You can read the first part of the interviews at http://www.dicksoncommunity.com/interviews/commi….

Sean: You believe that bidding out for the legal services annually would save the county some money. Can you explain how it would?

Commissioner Gary Suggs: What’s showing on our budget right now is $300,000 for legal fees. That’s more than it has ever been since I’ve been on this commission. One year, $70,000 was budgeted and that was about the highest I’d seen until last year. Last year I think we spent around $114,000 and this time they said $300,000 was budgeted. And the attorneys told us that it could go higher than that. So, that’s what scared me.

S: In the previous years, was it bid out annually?

GS: As I’ve been on the commission, it’s always been done by the hour. And if you’re talking about this much money, you’d think that a firm would be willing to bid on it by the year. I would. I mean, I’m not a lawyer, but I would think they would be willing to bid on it because that’s a lot of money.

S: What do you see that’s inefficient in the current structure?

GS: With the attorney situation? Well, I’m not saying that the ones we have are doing a bad job, I’m really not, and it’s nothing personal with me. I just feel like we could save some money by doing it this way, and that’s why I brought it up.

S: What are some pros and cons that you would see if we went the route of bidding annually?

GS: Well it would give us a hard number to put in the budget, you know. We could say we know our legal fees are not going to go over $180,000 or $200,000 or whatever it was going to be. We could say we know it won’t go over that and that would give us a hard number that we could count on to put in the budget.

S: Can you think of any negatives that might occur from bidding it out annually?

GS: The only negative that I think you would have to watch for would be the possibility that everybody could just put their heads together and say that none of them will do it for less than a certain amount.

S: Which would be kind of unfair.

GS: Right.

S: Let’s say you had a new litigation issue to come up. Would there be any provisions or would the lawyers be expected to honor the contract?

GS: You would have to have one provision in there, I would think. In fact, we have a case against us now that we’ve already had to hire an attorney from out of state for on environmental issues. Something like that would be understandable. But other than that. . .that would be the only thing. We have one case against us now for which we might have to get someone else again, an out of state attorney one more time. We’ve already done it once, but hopefully not.

S: This (suggestion to bid annually) did not pass. Do you have any intent to bring up the issue again in the future?

GS: I probably won’t because I think that there were other people besides me who wanted to see it happen, and I think I ought to let someone else take the initiative this round. I just really don’t understand why anybody would be against just finding out if we could do it. Because this wasn’t about changing attorneys at the present time. This was about getting a bid to find out if we could get the price down. That was all.

S: So you think it’s almost like a phase one out of many phases?

GS: Sure, I mean if we had received a bid for $150,000 from a firm then I think we would have been foolish not to pursue it. But this vote was just to see if we could reduce the price. And that’s what baffles me about it. I don’t understand why anyone would be so adamantly against it. In other words, a fact finding mission is what we wanted to do.

S: You said you’re probably not going to bring up the issue again. If someone else does, is there any time restraint for when it can be brought up again?

GS: Not that I know of, and it’s something that really should be brought up again. Sometimes on other issues we’ve had to bring them up two or three times to get them passed.

Commissioner Gary Suggs

Last week, Sept 15, 2008, Commissioner Gary Suggs’ efforts to reduce the cost of the legal services were thwarted with a vote of 5 for, 4 against, and 1 abstention.

A 2/3rds vote was required. To get the full story on both sides both Commissioner John Gunn and Commissioner Gary Suggs agreed to meet with me and talk about the issue. I’ve recently posted my interview with Commissioner John Gunn, who opposed the motion. Now we hear from Commissioner Gary Suggs to see what he has to say. This will be a two part interview.

Sean: So if you don’t mind, tell me a little about yourself.

Commissioner Gary Suggs: I was born and raised here, in this county, all my life. I’ve been on the commission, this is my second term. I work at Pleasant View Water Treatment Plant. I’m the plant super attendant. That’s in Cheatam County. That’s the business I’ve been in for about the last twelve years at different places. I worked eight years in Dickson. I was over three plants up there.

S: You are commissioner of District 3?

G. S.: That’s Vanleer, Slayden, and Cumberland Furnace.

S: To save money, you introduced two ideas. One was to consolidate the legals services for the Roads Department, Sheriff Department, the County, and the Board of Education. The second idea was to bid it out annually for the legal services.

