These days it’s very difficult for rural Mississippi communities to land major economic development projects like huge manufacturing facilities. Even when they do, it has typically come at an enormous cost to state residents in the form of tax breaks and cash payments to industries.
And many of those projects don’t work out the way the legislature anticipated when it gave away the people’s money to a private business. For example, just this week State Auditor Stacey Pickering issued a demand for repayment for $6.3 million to GreenTech Automotive, a Tunica car startup. It failed to live up to its end of the bargain by not making loan repayments to the state, not investing the $60 million it promised to and not creating the required number of jobs. It’s unlikely the state will ever see that money back.
So the name of the game for lasting success in economic development is a lot of singles, not home runs. Those can still add up to a winning ball game, often more so than the big deals.
It’s encouraging for us to see one such business doing well.
Nelson Wholesale, a Texas-based pet food distributor that caters to independent feed stores, opened in Columbia last year in the 100,000-square-foot former Orleans Import building and is doing well, according to a report company executive David Foxworth gave to the Columbia Rotary Club Tuesday.
He said the company bought 30 acres — a sign that it’s in it for the long-term as opposed to leasing — and hopes to outgrow it and expand its facility. It currently has 10 employees and is adding them at a rate of about one every two weeks, mostly truck drivers, Foxworth said. That’s a positive job trend.
Foxworth said Nelson hopes to be part of a revitalization of a part of town that has lost most of its industry.
“We want to be a driving force in the economy of Columbia and Marion County,” he said.
He said Columbia is a centralized point that is good for distribution, something that holds true for other potential industries.
The biggest challenge, he said, is finding quality drivers. Still, the potential for growth is strong.
“If everything works right, we could employ 100 to 150 people, but that's long, long term,” he said.
To continue a baseball analogy, that’s the type of economic development single that drives in a lot of runs.
