Grant money should be awarded to local station
Jennifer Ann Katzenberger smiled for the camera as Officer Bruce Alderman placed her in his patrol car on Jesse Street Tuesday. (Deuce Niven photo)
Jennifer Ann Katzenberger smiled for the camera as Officer Bruce Alderman placed her in his patrol car on Jesse Street Tuesday. (Deuce Niven photo)
It’s disappointing to learn the Nursery Crop Research Station here in McMinnville appears to be on the receiving end of a million-dollar snub.
It will be a million-dollar snub if Congress goes through with its plans to award a $1 million grant to the University of Tennessee instead of awarding it to TSU’s research station on Cadillac Lane.
Naturally, officials at TSU are upset by this decision. Truth be told, they have legitimate reasons to be angry.
The Nursery Crop Research Station here in McMinnville is a one-of-a-kind facility in Tennessee. Some people in Warren County may not even know this facility exists because research scientists here quietly go about their business without making headlines.
These are people dedicated to making strides to improve the nursery industry. These are people who, when state government shut down for a week over the summer, still reported to work anyway because the plants needed to be watered.
The Nursery Crop Research Station already has well-established programs doing exactly the kind of work the $1 million grant is intended to support at the University of Tennessee. Overlooking the programs and research being conducted here can be viewed as a hard slap to the face.
The main problem with throwing $1 million at Tennessee for nursery research is UT doesn’t have such a nursery research program. And if a full-scale program was ever implemented, it would merely be duplicating the work being conducted right here in Warren County.
The logical train of thought, with the push to cut government expenses at an all-time premium, would be to invest the funds into a program which is already up and running. It makes little financial sense to begin from scratch when a large portion of the start-up costs will absorb the $1 million grant.
Taking advantage of available resources and funneling the money to TSU’s research station makes perfect sense. The only reason to appropriate the money elsewhere has to be because of political motivation. There’s no other way to explain why $1 million would be tossed in UT’s direction for a program which doesn’t exist.
We should keep in mind this is taxpayer money that’s being used. It’s a quite a bit of taxpayer money.
As Warren countians, we should want that grant money to come into our area. As taxpayers, we should expect our tax dollars to be spent wisely.
It’s not too late to give U.S. Sen. Bill Frist some feedback. Let him know this money should be utilized at the already established and thriving station right here. Frist can be reached by writing Hart Senate Office Building, Room 825, Washington, D.C., 20510 or by calling (202) 224-3344.