Samsung has promised to create 2,000 jobs in Taylor, Texas – though it remains to be seen exactly whom those jobs will ultimately benefit.
Samsung is building a massive, multi-billion dollar microchip fabrication plant in the middle of a cornfield in Taylor, about 40 miles northeast of Austin
In the community of less than 20,000, that feeling appears widespread."Samsung is the largest foreign investment in Texas' history," said Amy Everhart, a planning and zoning commissioner in Taylor and co-founder of the Texas Beer Co."It's a $17 billion project, and could be 10 times more than that because they've said they want to build more fabs [microchip fabrication plants] on the same site ... The scale of this is not something another small town has seen.
"There was this comfortable feeling that, 'Hey, it's just about like it was when I left,'" he said."That's also bad news: In a 17-year period, nothing had really changed in Taylor, and in fact in some cases, it had regressed." In those cases, the results of development for the local communities have been decidedly mixed. Many of the high-paying jobs at those companies have gone to out-of-towners with levels of education and experience local residents largely lack. The relocation of these corporations has driven up housing prices, while operations have created an array of environmental headaches disproportionately impacting longtime residents.
Wegmann said the town should act now to buy up vacant plots of land and prepare to try to control as much as possible the shape of its growth."It's kind of up to them to get ahead of the curve and be proactive about it, because I think if they just hang back, a wave of change is going to wash over the town – with some good effects and bad effects," he said.
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