Community Planning in Anticipation of Blue Oval City

Consultants with the Municipal Technical Advisory Service (MTAS)  and County Technical Assistance Service (CTAS)  worked with communities surrounding Ford's Blue Oval City development to help them plan for the growth.

In this episode, MTAS Municipal Management Consultants Chuck Downham and Ronnie Neill discuss their presentations to regional municipalities and how these cities can plan for the anticipated growth. 

Transcript

Audio file

ITWT Blue Oval City_mixdown.mp3

Transcript

00:00:01 Speaker 1

Hi and welcome to In Touch with Tennessee, a podcast of the University of Tennessee, Institute for Public Service.

00:00:12 Speaker 1

Late last year, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee announced that Ford Motor Company selected the Memphis Regional Mega site for one of the largest battery and vehicle manufacturing campuses in the US.

00:00:24 Speaker 1

Ford and SK Innovation will invest $5.6 billion to build a 3,600-acre Mega campus called Blue Oval City where production of next Generation all Electric F series trucks will begin in 2025.

00:00:40 Speaker 1

The project is expected to result in the creation of 27,000 new jobs to directly and indirectly support the site's operation.

00:00:49 Speaker 1

This will result in more than $1.02 billion in annual earnings. Additionally, more than 32,000 jobs are expected to support the construction period with around $1.87 billion in salaries related to construction activity.

00:01:08 Speaker 1

This project is also expected to generate temporary construction benefits, including $5.6 billion spent on land buildings and other real property improvements. This project is anticipated to contribute $3.5 billion each year to Tennessee Gross Product.

00:01:27 Speaker 1

Excitement is building about economic impact potential as a result of this development.

00:01:32 Speaker  1

So what does this mean for Blue Oval city surrounding communities?

00:01:36 Speaker  1

Today's guests are Chuck Downham and Ronnie Neill Municipal Management consultants with the Municipal Technical Advisory Service.

00:01:45 Speaker 1

Both of them have worked with area cities.

00:01:47 Speaker 1

And towns to advise them on being prepared for this multibillion-dollar investment.

00:01:53 Speaker 1

Welcome Chuck and Ronnie.

00:01:55 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Thank you, it's good to be here.

00:01:56 Speaker 1

Yes, So what are some of the unique challenges facing cities in West Tennessee and how are they working to address those challenges?

00:02:05 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

Well, as the management consultant for this area of Western Tennessee when this announcement came along, I knew that it was a game changer for many of the cities, especially the cities that are right next to the Blue Oval City.

00:02:21 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

And I realized that we needed to do some things to try to.

00:02:25 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

Yup, those cities.

00:02:26 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

So I knew that Chuck, a management consultant in Middle Tennessee, sitting within MTAS had been involved at Spring Hill where the Saturn plan originated and later became a GM.

00:02:39 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

So I reached out to Chuck and asked him for his advice and what could he do to help our cities in West Tennessee and Chuck’s background is in planning.

00:02:50 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

He was just the perfect person.

00:02:52 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

Come down here to assist me with working with the cities that are around that area and so I asked Chuck.

00:02:59 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

To come down, he prepared a presentation and I think he's made that presentation three or four times Now to various groups of cities and county officials in West Tennessee.

00:03:10 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Thanks Ronnie, you know just to build on it I'm in.

00:03:13 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

A very unique.

00:03:13 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Position being a management consultant here in Middle Tennessee.

00:03:16 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

We are blessed with two different auto manufacturing facilities in the area that I work in.

00:03:23 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

We have the General Motors facility in Spring Hill and then we also have the Nissan manufacturing facility in Smyrna both.

00:03:30 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

These are significant auto manufacturing operations. They employ thousands of individuals, generating hundreds of millions of dollars if not billions of dollars and revenues that helped to bolster the state's economic position within the United States.