G. S.: Yes.

S: Do you think there are more advantages in consolidating the legals services other than the savings advantage?

G. S.: Probably. They would have a better view of what the entire county is up against. In other words, the right hand would know what the left hand is doing. Yeah, I think there would be other advantages to it other than money. I can’t say if we would have bid it out that we would have gotten a cheaper bid. But I can’t understand why you wouldn’t want to find out if you could get a cheaper bid.

S: Do you think there would be any disadvantages to consolidating the legal services?

G. S.: There might be some issues with elected officials. They have the right to choose who they want. We as the commission can’t dictate to them who they’re going to use. We’ve got some of that going on right now. The Highway Department has their own attorneys, the schools have separate attorneys, and then the county general has different attorneys. Right now we are running on about three different sets of them.

S: What would you say about the lawyer expertise of a certain field. If you consolidate the legal services to a set of lawyers or a team, would you lose on the expertise of education laws, etc.

G. S.: Not really. I think one of the stipulations on this bidding of attorneys was going to that they had to be a local firm. You can’t expect somebody to come from Nashville or Clarksville to as many meetings as they would have to attend. You also want local people because they live here and they keep up with what’s going on in the county. There might be a slight difference of the attorneys in the county of the ones I know about, the firms that are big enough to handle it. But there wouldn’t be much difference in the expertise, I would think.

….

In part two, Commissioner Suggs will talk about the bidding of the legal services annually. The second part will be available in a few days.

Commissioner John Gunn

In a bid to reduce costs during tough economic times, Dickson County Commissioner Gary Suggs of the third district introduced an idea to save on the county legal services. From there the debate began.

At the last county commission meeting, Commissioner John Gunn of the second district adamantly opposed the idea, believing unforeseen issues could arise. Commissioner Gunn agreed to talk with me to tell his thoughts on the matter.

Sean: Commissioner Gunn, would you tell me a little about yourself?

Gunn: I’m the Attendance Director for Dickson County Schools. My primary function is to ensure all students are in compliance with state law about compulsory attendance. Along with that, I do the policy and procedures for the school system. I’m kind of the unofficial legal adviser. I go find an attorney if there’s a legal question. I assist with the employee issues, human relations type of thing. I’m a member of the negotiating team for the school board. I’m the DHA, Disciplinary Hearing Authority Chairman. I’m also a Dickson County Commissioner for the second district. I was born in Dickson County and have spent the majority of my life in Dickson County.

S: How long have you been a commissioner?

G: I took office September 2006. So two years.

S: How long have you been at the Department of Education?

G: This is year three. Prior to that I was the principal at New Directions Academy for eight years. And prior to that I was a teacher for ten years.

S: What did you teach?

G: I was a special educator. I taught resource English, resource reading, resource math, multimedia, and social studies.

S: More onto the topic at hand, Commissioner Gary Suggs introduced idea to first consolidate legal services from four departments: Department of Education, County, Roads Department, and the Sheriff Department. Then he also wanted to do an annual bidding for the legal services. First how do you feel about the consolidation of the legal services?

G: It’s a good idea if it would work. Of course all the different department heads would have to agree to do it. They can choose who they wish. As a suggestion to see if we can combine them, I think that part is a good idea. I just don’t think it should be forced.

S: Overall do you think it would improve things if that could occur?

G: It could be a potential cost saving, yes.

S: Do you know of any negatives to the idea?

G: Just the mere fact that everyone might not be able to agree to use the same set of attorneys. I was primarily opposed to it for the other reason. I can’t go into the details; it’s [due] to something that is currently in the legal system right now. I think with the complexity it would far better for us to remain with the current attorneys.

S: In the last county commission meeting, you voted no stating issues with the the current litigation issues. Are there any other reasons why you oppose it?

G: That’s it. That’s the only reason.

S: If we got past that point with these issues, would you support it?

G: I wouldn’t mind looking into it at that point. I do think our current attorneys have done a very good job for us. So I’m really comfortable with that. I’m not convinced that there would be any cost saving. By no means is this my illustration. A couple of my fellow commissioners used it and I agree with the logic of it. To me it’s comparable like me going to you as a physician and I say want to contract out with you. I want to pay you $50,000 this year. Will you be my doctor? If you have any sense at all, you would say, “Well I can’t do that. I don’t know if you are going to have three or four bad colds or if you will come down with Leukemia.” You just don’t know. It’s not like building a house where you can control the cost. We don’t have any idea what’s going to come up legally in the course of a year.

