$4 a gallon for gas? They’re not even trying

When I heard that Hurricane Katrina was going to damage refineries and offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, I quickly left work and filled the tank of my Bonneville in anticipation of a shortage that never came.

My bunker mentality notwithstanding, I was relieved to see no hoarding by consumers or rationing by stations. Of course, I was aghast at prices the next time I filled up: $3.29 per gallon for regular unleaded at the Central Avenue Circle K. I kept that receipt from the summer of 2005 for months, evidence of what I thought would be the high-watermark in U.S. fuel prices during the first decade of the new millennium.

Boy, was that stupid!

As I write this, the average price for regular in the metro Augusta area is $3.51. Nationally, it’s $3.62, and analysts forecast it could head well above $4 a gallon in the high-traffic summer.

What I say to that – and this is the point where you might throw your newspaper down in disgust or, if you’re an online reader, spit on your computer screen – is: Bring it on! I hope gas prices hit $4. In fact, I want them to climb even higher.

It’s not because I want the sheiks, the commodities brokers and the oil companies* to get even richer – which they will; it’s because I want a riot.

Whoa, hold on there, hoss. I’m not talking about a violent “let’s-go-loot-a-liquor-store-and-steal-a-TV” kind of riot; I’m talking about a major social, political and economic upheaval.

I’m talking about passing the tipping point where the people and leaders of this nation are forced to make real changes in how it consumes energy and invests in technology to make alternative energy sources as economically viable as fossil fuels.

We have never come close to that tipping point, not even with dino juice trading well above $100 a barrel.

What we’ve seen so far is what always happens during a run-up in oil prices: Oil companies boost their “alternative energy” marketing campaigns to make you think they’re actually working on ways to sell you something other than oil (e.g., BP as “Beyond Petroleum”); politicians (those who aren’t on oil companies’ contribution lists) hold meaningless hearings to question the industry’s “windfall profits”; and, last but not least, upset motorists direct their blind rage at anyone who will listen, usually local service station operators (whose gasoline profits actually go down as pump prices get higher).

Then, when prices fall or stabilize – as they always do – the innovation stops. Nothing changes. Everything goes back to normal until the next excuse for a price spike comes along.

Like it or not, we’re not going to see major changes in mass transit, urban planning, car fuel efficiency or alternative fuels until we reach the tipping point.

ONE MORE POINT ON TIPPING: It’s a reflection of the level of service, not an entitlement. At least, in my book, anyway.

TALE OF TWO CORPORATE CITIZENS: Augusta’s favorite environmental whipping boy, Olin Corp.’s manufacturing plant, now has another strike against it.

Competitor Occidental Chemical Corp. announced last week it has ceased all mercury-based manufacturing processes in North America, leaving Missouri-based Olin’s chlorine, caustic soda and bleach plant in south Augusta as one of only four remaining producers using mercury-cell based technology.

Dallas-based OxyChem, which operates a sodium silicate plant in south Augusta near Olin (small world, eh?), already appears to be marketing itself as the good-guy chlorine producer.

“Our ability to offer all of our caustic soda and caustic potash customers product made in a non-mercury cell process reinforces our position as an industry leader,” OxyChem President Chuck Anderson said in a statement issued last week.

OxyChem’s decision will no doubt embolden Olin’s critics, namely Washington-based environmental group Oceana, the driving force behind the anti-mercury campaign.

I can see the new protest signs now: “Olin: Can’t you be more like OxyChem?”

NO TAX INCENTIVES ON THIS LURE, YET: Aside from sheer jubilation, the recent announcement by Bass Pro Shops to build a megastore at the Village at Riverwatch site has produced another common reaction: “What are we giving them?”

It seems to be a fair question, considering destination retailers such as Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s** have commanded huge tax incentives from the communities they have built in over the years. I won’t get into the nitty-gritty here, because writer and corporate watchdog Greg LeRoy has already written a comprehensive piece on the subject ( www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=19290).

Let’s just say the two retail chains have no problem using their status as tourist attractions to secure economic development goodies usually reserved for major industry. That’s caused smaller competitor Gander Mountain – which The Augusta Chronicle reported this year was scouting Augusta as a possible site for its first store in Georgia – to go on the offensive.

So far, Richmond County officials have not given Bass Pro Shops any taxpayer money or government grants. They are, however, working on a $25 million tax-exempt industrial revenue bond to help the retailer finance its proposed 100,000-square-foot store.
The bonds carry no cost or liability for taxpayers. The store qualifies for the bonds because of a loophole for sports- and tourism-related developments.

Of course, no one knows what incentives the Village at Riverwatch developer and property owner offered to lure the retailer to the site near River Watch Parkway and Interstate 20. Whatever it was, it was attractive enough to make the company stop looking at property near the Lewiston Road exit on I-20 in Columbia County.

SINCE WE’RE ON THE TOPIC OF CONSTRUCTION: Residential construction in the metro area was off to a slow start in the first quarter. The value of residential construction contracts through the end of March, $133 million, was about 15 percent lower than the $156 million reported during the same period last year by McGraw-Hill Construction.

Now for the sunny side: Non­residential contracts, which include everything from office buildings and hotels to apartment complexes and churches, were up 62 percent – from $53 million in 2007 to $86 million .

WE DON’T NEED NO EDUCATION (OR DO WE?): Here’s something to think about at graduation season: The 59,000 Georgia high school dropouts from the Class of 2007 will cost the U.S. government nearly $2.8 billion in lost tax revenue over their lifetimes.

That’s according to the Washington-based Alliance for Excellent Education, which calculates lost revenue based on the lower earning power (which equals lower income taxes) of the average high school dropout compared to diploma holders. Nationwide, the 1.2 million dropouts could have put an additional $60.72 billion in tax revenue in the federal coffers over their lifetimes, the alliance said.

Of course, I’d like to think all of those tax collections would have been directed toward education as opposed to offsetting the $58 billion in “unreconciled transactions” between federal agencies that auditors found in last year’s budget.***

* And the Russians and that Hugo Chavez character.

** Which my friend Joe Converse said I gave short shrift to last week. Sportsmen consider Cabela’s the “Cadillac” of outdoor stores, he said.

*** That’s right, the federal government lost more money in 2007 than Exxon Mobil made in profit. I’m in the wrong business.

Who moved my (pimento) cheese?

It takes an outdoor store to save a Village

Well, well, well.

I guess developers of the stalled Village at Riverwatch had an ace up their sleeves after all.

After nearly three years of on-again off-again (mostly off) activity at the proposed retail site near River Watch Parkway and Interstate 20, project backers have secured the holy grail of outdoor retail: Bass Pro Shops.

But is it enough to save the 170-acre tract?

Of course it is. Duuuuh.

A Bass Pro Shops store (there are only a few dozen of them, by the way) is a tourist destination. People who are not me will drive many miles to go to one. Others who ordinarily wouldn’t stop in Augusta will pull off Interstate 20 when they see the store’s sign.

It’s like a shopping mall, outlet center and theme park rolled into one. Only there are more folks wearing camo.

A couple of years ago I drove through Mitchell, S.D., on Interstate 90. As far I could tell, there were two things to do there: see The Corn Palace (a big building decorated with corn) and stop at the Cabela’s outfitter store (whose massive parking lot was chock-full of cars, RVs and buses).

Anyone remotely interested in outdoor retail knows Bass Pro Shops is way more revered than Cabela’s. In fact, I’ve never heard locals more excited about a single store since, since … well, I can’t remember.

It’s clear Bass Pro Shops will revive the Village project. What’s unclear is what the rest of the tenant mix will be. The developers’ representatives last week were typically mum on the details of the project once pitched as a lifestyle center anchored by a Dillard’s, Belk, Starplex Cinemas and , most recently, a Costco.

Lifestyle center, big-box center, strip mall, outlet center – who cares what the rest of the place looks like? We’ve got Bass Pro Shops!

Eat your corn-fed heart out, Mitchell.

RUMOR OF THE WEEK: The Salvation Army property on Greene Street has been purchased by hotel developers.

Wrong.

Although developers have made overtures, a sale has not occurred, the organization isn’t seeking offers and it doesn’t plan to move any time soon, Commanding Officer Chip Hall said.

Some of the Salvation Army’s land has been acquired to complete the St. Sebastian Way extension project, but Mr. Hall said the organization is “perfectly happy” staying where it is.

“We don’t need to move; we don’t have to move,” he said.

Now, if somebody really wants the property, Mr. Hall said, the deal would also have to include payment for relocation and new building expenses.

“If (relocating is) best for the city, then I’m open to it,” he said.

IN THE (NU)CLEAR? If you’re opposed to nuclear power, this is bad news. If you’re in favor of nuclear power, this is good news. If you’re the kind of person who doesn’t really care what makes your TV glow, skip right ahead to the next section.

The owners of the Alvin W. Vogtle Nuclear Generating Plant near Waynesboro, Ga., cleared a major hurdle in the proposal to build two new units at the plant. T his month, they finally settled on a price for the reactors with a consortium of companies led by Westinghouse Electric Co.

Southern Co. subsidiary Georgia Power, Plant Vogtle’s majority owner, had been wrangling with Westinghouse (one of only two companies whose reactor designs have already been approved by federal nuclear regulators) for months over spiraling costs that threatened to derail the multi billion -dollar project.

The price of the reactors is being kept confidential until state regulators sign off on the long-term electricity-supply plan that Georgia Power will submit next month.

After the plan is (likely) approved, the company is finally expected to finally announce it will commit to the project, which will create thousands of temporary jobs and double the plant’s full-time employment to 1,800.

HERE’S SOMETHING FUNNY – SORT OF: My Unverifiable Fact from a couple of weeks ago – the one about the percentage of area residents who leave town during Masters Week – can almost be verified.

I said 23.7 percent of people leave town. Although no one can prove that, we can say that 22 percent of area residents polled in a recent Belden Associates media survey said they leave during Masters Week.

Was I close or what? I didn’t even have to randomly call up thousands of people to do it, either.

The Belden survey also showed (warning: shameless self-promotion ahead) that The Augusta Chronicle and its affiliated products reach more area residents than all other Augusta media combined. Boo-yah!*

ON THE TOPIC OF MEDIA: You might have noticed that E-Z-GO went all-out this year during its Masters Week media blitz.

