During a public meeting regarding the Middle Valley Neighborhood Walmart proposal, residents of the area broke into applause when a man yelled that the store should be built somewhere else.
Another man said, "Put it in your neighborhood, we don't want it in ours."
Held at the family center of Middle Valley Church of God, the meeting drew such a large crowd that many had to stand. The project has generated substantial opposition from the surrounding community, though some have spoken in favor or it, including pastor of the church Mitch McClure and former state Rep.
Jim Vincent.
Engineers at the meeting described the specifics of the project, which would be located at the corner of Thrasher Pike and Middle Valley Road, addressing major concerns, such as traffic.
A traffic study of the area showed that traffic going in and out of the nearby school would pose the biggest problem.
One engineer said, "If you eliminate a lot of the traffic related to the school, it would lessen our impact."
Other citizens worried about the likely increase in the number of 18-wheelers on the narrow county roads the project would bring.
One woman asked, "How is our one little two-lane road...going to handle that?"
A project manager told her that while they would have to make sure the store was easily accessible to the trucks, the county would have to fund widening the roads.
Like most Walmart stores, this one would be open 24 hours every day, seven days per week.
County Commissioner Marty Haynes told the audience that the project would generate approximately $2 million, of which he said nearly $500,000 would stay in the county. Of that money, he said 60 percent would go to education.
The other $1.5 million would go to the state.