S: I guess the biggest concern or questions is, what would be the harm looking into it?

G: No, no. There’s no harm at all. I’m just unconvinced though even if an attorney agreed. I’m unconvinced that they really could hold it.

S: So, you believe if we actually went that route and it appeared that there would be a savings initially, there would be problems in the future?

G: I just think it’s too good to be true. Usually when something is too good to be true, it is.

S: Do you have any other points to make on this?

G: That’s about it. I do appreciate Commissioner Suggs seeking ways to save money. In tight economic times I think that’s our responsibility. I just fundamentally disagree that it would be money saving. Because if things were to get awry with this lawsuit, it could potentially cost much, much more than the potential savings.

S: At the last commission meeting it was voted 5 – 4 and one abstained. It would appear it would have passed, however it didn’t. Could you explain why it didn’t?

G: We needed a three quarter vote. I’m not sure why. I need to do some research on that.

S: Do all things require a three quarter vote?

G: No, just some issues.

S: Is there anything exciting that’s coming up, that the county is working on?

G: Yes, sometime early October, we’re going to get back bids for the jail construction. Hopefully we are going to be making a decision on whether we are going to start on the new jail. That’s a pretty big issue.

S: That it is.

Sean: What really initiated the higher education center being in White Bluff?

Jeff: About two years ago in the Fall of 2006, Linda and I were both invited to participate on the county three star strategic planning committee. And that committee was comprised of about forty-five individuals from across the county. It represented every community in the county. It represented every walk of life in the county. There were professionals, there were elected officials, there were homemakers. . .it was a cross section of the county. And the purpose of that group was to come together and develop a five year, rolling strategic plan for the county.

And out of those discussions, one of the initiatives that we discussed was the need for higher education in Dickson County. We in turn took that concept of that county wide strategic plan, we brought that back to White Bluff and we put our own community leadership group together and we went through the same process at the town level. It was amazing to me how the town goals dovetailed into the county goals. And higher education also came up in our White Bluff strategic plan as a desire from the citizens of the community. At that point, Linda approached Mayor Stone in Charlotte and inquired as to what would be the next step to bring higher education to Dickson County. His first priority was to see if they could acquire donated property and Linda approached Richard Bibb, who has been a strong community advocate and has done a lot for White Bluff as well as Dickson County. After some contemplation, Richard came back with the desire to donate the ten acres of property in White Bluff. We approached Mayor Stone at that point and it’s taken off from there.

S: When did you approach Mayor Stone initially?

Linda: After we had our community leadership seminar, I talked to Jeff and we decided if Dickson County was ready for a college, there’s no reason in the world that it could not be right here in White Bluff. No reason in the world. So, I approached Mayor Stone and said, “If I could get you ten acres, ten or twelve acres, would you consider White Bluff for the foundation?” And that was based on the fact that Humphreys County has ten or twelve acres, so I thought that would work. I didn’t know at that time if it was the county or if it was the foundation, I really didn’t know what the next step was. And he was just ecstatic, so I said, “Well, I think maybe I can.” So, I went to our friend Richard Bibb and at first he was like everyone else, like, “Oh, gosh. A college in White Bluff. . .that’ll never happen.” The more he thought about it and after we had a couple of meetings and we showed him the transportation route, the commuter route coming in and how we were in a hole and the closest colleges around, and how it would fill a void for this region. Then he said, “You know, you might be right. It may make some sense. Yeah, let’s go for it. Let’s try it.” Then I went back to Mayor Stone and told him we got the land.

