County to Consider Tax Incentives for New $17.9M Manufacturing Facility
Greg Wilson/Anderson Observer
On Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. in the historic courthouse, Anderson County Council will address addiction, housing, tourism, and consider a tax incentive for a proposed new investment of $17.9 million in a manufacturing project.
The company, given the code name “Project Flyrod 1” by the county’s economic development department, would provide 53 new full-time jobs. The location of the proposed facility was not included in the agenda packet.
Council will also take a final vote Tuesday on a plan to create the legal framework for issuing revenue bonds backed by the county’s 3 percent accommodations fee and a portion of “park fees” to fund tourist-oriented projects. Currently, accommodations-tax revenues are distributed annually in relatively small amounts to various groups that promote projects or events aimed at “putting heads in beds” and generating taxes in the county’s hotels, VRBOs and Airbnbs. The proposed $12.7 million in bonds, with a cap of 6 percent on the interest rate and plans to solicit bids from roughly 40 banks and financial institutions, would allow for funding more expansive and higher-impact projects.
Those projects include significant renovations to the amphitheater and related infrastructure at the Anderson Sports and Entertainment Center, added boat-ramp lanes and courtesy docks at Green Pond Landing, replacement of the ramp and docks at McFalls Landing, and upgrades at Dolly Cooper and Wellington parks.
County Administrator Rusty Burns said earlier the debt would be repaid entirely from accommodations-tax revenues, which state law restricts to tourism uses, and not from property taxes. Finance Director Rita Davis told council the county has lined up roughly $4 million in sponsorships and about $1.2 million in grant funding toward the overall package, which is estimated at $13.9 million, with the bonds filling much of the remaining gap.
The first public hearing of the night will be on third reading of a rezoning proposal in District Four: four lots totaling about 10 acres in the Fork No. 2 precinct, proposed to be shifted from a commercial rural district to Residential Agriculture.
A separate proposal to amend the county’s code by adding a new provision governing the development of townhome and apartment units will receive first reading Tuesday. The text of the ordinance, not yet debated in public, suggests that Anderson is edging toward a more formal relationship with density. In a county where large swaths remain unzoned, and where recent fights have centered on minimum lot sizes for single-family houses in unzoned areas, the decision to write rules specifically for multifamily construction is a recognition that apartments are no longer an exception but an inevitability. The purpose of this new code aims to ensure the proper siting of future projects in relation to their surroundings, to avoid any negative fallout from improper planning and design, and to determine which such housing projects shall be submitted for approval and review to the Planning Commission.
In addition to land-use debates and bond covenants is an altogether different kind of proposal to lease a county-owned parcel at 2335 Snow Road to a nonprofit called Love Well Ministries for “a nominal fee”—one dollar per year—to operate a residential opioid-treatment facility for women. The ground lease attached to the agenda is precise. Anderson County, as lessor, will grant Love Well an “absolute net lease” on the property, with the cost of installation, maintenance, insurance, and compliance with laws borne solely by the lessee. The purpose is tied to a prior memorandum of understanding outlining an “opioid abatement program,” and the structure is typical of the way local governments now participate in addiction treatment: by offering space and legitimacy, but not running the program themselves.
It is not lost on the council that the money facilitating this, and other recent addiction-related efforts, comes from national opioid settlements—a stream of funds that has forced counties to decide, more explicitly than usual, whether they are in the business of harm reduction or of symbolic denunciation. The ordinance, with its modest rent and delegated responsibilities, lands squarely in the harm-reduction camp, even if the rhetoric around it will likely be couched in terms of gratitude to nonprofits and assurances that the funds are being used “for what it’s meant for.”
Meanwhile, in the 6 p.m. honors meeting, council will recognize the Anderson Christian School boys’ volleyball team for winning the SCACS state championship, and the Belton Preparatory Academy, a tuition-free public charter serving five-year-old kindergartners through eighth graders, for what the resolution calls “outstanding academic achievements” in the 2024–25 school year.
Full agenda here