The gist of the golf and speciality vehicle manufacturer’s television, billboard, radio and newspaper ads is to get consumers (rather than the shrinking golf course market) thinking about its non golf vehicles as an alternate form of transportation around the yard.

The company wants people to see its small vehicles as the car you drive around the neighborhood or take down to the ol’ fishin’ hole. The unique twist, though, is that the company is using its celebrity golf endorsers – Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Vaughn Taylor – as pitchmen in the off-the-course campaign.

“This is a perfect week, when you’ve got a global audience,” said Kathleen Searle, the company’s vice president of communications.

Now that the Masters Week marketing has concluded, the company is pushing the campaign out to its 600 dealers and distributors around the world for use in their local markets.

ONE LAST MASTERS COMMENT: If it seemed like Augusta National Golf Club hired more people to work this year’s Masters Tournament than in years past, that’s because it did.
Sources say the club hired about 1,900 people to work the week, or about 300-400 more than the number of temporary hires it has made in previous years.

It’s nice to know there will always be one industry in town that’s recession-proof.

SEEING DOUBLE: You might have noticed a new Circle K under construction at 459 Old Evans Road near the intersection of Old Petersburg Road, which is the site of … another Circle K.

At first glance, this would appear to be the convenience-store operator’s third set of dueling stores (side-by-side locations on Washington and Wrightsboro roads being the other two).

The new store, however, is designed to replace the older one, which is being razed as part of the River Watch Parkway expansion project on Old Petersburg Road.

The plan is for the new store to open in mid-July, just as the old one is torn down, said Robert Campau, the director of Circle K regional operations for the chain’s Canadian parent company, Quebec’s Alimentation Couche-Tard.**

The largest convenience store operator in North America – and the largest in the Augusta-Aiken area – is also building a new store at 3698 Mike Padgett Highway at the intersection of Tobacco Road.

Mr. Campau said that the company, which has remodeled many of its area stores during the past 18 months, plans to develop two more area stores next year.

* That’s the last time I’ll do that. Pinkie swear.

** The company name is French for “food for those who go to bed late.” Honest!

Thank you for the thank yous

In case you missed it, the piece focused on the socio-economic changes that followed the loss of the town’s sole industry several years ago.

Some of those changes included the eviction of my parents from the place they have called home for more than 30 years.

I have been inundated with reader comments since the date of publication. In fact, I don’t think I have ever received more feedback on anything I’ve ever written for a newspaper during the past 15 years. With the exception of one e-mail chiding me for not sticking to Augusta-area news (“...I really don’t care about your hometown...”), all the comments I have received have been complimentary and heartfelt.*

At first, I was a bit surprised by all the reaction. After all, the social upheaval caused by job losses in a town 1,650 miles away has little impact on the lives of Augusta-area residents. However, after speaking with many of you, I have come to realize that nearly everyone, whether they live in a trailer park or a gated mansion, can relate to the column’s underlying themes: the cause-and-effect of industrial decline, a child’s concern for aging parents and the very concept of what we call “home.”

I rarely comment on what I write (I prefer to let readers have the last word), but in this case, I feel the need to say something about the kind words from everyone who called or wrote to me about the column: Thank you.

* The column also helped me reconnect with my childhood best-friend, whom I had lost touch with over the years. We failed to reunite during my recent visit, but he posted a blog reply reminding me of something I forgot long ago: That we entombed a coffee-can “time capsule” inside the block wall of my mother’s home. I’m hopeful it can be retrieved before she moves. I’d like to know what we put inside it.

Masters Tournament: What's the economic impact?

The hotels are empty. The street vendors are gone. The limos and vans are back in their garages. The golf fans have all gone home.

All that remains of the 2008 Masters Tournament is the money still circulating around the Augusta economy. How much money?

That’s a common question, but one that’s tricky to answer.

Calculating the economic impact of the Tournament would require, among other things, a ballpark figure on the number of people attending. The only people who know the answer to that are at the Augusta National Golf Club, and they aren’t talking – yet.

Officials from the Augusta Convention and Visitors Bureau last year began discussing with the Augusta National the possibility of issuing an economic impact statement. The Augusta National last week acknowledged it has had some talks with the CVB, but would not indicate if or when such as statement would be issued.

The fact that the Augusta National has even entertained the idea is a landmark achievement. That’s because the club has never disclosed the number of people it hires to work the Tournament (hundreds, possibly thousands), the value of Masters merchandise it sells (reportedly in the low tens of millions) or the tonnage of pimento cheese sandwiches consumed on the course (my guess is somewhere between one and three).

Sales tax collections spike during the period, but remember that much of the spending during Masters Week isn’t reported. Think of every homeowner who turns their yard into a paid parking lot or every schoolteacher who gets cash “under the table” to help a catering company deliver gourmet meals to corporate executives at their hospitality suites.

The Augusta National is apparently interested in what people think of its impact, as evidenced by one of the questions on its first-ever patron survey. The survey allowed patrons to plug in their best guesses, all the way up to $200 million.

In 1997, the CVB (using hotel occupancy as a gauge) estimated the Masters Tournament pumped $109 million into the local economy. That was the last economic impact statement.

Hopefully, Augusta won’t have to wait another 11 years for the next one.

Red Carpet Tour goes confidential

When I covered my first Red Carpet Tour in 1998, I practically knew everything about it before ever stepping foot inside the hospitality tent on the far southwestern corner of the Augusta National Golf Club property.

The organizers of the state’s largest economic development initiative used to hold press conferences weeks before the event to tout the decades-old program that each year brings more than three dozen titans of industry to the Masters Tournament.

Officials from local and state chambers of commerce would give interviews to talk about how the tour has generated thousands of jobs and billions of dollars’ worth of investment from companies whose tour guests were impressed by Georgia’s hospitality and “pro-business” climate.

Basically, the Red Carpet Tour organizers expected – practically demanded – publicity.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when on Thursday (the first of two Red Carpet Tour dates) I and other members of the media, were told to stay out. Some VIP guests on this year’s tour, I was told, were so concerned about confidentiality that the tour’s local organizers (the Augusta Metro Chamber of Commerce) had to make the decision to keep the media away.

Apparently, the chances were just too great that the 10 seconds of B-roll footage that a local network affiliate would have shot for its 45-second story about the tour could compromise some corporate bigwigs’ identities and jeopardize the business they might bring to Georgia.

Corporate spies scan local TV newscasts for intelligence. Interesting development.

The media has covered the event since it was created in the 1950s, and not once has the coverage played a part in a tour guests’ decision to locate or not locate their business in Georgia.

Was I surprised by the media blackout? Yes, but I probably shouldn’t have been.

The tour’s organizers – namely the Georgia Chamber of Commerce – have been increasingly hostile to reporters over the years.

Two years ago Augusta Metro Chamber officials, under pressure from their state counterparts, told me not to come to the event. I protested and was later told I could come but couldn’t “talk to anyone” on the tour.

At this point, it is necessary to point out that all tour guests are consenting adults well over the age of 18. All are briefed that they are under no obligation to speak to the media or anyone else who isn’t a tour volunteer. All appear to have average or above-average intelligence.

You can understand, then, why I found it a bit odd at last year’s tour event that a Georgia Chamber employee repeatedly stepped between me and tour guests to disrupt my interviews. The people I interviewed found this odd as well.

Contrary to the image portrayed by tour organizers, not everyone on the tour wants to keep their identity secret. Most have no problem telling you who they are, what they do and why they are on the tour – they even wear name badges.

Coverage or no coverage, the Red Carpet Tour is a great event. It has helped attract several companies to Augusta in the past, such as Sitel, John Deere and IFF. It’s a good partnership between the public and private sectors – some state and local tax dollars are contributed, but the bulk of the money comes from major corporations.

Still, closing the event to the media is a bad idea. Here’s why: The Red Carpet Tour is essentially a marketing program. It is designed to tell the world how wonderful our area is and why they should be doing business here. Shouldn’t the tour try to have as many people as possible, including the media, tell that story?

Earlier in the week, I had heard that a camera crew from CNBC went to the tent looking for a story. Instead of giving the national news crew a few minutes of sound bites that sung the praises of the Augusta-Aiken area, volunteers and officials at the tent told them to take a hike.

What a blown opportunity.

If the powers that be at the tour have decided their event will yield better results without media attention, then they have their wish. I, for one, won’t be bothering them anymore.

New cars, new homes

 OUT WITH THE CADDY, IN WITH THE BENZ: White DeVilles have given way to silver GL 550s.

Masters visitors have noticed the change in courtesy cars as the Augusta National Golf Club has selected Mercedes-Benz as the exclusive provider of transportation services for the Tournament. For decades, Cadillac – a former broadcast sponsor – was the official courtesy car for players and other Tournament VIPs.

“I’m partial to Cadillacs – I own two of them – but this is an international event and everything about it should be international,” Mark Reeder, a first-time visitor from Peoria, Ill., said Wednesday.

The partnership between the Augusta National and the German automaker was announced late last year.

Charles Coody said he enjoyed driving his Mercedes this week. He laughed when asked if that was because the Benz had more features than the Caddy he drove after winning the 1971 Masters Tournament.“Everything now has more features than what I drove,” he said.     

HOUSES, NOT CABINS: Eagle-eyed course visitors may have glimpsed the new homes east of the No. 10 fairway, barely visible through the pines and azaleas.

Unless your a guest of one of the three broadcast sponsors – AT&T, IBM and ExxonMobil – that is as much as you’re going to see. The Augusta National confirmed the homes are hospitality houses that were built late last year to allow the sponsors to entertain their guests and clients.

Unlike most professional golf tournaments, the Augusta National does not allow corporate sponsors and partners to have on-course tents or other temporary structures.

Because the hospitality homes have no overnight accommodations, the homes will not be considered one of the “cabins” on the course, of which there are 10. The Eisenhower, Butler and Roberts cabins stand alone.

There's more than smoke in the air at the course

SMOKE GETS IN YOUR EYES: If the Masters Tournament had a smell, what smell would it be?

Ask that question to 1,000 people and you’re likely to get 1,000 different answers. If you asked me, I would say it smells like a cigar.