J: There were some other concepts that came out of the county wide strategic plan, and one of those was that we need to adequately use our limited resources. I mean, the county is a certain size, and we have a certain amount of land and road ways and those types of things. So, as we grow as a county, we want to make sure that we adequately use the resources that we have. There’s the consideration of road congestion and things like that, and we feel like the White Bluff location really solves a lot of the county issues of how to grow in the future. The other concept that we discussed was that there are certain things that have to be in your population center such as your Wal-Marts, Lowes, and larger chain restaurants. If you’re going to get those in your county, you’re going to get those in your larger population centers. A facility for higher education is not an entity that has to be in your population center. It can be in a more rural area, because people are going to come to that facility. And the other thing is where do you get the biggest economic impact for the county? If you put a facility of this nature in an area, what our position is that we can put this campus in a White Bluff location or for that matter another rural location and it will have a larger economic impact for the county than putting it in an area that is already basically filled out economically. So we feel like from a county perspective, and quite frankly from a town perspective, this would be the beginning of establishing a second economic center in your county. And we don’t see that as a bad thing. We don’t see this as taking away from any existing activities. We see this as really enhancing the county’s desire to grow. I think, of course we’re partial here, but we really see benefits at the county level by putting this facility in an area outside of your population center.

S: You mentioned that you have some resource limitations such as the road system. Anything else?

J: Now, don’t misunderstand. I said that county-wide you have certain areas that you will have resource limitations. You have a lack of large tracks of develop-able land in certain areas of the county. In White Bluff we have large tracks of land. You have congested transportation networks in part of the county. We do not have that congestion here, so we feel like this is an appropriate place to put a facility of this nature. We would never spend time trying to court a Wal-Mart or a Lowes. Those things would naturally go in your population centers. But this particular entity, the reason that we’re going to fight as hard as we are for this is we feel like it fits the bill for the county’s strategic direction.

S: Awesome. What type of education can people expect to get from this facility?

L: That really is more of a question for the board. I don’t want to be so presumptuous as to answer for them. From the meetings that I’ve attended so far and observed and different board members I’ve spoken with, it sounds like it would probably be wise to go for the two year college program with maybe certified courses available, maybe three month certified courses available. There will be a needs and assessment study and I know in that study and in that survey, they will be talking to all of the industries around here asking, “What do you need for your labor force? What kind of certificate so that you don’t have to go outside the county and outside the area to maybe try and get people to move in.” So, we’re looking right now probably, I would say, when it’s first built it would be like most other colleges have started out with a two year program that could be transferred on over to a four year university. Obviously, we would like for it to go into some four year degrees.

S: Okay, so we’re looking more at a two year college, hopefully eventually progressing into a four year, but this is not certain.

L: No. (in agreeing of uncertainty)

J: And I think Linda’s point is absolutely appropriate. That would really be more of a question for the Dickson County Higher Education Board.

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Thanks for reading and comments are always welcomed. By the way, the image at the top is a photo of the proposed site to be donated by Richard Bibb.

Linda Hayes

White Bluff Mayor Linda Hayes and Vice Mayor Jeff Martin, you’ve heard their names. You probably even see them around town. Now found out their inner workings.

I had a great conversation with Mayor Hayes and Vice Mayor Martin Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008. Now I’m here to share it with you. This will be a three part interview, so come back and check what else they have to say.

Sean: Okay, Linda could you tell us a little about yourself?

Linda: I’ m Linda Hayes. I’ve lived in White Bluff all of my life I’d say about four or five generations back. I graduated from William James School. I married Kenneth Hayes and have three children and three grandchildren. One

is at UT Knoxville and was very sad last night at the Rose Bowl at UCLA when we lost by three points. I’ve had a corporate administrative background. My last longevity job was with Nashville Federation of Independent Business and we lobbied for small, independent businesses. The best way I know to describe it if people ask me what it is would be to say that it’s not a union, but a voice where all small businesses stand together and one person goes and speaks for them at the state level, at the national level. I worked there for twelve years as the executive assistant to, part of the time, the president, the CEO, the vice president and all the region managers. I retired from there in 2005.

I’ve been on the council for eight years and vice mayor for six of those eight years. And then I decided to run for mayor to see what I could do for our town. I’m really enjoying it. It’s such a challenge. We’re having to recreate basically some of the personnel policies, the charters, and the codes. We’ve recreated so much in the last two years on the way that we do things. And that’s just a part of our growth, an indicator of our growth and change.

S: And Jeff, could you tell me about yourself as well?

Jeff: My name is Jeff Martin and I’m the vice mayor in the town of White Bluff. I grew up in White Bluff. My family has been here, actually, since around 1800. I do a lot of genealogy work and I’ve traced it back to around 1800. My wife is Lou Anne. I have a daughter who’s sixteen years old and a senior at Creek Wood High School. My background is in software development. I left Health Care Management Systems in 2001 as the vice president of research and development and had an opportunity to come back to White Bluff. I had always had the desire to come here and serve the community and had an opportunity to do that in 2001. I opened a business here in White Bluff and then in 2006 was elected to the council and asked to serve as vice mayor. And the rest is history.

