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OBSERVATIONS
May 13, 2021 |
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Lots of work already going on at the Amazon site, the first project by the Samet Corporation in the new West Smithfield Industrial Park beside US 70 Business.
 Wingate Lassiter |
Does Amazon signal the return
of major industry to Smithfield?
Chris Johnson, director of Johnston County's Office of Economic Development, put Monday's announcement of Amazon's coming into historical perspective when he said this project "has the ability once again to move the town of Smithfield to the forefront of growth and opportunity that has not been seen since companies like Sylvania, Burlington, and Fieldcrest dotted the town's landscape."
Those companies thrived here in the 1960s and 1970s, but Sylvania was gone by the early 1980s and Burlington and Fieldcrest faded away a decade later. Those companies were victims of either corporate mergers or global economics, if not both --- things beyond our control here in Smithfield, North Carolina in the U.S.A.
Will Amazon hang around for "a mighty long time," as Mr. Johnson stated? Or will the volatile world economy coupled with unimaginable technology make this giant of present-day retailing obsolete by the time the next generation reaches maturity?
No doubt Amazon's arrival will shake things up on the local economic front. We saw that already in evidence at Tuesday's meeting of the Johnston County Board of Education when there was much talk about raising wages of school employees to keep good workers from jumping ship for greener pastures.
Isn't it gratifying that raising the long-stagnant minimum wage to $15 an hour isn't going to wait for action by a Congress so politicized that action on anything worthwhile these days seems unlikely. Corporate America is rapidly making the new minimum wage reality by means of the marketplace.
"We have embarked on a new era of growth," Mayor Andy Moore said at Monday's Amazon announcement celebration. He's most likely correct in making that assessment, given where we're situated in one of the nation's most dynamic regions.
But those of us who've been around for a while will never forget how Smithfield's Golden Age of Industrial Development back in the 1970s faded almost as quickly as it arrived. Fifty years is a long time to travel between mountaintops.
A BUSINESSMAN'S SIMPLE REQUEST FOR FAIRNESS
David Johnson the businessman (who spoke just ahead of David Johnson the college president) stood before the Town Council and the County Commissioners at Monday's public hearing on tax breaks for Amazon and made a simple yet important statement about government and fair play:
"I'd like to welcome Amazon to this great community," he said as he thanked local leaders for their efforts in landing this beneficial new business. "I would just like to ask that the town and county be just as eager to assist existing businesses with their needs and their problems as they arise."
Without bringing it up, he was reminding both governing boards of his repeated requests for help in resolving the CSX drainage problem that has damaged his commercial property and that of his neighbors on South Bright Leaf Boulevard on several occasions in recent years.
But there's more at stake than Mr. Johnson's predicament. May I add corporate tax incentives, if they must continue, to his call for fair play in helping the businesses we've already got.
GOOD SHOT FOR A SMITHFIELD POSTCARD
This scene from last Friday evening's return of the Third StrEATery outdoor dining event was posted on the Downtown Smithfield Development Corporation's Facebook page. The series continues every other week, the next event set for May 21.
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