TVA has filed with the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC) to build "Project Viper," which appears to be TVA's chosen name for its "secure office complex" in Georgetown. (TDEC Project #SOP-18017)
Is this the best TVA can do? TVA IS INEVITABLE. But the continued destruction of the landscape is not necessary. Citizens deserve information and more transparency from TVA.
TVA operates in seven states all over the south and owns almost 300,000 acres of land. With its property or what it can buy, how was this site chosen for the "secure office complex?" And the best path for a new transmission line is across the private property of four residents in Georgetown?
Dear TVA: Five months ago, TVA employees came to Georgetown. It’s time to come back and talk.
On Aug. 30, the agency held a public meeting and the letter sent to 70 or so property owners (dated Aug. 9, 2018) said the meeting concerned a $26 million upgrade to a transmission line from Hopewell to Georgetown to serve a “secure office complex.” A press release was issued on Aug. 20.
TVA employees supported by an armed guard entered the private property the government agency is condemning shortly before 1 p.m. today. The environmental study team was from Knoxville. They said they weren't testing, just observing the "natural features." The officer in full body armor wouldn't say where he was based, just "Hamilton." They crossed Gunstocker Creek and onto Project Viper, TVA's $300 million new secret city in Georgetown, around 2:45 p.m.
VA filed suit on Tuesday, Nov. 20, against four private citizens in order to take their private property for Project Viper in Georgetown. Property owners found out in the media. TVA has done nothing it said it would do since over the past 90 days. Below is a statement from Greg Vital, one of the property owners who has tried to work with TVA without success.
Is this the best TVA can do? TVA IS INEVITABLE. But the continued destruction of the landscape is not necessary. Citizens deserve information and more transparency from TVA.
TVA operates in seven states all over the south and owns almost 300,000 acres of land. With its property or what it can buy, how was this site chosen for the "secure office complex?" And the best path for a new transmission line is across the private property of four residents in Georgetown?
Marchetta Cannon and her family have lived in Georgetown for 18 years just down Highway 58 south, less than a mile from the Highway 60-Highway 58 intersection. Her land is not impacted by the TVA’s new secret city, but she’s concerned about infrastructure and the planning that has been done on what TVA’s new compound will mean for the Georgetown area. She wonders if TVA has worked with county officials from three counties to consider infrastructure needs.
She speaks of Hamilton County employee Steven Evans, who was killed a half mile from the intersection in a tragic accident on March 24, 2011. His picture sits on a well-kept cross about a half mile going south from the main intersection.
“The road (Highway 58) needs to be widened now with the traffic we have now,” Marchetta says. “If you add hundreds of cars in the morning and afternoon, it could be a nightmare. Did TVA consider the impact this secret facility will have on roads out here?
"Other have died on this road.”
But it’s not just roads. Marchetta talks about how people living in the Georgetown think the self-contained wastewater system TVA is building at the secret site means sewer service will be available. “Totally wrong, but TVA just dumped this on us.”
She also wants to know if any blasting will be done if TVA condemns private property and cuts a new, 1-mile right of way to the site through farmland. “This is all rock out here,” she says. “We used 35 pounds of dynamite to put in our septic tank.”
Traffic. Sewer. Blasting. Marchetta knows a fast-food chain has owned property near the main intersection for years, and if the logical development comes, she worries the lack of infrastructure will create problems for residents.
“I see the potential good; most people do,” said Marchetta, “but TVA acts like the residents don’t exist. If the development comes in the next five years, Georgetown won’t be able to handle it.”
TVA needs to rethink what it is planning for Georgetown and be more transparent. TVA needs to do the right thing by citizens and taxpayers. Like our page. Share our posts. Write your elected officials. Keep up with the issue. #4TNFarms
That has been the question on the minds of citizens since Aug 20 when TVA announced a $26 million major transmission upgrade to provide power to a “new TVA secure office complex” The secure complex is to be built on 167 acres TVA owns along Highway 58 just north of the intersection of Highway 58 and Highway 60 at Gunstocker Creek in Meigs County. A week’s worth of inquiries have yielded no new information.