S: So you’ve been on the council for two years?

J: Correct.

S: Linda, what was your expectation on becoming the mayor of White Bluff?

L: My expectation was that I just wanted to carry on. I thought, in my mind, that we had had excellent leadership for the past two terms. When our existing mayor of the past two terms decided not to run again, being vice mayor I was hoping maybe I could step in if I was elected and carry on a lot of the changes and the visions that had come forth out of that tenure.

S: Have any of your expectations changed at all?

L:No, I’m very happy.

S: Excluding the higher education center, what are the city council’s goals?

J: Well, the goals are to enact and enforce codes and ordinances to better the community, to better the town. One of the things that Linda and I have both been active in, I believe, is the place of the leadership of the town to pro-actively do things to move the town forward. We’re actively soliciting business in order to generate sales tax revenue. We’re actively looking at opportunities for the town that would make it a better community for not only for the citizens of White Bluff but for Dickson County and the region. For example, the higher education campus that we’re trying to get.

L: I think maybe to wrap up what Jeff has said is we’re looking for a way to increase our revenue without having to raise taxes if that’s at all possible. Also, I think one thing that we’re doing is we’re establishing a program to educate our elected officials. We participated and are in the elected official seminar that TML conducts. Jeff and I have already gone through level one.

J: It was ten hours of classroom instruction.

L: And we participated with Kingston Springs’ mayor and some of their council and also there was a representative for Dickson. We’ve had eight or ten hours of course level two.

J: We’ve had eight hours of level two, which is fifty percent of the requirement for level two.

L: I think that we’re probably the first elected officials in White Bluff that have ever participated in this course. And that’s because we want to become pro-active and learn what we really need to do and how do we get our town on a ten and twenty year growth program.

S: That’s really interesting. What do the courses do, teach you how to better run the government or more historical types of information?

J: It goes over things like types of government. It goes over ethics. It goes over open meetings. It’s basically training to let you know how to be an effective community leader, town leader.

L: They discuss budgets, planning, vision. They update you on the latest policies and procedures that will be coming down mandated by the state. You can kind of look forward in the years to come and see what you’re going to have to deal with and that allows you the opportunity to start planning for it.

S: That really gives you an edge, doesn’t it?

J: Yeah, you get specific things. It goes down into specific departments:fire department, police department, public works, personnel.

S: That’s really cool. And you are the only ones doing this in Dickson County so far?

J: No, the only ones in White Bluff.

L: The statement I said was that as far as I am aware, we are the only elected officials that have ever in White Bluff participated in the leadership training.

S: I see. That’s really interesting.

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Well that concludes part 1 of my interview. Come back in a few days and read what Linda and Jeff has to say about the Higher Education Center. Also if you like my interview, you can let me know by submitting a comment.

Schermerhorn Symphony Center

Sean: I have an entertaining question. If you could take any famous structure or building and place it in Dickson, what would it be?

David: Oh, Lambeau Field (laughs). I don’t know. That’s an interesting one; let me think about that one. You’re talking about any building, anywhere?

S: Any building, any structure, anything famous. If you could put it in Dickson, what would it be? A little twist here.

D: That is an interesting question. I can think of a bunch of things: the Eiffel Tower, the Schermerhorn in Nashville, Carnegie Hall, Madison Square Garden. . .I would want to go with the Schermerhorn Symphony Center. I think that’s a beautiful building inside and out. Why that building? I don’t know, I just like it. I think it’s a really neat place that offers a lot of options for people who like music. But, you know, there are a lot of neat places in the world when you stop and think about it. The Sears Tower, the World Trade Center would’ve been nice, of course they’re not here anymore. Who would’ve ever thought that? The Empire State Building, just think of all the neat places. Yeah, I guess I’d have to go with the Schermerhorn. I’m a little more familiar with it, I guess.

S: And finally, what’s a hidden gem in Dickson County that you wish more people knew about?

