Oak Ridge Today

Lady Wildcats’ soccer season ends with 2-0 loss to Hardin Valley

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Oak Ridge Lady Soccer Cats and Hardin Valley Academy Hawks

Lady Wildcat Mahala Myers, left, a senior, battles for the ball with a Hardin Valley player during a season-ending subregional game on Tuesday in Oak Ridge.

The Lady Wildcats’ soccer season ended with a 2-0 loss to Hardin Valley Academy in a subregional game on Tuesday.

Coaches said the game featured two good, evenly matched teams, but the Hawks took advantage of opportunities while Oak Ridge did not. Among the missed opportunities for Oak Ridge was a free kick that hit the crossbar with less than three minutes left in the game.

“They just finished theirs,” Lady Wildcats coach Jason Schmieg said. “We didn’t finish ours.” [Read more…]

Guest column: Selling Oak Ridge to the DOE workforce

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Change in DOE Payroll Chart

by David Stanley

Our city urgently needs to market Oak Ridge to the local U.S. Department of Energy workforce. That workforce brings a billion dollar payroll into East Tennessee each year. Unfortunately, the Oak Ridge economy sees very little of this money.

Over the last two decades, the erosion of DOE residency has cost the City of Oak Ridge a great deal of payroll. The problem looks even worse when one considers the concurrent payroll increase of our city’s competition. For example, over those two decades the gap between the annual Oak Ridge and Knox County DOE payrolls grew by $130 million dollars. That’s just the growth in the gap. The total gap in DOE payroll between Oak Ridge and Knox County is now approximately $270 million dollars per year.

No wonder Turkey Creek and so many new housing developments have gone over there. That’s where the DOE payroll went! [Read more…]

Down at halftime, Wildcats rally but fall to Farragut 31-24

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Oak Ridge Wildcats Interception Tommy Kaczocha

An interception by junior defensive back Tommy Kaczocha, right, early in the third quarter helps set up Oak Ridge’s first touchdown.

FARRAGUT—Down three touchdowns at halftime, the Oak Ridge Wildcats rallied in the second half against Farragut on Friday, keeping the football game close but falling to the Admirals 31-24.

It was, in part, a test of the high expectations that had been set for returning Coach Joe Gaddis, who led the Wildcats to their last state championship in 1991 and returned to Oak Ridge in March after 15 years away.

Fans disheartened by the score at the end of the first half at Bill Clabo Field in Farragut were encouraged by the turnaround in the second. [Read more…]

First Wildcat Day for all sports draws players, fans, Coach Gaddis

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Oak Ridge High School Wildband at Wildcat Day

Members of the Oak Ridge High School Band play at the opening of a Wildcat Day pep rally at the Ben Martin field on Saturday.

Enthusiastic fans and players flocked to Oak Ridge High School on Saturday for a first-of-its-kind pep rally that incorporated all sports and featured a football coach that helped the Wildcats win their last state championship and is leading the team once more.

The pep rally was part of what had officially been proclaimed Wildcat Day by the Oak Ridge City Council. The rally featured short cheerleader routines, music by members of the Oak Ridge High School Band, short speeches from city and school officials, an introduction to the ORHS Wildcats football team and coaches, and fireworks. [Read more…]

Picture: It’s football time in Tennessee!

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Jefferson Middle School Eagles

The Jefferson Middle School Eagles lost 44-8 to the Rhea County Eagles on Thursday.

The Jefferson Middle School Eagles lost 44-8 to the Rhea County Eagles in their first game of the football season on Thursday.

The Oak Ridge High School Wildcats open their season on Friday, Aug. 30, at Farragut.

The Robertsville Middle School Rams play next at Christian Academy of Knoxville at 7 p.m. Thursday. [Read more…]

Guest column: A competitive advantage for Oak Ridge

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Note: This is a copy of a letter sent to Oak Ridge City Council members by resident Martin McBride.

I came to East Tennessee 25 years ago to work with Oak Ridge nuclear facilities. One of the first things my new employer did was to set up an appointment with a Farragut Realtor. The realtor gave my wife and I a lovely tour of the west Knox County area.

When I hesitantly mentioned Oak Ridge, he quickly responded, “You realize the property tax problems over there?” For the next several minutes, the realtor went over the tax rates, emphasizing the tax advantage of living in Farragut.

He then compared the Farragut lifestyle to that of Oak Ridge. Amazingly, Farragut kept getting the edge. According to that realtor, Farragut had all the advantages—especially in tax rates. [Read more…]

Guest column: It’s not the property tax rate

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There is a persistent plaint that workers at Y-12 National Security Complex and Oak Ridge National Laboratory don’t live in Oak Ridge because the property tax rate is so high. Farragut is pointed to as having no city tax at all and therefore highly attractive. Farragut, no less than Oak Ridge, is indeed an attractive area in which to live. It is not because of the property tax rate.

Let’s look at a few of the numbers related to the Oak Ridge city tax rate of $2.39. That rate is applied per $100 of value on 25 percent of the assessed value of residential property. In other words, if one’s home has been appraised at $150,000, the epitome of an “affordable” home, the city property tax is $2.39 per hundred dollars on $37,500, or $896.25. That means that this homeowner is paying just at $75 per month for city services.

Among the services covered by this $75 are police, fire fighters, parks and recreational services, library, street lights, sidewalks, code oversight, street maintenance, and the city’s contribution to the schools. That is $75 per household, not for each person. [Read more…]

Guest column: A tale of two cities

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By Leslie Agron and Pat Fain

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Oak Ridge is on the cusp of a renaissance; Oak Ridge is in its worst-ever financial shape. Despite the looming risk of the guillotine for questioning the conventional wisdom here, we want to examine where Oak Ridgers are coming from when they speak of our future. To do this we, conveniently, will compare these possible futures for Oak Ridge with two present day Tennessee cities: Farragut and Chattanooga.

Farragut is a place most Oak Ridgers are fairly familiar with. It is mostly new and upscale. It tends toward sprawl and toward heavily developed strips, but has no real heart. It has low taxes, but is not a full-service city. Chattanooga is an older city with a downtown and outlying neighborhoods of varying ages. It is a full-service city with commensurate taxes. Chattanooga has done an outstanding job of revitalizing some of its older neighborhoods. The neighborhood in the vicinity of its Aquarium is particularly noteworthy in this regard.

[Read more…]

Guest column: Changing the economic development game in Oak Ridge

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There’s no nice way to spin it: The results of our city’s bad decisions for the past decade are catching up with us.

In addition to having high debt and property taxes, our sales tax revenues continue to decline, we are exporting more than $727 million per year in U.S. Department of Energy payroll (1), and we have a comparatively stagnant population growth. Even with all the new restaurants opening, these projects won’t fully replace the revenue we’ve lost from the countless businesses that have closed up shop or left town for greener pastures.

Continuing down this path is not an option. Thankfully, our city manager understands this and wants to strategize a more competitive position for Oak Ridge. He is proposing that we change our approach to economic development (2) by finding other uses for the $1-2 million we’ve been spending annually on nearly 20 different external organizations like the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce.

[Read more…]