Everyone*, it seems, is smoking a stogie.

There are roughly a half-dozen tents selling cigars outside the gates of the Augusta National Golf Club, and all are doing brisk business.

“What just this one tent does is two-fold what we would do on an average day (at our store),” said Clayton Smith, who was manning one of the four tents run by Top Shelf Cigar & Tobacco Shoppe.

The company, whose brick-and-mortar store is on Washington Road in Evans, sells roughly 30 boxes of cigars a day. Cohiba, Arturo Fuente, Ashton and Partagas appear to be patron favorites, Mr. Smith said.
What about Cubans?

“We get asked that constantly,” Mr. Smith said. “We don’t have them. We run a clean business.”

SOMETHING ELSE IS IN THE AIR: Verizon Wireless said it expects data usage over its network around the Augusta National to double this year.

Cell phones and other wireless devices are, of course, not allowed on the course. That means people are making up for it once they get outside the gates.

“It’s all those people trying to get some work done on their Blackberrys,” Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Kira Perdue said.

Last year, Verizon moved more than 131 megabits of data per hour last year through its towers near the course between 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. During that same period the company processed 5,000 phone calls per hour.

There was no shortage of people using their wireless toys to get work done at Executive Marketing Services’ Foundation Club corporate hospitality building on Azalea Drive on Tuesday.

“I expected to come up here and work,” said Skylar Rupp, vice president of underwriting at Guarantee Insurance Co. in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., while working on his AirCard-equipped laptop.

Sitting next to him, also working on a laptop, was Marshall Gordon, the company’s vice president of marketing.

“We’re entertaining customers. We’ll be working all week,” he said.

SO THAT’S HOW THEY GET THE AUTOGRAPHS: Ever wonder how these sports memorabilia dealers get all those autographs?

Me too. That’s why I asked Joe Soprano** of Classic Golf Images Inc.

The answer, unfortunately, wasn’t as interesting as I thought it would be. Turns out golf megastars such as Arnold Palmer and Ben Crenshaw have arrangements with memorabilia companies for their autograph. These companies are the ones that supply Mr. Soprano’s company with autographed photos, scorecards, and flags.

Mr. Soprano said memorabilia from golf greats such as Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods cost more because they don’t work with such companies.

That explains the $9,995 price tag on the 36-by-51 inch oil giclee of Tiger Woods at St. Andrews hanging in Mr. Soprano's Azalea Drive tent. The painting has Tiger’s autograph and a certificate of authenticity.

But is someone really going to pay $10,000?

“Oh yeah,” Mr. Soprano said. “Some Japanese guy will come in here and buy it.”

He practically has to sell it. His tent, across the street from the Augusta National’s main patron entrance, is costing him $16,000.

JUST GOOD TIMING: Whole Life Ministries didn’t plan to open its restaurant, Honey From The Rock, to profit during Masters Week, it just happens to be a fortuitous coincidence.

“We had hoped to open a couple of weeks ago,” said Cindy Jones, the children’s pastor at the church located across the street from the Augusta National.
The 95-seat home-cooking cafe is going gangbusters at breakfast and is doing well at lunch.

“We have people lined up here at 6:30 in the morning,” she said. “They’re trying to get something before the gates open.”

Dinner traffic, however, is so light that the restaurant plans on closing after lunch for the rest of the week.

* Well not everyone, just most men over 40.
** That’s his real name.

Masters Roundup: Gas, food and lodging

PRICEY PARKING: Parking lots were filled up quickly Monday at paid lots all around the Augusta National property except for one: the National Hills shopping center.
The $40 price posted to park at the property, which was acquired last year by an Atlanta-based retail developer, is now the high watermark for Masters Week parking prices.

By mid-day, parking spaces were still visible in the lot surrounding the former Dillard’s department store, which closed in January. Nearby parking lots were charging $20-$30.

NO THRU TRAFFIC: The Madison on the Green apartment complex on River Ridge Drive has long been a favorite shortcut for locals and Tournament regulars as a good short cut to avoid congested sections of Washington Road.

Not anymore.

Non-residents attempting to drive through the complex, located directly behind the Washington Road Arby’s restaurant, were stopped by a two men asking for $5 for a one-day “pass” or $50 for the week.

A reporter inquiring about the toll was met with a no-comment from the men, who said the apartment complex is private property and that they had permission from the owner to collect the money.

County records show the property is owned by a limited liability company based in McLean, Va.

ROOM AT THE INN: Have some Augusta hotels priced themselves out of the market? That’s what some industry insiders are saying about vacancies at hotels such as The Partridge Inn and the DoubleTree Hotel, where dozens of rooms remain available.

With prices hovering around $700 a night for what is essentially a $100 room, well-heeled patrons and corporations are looking elsewhere for accommodations.

On the budget end of the spectrum, the glut of low- and mid-priced hotels in recent years has boosted the number of available rooms, giving patrons more choice in where they can stay.

NO DOUBLE DIPPING: Those attending past practice rounds and tournament days are using to having their tickets and badges scanned on the way in to the Augusta National. This year, they were surprised to have them scanned on the way out, too.

Longtime patrons were speculating Monday that the move is designed to cut down on more than one person using the ticket at the same time.

Here’s how the con has worked in the past: A group of friends go in the gate. Once inside, they go to a discreet area (such as a restroom) pass the tickets to a designated mule who walks the tickets back out the gate to another group of people who then use the tickets to enter the property.

Once together, they can then walk around and hope security doesn’t notice only half of them are wearing tickets. If noticed by security, the ticketless patron could pretend their ticket must have been lost or stolen.

Not anymore. Now, tickets that haven’t been scanned out will send up a red flag if they are used to reenter the property.

A ghost in the (wrecking) machine

Business Reporter LaTina Emerson’s feature story on Thompson Building Wrecking Co. Inc. this week yielded more than just 50 years of family business history – some bona fide ghost stories were told.

The company’s president, Hiram Thompson, said two of his employees have sworn they experienced paranormal activity while working at the Forrest Hills-Ricker Hotel/Oliver Gen­eral Hospital building near Forest Hills Golf Club.

The first occurred in 1987, when the historic hotel-turned-Veterans Administration hospital and 32 smaller buildings were being torn down.

Employee Thomas Valentine was working alone in one of the buildings when he heard a noise. He looked down a hallway and saw what appeared to be a line of German soldiers marching down a hallway. Mr. Thompson said he and his employee later found out the building, which was turned into an Army hospital in 1942, treated German prisoners of war.

Mr. Thompson said his nephew Paxton once heard doors slamming repeatedly when he went there with some friends.

The second sighting occurred when the company returned to the site in 2006 to do more demolition work.

This time, Mark Boyd, Thompson’s asbestos supervisor, walked into one of the buildings and told his boss that he felt the “hair raise on his neck” just before seeing what appeared to be an American G.I., a corporal, based on the stripes of his WWII-era uniform.

Mr. Boyd said the soldier walked across a hallway from one room to another and (gulp) locked eyes with him as he went by.

Intrigued, Mr. Boyd later placed recorders in the vacant building. Mr. Thompson said conversations could be heard on the tapes. We asked to listen to those tapes, but they were apparently confiscated by federal agents named Mulder and Scully.*

The ghosts of the Forrest Hills-Ricker Hotel will probably remain a mystery.

POSTPONED, NOT DEAD: Augusta-based medical billing company Medac Inc. has yet to follow through on plans it announced in 2006 to build a 20,000-square-foot data processing facility at the Lincoln County Industrial Park.

However, the delay is not because the company is having trouble. On the contrary, it’s in the middle of a major deal that has the potential to make the $2 million data facility even larger.

Medac President John Memar would not disclose details but said the deal could expand the scope of the company beyond services for anesthesiology practices.

However, he did indicate the deal has the potential to bring 120 jobs Medac currently outsources overseas back to the Augusta area.

There’s something you don’t see everyday.

SUPERMARKET STUFF: The rumor is that grocery chain Publix is interested in locating a store near the planned extension of William Few Parkway to Hardy McManus Road in the Greenbrier section of Evans.

I’m here to say it’s not a rumor – there will be a Publix-anchored shopping center there in about a year.

I can’t tell you how I know, I just do. Have I ever steered you wrong before?**

WHAT ABOUT SOUTH AUGUSTA?: The topic of grocery store development made me curious about something: When was the last time a new grocery store opened in south Augusta?

As best I can tell, it was 1998- 99, when local developers began work on the Winn-Dixie at Tobacco and Peach Orchard roads and the Food Lion near Tobacco Road and Mike Padgett Highway. Only the Food Lion is still open.

More south Augusta grocery stores have closed than have opened in recent years, fueling speculation that the Deans Bridge Road Kroger store would close. The location, along with the 15th Street Kroger, are the only Augusta Krogers that haven’t been renovated. As of last week, Kroger officials said the store wouldn’t be closing.

UNVERIFIABLE FACT NO. 113: 23.7 – percent of area residents who leave during Masters Week.

BE MY LITTLE ANGEL (INVESTOR): The Augusta area’s burgeoning life sciences industry has everything it needs to grow, except cash from venture capitalists and “angel” investors.

A Savannah-based investor group, in conjunction with a coalition of state biotech organizations, is hoping to change that.

Ariel Savannah Angel Partners has scheduled a daylong seminar on how to invest in start up companies on April 23 at the DoubleTree Hotel on Perimeter Parkway.

Well, Daddy Warbucks, what are you waiting for? Call (912) 447-8455 to learn more.

GIMME A CAR(T): The tradition of Club Car lining Augusta’s streets with its golf cars*** is going on 25 years and doesn’t appear to be waning in popularity. Requests by businesses to have a vehicle placed at their establishment start earlier each year.
“We started getting requests about two months ago,” said Ray Bentley, Club Car’s director of aftermarket sales. “We’ve had requests for 90 to 100 cars already.”

Club Car said it tries to get everyone a car that wants one but acknowledged there have been a few oversights, including one year where it forgot to deliver a car to Hooters.

“They weren’t too happy,” Mr. Bentley said. “They even put a message on their sign out front saying they didn’t need us any more and they’d get a Harley instead.”

