Steve Mensing, Editor
♦ Well over a year ago we pulled together what numerous studies and surveys tell us about what attracts entrepreneurs to a city or small municipality. Its time again to put Salisbury, N.C. to the entrepreneurial test. Does “America’s 10 Gig City” have what it takes? Or will it continue to watch entrepreneurial talent pass it by for far more attractive and happening cities in North Carolina? Let’s cut to the test:
• Does it have low costs for doing business?
Downtown suffers from municipal service district whose taxes are known to be the highest in North Carolina. The municipal service district taxes support DSI and the derelict Empire Hotel long overdue for demolition and an expensive abatement. Every year we hear the same guff about “well qualified” developers showing interest the Empire. I’d be more impressed if they unloaded this ballast on someone who wanted to build a two-tiered parking lot. Maybe use the front wall of Empire for its ugly Jules Vern charm and widen its entry for vehicles to pass through. The Downtown taxes, fees, utility bills, and rents are prohibitively high and anti-business. The City’s historical codes negatively impact the costs of doing business.
Housing costs are cheap because the city’s Black and White working class and upper income folks are moving away when they can unload their homes and properties. Prices are plummetting on Salisbury homes. There’s some real steals at the Crescent.
Code enforcement officers can write up any entrepreneur with an office in their home over so many square feet or if they live in an area zoned wrong.
Add in expense for securing your home or property. Property crime in Salisbury is through the roof. How many of your neighbors had their back and front doors kicked in when they were at work?
Salisbury gets a resounding F for the costs of doing business. Except for cheap houses, Salisbury is a non qualifier due to its high costs for doing business.
• Are there attractive business areas and districts?
Downtown Salisbury remains a blighted area pockmarked with many vacant storefronts and obsolete buildings in need of gutting and demolition. Numerous buildings suffer from graffiti, gang tags, and broken windows.
Downtown Salisbury certainly is attractive to panhandlers.
Downtown Salisbury fails as an attractive business area due to its blight and ghostly atmosphere. After nightfall the business areas are chancy because of ever present possibility of violence and property crime.
Business areas gets a D.
• How are the area’s major institutions such as colleges, universities, libraries, and hospitals? Are they well regarded?
Catawba College is an average college, but lacks truly outstanding departments. Livingstone College struggles academically and its campus is rated among the top 25 most dangerous colleges and university campuses in the USA. Rowan-Cabarrus Community College provides a decent enough education for the budget-minded.
None of the above schools are a magnets for entrepreneurs.
Novant Rowan Regional Medical Center is rated as okay.
The county public library in Salisbury is one of the city’s outstanding attributes.
Salisbury’s major institutions get a C.
• Does Salisbury have a secure customer base and a sense of business opportunity?
Salisbury suffers from poverty. The U.S. Census Bureau says 27.2% of the city’s population lives below the poverty line. The city is lacking in spendable income. Don’t expect to make much money utilizing Salisbury’s customer base.
An F.
• Existing networks of entrepreneurs already in Salisbury?
Nothing going on here. You could start a “mashup” by posting on Craig’s List. Telephone interview those who apply-–you could be inviting trouble if you don’t. Ask them for their names and see if they show up on the NCDOJ list. Salisbury is crawling with petty con artists and persons who would exploit any opening. Salisbury also has a huge population of registered sex offenders.
Give this area an F.
• Are there existing industrial clusters/company clusters that permit collaboration between entrapaneurs with similar interests?
Very few similar industrial/company clusters in the Salisbury area. You might investigate a common cause that others might share. Like if your cement plant and an asphalt plant might be interested in linking up to fight the area’s pollution control.
Give this area an D.
• Does Salisbury have welcoming attitude toward small business and entrepreneurs?
Newcomers can feel left out really fast. However the Downtown merchants will love bomb you and try to convince you to join their “Downtown Cult” that touts that its “vibrant”. They will fill your ears about business being really great here which doesn’t jibe with the vacancy strewn downtown and with few human lifeforms skulking about on the streets. Most new retailers and restaurants last about a year in the musical chairs Downtown economy. “Oh you’ll love it here!”
This one gets a D.
• Does the area possess walkability? Sidewalks?
The Downtown area has sidewalks and so does the Historic District. The rest of the city is largely left out of the pie.
An A for Downtown-–an F for areas beyond “8 block”.
• Do several high-speed internet companies operate in the area? Do they have competitive prices?
3 area internet providers offer high-speed internet. Time Warner Cable is the city’s leading highs-speed internet provider and they rolled out TWC Maxx with terrific high-speeds at budget prices. AT&T U-verse has launched a bargain basement gig for $70 bucks a month. The city’s municipal broadband is less unstable than it used to be and suffers from anti-consumer contracts and fees. Time Warner Cable business class has up to 10 gig by 10 gig fiber optic dedicated ethernet to business and industry locations inside of Salisbury. There is no real call for 10 Gig internet in the Bury.
On High-speed broadband the city gets an A plus.
• Are there a large variety of restaurants, entertainment, movie theaters, theater, common interest groups, and music venues?
