To the editor:

I just want to make sure I have all of this right.

The Brown County Commissioners and the town council of Nashville have given the go-ahead to 326 acres for a new distillery to sit on the top of our town. (Yes, I realize ONLY 126 of those acres are zoned general business.)

The commissioners have given their blessing for the music venue zoning to proceed, putting a three-lane road through the center of the senior housing buildings, passing by the nursing home, the only grocery store in Nashville, the only doctor’s offices, eye doctors and dentists in town, and our community YMCA, effectively making these places inaccessible when there is an “event,” and additionally creating an instant bottleneck at one of the main entrances into town.

The town council has created a “park” in town in a residential neighborhood that is not zoned for a park but is well-known to flood excessively each spring, and paid $100,000 for the half-acre of land. The town council claims they did not have to let the neighbors know they were doing so.

The commissioners are deciding whether to take a local resident and longtime teacher’s property under eminent domain, to extend the Salt Creek Trail. But the disruption of this family’s peace and right to property doesn’t matter, according to our elected officials, as long as the trail is extended so tourists can go for a stroll. Imagine if they erected a steel bridge in your front yard for tourists to walk on? (Moving that bridge will cost the state millions, by the way.)

Town council President “Buzz” King monitors the trash cans, because “the trash cans are for the tourists”; yet, I read where they will now ticket you for littering while simultaneously putting a “program” into place where you can pay them ($80) to divert the charge. So, you can’t throw your cup away in a trash can, but don’t dare drop it. (Maybe as locals we should not purchase food or drink downtown?)

All this comes with the standard, canned cry of those in elected seats: “It will not cost the taxpayer anything.”

Yet, we are currently paying for four attorneys to “defend” the water issue for the distillery property, at the state and federal level. We will be putting in new roads, which must be maintained, for both the distillery property and the music venue.

Our police will be busier than ever with both projects and the park, and don’t try to tell me we won’t need additional officers. The first feasibility study for the distillery property said we’d add no additional officers and need $500 in gas money to patrol 95 acres. We paid $6,500 for that study to tell us a lie. Who knows what the next study will cost.

And speaking of police, the three-lane road for the music venue will go directly through the police department in town. As you know, it costs money to build a new police station, but elected officials say all these projects will cost us nothing?

There is the issue of fire safety for these venues as well, and our volunteer fire departments need help now! So, if they are on a fire run at the distillery, can they be at your home if it is on fire too? No, but that won’t “cost” you, right?

Finally, there is the issue of our sewer treatment plant. Can it sustain the extra load from a 2,000-seat music venue, a distillery and a residential park (for tourists only, of course) with restroom facilities? I haven’t heard of a study that was done on this yet, but my guess is no. (But you can believe a study will be done and we will pay for it.)

So as Brown County residents, I guess we know where we stand in this development. Our voices ignored by our elected officials, our property taken under eminent domain, our neighborhoods disrupted by tourist parks, our roads congested by traffic, our police and fire departments overworked to the detriment of citizens and our infrastructure (roads, water, sewer) pressed to the outer limits by the sheer number of visitors using it.

As citizens, our role is clear, we are here to foot the bill. Our taxes will go up, our county roads will be neglected, our water quality poor, but just pay for it. This is the clear and constant message from our elected officials.

Tricia Bock, Nashville

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