It’s a pleasure to bring you the good news on page 1 of today’s paper, though we can’t take any credit for it.
That would be the report about McCool Millworks’ move to Sweet Home. When cynical journalists get excited, that can be a good sign. We’ve seen plenty of big plans come to naught – case in point: Western States Reliance Trust Fund’s plans for that golf course and hotel, etc., so when somebody tell us they’re going to do so, it’s hard not to be somewhat reserved till we see boots on the ground.
Well, we’ve seen them here – not a lot of big talk and song-and-dance. Just some quiet work under the radar to get things lined up to make this happen. The property has been purchased, the employees have done a walk-through, the product is real and the company isn’t Johnny-Come-Lately. These people have experience.
At the risk of stating the obvious, there are a couple of exciting aspects to this development.
What the McCools bring to Sweet Home is something that’s badly needed here: real, local jobs. At this point, based on what they’ve told us, we’re talking about maybe a dozen positions for the near future. But that’s a dozen more people who can be gainfully employed locally and can hopefully contribute positively to the community by just being here more than long enough to eat and sleep.
We’ve mentioned before on this page how there’s a brain and energy drain each morning as some of Sweet Home’s brightest and best head down the highways to other places to make a living. It’s one reason why our chamber is struggling. It’s one of the reasons why we’ve got some big opportunities that are really still waiting for us to take advantage of them: the community forest, the livability assessment – initiatives that hold great promise for helping us develop exactly what we need to counteract poverty and resulting social ills.
We have the potential for sustainable industries and jobs based on tourism and other uses of the natural resources around us. But it takes a village to make some of these things work and a lot of our villagers are not around all that much.
Which brings us back to the McCools. We’re delighted that they’ve found Sweet Home and that they are getting ready to occupy the cavernous facility at the intersection of 18th and Main, next to Safeway that’s been empty since Overhead Door shut down in the depths of the Great Recession.
Speaking of which, it’s also great to see a new business developing in the building formerly occupied by Periwinkle Provisions, to see that plywood sheet come off the display window and lights on inside. That’s a boost for everybody.
City officials and others concerned with Sweet Home’s future spend a lot of time talking about how to address the problem of empty storefronts. There’s a lot of potential in Sweet Home.
Despite the poverty and the substance abuse problems that seem to color a lot of the impressions people have about our community, there is a work ethic and a can-do attitude that is not found just anywhere. We’ve listed the exhibits before, but they defy argument: the new football field, the community center, the scores of smaller crises that have been swiftly addressed by this community, which rises up to help those who need it.
The bottom line is, a can-do outfit like the McCools appears to be will be a great fit here. The owners should not have difficulty finding eager, capable workers. The community should be greatly appreciative of their occupying that facility.
We also should appreciate the efforts by our city leaders to make Sweet Home the kind of place an established business or a canny entrepreneur would want to come to. We encourage them to keep working along these lines, to solve problems, to create an environment that facilitates industry – in more than one sense of the word.
We’re wishing the McCools the best as they kick things off here, hopefully after the first of the year. Their success is ours.
Sweet Home’s.