00:03:46 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

A more critically, they've also served a significant catalyst for development, as Ronnie indicated, I used to work for the City of Spring Hill

00:03:53 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

I was the assistant city administrator there, and although the General Motors Saturn plant has been in place for well over 20 years in Spring Hill, my role during the four years I was there was basically dealing with a lot of the aftermath.

00:04:07 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And the growth that continues to occur in and around that facility.

00:04:11 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

General Motors Manufacturing continues to invest billions of dollars in that location and as a result, we're seeing exponential growth that's occurring in and around Spring Hill.

00:04:22 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And so we were dealing with a lot of infrastructure issues, public facility issues, and just the sheer impact of population growth that was happening around the community.

00:04:32 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So I think that landed a lot of kind of hands on expertise that I felt would be very beneficial to communities in West Tennessee.

00:04:39 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

They need to be prepared for the growth that's going to happen.

00:04:42 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

As Ronnie indicated, the Blue Oval City project is going to be very transformative.

00:04:47 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

To all of.

00:04:47 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

West Tennessee, so it's important that communities prepare for that growth.

00:04:52 Speaker 1

Great, thank you.

00:04:53 Speaker 1

Very informative.

00:04:55 Speaker 1

So how many cities have you all worked with in this region around Blue Oval City?

00:05:00 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

I would say directly or indirectly, basically every city in West Tennessee.

00:05:05 Speaker 3 Ronnie Neill

Chuck has made several presentations to different cities and included county officials through the Western city mayors we've had direct and indirect contact with many of the cities.

00:05:18 Speaker 3 Ronnie Neill

So I would say we've pretty much worked with almost every city in West Tennessee in some way to discuss what's going to happen with Blue Oval City.

00:05:28 Speaker 1

What are some of the practices that you're sharing with them?

00:05:31 Speaker 1

Chuck, if you could.

00:05:32 Speaker 1

Speak to some.

00:05:33 Speaker 1

Of the advice that you all are giving them and some of the challenges that you were alerting them to.

00:05:39 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Yeah, absolutely. As I drew on the experience having worked in Spring Hill, I realized very quickly that here you've got a community that's being impacted by a very significant manufacturing facility, but also as you look at communities up and down the Interstate 65 corridor just outside of Nashville. All of them are experiencing tremendous growth.

00:05:59 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

The development right now.

00:06:00 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Now, some of that's related obviously to the ongoing investments in the auto manufacturing industry, but more critically, you know, just the the sheer development that's happening in and around the Nashville metro area.

00:06:12 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And so a lot of communities in Middle Tennessee continue to struggle with being prepared to handle the growth that's coming, and how to best accommodate that.

00:06:21 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And so, taking some of those experiences and applying them to what will be happening in the early days of the Blue Oval City project, I really focused on three different themes in the presentations.

00:06:34 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

We did presentations at three different locations right there in Summerville.

00:06:38 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So we did a presentation over in Atoka that we also did.

00:06:42 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Went up in McKenzie involving city and county officials as well as economic development specialists and just people that are very interested in understanding.

00:06:50 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

You know the potential impact that a project like Blue oval City is going to have, but the presentation focus really was on three primary.

00:06:56 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Here's the first was on.

00:06:59 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Comprehensive planning and updating and making current plans within community.

00:07:06 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

A lot of communities have not undertaken any kind of comprehensive planning or land use planning of any sort, and so this was an opportunity to educate them on the importance of developing those plan instruments that.

00:07:17 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Will help guide.

00:07:18 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

The responsible growth and development of those communities in the future.

00:07:22 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

We emphasize focusing on things like transportation plans, utility.

00:07:25 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Plants public facility plans.

00:07:28 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Make sure that you also include a conversation with the education systems, many of which are great systems.

00:07:34 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

But are they prepared to handle the growth in student population?

00:07:37 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That's going to occur over the next 10-15 20 years, and making sure that you've got sufficient facilities for educating young people throughout these different areas. Second, focus was on what I'll call the.

00:07:49 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Regulatory toolbox and that dealt with things like subdivision regulations.

