Shopping Local for the Holiday benefits our Community

Well, it’s that time of year, yet again. All the hustle and bustle to attend various open houses, get to the next shopping destination, and making sure you’re home in time to hide the gifts from your spouse or kids. It seems like it comes faster and faster with each year! As you do your shopping this year, I want to encourage you to do it with intention – intention to support your community by shopping locally.

Shopping locally helps support our school systems. Many people may not be aware of this, but every time you make a purchase in Elizabethton, a portion of the sales tax goes directly into an account that is dedicated for city schools capital improvements. Many of the recent improvements at East Side and West Side Elementary schools were paid for out of funds from these sales taxes. Additionally, whenever the city schools borrow money against this sales tax revenue, a portion also goes to the county school system. So, when you make a purchase big or small in Elizabethton, you are helping to support and create a better education system in Elizabethton and Carter County.

Shopping locally and especially small helps support Elizabethton and Carter County’s local economy. When you shop at a small business in Elizabethton a larger percentage of the money you spend stays in our community and, kind of like at a bank, grows and generates additional income for others in our community. When you spend 100 dollars, 48 dollars stay in Elizabethton if it was spent at a small business, 14 dollars stay in Elizabethton if it was spent at a local business, 1 dollar stays in Elizabethton if it was purchased online and shipped to Elizabethton, and 0 dollars stay in Elizabethton if you make the purchase in Johnson City, Bristol, Kingsport, or Knoxville. Shopping with small, local businesses encourages new small businesses to open and small businesses are more likely to support community events and organizations like a little league team and the Covered Bridge Festival.

Shopping local helps support our city and our county. When you shop local, the city receives a portion of that sale in the form of sales tax which is used to pay for better roads, police and fire services, and funds our schools. But the other side of this is that it encourages new businesses to locate in Elizabethton. If our Peebles and Burkes had some of the highest sales in East Tennessee, this would pique the interest of other clothing retailers and stores like Ross or Marshalls may be interested in coming to Elizabethton to take some profit from the stores we currently have. This means more sales tax for Elizabethton, more variety of stores for our citizens, and more property taxes coming to Elizabethton and Carter County meaning our residence aren’t required to shoulder as much of the tax burden.

We estimate that Elizabethton and Carter County loose over 120 million dollars of retail sales per year; that’s 11 million dollars in sales tax to Elizabethton and Carter County. Now, I’m not naive enough to believe that we will completely capture ALL the retail sales for our citizens, but even a small fraction of that 11 million dollars in sales tax revenue could mean the difference between a property tax increase or not. This holiday season shop small local businesses first, chain local businesses second, and other businesses in Johnson City or Bristol third. Let’s talk about it!

Is it time to prepare for Renewable Energy Sources?

During our last Presidential election (and likely to be a topic in every election into the future), one vision for the future of the US electric consumption placed a strong emphasis on renewable sources of energy. And why not – after all, they provide a non-polluting, automatically renewing, low-impact source of electricity. Even in the early days of Elizabethton our first sources of electricity came from a renewable source – hydroelectricity from Wilbur and Watauga Dams.

While large-scale renewable source of electricity is much more efficient, we are starting to see more and more small-scale renewable sources appear in our community. We have a bank and veterinarian who have solar panels on their roofs and a residence that has placed solar panels in the back yard. Coming on the US market are Tesla’s new solar shingles, a stand-alone solar panel unit called SmartFlower, and varies wind turbines which can work in high and low wind environments. As these technologies become more popular and the prices become cheaper, we will likely see an increase in local usage.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, small-scale solar (think residential or small business solar units) is expected to increase by 23 percent nationally during 2018 and it makes good sense! Adding a solar unit lowers or possibly eliminates your electric bill depending on your electric usage and how efficient your house is. Additionally, in natural disasters like we saw in Puerto Rico recently, buildings and homes that had solar and wind capabilities were back up and running in a day or two compared with others connected to the grid who still may not have power weeks after the disaster.

A concern the community may have as these small-scale energy sources grow is the location and appearance of these sources. Solar panels may not look bad on the top of a building, but what about in your neighbor’s back yard, or what about a 30-foot pole with a turbine on top in your neighbor’s back yard? Aesthetics and appearance of these renewable sources can have a negative impact on home values and even the community as a whole.

What are your thoughts? Is it time for us to start considering aesthetic and location requirements for small-scale renewable energy sources? Tell us what you think we should require. Let’s talk about it!

Public Art Makes the Community

The discussion of public art has been somewhat of a hot topic this past year, especially with the formation and activity of the new Elizabethton Arts and Cultural Alliance. In many cities throughout North America, public art has started to become a recognized necessity. Public art was an identity for many ancient cultures such as the Egyptians and Persians and old cities such as Rome, Athens, Florence, Vienna, and even (to a certain extent) New York.

One reason it was and is becoming popular again is because it was something one-of-a-kind. It was a public icon that was specifically tied to a particular community or city and, therefore, helped you easily identify where you were before there were town signs or water towers with community names on them. In a time before every street had a name, you could easily navigate a city based on building landmarks (such as church bell towers), a city’s public squares, and the city’s public art. During the middle of the Renaissance, public art began to even become a competition among cities – who could have the most public art and who could have the best public art.

As I eluded to earlier, many great places and many successful cities have public art. Rome and Florence and two cities well known for their public art, but cities like New York, Vienna, Paris, Seattle, Rio de Janeiro, and Chicago also have a lot of public art. These are fun cities to be in and their public art creates a little excitement every time to visit a park or turn a corner to see a unique piece. Even smaller cities like Chattanooga, Asheville, Huntsville, and Johnson City and Kingsport have great public art or have started programs to promote public art. Public art can inspire future artists, provide a sense of beauty, and give an identity to these cities.

Lastly, public art provides something for our local citizens to enjoy and something memorable for our visitors. As we work to increase tourism in Elizabethton, we want to create memorable icons and things for visitors to take pictures of and with. Public art should be something that reflects our local culture and community. Think of a time when you visited a new place and years later, as you recall the story or look through a photo album, you say, “Remember when saw that ______ in ______?” When you visit Chicago, you might think of the Cloud Gate; when you visit Wall Street in New York, you think of the Charging Bull sculpture; or when you visit Paris, you think of the Arc de Triumph or maybe the Eiffel Tower. These are all icon that help identify the city.

Just as you hang pictures or other forms of art on your walls at home, so must our community “decorate” to become a more attractive and unique place. What role do you think public art should play in our community? Let’s talk about it!