The delightfully tacky restaurant got over it, as evidenced by the bright orange car currently parked there.

* This is not true.
** Don’t answer that.
*** Yes, 99.9 percent of people call them golf “carts.” But isn’t a cart something you push or pull, not drive?

The 'other side of Augusta' is like your city

The first week of April is nearly on us, and you know what that means.

That’s right: A major media outlet somewhere is working on its (insert Stone Phillips voice here) “other side of Augusta” story.

You know what I’m talking about. Nearly every year a major newspaper or magazine publishes a story during Masters Week, pointing out how most of Augusta is not as classy as the venerable Masters Tournament or as picturesque as Amen Corner.

Local reaction to these stories (even after all these years) falls into three basic categories:

- Outrage from local community leaders who usually complain that the writer failed to mention the city’s “positive” attributes

- A chuckle from people who like to dwell on the city’s problems and secretly take delight in seeing community leaders get bent out of shape.

- A sigh from people who are too weary of reading the same story to have a more visceral reaction.

I’m in the third category. I do not complain about such stories, nor do I get some perverse thrill out of having an outsider tell me about my city’s flaws during its most exciting week of the year. I’m just a little tired of it.

That being said, there’s not much you or I can do to stop reporters from doing the (use the Stone again) “other side of Augusta” story. If you find yourself in a situation, though, where you are being interviewed by a national media outlet and you have a concern they are working on a (come on, one last time, Stone) “other side of Augusta” story, clip out the following segment and hand it to the reporter.

Think of it as a favor to me.

“Dear Mr./Mrs./Ms./Miss Journalist:

Hi there. Welcome to Augusta. I hope you’re enjoying our accommodations and your company’s expense account. Here’s a few things you should know about our city before you write your story.

Being a perceptive individual, you no doubt have noticed we have litter on our streets. Except for the Wifesaver logo on the plastic cups, our litter is very similar to the litter on the streets where you live.

You might have noticed a person or two not wearing a Tournament badge who appears to be destitute. Don’t be alarmed – these people are just as needy as the folks on your streets. You might want to check with our numerous nonprofit organizations – I’d start with the Golden Harvest Food Bank – to see how well we take care of them.

Your trained journalistic eye surely has taken note of the fact that there is a two-block section of Augusta where adult businesses flourish. These “gentleman’s clubs” are the similar to the ones you have in your (much larger) adult district back home. Sure, the lap dances are likely less expensive here (reflective of our lower cost of living), but that’s not much of a story, is it?

Oh, speaking of “strip,” the strip malls here are exactly, exactly, like the one’s where you live: a grocery store, a Chinese restaurant, a nail salon, a video store and a dry cleaner. Just because we play host to the world’s most famous golf event for a week does not make us different from the rest of the country during the other 51 weeks.

Those big buildings with all the pipes, boilers and storage tanks you saw on the far east side of town? We call that “industry.” It’s how some of the people who don’t work at the golf course earn a living.

Last, you might have picked up on what appears to be some racial-political tension in Augusta. Although it’s true our brand of racial politics is a little “over the top” (you probably heard something during your visit about our coliseum authority), it’s not much different from what you might encounter in the 42 states that aren’t Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Iowa, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. There are racists in Augusta, but Augusta is not a racist city.

In closing, thank you again for your visit. We appreciate your hotel, meal and rental car expenditures. When you write your story, double-check your spelling. That little town south of here is spelled H-E-P-H-Z-I-B-A-H.

Sincerely,

Damon Cline

P.S.: Try the sweet tea. You might like it!”

HARRY KITCHEN’S SINK: Wondering what’s up with Harry Kitchen’s Watermark project at the site of the former train depot between Fifth and Sixth streets on Reynolds? So were we.

The head of Bluffton, S.C. -based The Foxfield Co. said his riverfrontoffice/hotel/condominium project is about 45 days from receiving state environmental certification, allowing him to complete his purchase of the property from the city. An architectural firm has been hired, and Mr. Kitchen said he has been in talks with the Hilton Hotels Corp. as a possible tenant.

“We’ve gotten some interest, but we haven’t gotten one to the final stages yet,” he said.

The condominium tower would likely be the last phase to be completed, he said, because financing for residential projects is a little tight.

“Obviously, the residential market is non existent at this point. You have a hard time putting together a condominium project,” he said. “The banks don’t even want to hear the word condo right now.”

HOTEL FRENZY: Something else we’re wondering about: How many hotel rooms can downtown Augusta support?

You’ve no doubt heard of the multistory hotel being considered for development on the site of the former city police station at Ninth and Reynolds. The project, which is rumored to involve the Hyatt hotel chain, is said to be the centerpiece of a condo, retail and underground parking complex that would be built on parcels housing the old police station and vacant warehouses.

Whether there will be enough commerce in Augusta to support such a project, even after construction of the TEE Center, remains to be seen. Either way, a new hotel would look a whole lot better that what’s sitting there now.

THE WHOLE STORY ON HULL STOREY: Last week, I updated the Hull Storey Retail Group’s proposed sale of 11 shopping malls to an Atlanta-based company.
Or so I thought.

Information that the Augusta retail developer was “confident” of the conclusion of the sale was outdated before the ink dried.

Shortly after I spoke with Hull Storey owners, the deal fell through because the proposed acquirer, Hendon Properties, couldn’t get the $214 million in financing for the malls, none of which are in Augusta. The Hull Storey folks aren’t too upset – Hendon Properties solicited the sale. You don’t seem too upset, either. The only mall you’re interested in is at 3450 Wrightsboro Road.*

THE “OTHER MALL”: Someone asked me the other day “what’s going on” with the Village at Riverwatch project near River Watch Parkway and Interstate 20. Here’s the answer: Nada.

NEXT! Richmond County economic developers are helping market the former Pfizer pharmaceutical plant that alternative fuel company Xethanol Corp. occupied just long enough to convert to a scrap heap.

The facility, or what’s left of it, is for sale or lease. Economic developers are working with a company interested in the site, but they characterized the talks as “preliminary.”

* How’s P.F. Chang’s? I’ve never been, and I’m not about to go until the wait is less than a half hour. I hate holding pagers.

Motorists: Don’t say 'egad' over E10

If you think alcohol is made for drinking and not for pumping into your gas tank, you might be a little miffed at what’s going on around town: Ethanol-blended fuel has arrived.

Many fuel pumps in the area are sporting stickers proclaiming that the fuel they dispense might contain up to 10 percent ethanol, a blend known in many parts of the country – mostly the Midwest – as E10.

Ethanol, a type of alcohol produced mostly from corn, has been blended with gasoline for years but is just now beginning to become commonplace in the Augusta-Aiken area – and most other parts of Georgia – because of the federal Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007.

The legislation, approved in December, requires companies to sell 9 billion gallons of renewable fuels this year – 36 billion by 2022.

“You’re going to see ethanol blends in gasoline everywhere,” said Davis Cosey, the president of Perry-based Davis Oil Co. and board member of the Georgia Oilmen’s Association.

Andy Jones, the president of M.B. Jones Oil Co. in Wrens, which operates the Augusta-area Sprint stores, said customer response to E10 has been positive.
“We have not had any issues,” he said.

Regardless of how you feel about the political ramifications of ethanol (driving up the cost of food; not producing as much power as straight gasoline; etc.), it’s here to stay.

Here’s what you need to know about E10:

a) It’s not going to damage your gasoline-powered car, boat or lawn mower (pilots, stick to aviation fuel). All major automakers warranty their vehicles for the fuel, and some even say the cleaner-burning fuel can improve engine performance.

b) E10, as its name implies, is not E85, a high-ethanol blend that can be used only in flexible-fuel vehicles, or FFVs.

c) You’re not getting cheated. Though it’s true that ethanol produces less energy than gasoline, numerous government and private-sectors tests have shown E10 blend has virtually zero impact on a vehicle’s fuel economy. Only vehicles burning E85 get lower mileage than straight gas.

d) You won’t be paying any more for your gas … but you won’t be paying any less, either. That is, until the alternative fuels industry finds a way to mass-produce ethanol using something other than corn as a feedstock.

As to when that occurs … your guess is as good as mine.

Remember the Xethanol folks? The ones who said they were going to produce cellulose-based ethanol from paper mill waste at the former Pfizer plant in east Augusta?

The one thing they did, besides scrap a perfectly good pharmaceutical plant, was prove that making ethanol from low-cost feedstocks is easier said than done.

NOW THIS IS MY KIND OF ALCOHOL: I like bourbon.* I like jelly.

So, when Aiken resident Sheila Bowers sent me a jar of City Grocery Bourbon Jelly, what was I going to do, donate it to a soup kitchen?

The jelly is made by her brother, Jim Boklage, and his wife, Constance, in their hometown of Frankfort, Ky., a place any bourbon lover calls Valhalla.

It has already garnered somewhat of a cult following since they began selling it in October – Louisville’s landmark Brown Hotel carries it, and the governor of Kentucky includes it in his gift bags.

“It’s another connection between Aiken and Kentucky,” Ms. Bowers said, alluding to thoroughbred horses, the other link.

With a 7 percent alcohol content, I think the jelly makes a better ham glaze than a spread on your morning toast, but to each his own. Just don’t let your boss smell it on your breath.

Get a 9.2-ounce jar for $7 at ww.citygroceryfoods.com (you can also check out recipes there).

Or,you can actually move away from the computer and get a jar in “real time” at Aiken’s Plum Pudding store on Laurens Street or the Old Aiken Market & Smokehouse on Park Avenue.

NOT EXACTLY BREAKING NEWS, BUT ... : Hawk & Simpson Real Estate has merged into Larry Miller Realty.

That’s probably not a shock – the two Augusta Century 21 franchises have been in negotiations since last year – but hey, it might be news to you.

“I’ve known both Jerrell Hawk and Dennis Simpson as first-class real estate executives and honorable, worthy competitors for over twenty years,” Mr. Miller said in a prepared statement.

In the same statement Mr. Hawk said, “we can all now enjoy greater operational efficiencies and increased performance, primarily because of economies of scale and the seamless nature of our merger.”

HERE’S A DEAL THAT’S NOT QUITE DONE: Augusta’s Hull Storey Retail Group’s proposed sale of 11 shopping mall properties, originally set to close in January, has still not been completed.

