The Tennessee House reportedly just passed a budget that includes $11 million in taxpayer money for cost overruns for a new Inn at Fall Creek Falls State Park, which have caused costs to soar.
Taxpayers, of course, must pick up the slack.
The park is in Bledsoe and Van Buren counties in east Tennessee.
“A Lee administration budget provision includes $11 million to cover ‘cost overruns’ for construction of the new inn, restaurant and conference center at the park near Spencer, Tennessee,” according to this week’s Chattanooga Times Free Press.
“It’s causing the total costs for building the $29.4 million, 95,000-square-foot replacement facilities to soar by more than one third to $40.4 million. And it’s also pushing the anticipated completion date beyond the summer of 2020 to 2021.”
The website went on to say the cost overrun is because pf problems finding workings in “the sparsely populated, remote area during a time of high employment.”
“General Services Department spokesman David Roberson cited via email two main factors at work: The first is that ‘construction cost escalation has been more than anticipated since 2017,’” according to The Times Free Press.
“Secondly, Roberson said, there’s been ‘difficulty in finding subcontractors to bid on the project at the location, which has added to the cost of construction.’”
Roberson also reportedly said it’s difficult to find labor for large projects in rural areas.
According to its website, Fall Creek Falls State Park is one of Tennessee’s largest and most visited state parks and has 26,000 acres.
“In 1937, the federal government began purchasing the badly eroded land around Fall Creek Falls. The following year, the Works Project Administration and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) began restoring the forest and constructing park facilities,” according to the park’s official website.
“A few years later in 1944, the National Park Service transferred ownership of the park to the State of Tennessee.”
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Image “Fall Creek Falss Inn” by Tennessee State Parks.
TDEC needs to consult Trump. Make it under budget and ahead of schedule.
That’s still a better expenditure than the West Tennessee Megasite.
Remember the next time you go the voting booth (to select a future US Senator) that these programs and projects were all initiated and managed (or not) under the Bill Haslam regime!
But why should spending money frivolously surprise any of us? We spend money re-naming a state park after the current (living) Comptroller, Justin P. Wilson. We spend money naming (in nice big stainless steel letters) the tunnel that goes from the Capital to the Cordell Hull Building after a living, former Speaker of the Senate, Ron Ramsey. And we spend money naming (in nice big stainless steel letters) the “park” outside the Cordell Hull Building after a living, former Speaker of the House, Beth Harwell. Yet we tear down heroes from the past!
Gone are the days of public service, now it’s all about public recognition!