evening at a recent Oak Ridge City Council work session, City Manager Mark Watson did something else. He offered the city and the Council a creative and achievable road map to changing the decades-old paradigm that is today’s Oak Ridge. He offered new exciting ideas geared to the 21st century and designed to promote both the fiscal health and the allure of the city.

The focus of the room was total, and one could almost hear the gray cells churning to take it all in. It is really fun to be present at the very beginning of hopeful change. The inertia of the city has been challenged, the status quo has been shaken, and the restlessness of the citizenry has been given a positive direction around which to coalesce.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Guest Columns Tagged With: economic development, hopeful change, lobbyists, Mark Watson, Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce, Oak Ridge City Council, Oak Ridge Convention and Visitors Bureau, Oak Ridge Industrial Development Board, outsourcing, property tax base, sales tax revenue, status quo, tax abatement policy, uranium processing facility

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