00:07:54 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Zoning standards making sure that their building codes are all up to date in terms of adopting the latest additions checking staff resources to make sure that they either have professional staff that's sufficient to administer those codes and standards, or to engage engineering and architecture consultants and different consultants to help these communities.

00:08:13 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Deal with the day-to-day administration of standards.

00:08:16 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

It's very important not only to have good, up-to-date regulatory tools, but also to have the proper staffing and consultant support in place to administer those standards so that you're doing it consistently and also with quality in mind.

00:08:30 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And then the third focus of the presentation was on public facilities and public infrastructure.

00:08:37 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

It's very important to understand that with the anticipated growth and development is going to come a significant burden on a lot of cities and counties to deal with the public facilities and infrastructure needs that are going to.

00:08:50 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Curve things like expanding water facilities, expanding sewer plant capacity, adding on to education facilities, building new fire stations, adding on to police headquarters and public Parks and Recreation facilities.

00:09:03 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

All are going to be in very significant demand over the course of the development of the Blue Oval City.

00:09:10 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Project and the impact is going to have on communities around them.

00:09:14 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

It's important for cities to undertake things like developing a capital improvement plan, taking an asset, inventory of all of the different municipal assets and county assets that they have, understanding what the useful life of those facilities are, and making sure at the end of the day that they are sufficiently budgeting and providing the necessary financial resources.

00:09:34 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

For those facilities to grow and expand over time.

00:09:38 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

The last thing he wants to be caught up and 10s of millions about hundreds of millions of dollars in infrastructure improvements because you got behind on keeping pace with the growth and development.

00:09:47 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That's one of the significant things that happened with Spring Hill is that while they were managing the growth, a lot of the public infrastructure got out of reach for them and they are now spending literally.

00:09:58 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

10s if not hundreds of millions of dollars in road improvement projects and utility infrastructure projects just to get back on pace with the development that they're currently experiencing.

00:10:08 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So it's important for communities to try to get out and stay out ahead of that growth development.

00:10:13 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So infrastructure planning, public facility planning being the third component was.

00:10:18 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Was a key piece.

00:10:19 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Of the presentation as well.

00:10:21 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

We had a.

00:10:21 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Lot of interest in the presentations following each of the different areas.

00:10:24 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That we visited.

00:10:26 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And we're really excited to have the opportunity to.

00:10:28 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Be able to assist cities ongoing with some of those efforts to make sure that they are putting the right tools and the right planning processes in place to guide and manage the growth.

00:10:38 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That's going to happen with this project.

00:10:40 Speaker 1

Right, right? That's interesting. They say that production of the all Electric F series trucks is anticipated to begin in 2025.

00:10:49 Speaker 1

So that really doesn't leave cities a lot of time to plan.

00:10:53 Speaker 1

Ahead I guess.

00:10:54 Speaker 1

How are you encouraging them to jump on this?

00:10:58 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

I think just that very fact that we're encouraging cities you know don't sit back and wait for things to happen.

00:11:04 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Take a very proactive, progressive approach.

00:11:07 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Make sure that you've got good plans in place or that you're working on those plans.

00:11:12 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Take the time to seek advice and counsel on getting your regulatory tools up to speed as quickly as you can.

00:11:19 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

This is an opportunity to work smarter, not harder.

00:11:22 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So looking at processes, I think it's a very important component of that.

00:11:22 Speaker 1

Right?

00:11:26 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Then taking stock of your existing infrastructure and public facilities, if you're going to grow 10, 15 or 20% or as much as 100 to 200%, which is what happened in some of the communities in Middle Tennessee, are you prepared?

00:11:39 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

For that, have you thought about how to best expand sewer plants and water plants and park facilities and schools and so on?

00:11:46 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So start those conversations now.

00:11:48 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Make sure that you've got good plans in place that you've got good financial and fiscal strategies in place to deal with the financial burden that these communities are going to be experiencing with that growth.

00:11:58 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So there's no better time.

00:11:59 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

To start than now.

00:12:01 Speaker 1

So this is a question for both of you.