D: (Laughs) Another good one. Rhonda is one who needs to answer that because she knows a lot about what’s out there that most people don’t know about. I don’t know if there’s any particular thing, but what I like and what I think is unique about Dickson is all the artists. Just all the craftspeople we have here that people don’t know about. Think about Tim Schermerhorn that builds the Dobro Guitars. He’s a world famous builder. I understand that he’s going to retire, but he’s here. Think about the lady that works with the horses like at the Wild Horse Saloon. Then the father and daughter that do the wooden bowls. We did them in our magazine. There are a lot of people in this community that we’re unaware of that have very big talents, wonderful talents. You know, John Rich, the songwriter, he’s from Dickson County. You have Bob Walcott who’s a golf pro who’s traveled and played in PGA. There are so many talented people here that a lot of people don’t know of. It’s hard for me to say any particular gem. I just think of the people, the talented people that are here. I know there are others out there. Craig Morgan. We have two big country music stars who came through Dickson County High School. Oscar Robertson, Big O, he’s from the Charlotte area. Tom Beasley, one of the founders of CCA, Christian Corporation of America. It’s amazing- the people you find out about here. I’m amazed. I learn everyday of someone here. I think William Lee Golden of the Oak Ridge Boys lives here. I heard that. And you think about the Renaissance Center and what a nice place that is. And you think about the farm tours we’re doing that are unique. People from around here and in a lot of rural communities, they think, “Farm tours? Who would want to go on a farm tour?” But it sells out every year. And I guarantee if we really opened it up and promoted it in the Nashville area and others that we’d get a lot more. Because a lot of people have never set foot on a farm. They don’t know the Virginia Grays wheat thrasher or Greys Brother wheat thrasher they have. You see a lot of unique things out there. I’ve gone there several times and you see the old tractors and you can watch how they did the wheat thrashing in the old days. I find that when I go to Greys Brothers, it’s neat to see the camaraderie of the community. We have a lot of festivals throughout like the Charlotte Festival, Old Timers Day, White Bluff has a festival, and the apple butter festival. There are a lot of things like that where people in the community just get together and enjoy things. There’s quite a lot of talent in Dickson County.

S: The Renaissance Center has a lot of art work and Studio 123 on Main Street, she sells a lot by local artists.

D: Yeah, they do. And then there’s, I think a father and son pair that does the iron works, the welding and all. I think they have the musicians down at Holland Park. They did that type of art. It’s amazing, the talent we have here for a small community. I guess that’s the hidden thing, although not an event or an activity. But it is something that is unique to Dickson County I think.

S: That’s a good answer.

D: Thank you.

This concludes my three part interview with Mr. Hamilton. I would like to give a big thanks to David for spending time with me and giving us all a little insight about the Dickson Chamber of Commerce. If you missed the first two parts of the interview, you can check them out at:
Interview with David Hamilton: Growth in Dickson County
David Hamilton: Be Local Campaign

Buy Local, Be Local

In part 2 of my interview with David Hamilton, David talks about how the “be local” campaign started and their intentions for it. If you want to know more about the campaign, here’s your inside source.

Sean: OK the “be local” campaign, how did you all come up with this idea?

David: Well, actually Jeremy Spencer and Beth Garrett, who serve on the Chamber board, came up with it in one of our board meetings. We’ve always talked about trying to promote shop local, buy local, but I guess we got distracted by other issues going on. Like when we recruited Bridgestone, we really concentrated on that. [Same with] MetriCan. We kind of became distracted

at times but this came up about six months ago at a board meeting. So Beth, Jeremy, and I got a few more people in the Chamber. We got Dick Graham, Bob Rial , Scott England, and Ervin Upchurch who is now on our board. Ashley Ramp from Tri-Star Bank and a lady from downtown. We just got a group of business people together and we talked about it. Jeremy got on a website on saw a similar campaign in South Carolina or North Carolina; he saw it on the web. He came to us with a logo. We thought, “You know that’s a great idea.” We talked about how could we promote this in the community and what all we wanted to do with it.

