Reasons we oppose a Gatlinburg Style Resort

Backed by the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce the resort began as “well planned modern Gatlinburg” to address the economic collapse of Eastern Kentucky. Under this mission the project gained a million dollars in funding, $500,000 from coal severance tax, and $500,000 from the Appalachian Regional commission (ARC.) Under this mandate, the resort is projected to receive an estimated 70 million in tax incentives. While this project is currently set to be developed on private land, it is publicly funded and backed (through tax incentives and grant monies). Therefore, we as citizens should have a say in what happens regarding this project.

Reasons we oppose a “Well planned modern Gatlinburg”

  1. This project won’t address the coal collapse of Eastern Kentucky, which was its original impetus and justification.

    In 1950 Coal boasted approximately 48,940 jobs in Eastern Kentucky. Now less than 3000 remain. The RRG is not historically a coal region, and any jobs here would be too far of a commute to the coal fields.

  2. Mass-concentrated commercial tourism endeavors like Gatlinburg don’t solve poverty.

    Jessica Amason, scholar of anthropology at Central Washington University, observes that what remains in the wake of mass-scale-commercial-tourism is not prosperity, but something akin to despair. “The result is a new type of poverty not usually associated with Appalachia, where abandoned amusement parks sit decaying and lifeless, and once-prosperous motels become halfway houses for Gatlinburg's severely underpaid workforce,” Amason warns.

3. The publicly incentivized resort may outcompete small businesses.

As AECOM studies stated, “current visitors to the region would be the easiest to market to.” Furthermore,  if the project is unsuccessful in attracting high-dollar clients, officials must lower rates of their services to market value to pay off debts and escape bankruptcy. Such competition will push small businesses out of the area, as they will be unable to compete; those once-sustainable jobs will disappear.

4. The top-down approach is not what the community needs.

This project began six years before the plans were announced to the public. Their plans were well underway before they sought local engagement.