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Hendersonville officials have been telling everyone who would listen that their city was not only a great place to live, but also a great place to start a business.
Turns out they aren’t the only ones who think that.
Sumner County’s largest city was recently named the state’s sixth most business friendly city by The Beacon Center of Tennessee, a free-market group previously known as the Tennessee Center for Policy Research.
The news didn’t come as a surprise to Hendersonville Mayor Scott Foster. “I think it’s impressive because they judged economic vitality, job growth and those types of things and I’m certainly excited that Hendersonville was in the top 10 in those areas,” he said.
According to the organization’s website, the state’s 50 largest cities were ranked on three main categories: Economic Vitality, Business Tax Burden, and Community Allure. Each city received a separate score for each of the three categories based on a number of factors, including business and individual tax rates, job and population growth, median household income, cost of living, crime rates, and a combination of high school graduation rates and ACT scores.
The report stated that Hendersonville took the sixth spot with “strong numbers in all three categories. Most importantly, high job and population growth, as well as a low crime rate, led to the city’s ranking. It also fared well in most every other category, though average ACT scores and low median income levels kept it from rising higher in the rankings.”
“I think it’s interesting what our weaknesses were, ACT scores and high school dropout rates,” he added. “Certainly, Hendersonville doesn’t score low in those categories but the county, as a whole, does have some issues. That’s something as county we are going to have to work on.”
Hendersonville’s attractiveness is evident with several major construction projects underway including a Sam’s Club, Union University, and a national call center. The city has also posted increases in revenues during the past few years of economic struggles..
“Our revenue is up, not very dramatically, but we have been blessed,” Foster said. “We are not like many other mayors across the country with serious declining revenues and having to lay off a lot of folks.
“We’ve stayed steady through the recession and on top of that, we’ve been through two natural disasters, a tremendous tornado and Noah-like floods. We’ve remained stable throughout all of that. So I think our best is yet to come. It’s exciting.”
In the three main categories, Hendersonville ranked fifth in economic vitality, 11th in business tax burden and seventh in community allure. Goodlettsville ranked 12th in the overall business friendly list, Gallatin ranked came in the 14th spot and Portland ranked 21st.
Knoxville suburb Farragut took top honors in the list for the second time since being named first in the inaugural report in 2006. Northern Middle Tennessee towns dominated the favorable list with eight of the top ten spots. Joining Hendersonville was Brentwood (2), Franklin (3), Mt. Juliet (4), Spring Hill (5), Lebanon (7), Clarksville (8), and Smyrna (10). The only West Tennessee town to crack the top 10 was Collierville (9).
by Randy Cline |