It really has different focuses. One is we wanted to educate the public on the benefits of shopping locally. We wanted them to know about the sales taxes that come in, and what it goes to, how that helps our local economy and our local governments that provide services. The other is we want encourage people to consider buying locally and eating out locally instead of going to Nashville or Franklin to the mall. When you’re going to buy a pair of shoes or some pants, see if you can find them here. We know that everybody isn’t going to shop in Dickson County; I’m not going to buy everything that I buy in Dickson County. It’s just not possible. But there are a lot of things you can buy here, and that’s really what we’re trying to get across to people, is to think about it. When you go out to buy something, think about Dickson County first. See if maybe they have a store in White Bluff that has what you need, or maybe there’s one in Charlotte or Burns. Think about what you can find here before you go to the mall and buy it.
One of the things that’s important about shopping locally is that the local business community supports so many other activities and organizations in the county, like little league baseball, soccer, United Way, and the help center. Name me a business outside of Dickson County that you buy stuff from that supports any of those. They don’t. So, not only do you lose the sales tax [by not shopping locally], you’re losing money that you could be providing businesses with that they could turn around and invest in the community, so that’s the other part of it.
Then the other part of the campaign, which we did last week. . .we didn’t do shop local obviously, but we did a campaign in the surrounding counties when we had the tax free weekend. We did advertisements in the surrounding Shoppers in Cheatham County, Humphreys and Hickman, Houston and some others, I think, encouraging them that if they were going to shop for back to school during tax free weekend to come to Dickson County and see what we have to offer. So, it’s not just “shop local” for local people, it’s also to try to draw people from outside. We are a mini-hub, I would say, of retail for the Western portion of Middle Tennessee. We draw from the surrounding counties, and so it’s been a very good campaign. We’ve been very pleased at the response. We’ve been on Channel 2 News, Channel 4, and Channel 5 from Nashville promoting the campaign. We’ve sold a little over 700 t-shirts for “Buy Local”. Businesses are wearing them on the first Friday of the month now, and obviously if they want to wear them more that’s fine. They wore them every Friday in July. We have signs and banners around, and we’re getting requests from people wanting banners so they can put them in front of their businesses. It’s really growing and getting a lot of support. We’re looking at some other ideas on what we can do to branch out a little more and maybe broaden our program with our efforts. We’ve been pretty pleased with it.

S: That’s good. Are you able to measure any performance with it?

D: I think that’s kind of like advertising. How do you ever know when you do something if it’s really resulting in sales? Honestly, no, we haven’t looked at that. I don’t know how we could track that. Now, I can tell you that I have had business people, when I’ve been in their stores or run into them around town, that have stopped me and said, “This campaign is really benefiting us. We’ve had people come in who have said they’ve seen the campaign and the signs around and they’re more conscious about shopping local.” I had one business person who said, “I’ve been buying my materials out of the county for years, but I got to thinking that maybe I’d see if I could buy them here in Dickson County.” He said, “I found a place where I can buy them. I actually got them cheaper. Now I’ve moved all that business to that person.” How much is it working? I don’t know. I think it is working. Even myself, I’m more conscious about it. You just think about it. And that’s really what it’s all about. It’s kind of a subliminal message, getting people in that mindset of, “Hey I’m not going to go to Nashville and buy those shoes. Let me go down to downtown Dickson, let me see if I can find them.” And then again there are things we don’t have here but hopefully as we grow we’ll continue to get those opportunities and people will continue to shop locally.

S: How long are you planning to run the campaign?

D: I don’t know that we have a definite one year, two year, five year [timeline]. I think it’s something we’re going to continue as we can. Obviously it’s going wear itself out at some point. I know we’re talking through this year because there are certain times of the year we want to really continue the campaign and really promote it. The tax free back to school time, between Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping, during the holiday shopping we want to get the message back out. Probably in the spring around Easter and about that time we’ll get it back out and really promote it. But we’re still going to do little things and have our banners out throughout the year. I think after a year or so when it’s kind of run its course we’ll probably back off some of that. Hopefully we can come up with a different idea to change it up a little bit, renew it, and get more energy behind it. I don’t know; we’ll just have to wait and see. It’s new for us so we’ll see. We have a good committee and they’re really energetic, excited about it, and we’ve got some people involved in that committee who haven’t been involved with the Chamber in the past since I’ve been here. It’s kind of got some new blood involved and that’s what we are trying to do. We want to have more people involved with us because we’re looking for ideas everyday in what we can do to improve the Chamber that would benefit the community and the business community. Any ideas people have, we’re always open for them.

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Well, there you have it. Interesting isn’t it? Well, I hope to see you back for the last segment.