Company principals said they are still working out the reported $214 million deal with Atlanta-based Hendon Properties, and said they are confident the sale will occur as announced in November.

None of the malls is in the Augusta-Aiken area.

ONE POINT OF VIEW: So, how do you feel about Augusta’s being in a recession? Huh?
A recent report from Moody’s Economy.com said the Augusta metro area is in a recession based on the market’s employment, income, industrial production and retail sales.

Augusta State University Economist Mark Thompson, who follows the same stats, disagrees , arguing that employment growth is still solid and unemployment has not skyrocketed.

Who’s right? Because federal gross domestic product figures for metro areas have a three-year lag, we won’t know until 2010.

In case you were wondering, Moody’s says Rome and Dalton are also in a recession, while Atlanta, Athens and Savannah are in the midst of an expansion.

SINCE WHEN IS RICHMOND COUNTY 'Rural’ ? Gov. Sonny Perdue’s office recently announced that Richmond County has been awarded $1.5 million in Economic Development, Growth & Enterprise grant funds to purchase equipment at the new(ish) T-Mobile call center off Wheeler Road.

The grants, administered by the OneGeorgia Authority, are “aimed at spurring economic development in rural Georgia.”

I don’t know anybody who would consider Wheeler Road a part of “rural Georgia” except for maybe folks in Atlanta. That being said, I don’t think we’re going to give the check back.

* I find Ezra Brooks and Old For ester to be exceptional values; however, if I’m over at your house, I’ll be looking for Buffalo Trace or Maker’s Mark. And a glass of ice.

Trip to hometown elicits mixed emotions

Editor’s Note: The Augusta-area business news, issues and gossip normally found in Scuttlebiz is absent this week because business editor Damon Cline was out of town. Instead, he offers the following account of his visit to his hometown. Mr. Cline apologizes to readers interested exclusively in Augusta-area topics and urges them to read next week’s Scuttlebiz.

SAN MANUEL, Ariz. — It’s eerily quiet in this high desert town.

The dull industrial drone of what was once the world’s largest underground copper mine – the region’s sole industry – fell silent a few years ago after a half-century of production.

Homes and storefronts are vacant. So many families have left that the middle school had to be closed and consolidated into the high school.

The residents have long said that “there’s nothing to do in San Manuel.” Now it’s really true.

This is my hometown.

I HAD NOT BEEN BACK here since 1999, right before the Australian company that acquired the mining operations three years earlier announced it was suspending operations. During that visit, the place pretty much looked the same as when I was born there in 1972. In fact, the town has hardly changed since it was built in the early 1950s to house the 2,000 miners who would eventually produce nearly a quarter of the nation’s copper.

I thought I was prepared for this visit. The mine closure and the town’s subsequent decline were often topics of conversation during bimonthly phone calls to my parents. I had read news reports on the closure and even watched the demolition of the smelter’s massive twin smokestacks on YouTube.

Nothing about the largest mine closure in Arizona history resonated with me, however, until Monday, March 10, at 1:43 p.m. MST. That was when I looked out the passenger window of my rental car, somewhere between mileposts 107 and 106 on Arizona Highway 77, toward the San Pedro Valley.

I saw nothing.

The people of San Manuel have always known they were close to home when they could see smoke billowing out of the 500-foot-tall stacks that loomed over the town like giant twin sentinels. On a clear day (which wasn’t all that often when the smelter was in full production) the stacks could be seen 40 miles away. On this day, there was a picture- perfect view of the Galiuro Mountains.

I pull into The Highlands trailer and RV park and drive up the gravel and dirt road toward the double-wide at Lot 224, the address that for 18 years was my legal residence. The old home is a disaster area because my mother is in the process of moving.

The fence is torn down, the skirting has been ripped off and debris is scattered all over the yard that was once considered the finest in the trailer park.

After more than 30 years of living there, she is being evicted. Earlier this year, the park’s residents were given notice to be out by the end of June. The Scottsdale businessman who bought the property a few years ago plans to turn it into a golf course community.
My father, who lives down the street in a single-wide (they divorced several years ago but still see each other practically every day), was told bulldozers will roll in to level the place during the summer.

I walk up the steps past the handprints I made in the concrete patio 25 years ago and give my mom a hug.

PEOPLE HERE ARE ANGRY. They can’t understand why BHP Billiton would spend $3.2 billion to buy Magma Copper – the San Manuel mine’s owner – in 1996, only to suspend operations in 1999 and permanently close them in 2003 during the next few years while nearly 2 billion pounds of copper remained in the San Manuel and Kalamazoo ore bodies.
Conspiracy theories abound. The most likely explanation, however, is this: It was a bonehead decision.

Copper was selling for 60-70 cents a pound in 1999. At those prices, it was more profitable for BHP to focus on its overseas operations, where government regulations are lax and labor is cheap. By the time workers began reducing the world’s most technologically advanced copper mine and smelter to 21 million tons of scrap metal, copper had risen to $2 a pound. Copper is now trading just below $4 a pound.

Whoever it was at the BHP headquarters in Melbourne who decided to close the mine that had employed four members of my family probably never envisioned such a run-up in copper prices. Or had they?

A couple of decades ago, the U.S. produced nearly all of the copper it consumed. Now, nearly half is imported.

GOING THROUGH MORE THAN 30 years of accumulation produces myriad memories. While helping my mother clean out one of her three tool sheds (the one on the northwest side of the yard, closest to the small hill where I learned to ride a bike) I find some old G.I. Joe toys, an E.T. storybook and somewhere between 80 and 3,000 copies of the high school and college newspapers I worked on.

Later, I help her demolish the plywood back porch and haul the rotted timbers to the empty lot across the street, a spot where the landlord promised there would be a roll-off waste container.

I won’t be here to help my parents move their trailers to Rancho San Manuel Park – the trailer park on the other side of town – so I want to make sure they can travel as lightly as possible. Because they are being forced to move, the state will pay up to $5,000 to move my father’s single-wide and $10,000 to move my mother’s double-wide.

The problem, however, is that the companies they contact want to charge the maximum to do as little work as possible. During my visit, my mother learns the mover she has been working with will not move any of her sheds or reinstall her awning, so she and my father begin calling other companies.

Neither of my parents has a lot of money to spend on the move, particularly my mother, whose sole income is a monthly $600 Social Security check. She tells me she has less than $100 left over after paying her lot rent and utility bills. After hearing that, I sleep the rest of my nights in the trailer with the space heater turned off, wondering how this place was ever big enough to house my six brothers and sisters.

I FORGOT HOW COLD the desert is at night. I packed no warm clothes, so my mother takes me to the recently opened dollar store (one of the few businesses in town that appear to be thriving), where I buy a hooded sweatshirt and some ill-fitting sweatpants for less than $7.

While driving around town, we swing by the barren lots that my parents have reserved at the new trailer park; two concrete slabs on light-brown dirt.

My mother has tried to dig up the oleanders we planted in the old yard, but most have grown too large to transplant. I notice the portable storage unit she dropped at the new site already shows signs of attempted burglary. The area’s methamphetamine addicts are the likely culprits.

The closure of the mine has left three basic types of residents: elderly retirees (such as my parents), people who commute elsewhere to work (such as my older brother) and unemployable drug addicts (such as the neighbor’s 20-year-old son I saw sneak into his mother’s car to pilfer through her purse).

I LEAVE SAN MANUEL with mixed emotions. I’m pleased I could help my parents better prepare for their move. I enjoyed visiting with them and two of my brothers who still live there. But there’s a lump in my throat and a queasy feeling in my stomach as I think about the changes my hometown is going through.

People speculate that the area will someday become a thriving bedroom community of Tucson, which every day inches a little further around the Catalina Mountains toward town. Some are banking that retirees will move in to buy the vacant homes.

Perhaps the signs of evolution will be more evident on my next trip , whenever that is.
The only thing I know for sure is that the twin sentinels will still be missing and that bulldozers will have plowed through a little boy’s concrete handprints, some oleanders and a gentle hill that was perfect for bike riding.

It’s dark when I drive out of the San Pedro Valley. I tell myself I won’t look in the rear-view mirror at the dark spot that used to be a gleaming beacon in the desert, but I do anyway.

The queasy feeling subsides by the time I reach Phoenix. The lump in my throat doesn’t.

Officials will be hoping to zap one another

What do you get when you take 30 local officials and business leaders, arm them with laser guns and turn them loose on each other in a dim arena?

I call it the best grand-opening gimmick ever.

On March 17, Augusta Mayor Deke Copenhaver and Columbia County Commission Chairman Ron Cross will celebrate the opening of the new laser tag arena at Adventure Crossing by doing battle in a cross-county exhibition match.

Gens. Deke Skywalker and Obi-Ron Cross will command a 15-member team each during the 15-minute laser tag match sceduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. at the family fun park formerly known as Funsville.

The epic battle is the main attraction of the Columbia County Chamber of Commerce’s SuCCess Columbia County Style networking event, which will run from 5-7 p.m. at Adventure Crossing, 4350 Wheeler Road in Martinez.

The evening is all about fun and games but it’s still a chamber event ( no kids), and as such, you’ll need to make reservations. E-mail chris@columbiacountychamber.com or call at (706) 364-0425.

If you’re a chamber member, it’s free. If you’re not, expect to pony up $15. I’d say that’s a small price to pay to see community leaders shoot each other down .

RUN OF THE MILL: An Augusta businessman’s purchase of the historic Sibley Mill property along the Augusta Canal is going to take a little longer than expected.

The property’s owner, Avondale Mills, is extending an option to Clay Boardman, the man behind the redevelopment of Enterprise Mill, to Sept. 1. The sale of the old textile mill was initially supposed to close on Feb. 28.

Mr. Boardman, the head of Augusta Capital LLC, said the extension will allow more time to complete environmental testing and other pre-sale stipulations.

GUV’MENT IS GOOD? If you could grade the state of Georgia’s government, what would you give it?

Well, you may have heard that The Pew Center on the States and Governing magazine ranked Georgia among the best-managed states in the nation. In its the Grading the States 2008 report, Georgia’s overall grade was B+, the highest awarded to any state in the Southeast.

