For the past two decades, every government entity in Jackson County was preoccupied with growth. We’ve watched Jackson’s rating among the fastest-growing counties climb and listened in awe as Frank Norton predicted that Maysville will have a population of 75,000 by 2020.
Then the housing bubble burst, the credit market collapsed and the economy slowed. Is this a hiccup or a basic change?
Certainly the economy will recover, but we may never see the kind of rapid, speculative construction and growth of the immediate past. Zero-down mortgages are gone; more regulations on mortgage lending and the memories of the mortgage collapse may permanently slow the construction of new single-family houses.
The basics for growth remain. We have (relatively) cheap land and access to Athens, Atlanta and I-85. We have adequate water and sewerage. Yet, although Jackson County may continue to rank among the fastest-growing counties, a return to the growth rates of 1995-2005 seems unlikely.
Given that virtually every decision by local government in the past two decades was based on projections of rapid growth, it’s time for local governments to take another look at population projections and long-range capital needs. The assumptions of the past warrant review.
The recession is already altering capital spending. Government at all levels is locked into surviving 2008 and 2009, not looking ahead 10 years. Just as we were wrong to assume the economy would stay strong forever, we shouldn’t expect the recovery to put us back where we were in 2005 anytime soon.
I used to wonder what governments in parts of Georgia that did not have rapid growth did at their meetings. I’m finding out. Planning commissions and the water and sewerage authority have less to do. City and county governments quit talking about expanding services or utility systems. Meetings get shorter, and the focus turns from growth to survival.
It’s possible that the population growth will continue apace but the construction of new houses will lag as buying houses becomes difficult. That will create a demand for rental property, and whereas most of our apartment growth in the past targeted low-income residents, there may be a demand for more upscale apartments.
The recovery will occur in due time, but the patient may not look as well fed and robust as he did before the collapse. The population assumptions local governments operated under for years in regard to facilities and services to meet future populations are no longer valid.
For the rest of the opinions and editorials, see the Nov. 19 issue of The Commerce News.
