The Herald-Citizen's optimistic report that Cookeville city government took 'a major step last night toward attracting new industry' may have been a bit pre-mature, considering: The city has a track record with the hospital that gives little evidence of skillful oversight of any project; the city recently gave land for a technological school that also is supposed to train workers. We have to ask ourselves, 'How is this going to benefit anyone except the contractor who gets the bid?'

Contemporary economic development and growth efforts in most communities often tend to make the regional areas poorer instead of better off.  But isn't development & growth 'betterment for all?' you ask. Well, sometimes not. There are always losers and winners in any economic development effort. The developers, real estate interests and other related businesses, known as the "Growth Machine," would like us to believe that growth brings progress. However this is often not the case.

Moving to cope with recent job losses here and facing an increasingly competitive future, Cookeville City Council took a major step last night toward attracting new industry -- constructing what's called an "expect building" in the city's industrial park. The Council voted 4-0 to authorize city hall staffers to explore the costs and the legal ramifications of erecting a building that would be available to a job-producing industry and to report their findings back to the Council at their next meeting on Feb. 17.