“We have made sensible, strategic reforms in Georgia to make government more efficient and more responsive to the needs of our citizens,” Guv’ner Sonny Perdue said.

Only three states received a higher grade than Georgia’s B+ (Washington, Utah and Virginia) and four other states received the same grade (Missouri, Texas, Michigan and Delaware). South Carolina got a B-, which is the national average. New Hampshire scored the lowest, with a D+.

Georgia’s previous overall grade was a B in 2005, the most recent year the study was conducted. This year’s study is the fourth in the series.

Read the entire report at http://pewcenteronthestates.org.

BUT CAN YOU EAT 50 EGGS? The Sunrise Grill in Martinez recently cracked it’s millionth egg.

Were they counting every single egg? Probably not, but when you’ve been in business since 2003 and your bread-and-butter is waffles and omelets, it’s entirely plausible.

The eatery, which also has a North Augusta location on Martintown Road, served the egg to customer Brock Poole, who also scored a gift basket full of Sunrise Grill goodies.

WE WANT YOUR BUSINESS: Screven County, which you almost drive through on your way to Savannah, was recently named the state’s newest “Entrepreneur Friendly” community.

The Georgia Department of Economic Development designation indicates the community has “worked to develop an environment that is welcoming to small business and entrepreneurs.”

The state agency said 96 percent of Screven County’s 626 companies are small businesses with fewer than 20 employees. Screven County is the 80th community in the state to be named Entrepreneur Friendly, joining Burke, Jenkins and Emanuel counties.

The state said Richmond County is “in the process of receiving” the designation.
It probably would have received the designation already if it hadn’t been too busy attracting major corporations such as T-Mobile and ADP.

Boo-yah!

HOLD ON JUST A MINUTE … : That’s even more amazing about Richmond County’s recent economic development success is that the body that oversees industrial recruiting, the Development Authority of Richmond County, has for several months had four board members with expired terms.

Milk goes bad after its expiration date, but political appointees, apparently, do not.

ONE FROM THE VAULT: Re­mem­ber my sort-of official Augusta Chronicle Pork Brain Recipe Contest? Of course you don’t – that was, like, so eight months ago (http://blogs.augusta.com/node/1009).

The passage of time didn’t stop a loyal reader from sending in another recipe a couple of weeks ago. According to his letter (He asked, by the way, to remain anonymous: “No acknowledgement in print of this gracious favor to you is necessary.”) he found a recipe for brains (the type of brains were not specified) in an old copy of his wife’s Better Homes & Gardens cookbook.

For the purpose of discussion, I will call him Mr. Bing.

Had I received Mr. Bing’s recipe earlier, he would have been the hands-down winner of an Augusta Chronicle golf shirt. Heck, I might send him something anyway just for the effort. Here’s the recipe he mailed in:

“BRAINS

Cover with cold water; add two tablespoons vinegar. Soak 30 minutes. Drain. Remove loose membranes. Simmer in salted water 20 to 30 minutes. Drain; chill in cold water.

Then: drain; season. Dip into beaten egg, then into cracker crumbs. Fry in hot fat.

Or, dice; add to creamed peas with mushrooms. Or, chop fine, fry in butter, add beaten eggs and scramble.”

Are you still there, or did I lose you at “remove loose membranes?”

At this point, it would be appropriate to mention that the photocopied page containing these instructions also listed recipes for “Bologna-Rice Skillet,” “Deviled-ham Hot Lunch,” “Saucy Corned-beef Patties” and “Liver Loaf.”*

Mr. Bing said he looks forward “with eagerness” to the report I will make once I try the recipe.

I hope you’re a patient man, Mr. Bing. A very patient man.

* If people don’t eat like this anymore, why is there such an “obesity epidemic” in this country?

Modern customer service underwhelms

“The older I get the more I admire and crave competence, just simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology.”
– H.L. Mencken

I really enjoyed sitting down to talk with Wayne Brown, the subject of this week’s cover story, for three reasons:

1. I’ve always been intrigued by highly successful businesspeople who have skirted media attention out of shyness instead of trying to conceal questionable business practices.

2. He’s a true Bootstrapper (See Scuttlebiz July 23, 2007 for the definition).

3. I enjoyed hearing his perspectives on customer service, given that he has run everything from fast- food restaurants to a luxury travel service.

Customer service was something that he preached to his staff when he was a Taco Bell franchisee, so I was curious to know how he copes with what many consider to be an across-the-board societal decline in customer service.

It turns out he deals with it like everyone else.

“It’s all about managing your expectations,” he said. “If I’m staying at a Holiday Inn, I know I’m going to be carrying my own bags.”

To put it another way, unless he’s paying a premium for something, he almost expects a mediocre experience. That way, if the experience turns out to be better than mediocre, he considers it a pleasant surprise.

You probably feel the same way.

Think about it – you used to get upset when you found no napkins in the bag after leaving the drive-through window. Now you’re happy to get an employee who can enunciate and simply get the order right. It’s no wonder many people would rather use self-serve kiosks than interact with H omo sapiens.

The conversation with Mr. Brown stoked one of my bigger concerns about the future, which is: Service – not just “excellent” customer service, but plain old run-of-the-mill service – will be available only at the high end of the price spectrum.

Sound outlandish? Think of how far we’ve come already. When was the last time you received memorable service? Chances are, it involved you spending what you considered to be a lot of money. The concept of service has changed; what we now consider “memorable” service used to just be, well, “service.”

Are we becoming a less civil society? Are employers failing to train their employees, or are employees becoming increasingly untrainable in the ways of service? Do people believe working in an entry-level service job gives them the “right” to treat the people who help pay their wage with disdain? Or are customers too callous and demanding?

Granted, you shouldn’t expect a Nordstrom experience at the dollar store, but shouldn’t you expect something? What ever happened to a simple, “Hello, how are you today?” What ever happened to “please” and “thank you”? What ever happened to a smile, or any facial expression, for that matter, besides the blank stare that greets us from the other side of the counter?

I think basic civility is still out there, but in the future we might have to pay a little extra to get it.

GOING ONCE, GOING TWICE: Last year, some folks were pretty excited about the expansion and relocation of the Augusta Auto Auction from its Jefferson Davis Highway in North Augusta to a large tract near Augusta Regional Airport.

The Florida-based owners of the wholesale operation, Acacia Automotive Inc., announced last spring that they would acquire more than 50 acres of undeveloped land near the corner of at Doug Barnard Parkway and Dixon Airline Road in a deal that was set to close in June.

Here we are, nearly a year later, and still no deal.

It t urns out that the property’s owners, the Lawrence family of Bobby Jones Ford (which, by the way, also used to own Augusta Auto Auction), put the proposed sale on ice to court another ( read: deeper-pocketed) buyer for the prime real estate.

That deal failed to materialize, and Acacia executives are still in a holding pattern.

Both companies say they are still exploring their options but are hopeful the auction business, which has about reached full capacity at its existing spot, will be able to build a larger operation to house the 100-200 vehicles that are sold each week. No timeline has been given.

WHAT’S IN STORE FOR YOU: Not since Publix’s entry into the Augusta area during the mid-to-late 1990s has a grocery chain made such a splash as Kroger’s multi million-dollar renovation and construction project.*

The biggest piece of that project, the newly rebuilt store at the corner of Washington Road and Alexander Drive, is set to open March 27. The next-biggest piece, the new 77,000-square-foot North Augusta store on Knox Avenue near the Lowe’s home improvement store (which will replace an older and smaller location on Martintown Road) will be open in November.

WHY CAN’T THEY CHANGE THEIR NAME? MedExpress Clinics, the storefront health care clinic launched in Augusta last year, has had to change its name to ExpressHealth Inc. because a health care company in West Virginia already had the trademark on the usage.

Oops.

The old switcheroo, however, doesn’t appear to be a major setback to the retail health clinic. It already has forged a relationship with employment firm Norrell Staffing Services to provide pre-employment health screenings for Norrell clients in the Augusta market.

If the partnership proves fruitful in Augusta, I’d be looking for it to expand to other markets where Norrell operates.

* EarthFare is a really close second.

Vogtle should worry about cost, not water

Some fear that the addition of two new nuclear reactors to the Alvin W. Vogtle Electric Generating Plant might be derailed because of environmental concerns that the facility’s draw from the Savannah River would increase from 1 percent of the river’s annual flow to 2 percent.

Supporters of what would be the region’s biggest construction project since Vogtle Version 1.0, however, should be more worried about this: Can the power plant’s owners afford the expansion?

Utility giant Southern Co., whose Georgia Power subsidiary owns the majority of Vogtle, moved forward with confidence on its plans to double Vogtle’s size until last month, when it recoiled from sticker shock. The $4 billion price tag it was forecasting a couple of years ago was apparently nowhere near the price being asked by Westinghouse Electric Co., whose AP1000 was selected as the reactor of choice at the Vogtle project.

Negotiations have been continuing , but they become more urgent as weeks go by. That’s because on May 1, the utility is due to give its integrated resource plan, called an IRP, to the Georgia Public Service Commission, the state’s utility regulator. The plan, among other things, will spell out how the company plans to provide power to the state during the next 20 years.

If Southern Co. and Westinghouse (which is part of Japan’s Toshiba Corp.) can’t agree on a price by then, the utility’s Plan B will have to include non nuclear facilities, such as gas- and coal-fired power plants. Regulators simply won’t sign off on a nuclear power plant expansion if they don’t know how much it will eventually cost ratepayers.

Consider the lessons learned from the original construction of Vogtle, which went from an estimate of $975 million for four reactors to a final cost of $9 billion for two. Back then, the inflation was driven largely by delays caused by regulatory red tape that occurred after the Three Mile Island incident in 1979.

What’s driving the cost increase now? Supply and demand.

The supply is limited: The AP1000 and General Electric’s ABWR are the only Nuclear Regulatory Commission “pre-approved” ( i.e., no red tape) reactor designs, which make them highly attractive technologies. Also, the ultra-large steel forgings used in the reactors are produced by only one company, in Japan.