00:12:03 Speaker 1

What does a development of this size mean for West Tennessee?

00:12:08 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

You know, like you've talked about in the introduction, ECD has said that this will create 27,000 jobs over the next 10 years in West Tennessee.

00:12:19  Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

There will be about 8,000 people working on that site a day when they're fully up and in production.

00:12:27 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

They are also preparing the site to expand the site, so this will create without a doubt the largest project that's ever occurred in West Tennessee and probably in Tennessee.

00:12:41 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

From what we're hearing right now.

00:12:43 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

So to get ready for that and be prepared.

00:12:47 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

We've had a situation in West Tennessee has largely been agricultural over many years, and so we have not had the manufacturing jobs in West Tennessee that other parts of the states have had.

00:13:02 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

We've had counties and cities in West Tennessee losing population over the last 20 years, I think.

00:13:08 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

Reverses a lot of that, so it's.

00:13:12 Speaker 3 – Ronnie Neill

I mean it's a brand new day here in West Tennessee, and hopefully we're up to the task.

00:13:19 Speaker 1

That's great, we love growth in this state.

00:13:23 Speaker 1

And Chuck, what would

00:13:23 Speaker 1

You say about this development and what it will do

00:13:26 Speaker 1

For West Tennessee.

00:13:28 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Well, I think it presents a tremendous opportunity for communities.

00:13:33 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

The communities that are prepared to accommodate the growth and development that's going to happen should be in a position to receive a lot of significant economic benefit as a result of this, communities that haven't planned properly that haven't taken the initiative.

00:13:48 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

To make sure that their public infrastructure and facilities are in good order, I think you're going to struggle.

00:13:53 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

A lot of the questions that we receive from communities are, you know, how much growth and development can we expect in our community?

00:14:01 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That's really difficult to predict at this point. We know it's coming, and it's likely going to come in a very significant wave, especially with the manufacturing facility having to be operational by 2025. We're going to see a lot of people coming into West Tennessee.

00:14:15 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And they're going to be distributed throughout a lot of the communities that are ready to receive growth, and so those communities that are not only being proactive about preparing for growth, but also being proactive about promoting their communities as receiving locations for the growth and development that's going to.

00:14:30 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Be happening is.

00:14:31 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

Going to be very important.

00:14:33 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And that's where those communities I think could leverage the investment that's being made by Ford and the other industries that will be locating in and around the Blue Oval City campus.

00:14:43 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

They've got an opportunity to put themselves on the map for development.

00:14:46 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

That's going to be coming, and I think it's going to be important that communities leverage that interest in West Tennessee and do everything they can to show those folks that are coming that they are ready to support that growth and development that they've got the school systems in place.

00:15:02 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

They've got the infrastructure in place.

00:15:04 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

They've got the quality of life that a lot of employees are looking for, and it's all with easy access to the Ford facility.

00:15:12 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So you're going to see a lot of development happening in close proximity to the facilities, not unlike what happened around Smyrna and Spring Hill.

00:15:20 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

And as you get further further away, you'll see a little bit less development occurring, but still, those communities that are poised to receive that growth, I think, will receive great economic benefits.

00:15:30 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So this is a great opportunity for West Tennessee ends too.

00:15:33 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

To leverage the investment that's happening.

00:15:35 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

So this is.

00:15:36 Speaker 2 – Chuck Downham

An opportunity to get out there and showcase your community and hopefully receive some of the benefit that's going to be happening with the development.

00:15:43 Speaker 1

Well, I want to thank you both for this very informative discussion.

00:15:47 Speaker 1

Always great to hear about the work that's going on within our agencies.

00:15:51 Speaker 1

And of course, within the Municipal Technical Advisory service.

00:15:55 Speaker 1

So thank you both for being here and thanks listeners.

00:15:58 Speaker 1

Be sure to subscribe to the In Touch with Tennessee podcasts or be sure to leave a review.

00:16:04 Speaker 1

Or rate us on Apple Podcasts.