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Campbell upbeat about city's present, future

Published January 17th, 2009 | 1 Comments

KINGSPORT — City Manager John Campbell gave an update on the state of the city to the Kingsport Kiwanis Club on Friday, touching on financial data, the city’s debt level, and higher education in the Model City.

Campbell started off with a rundown of figures and dollar amounts, including information on building permits, sales tax collections, the cost of certain major projects, and other good news.

Last year was the biggest year in Kingsport’s history at $174 million in building permits. And that followed the previous biggest year, 2007, which was $164 million, Campbell said. Eastman Chemical Co. had about $25 million of the 2008 total.

Kingsport has seen $425 million in new investment over the past three years, with the city not seeing the full benefit yet, Campbell said.

Sales tax collections have slowed some in the past couple of months, but Campbell said the city is still doing very well — about 6 percent ahead of where it was this time last year.

One of the most significant items of news the city has received recently has been with its credit rating. Campbell said Kingsport heard this week that Moody’s reaffirmed its A1 bond rating for the city, while Standard and Poor had given Kingsport an AA- credit rating.

Kingsport had just one credit rating agency — Moody’s. But since June of last year city leaders have discussed the pros and cons of obtaining a rating from a second credit rating agency.

“The reason we went for two ratings this time is some investors require having two rating agencies. We feel like we’ll get more bidders with our bonds this time because of that,” Campbell said, adding Moody’s reported Kingsport has a solid financial position, stable economy and a manageable debt burden.

And speaking of debt, Campbell also presented a graph illustrating the city’s current debt burden and amount of debt service that will be rolling off in the next fiscal year. Campbell said Kingsport will see $3.5 million in debt service roll off in 2010, and with $1.5 million being added by the current capital improvement plan, the city will have just over $2 million in freed-up cash for future capital projects.

In the past two years Kingsport has undertaken a major push for higher education — building two facilities in downtown Kingsport to go along with the Regional Center for Applied Technology, the Regional Center for Advanced Manufacturing and an upcoming automotive program.

“There is no more truism in economic development than you better have an educated work force, a talented work force,” Campbell said, noting the city has a five-year goal of having 30 percent of the city’s population with at least a bachelor’s degree.

One bit of good news from the recently released U.S. Census data shows a 4.8 percent increase in Kingsport’s population since 2000 with an associate degree or higher.

During the Q&A session of the meeting, Campbell commented on any funding reductions passed down from the state. Campbell said Gov. Phil Bredesen has promised not to go after state-shared revenues for local governments or K-12 education funds.

Another question came on annexation and the city’s approach.

Campbell said the city should annex in a prudent manner and would not go after Colonial Heights next year when the moratorium ends.

“As far as I’m concerned, that’s not going to happen. We would not take all of it. There may be some parts of interest, but there are others that probably wouldn’t be,” Campbell said. “We will not be as aggressive as some people think we will be.”

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Hey John --- you want 30% of your population to have at least a bachelor degree? Where are they going to work big boy???? Sounds like you are trying to fleece the citizens of Kpt just like you did in JC. As a former resident of JC I remember your sorry career in my town.

captn kangaroo | 1/18/2009 - 7:40 PM - ( Comment

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