The demand side is huge: There are plans for more than 30 nuclear power plants in the U.S., mostly in the Southeast. While we’ve been talking about a “nuclear renaissance,” other countries have been doing it: T here are more than 30 nuclear plants under construction around the world, and many more are being proposed in developing nations such as China and India.

Manufacturers such as Westinghouse clearly have the upper hand, but if they’re not careful, they’ll price themselves out of the power market and cause the utility providers to burn more fossil fuel to power our air conditioners and widescreen TVs.

Hand-wringing over the impact of Plant Vogtle’s siphoning an extra 1 percent of water out of the Savannah River will be fashionable so long as we’re in a drought.

Hand-wringing over whether the project is economically feasible – well, that will never go out of style.

VENTURE CAPITAL: I had a chance to catch up with former Mercedes-Benz of Augusta owner David Karangu the other day. It turns out he has started a private equity group called Ivory Venture Capital to help fund start up companies in the metro area.

He said he has “probably looked at 10 businesses” since hanging his shingle outside his office at 211D in the Hudson Trace office complex off Stevens Creek R oad last month.

“It would be great if I could get two leads a week,” said Mr. Karangu, who also used to own Fairway Ford in Evans. He said he would like to specialize in medical start ups but is willing to consider funding any company with potential. If the investment exceeds his capital, his relationship with investment banker Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street firm that handles his personal portfolio, he said .

EVEN MORE VENTURE CAPITAL: Mr. Karangu’s firm might someday be big enough to finance a deal like the one that Washington, D.C.-based Allied Capital Corp. did last month when it ponied up $68 million to support the buyout of Augusta Sportswear by private equity firm Quad-C Management and members of Augusta Sportswear’s management team.

The athletic apparel and uniform company’s previous owner , Linsalata Capital Partners, of Mayfield Heights, Ohio, had doubled the size of the company since it acquired a majority stake from the Marks family of Augusta on Dec. 31, 2004.

“Augusta Sportswear has been an excellent platform yielding our firm its largest single gain on investment (read: cha-ching!),” Linsalata Managing Director Rob Weber said in a statement.

Augusta Sportswear, with about $200 million in revenues, operates facilities in Augusta; Sidney, Ohio; Olathe, Kan.; Seattle; and Tenabo and Becal, Mexico.

AUTHORITY UNITY?: I know I’ve been talking a lot about unity lately, but it just keeps coming up in public discourse. The latest: Should Richmond County have a one-stop shop for all things economic development?

City Administrator Fred Russell thinks it’s at least worth talking about, based on comments he made during a recent Augusta Commission finance committee meeting, which was prompted by recent discussions of creating a governmental authority for south Augusta.

Community leaders there want a group with the same kind of powers as the Downtown Development Authority (which focuses only on the central business district) and the Development Authority of Richmond County (whose industrial mission is not focused on a particular part of the county).

“I would like at some point to have a conversation about an Augusta development authority to cover our community as it is ... instead of giving our dollars to smaller groups with a specific focus … ,” Mr. Russell said. “ Otherwise we’re going to keep developing focus groups with boards of directors, but (who) aren’t looking at the total picture.”

Creating a catchall economic development group could create a more effective and efficient entity, or it could create a bureaucracy whose focus is so broad that it never really gets anything done.

Regardless of the outcome, the process of actually getting it would result in political havoc this area hasn’t seen since the consolidation of the city and county governments more than 10 years ago.

Allow me to digress for a moment to quote from a scene in the movie The Warriors, in which the smooth criminal Cyrus tries to persuade New York City’s gangs to form a singular, street-level syndicate: “We have been unable to see the truth, because we have been fighting for 10 square feet of ground ... our turf, our little piece of turf.”
The monologue could just as easily apply to the county’s existing governmental and quasi-governmental economic development groups – the problem will revolve around who gets to be “in charge.”

Cyrus sought unity, and his thanks was a bullet in the chest from someone who preferred to rule his “little piece of turf” rather than become prince of the kingdom. Nobody is going to get shot over talking about merging the county’s economic development “gangs” to fight for something larger than their “turf,” but if Mr. Russell is truly serious about pursuing a single agency concept, he’ll have a political rumble on his hands.

Dig that.

THIS 'INTERNET’ THING SEEMS TO BE A BIG DEAL: Most people (“most” meaning those with electricity and running water) born after 1988 have never known a world without the Internet.

If this describes you, your early childhood memories might have included playing Frisbee with one of the 257 free America Online trial CDs your parents received in the mail or listening to them yammer about the superiority of Netscape Navigator over Mosaic while trying to watch Full House.

I was not born in 1988, and I have no such memories.

My first introduction to the Internet was pornography.

In 1994, I was a young reporter for a small daily newspaper in southwest Utah. I can recall only two national stories from that year: 1. The O.J. Simpson murder melodrama, a story in which I had little personal interest; and 2. How the “Internet was changing America,” in which I had absolute zero personal interest because I barely knew what the Internet was and had never even been “online” before.

You can imagine how I was taken aback when I was assigned to do a story on the scourge of “Internet pornography.” Asking me to write a news story about the societal impact of online pornography would be akin to asking someone who just witnessed the Wright brothers’ flight at Kitty Hawk about the societal impact of a man walking on the moon.

As I write these words, (Feb. 20, 2008, 7:33 p.m. EST) it seems unfathomable to say the newspaper I worked for just 14 years ago had no more than three computers with Internet access. One of those belonged to the paper’s IT guy, whose office was actually inside the photography department’s darkroom. I asked him to show me some Internet pornography, and he obliged.

He started typing, hit the enter button and – after 30 seconds of watching text boxes appear on the screen – pornographic images began to appear.

I recall asking something like, “So, there’s a lot of stuff like this on the Internet?”
“Oh yeah,” he said. “You can find anything you want online .”*

I wouldn’t find that out for another five years. It wasn’t until 1999 that I worked somewhere (here, actually) where I had the “information superhighway” (a term that, thankfully, nobody uses anymore) on my very own desktop computer. The Internet was still a novel thing back then. If a local business created a Web site, it was considered worthy of a news story. Within a year or two, not having a Web site was like not having a phone.

My generation could very well be the last to remember a time when people were able to get by without e-mail , instant messaging, Yahoo, Google, Wi-Fi , broadband, blogging and, of course, Internet pornography.

At this point, you might be wondering what’s the point here? The short answer: There is none.

I’m taking a trip down memory lane simply because I received this in the mail (e-mail) the other day:

“LOCAL JOHNSTON SC FLORIST OPENS WORLD WIDE WEB LOCATION
Richardson’s Florist in Johnston, SC has just opened a new location; open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and just in time for Valentine’s Day. Customers worldwide can now visit, as well as purchase flowers from the shop at www.myfsn.com/richardsonsflorist.”

Welcome to the information superhighway, Richardson’s Florist; we’ve been waiting for you.

Watch out for the porn.

* Funny, considering that in 1994, e Bay, You Tube and MySpace did
not exist.

Talk of regionalism is breath of fresh air

Not long ago, I wrote about my belief that Richmond County’s political engine was starting to fire on all cylinders (the analogy actually involved a transmission ’ s gears shifting, but you get the point).

Despite the county’s dysfunctional coliseum authority – and some minor hand-wringing over whether the Downtown Development Authority should expand its boundaries and whether south Augusta needs a DDA of its own – I still believe the county’s leadership is pretty much all “on the same page.”

The next natural step? Seeking unity beyond the county line.

Richmond County is Augusta, but “Augusta” is not necessarily Richmond County. There are many who would argue with me, and I suspect they will. To them, I would ask: Is Atlanta only Fulton County?

Augusta is a region, and local leaders are increasingly realizing it needs to start acting like one.

The Augusta Metro Chamber of Commerce, the area’s largest and most influential private-sector organization, has taken the lead by choosing regional unity as its top priority for 2008. It seeks better coordination and cooperation Richmond, Columbia, Burke and McDuffie counties on the Georgia side, in addition to Aiken and Edgefield counties in South Carolina.

The barrier to this, as usual, will be a handful of self-serving government officials who labor under the delusional notion that what happens outside their political subdivision is of no consequence to them. There are honestly some in this community who believe Columbia County could thrive if Richmond County fails, or that whatever happens on the South Carolina side of our region has no impact on the Georgia side. Even worse are the people who, deep down, know that is absurd but choose to ignore it in order to appear stalwart to their political base.

What does all this have to do with business? Don’t underestimate the importance that unity has on a region’s economy.

In the late 1990s, the Georgia side of this region had taken the Bobby Jones Expressway as far as it could go, all the way to the state line. Across the river, zilch. The perception was that South Carolina’s leadership wasn’t interested (I think the fear was that their residents would find it more convenient to shop here, or something like that), but the truth was, as silly as it sounds, it just wasn’t on their radar screen.

The two factions simply weren’t talking with each other. Those darn political boundaries.
Today, of course, you know the expressway crosses the state line. But do you know what it took to get the ball rolling? It all started when no more than a dozen business leaders from both states sat down for a drink (probably a few) at bar in Washington during an Augusta Metro Chamber regional leadership junket and simply talked to each other. That’s how these things happen, folks. *

Nothing but good can happen when you get to know your neighbor.

GREENVILLE SHOOTs; IT SCORES! Greenville, S.C.-based human resources firm (read: outsourced contract workers) Human Technologies Inc. announced last week it has signed an agreement to provide Aiken’s Carlisle Tire and Wheel Co. with 250 employees. The personnel contract was previously held by Augusta-based MAU Inc. (Ouch!)
“HTI is very excited to be working with Carlisle, one of the premier employers in the CSRA,” said Nat Banks, the director of sales for Human Technologies and a former MAU executive. (Double ouch!)

Carlisle is one of the largest manufacturers and importers (read: outsourced foreign workers) of wheel assemblies for agriculture, ATV, golf, aviation, trailer, lawn and garden tires. You might remember last year that another Greenville company, GreenWood Inc., won the contract to oversee 140 maintenance and production employees at Augusta’s NutraSweet plant. GreenWood already has similar contract agreements at other Augusta facilities, including IFF, Solvay, General Chemical, Landmark Aviation and next-door neighbor Monsanto.

Let’s hope some Augusta company is kicking butt in Greenville.

PAGING MR. KIRBY: What? One little meat recall and you’re want to get rid of the whole company?

