Upon the examination of the information contained in the Fontana project, the exhaustive official record of the building of Fontana Dam, we find the following facts: Graham County 's tax base lost to the project 2.5 percent of its total assessed value, or $160,675, worth of property. Taxes levied on this property amounted to $2,006, or 1.9 percent of the county's revenues in 1941. During the physical year, 1942 and ‘43, TVA paid Swain County $1,462 in lieu of taxes. Increases of that amount each year since that time made this payment a substantial annual contribution to the Graham County revenues. Graham County was not a signatory to the 1943 agreement, in which the federal government admits that Swain County should be compensated.

Please do not build the North Shore Road through the Smokies. As the economy of NC suffers through loss of the textile and tobacco industry, we need to protect every form of revenue we have. Our mountain lands, and Great Smoky National Park in particular, are major generators of tourism income for our state.

It seems there is never enough taxpayer money to meet all the statutory requirements and perceived needs of the county. State law prescribes how county tax monies are to be spent and will also dictate how $52 million will be spent, if this settlement does come about.

There is a possible or perhaps likely economic price to be paid. The Smokys are the most visited National Park we have. One might argue that the impacts caused by this road would lead visitors to spend their vacation money elsewhere.

I've heard it stated that the North Shore people created a debt for the county by the old 288 being constructed. Those people lost their homes. They were displaced. They had to leave. They had no chance to repay those monies. What happened to the $400,000 that was allocated for Swain County in lieu of payment for that road? It's not the people's fault, if they didn't utilize the money the way it should have been.

Advocates of the road state that Swain County will benefit from construction and tourist jobs. This assumes, however, that there are enough construction workers in the county to fill all the jobs on the road (there aren't) and that an unrealistic number of new tourists come to the area to drive the road once it is completed.

Road gross dollars to Swain County . Monetary settlement, personal income per year, $470,000, depending on how the money is spent. Principal park road, $5,670,000 to Swain County . Monetary settlement, retail sales, $140,000, depending on how the money is spent. Principal park road, retail sales, $14,270,000. Jobs, 18 years, monetary settlement, 806; jobs, 15 years, principal park road, 7,315. Any elected official with the smallest amount of intelligence can see how many dollars the road would bring to Swain County versus monetary settlement.

How many people own a motel or restaurant or gas station or a retail business? That's the only people that get any economic benefit out of this. They say the county will get additional revenue from more visitors to the park. That's just nonsense.

The DEIS, in Section 4.23, shows it (NSC) would also provide the greatest and longest term economic benefit to Swain County . More jobs, retail sales, higher personal income, as opposed to a monetary settlement or any other option. In a county where the federal government controls more than 86 percent of the land, these benefits are much needed.

We are owned by the federal government. With the GSMNP, the Cherokee Indian Reservation, the Nantahala National Forest , TVA, the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Appalachian Trail within our County, there is less than 16 percent privately owned land. That's not much left for taxes to provide services for our people. We must profit from the federal land. Swain County is the second largest county in North Carolina . It also has the most federally owned land. When our land was taken for the Fontana Reservoir, we lost 44,000 acres of land, farms, orchards that were not needed for the reservoir. We lost businesses, home places. Swain County Commissioners in 1943 signed the document in good faith for a road that would bring economic prosperity to the area. Instead, the road has not been completed and we are an economically depressed county.

Swain County , with over 80 percent of its land in federal holdings that are non-taxable, needed major financing for schools and infrastructure. At this time a cash settlement seemed to be the most rewarding for the citizens of Swain County . About this time I was named chairman of a committee to plan for a new high school with Farmer's Home Administration financing. This loan would have to be repaid and money from interest earned from the cash settlement seemed to fit this bill. The school was built in the ‘70s and the county was left with a debt to be repaid. That is why I testified in 1984 that a cash settlement of nine and a half million and relief of the Farmer's Home Administration loan would benefit the taxpayers of Swain County .

If you believe that the road is going to create economic well-being, it will not be for the citizens of Swain County . It will be people from the outside. You will be spending all your money in restructuring your infrastructure.

Through the years, our little county has always depended on the tourists basically, and statistics show that Swain and Graham has, for the most part, always been in double-digit unemployment. If the road had been built, we could have had a better life in Swain County and in Graham County . It has been said that we don't want to become a Gatlinburg. We couldn't become a Gatlinburg because 85 percent of Swain County land is government-owned, so we would never fall in that category.

If $590 million was spent, we're told it would create 213 jobs after the construction ends. Do some simple arithmetic. If you have 213 jobs from that expenditure, that's $2,300,000 paid for each job. If you invested the $2,300,000 and five percent, that would pay each person in those 213 jobs a salary of $115,000, but the economists tell us those aren't $100,000 jobs. Those are sales clerks and gas-pumpers and hamburger flippers, not the kind of jobs that this county -- that Swain County needs. We are told that there are 1,000 members of the road association. They want the taxpayers of this country to pay $590,000 for each one of them. Is that fair? Is that what the citizens of this country want? Is that what they want the citizens of this country to lay out for them? I just don't believe that that is fair. It's not rational. It's not believable.

The business owners think the road will increase tourism and thus benefit them.  Let us assume it would.  It doesn't matter.  While the proximity of a National Park may provide economic benefit to a nearby community, to allow that community (or rather, a small vocal portion of it) to determine decisions about park management is to precisely reverse the proper order of things.

The road is supposed to compensate the loss of 288 and 44,000 acres of taxable land. Research states that personal income and net retail sales which would result from the road would dwarf the personal income and net retail sales which would result from the cash settlement alternative. The construction phase would result in many jobs for several years in Swain and Graham Counties . According to the DEIS, the road would bring economic benefits to the region, not just to Swain and Graham Counties .

The road has been touted as an economic benefit for Swain County . However, a Federal Highway Administration study showed that road building does not have measurable economic benefits for rural counties.

Also look at Cades Cove Rd. , it's only a traffic jam, and Townsend is not drawing crowds of tourists.

It would bring in so much tourism to Swain County that it is unbelievable. I live right under the Blue Ridge Parkway.