David Hamilton

Last Friday I got to pick the mind of the CEO/President of the Chamber of Commerce, David Hamilton. Mr. Hamilton is a friendly and down to earth type of guy, so from here out, I’ll refer to him as David. We had a great conversation. It’s really surprising all the planning, time, and effort that goes on behind the scenes. We spoke about growth and planning in the community, the “Be Local” campaign, and then had some theoretical and entertaining discussion. This will be a three part article, so make sure you check back.

Sean: First if you don’t mind, tell just a little about yourself. Wife, kids?

David: I’m David Hamilton. I’m 49 years old. I’ve been here in Dickson just over eight years now. I have a wife Barbara who works at the Tennessee Department of labor Career Center here in Dickson. I have a daughter, Allie Hamilton Wingo. She got married a little over a year ago. She lives in Nashville. She’s 27 years old and she’s a med tech. I’ve got a son Blanton Hamilton who’s a sophomore at UT of Martin.

S: So you’ve been in Dickson for about eight years. From your point of view as president of the Chamber of Commerce, how has Dickson grown or changed?

D: Well obviously it’s growing. I don’t know if it’s changed a whole lot. I think we’re seeing some new retail development, industries, and medical facilities. I think it’s a reasonable growth for where we are in relation to Nashville. If you look at Nashville, everybody is growing around Nashville. I think because of that location we’re going to see growth like most counties in Middle Tennessee won’t because they don’t have that economic engine to draw them. But we do. It is changing a little, and we are starting to see more people from outside the community move in. And as that happens it changes your community, but it’s for the good. I don’t think it’s a negative when people come in here. I think the more people you get in here with the different ideas, the stronger your community can be.

S: So you are really open for the growth and the change?

D: I’m for growth. But I don’t want to get run over by it. I don’t know how you can prevent that. I don’t know that answer, but I think growth in the community is a positive thing. If you’re not growing, you’re going backward. There’s no question about that. Where I see Dickson and Dickson County, [including] White Bluff, Charlotte, and all them, I think we’re at a point where we can raise the bar a little bit so when we have development, we can make it a little nicer. Have more green space. It’s not like we have to have it now; if we don’t get it we don’t get sales taxes. People now want to be here. So, we’ve raised the bar a little bit. I think we’ve already done that some. I think eventually it’ll raise a little bit more. I don’t think we need to get to a “Franklin” type deal where everything has to be brick. But I think we’re in a position now that we can kind of dictate to some of these developments, “We want you, and will do everything to help you, but we want it to reflect positively on the community.”

S: You’re looking more for the growth but not exactly the urban atmosphere.

D: I don’t think most of us want to see Dickson County grow to 250,000 people. We like the rural quality of life. I think we want to maintain that as long as we can. It’s getting harder and harder as we continue grow; we’re at 53,000 people in the county. We saw a 27% growth during the 1990 – 2000 census. We’re probably going to see that same growth or more in this next census, I think. We’re in a good situation. We’re sitting right on I-40. We’re 30 minutes from Nashville. The land cost and housing cost here are lower than most of the counties around Nashville. I think people are starting to discover Dickson County. We’re an opportunity that really was not thought of in the past. I think we are starting to see some benefits of the activities the Chamber has put forth. We try to promote Dickson County in the Nashville market. I just think we are naturally going to get some of that attention.

S: Explain to me what the Chamber of Commerce does.

D: Well the Chamber is basically an organization that is made up of private members, private businesses, and individuals. It’s also supported by local governments, county government, and the City of Dickson. Basically we’re an advocate for businesses. We’re here to market Dickson County, to promote it to new business, and to assist existing business and industry here by helping them to grow and produce jobs. We’re really here to help encourage investment and to promote economic development in the community. We do that through tourism and industrial recruitment. We get involved in leadership to make sure we have good, educated leaders coming up to run the county. We inform them about different things that are going on. I look at it as though we are the sales people for the county. We’re out there letting people know what a great place Dickson County is and what a great opportunity it is to come and move here. It has a good education system. It has job opportunities. It has a good medical center, a good retail base that’s growing. Our job is to make sure that everyone knows what a great place this is and that there’s opportunity here. We assist them any way we can to help them make those moves easier.

S: How long has the Chamber of Commerce been here?

D: I think it’s been here 74 years. Yeah, it’s been here a long time.

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Make sure you check back for part 2 and 3. Also, if you guys are liking the interviews, leave some feedback.