The Canadian owner of Augusta-based Castleberry Food Co. said it is considering selling the company after last year’s botulism scare that led to Castleberry brands’ disappearance from store shelves for six months and recall costs exceeding $35 million.
Toronto-based Connors Bros. Income Fund, whose core business is its canned fish products (it owns the Bumble Bee and Clover Leaf brands) said last week it was undertaking a “specific strategic review” of its canned- meat business (read: Hey, anybody want to buy this?).

Is there a logical reason for pursuing a sale? I’m sure there is; I just can’t tell what it is. Connor Bros. has previously said that the 90 recalled brands represented only 3 to 4 percent of its annual revenues.

If that’s true, shouldn’t the company try to ride this out and let the decades- old brand re-establish itself in the marketplace? If Tylenol can recover from cyanide poisonings , can’t Castleberry’s make a comeback too?

What could very well be happening is something Augustans have seen time and time again: A local, successful, profitable company attracts the attention of deeper-pocketed outsiders hoping to cash in. Company buys local operation, rapes it for short-term profit to the detriment of the operation and, after it begins to founder, puts it back up for sale.
Was safety compromised for output? Could the shortcuts that led to botulism have been avoided under a different corporate culture? Did I hear somebody mention Augusta’s Solo Cup factory?

Perhaps Robert Kirby, the former Castleberry’s chief executive and largest shareholder, who sold the company to Connors in 2004 for (ahem) $93 million, might be bored with his retirement and in need of something to do.

If so, he can start by calling Kent McNeil, Connors’ executive vice president and chief financial officer, at (858) 715-4076.

BUY THIS HOUSE, OR I’LL SHOOT THIS DOG: I’m a sucker for a good gimmick. Especially a “race against the clock” kind where you’re compelled to buy something before it’s too late. (Order now and we’ll send you not one, but two Samurai Sharks!)
A gimmick that I thought was sure to attract a buyer, the 24-hour open house auction of the house on Stonington Drive in Martinez, so far hasn’t lived up to expectations.
The home, originally valued at $194,900, dropped $100 in price every hour until it was sold. Unfortunately, the house reached a low price of $182,500 without selling, and the price went back up to $189,900.

“We have had some strong interest, but I cannot tell you more until we have an acceptable contract and the inspection period is over,” said Jim Bible III, a broker for Realty Executives of Greater Augusta, who is marketing the house.

When it sells, I’ll let you know. My promise.

MATH FOR DUMMIES: I’m the kind of guy who appreciates it when a friend lets him know when his fly is down or when he has a dryer sheet sticking out from out of his pants leg.

I was a little miffed, then, when nobody noticed my mistake last week when I dissected Exxon Mobil’s profits (the online version of Scuttlebiz was corrected in time). Because of my math error, I overstated Exxon Mobil’s average daily profit during the fourth quarter. It’s only (only?) $12 million.

ALSO LAST WEEK: I mentioned MCG Health Inc.’s estimated impact on Augusta’s regional economy: $835 million. Other local health care systems felt the need to let me know about their impact, too : Doctors Hospital’s figure was $357.6 million. University Hospital, the second- largest hospital in Georgia, had an estimated $909.3 million impact. Trinity Hospital was unable to provide its impact figure.

Adding up the aforementioned three equals about $2.1 billion, or roughly 15 percent of the $14.5 billion gross domestic product, of our metro area. If that’s the case (can somebody double-check my math?) that just goes to show you how important the health care industry is to our region.

* One of these days I’ll write about how Fort Gordon was spared from closure in the 1960s.

If I were a woman, I’d be Claire Voyant

Remember when I told you I could predict the future (Scuttlebiz, Dec. 30)?
“The following events will occur somewhere in our metro area during 2008 … A longtime local business, which some residents consider an 'institution,’ will close.”

Well ...

“The owners of Fat Man’s Forest announced they plan to close the well-known store and restaurant on Laney-Walker Boulevard … The business was started in 1948 … and became a retail institution in Augusta.” – The Augusta Chronicle, Feb. 5 .

By now, if you’ve been reading your newspaper* you would know that the Usry family is in the process of selling the Laney-Walker property to a undisclosed buyer for an undisclosed price.

Details of the sale will eventually become public, but right now, no one but a handful of people connected to the seller and potential buyer know what “the deal is.” Being someone who is of the not-connected variety, I have a chance to prove my prognostication prowess with another prediction: The buyer will be MCG Health Inc. (or one of its affiliates) and the price will be $2.23 million (give or take a couple of hundred thousand).

The Usry family has publicly said it expects the sale to close during the spring, so you’ll have to wait at least a couple of months before you know whether I have a sixth sense or whether I’m the fool you’ve always suspected. I’m predicting the latter.

SHOT IN THE ARM: In addition to potentially contributing a nice chunk of change to the Usry family, MCG Health, the company that operates the hospitals and clinics for the Medical College of Georgia, contributes an estimated $835 million in the community.
That’s according to a recent report by the Georgia Hospital Association, which revealed that MCG Health had direct expenditures of about $339 million in 2005. When run through the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis’ multiplier, the total economic impact reaches $834,998,297. Voila!

KEEP ON ROCKIN’ ME, BABY: Raleigh, N.C.-based aggregates firm Martin Marietta Materials said in its quarterly and year-end earnings report last week that it has begun the modernization and expansion project at its massive Augusta quarry.

The project will make the gigantic hole sandwiched between the Augusta Canal and River Watch Parkway one of the largest rock quarries in the nation. The 150-year-old quarry, which already produces 2 million tons of rock, gravel and sand, will produce 6 million tons a year after the $20 million equipment upgrade is finished in early 2009.

Not only that, but the investment “is expected to reduce production costs on a per-ton basis,” company Chairman and CEO Stephen P. Zelnak Jr.** said last week as the company reported record year-end earnings, sales and margins.

The company’s profit fell short of analyst s’ expectations, however, causing its stock to plunge 10 percent after the release of the earnings.

No wonder companies are increasingly converting from public to private ownership. Apparently, it’s not good enough to have a stable and profitable business. If you can’t deliver consistent earnings growth to the gods of Wall Street in good times and bad, you might as well be running a lemonade stand.

NO PROFIT PROBLEMS HERE: OK, here are some numbers to make you feel insignificant. Consider the Martin Marietta fourth-quarter profit (the money left over after all the bills have been paid) of $56.5 million.

Now, that’s less than the $62.5 million profit the company made during the same period last year, but it’s still an average of $18.8 million that the company earned each month from September to December.

OK , now here’s the mind-blower: Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest publicly owned oil company, also reported record fourth-quarter earnings last week: $11.6 billion . That’s billion, with a “B.”

While the folks at Martin Marietta were making more than $606,000 a day, the good guys and gals over at Exxon Mobil were making more than $374 million a month (a little more than what MCG Health spends in a year), or $12 million every day.

HERE’S A THOUGHT: What would happen if Exxon Mobil, and all the other U.S. oil companies, were owned by the federal government?

Nationalized oil is a foreign concept, but not a new one. Many oil companies are government-owned, including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company.

Before I go any further, let me say this: I’m not a fan of government performing any function that can be performed better and less costly by the private sector.

Still, could nationalizing the U.S. oil industry help funnel cash into federal coffers and help pay down the nation’s spiraling national debt and maybe, just maybe, help keep gasoline prices stable? And isn’t oil kind of a national security thing?

Not being an expert in petroeconomics – or anything else, for that matter – I decided to pose the question to people who might provide an intelligent answer.

“No!” was the response from Augusta State University economics professor Mark Thompson.

“Believe it or not, these companies compete with one another. If the government stepped in, what incentive does the government have to compete and keep prices any lower?” he said.

I also asked Lehman Brothers’ chief energy economist, Edward Morse, who sent me two lengthy papers he had written on the subject. Boiled down, the papers make the same point as Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Morse cited the example of BP (the once state-owned company known as British Petroleum) and Kuwait Petroleum Corp. (which is still state- owned). In 1980, the companies were the same size. Today, BP’s $300 billion in sales is 10 times greater than KPC’s.

“State companies show very poor shareholder return in comparison to private companies that are challenged by competitive pressures,” Mr. Morse said.

I called him and asked whether it is possible to structure a state-owned oil company in such a way that it could be competitive?

“That’s a three-hour conversation,” he said, shortly before saying goodbye.

Drat. From now on I’m sticking to easy topics. Somebody, anybody, send me some gossip.

* Or listening to local broadcasters read the newspaper to you.
** An Aiken native, by the way.

I’m leavin' (from Columbia) on a jet plane

I did something I wasn’t proud of the other day – I booked a flight out of Columbia Metropolitan Airport.

What made me feel even worse was that I clicked the “accept” button on my computer to buy for a round-trip ticket to Phoenix while ink was still wet on the invitations to Augusta Regional Airport’s new-and-improved terminal building – a facility specifically designed to encourage greater use of the airport.

Many Augusta consumers would have made the decision without hesitation or a shred of guilt. Some of these folks are the same type of people who will spend 30 minutes in a mom-and-pop shoe store trying on 15 pairs of wingtips to find the one they like before driving to a big box store (where such service does not exist) to buy the same shoe for a couple of bucks less.

Here’s the thing with me: I like Augusta’s airport * and I (generally) don’t cringe at the higher price I pay for the convenience of using a low-traffic local facility.

I like being able to drive 20 minutes to the airport, instead of an hour or two. I like being able to walk a few hundred feet to my gate instead of a few thousand. I like knowing that my 30-inch, green upright suitcase will be easy to spot on the baggage claim carousel.

With the exception of one international trip, every flight I have ever booked while living in Augusta has originated from Augusta’s airport. The fares on each of those flights from Augusta Regional have always been “reasonable,” which I define as being within $100 or $150 of Atlanta or Columbia.

So, you ask, what happened with this latest trip? The short answer is: I was too slow.
While planning this Arizona excursion (which includes attending a wedding, seeing some old friends and visiting my hometown for the first time since the Clinton administration), I found what I would call a reasonable fare from Augusta Regional to Phoenix’s Sky Harbor International. I did not, however, purchase the ticket just then because I had a few loose ends to tie up before committing to