I've been saying for a longtime that New York State is not an attractive place to do business, but what if that state problem was actually being made worse by our county officials? I would never have believed that was true.
Now, I'm not so sure.
Remember when a group of venture capitalists came to St. Lawrence County (more specifically, Massena) and threw out this idea (some said it was crazy) to build a huge livestock facility that would raise upwards of 10,000 head of cattle for meat, by-products and methane? The company was called BION and although the scale of the plan was huge, the businesspeople said it was viable.
All they needed was lots of land, a good supply of hay and corn, and a means to get the animal food in and the meat products out. They didn't want our money, special treatment or a handout. It was a little far-fetched, but kind of exciting at the same time.
I assumed a while ago that project was dead and gone, either collapsing due to its own failings or going to a more business-friendly state. Obviously, neither of those scenarios is true.
The failure it seems, was ours.
Click on this story from the Syracuse Post-Standard:
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2010/01/what_made_bion_pass_on_st_lawr.html
The BION project had plenty of support from town and other local officials, but it seems not so much at the County offices in Canton. Why? Did St. Lawrence County's bad attitude kill this project? It sure looks that way.
If that's true, shame on county officials - elected legislators and appointed bureaucrats in the planning department!
They say the company couldn't answer some of their questions. Why were they asking for environmental data months, if not years, before this project would materialize? Is there some secret plan in Canton or tests that a prospective business must pass before we'll embrace them.
Shouldn't we wlecome any potential employer to our county, especially when they first come in with an idea and ask for nothing more than a receptive ear and open mind?
First the steel mill, now this.
It's high time we start asking St. Lawrence County some tough questions of our own.
Very interesting! Thank you for taking the time to dig a little deeper into what seemed to be a "cold case".
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the article and comments, especially the one about Syracuse and Destiny USA, it sounds like St. Lawrence Country may NOT have been off the mark. Time will tell. We have environmental problems enough. 85,000 cows? Yikes. That's a lot of odor.
ReplyDeleteI have followed the proposal from Bion from its inception. On the surface it may have sounded a bit radical, but they have a good business plan and are trying to do something new. I found that the reaction of too many people was "what about the manure" and many other questions. No one at the town or state level did anything to allay the fears of people or try to explain anything. They have answers for all of these questions, but no one wanted to listen.
ReplyDeleteWe constantly hear "we need more jobs" but all we do is push them away and make it extremely hard for businesses to open up.
I could go on for another few hours, but, I have to get back to work.
Thanks for providing the sounding board for us taxpayers
Not in my back yard (NIMBY). That is all I hear. This facility would have been perfect in St. Lawrence county but too may people were worried about the smell. If you are worried about the smell you have absolutely no idea how this system works.
ReplyDeleteBecause they don't care about Massena, its not Potsdam or Ogdensburg or Gouverneur. Use Google Earth and just measure the distance, Potsdam is 10 miles from them, O-Burg is 16 miles, Gouverneur is 20 miles, and Massena is 30. I know its crazy but its the same thing Albany does the entire North Country. It what it comes down to is they don't want us to have anything good because think of the way the county was even in the 1950s, and we've been home to at one time 3 major industrial plants that nothing else in the county can compare to. We've been the golden child of the county so they just ignore us and care not, and god knows probably jealous because we actually had the forsight to build a 4 lane highway. Think of the traffic on that highway and then put it on a single two lane highway much like Route 11, heh. No offense but its time the people of Massena gave Canton the finger.
ReplyDeleteEverybody got behind the pie in the sky race track scheme and put little or no energy into what could have been an economic boost for the area. No one is willing to look at facts, they just work on emotions.
ReplyDeleteGreat post Joe. I concur 100% and posted about it on my blog too. Perhaps it isn't too late. Have you talked to any of the SLC task force members that rejected it?
ReplyDeleteJoe, I have a facebook group up and running now. Would love to see you there.
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