Salisbury has some decent restaurants, but can only support so many. Neighborhood and fringe theater exists which is a good training ground for newbies to get some experience before moving on to Charlotte or elsewhere. Movie theaters are lacking. Some common interest groups. A few music venues and several noteworthy artists. If you miss culture TV is filled with it.
Food and culture gets C.
• Are there research facilities in the area?
Nothing in the immediate area. A commute to Kannapolis’s research centers.
An F for Salisbury’s nonexistent research facilities.
• Do friends and family live in the vicinity?
Only a visiting entrepreneur can answer that question.
• Does the local government create unnecessary red tape and barriers such as excessive codes or show favoritism that newcomers must struggle through?
Salisbury is well known for creating major barriers, red tape, excessive arbitrary codes, and show favoritism. Would any potential entrepreneur want any part of the Salisbury business climate?
Salisbury gets an F minus on this grade.
• Do entrepreneurial incubators and training programs exist in the area?
Some training programs available at Rowan-Cabarrus. No business incubators anywhere in the city at this time.
C minus on this count.
• Is there good clean water available in the area at inexpensive rates?
The water is made more expensive by the city’s fiber optic network dipping into its water and sewer funds. The city’s water may have challenges with asbestos from decaying asbestos/cement lines and mains.
The water is expensive.
Grade B.
• How are Salisbury’s city Schools?
The city public schools graded D and F on the state education scores. City schools are havens for drugs, gangs, and many youngsters struggle with reading.
City public schools earn a D.
• Convenient airports and public transportation?
Charlotte Douglas is a 40 minute drive down I-85. Rowan County Airport is nearby for business jets. Public transportation has large gaps in its schedule. It is decidedly underused. Amtrac stops in Salisbury.
Airports get an A. Public transportation gets C minus.
• Low crime rates? Is the area safe?
FBI crime stats are very high for both violent crime and property crime. The city is under siege from gangs, heroin, crack, meth, shootings, violent crime, and property crime. The city is very unsafe any hour of the day. Registered sex offenders dot the landscape in Salisbury.
Crime in Salisbury is compared favorably on a per capita basis with the “Motor City”. All persons are urged to conceal carry. Break-ins and home invasions are extremely common in Salisbury. Exercise extreme caution when visiting Salisbury.
Crime gets an F- in the “Bury”
• Are the area’s streets and roads well maintained?
Streets and sidewalks are poorly maintained in Salisbury. Street repairs drop off in a major way outside of “8 block” and the Country Club.
Streets get an F.
• Is there an active local economic development agency?
Yes, but selling Salisbury is a difficult if next to impossible task.
EDC gets a B.
• Is the area a good place to raise a family or move one in? Is the area children friendly?
No Salisbury is not a good place to raise children. Crime, meth, crack, heroin, alcohol, gangs, substandard schools, sexual predators, and bullies make Salisbury an exceptionally bad choice. Would you choose to live in Detroit for your kids? Salisbury was the home of Erika Parsons before she vanished. Need we say more?
Salisbury gets an F for raising kids.
• Are very bright, talented, and creative people drawn to the area?
Take a look around. Occasionally some brilliant people drift in through marriage or from the misfortune of birth. Maybe from misreading a road map. Most don’t stay long-–they don’t fit in. They tend to become troublemakers after they observe what is going on around them. It’s alleged that public school testing some years back showed that Salisbury suffered from below average intelligence.
Salisbury gets a D for a lack of bright, talented, and creative people. Young educated people leave the area after college.
• How are the areas parks and recreation?
The city has some good parks, but lacks in recreational activities for many of the city’s youth.
A for parks. D- for recreational activities.
• A youthful population?
Most of the young move out for greener passages. The troubled remain and become heavily involved in Salisbury’s hard drug and alcohol culture. The town is aging.
The aging city gets an F.
• Is the city or small municipality friendly toward cooperative ventures?
Cooperative ventures are unknown here. Suspect the status quo might try to thwart such ventures if they believed it might remove eggs from their basket or curtail their control.
Unknown area. Could be a great draw for outsiders wishing to create cooperative companies in a job starving area.
• The community’s physical setting attractive?
Yes in some parts. Blight has taken over large sectors of the City.
Gets a C minus or a D.
• Is there convenient shopping close at hand?
Some selection of big box chain stores in Salisbury although great internet shopping is as near as the closest computer. Otherwise people desiring big box shopping have to drive down I-85 to Afton Ridge, Concord Mills, or Huntersville or travel to Mooresville or Winston-Salem. Shoppes at the Summit is nearby in county and has some great stores.
Big box store shopping C minus. Internet shopping A plus.
• Is a well-educated workforce available? Can they pass drug tests?
Fewer numbers of college graduates and vocational school graduates live in Salisbury than years ago. Drug tests are more difficult to overcome for many due to the rise of heroin, meth, crack, and alcohol abuse in the area.
Below average workforce available gets a C minus. Passing drug tests gets a D plus.
• Are their local business incentives and grants available?
Yes.
Incentives and grants get an A.
• Are community banks and lending institutions friendly toward entrepreneurs?
Less so in Salisbury as loaning institutions have tightened their belts.
Local banks friendly toward entrepreneurs gets a C.
• Would you be excited about calling this place home?
Imagine if an entrepreneur took a close look at Salisbury how they might feel?
