50 Business View Magazine - April 2016
before they will submit bids, and before we can accept
one. And we do have to get some environmental per-
mits; we need to have permits from the railroad, from
the agency that oversees the river, and, of course, the
Department of Transportation and a lot of others will
have to be involved in this before we can actually take
on the major parts of some of these projects.”
In terms of maintaining city services, Wright believes
that Hickory is similar to many other cities, but with the
added advantage of being one of the “soundest cities,
financially, in the state. Even during the bad times, our
people look out for each other and look out for their fi-
nances; they pay their taxes. We have been blessed to
be in such strong financial condition, considering the
triple recession effect, compared to most other places
across the country,” he muses.
Hickory has also benefitted from prudent and timely
infrastructure spending over time. “Like every city, we
have ongoing needs for road repairs, water and sewer
pipes, replacements, enhancements,” Wright admits.
“But we are fortunate that we have a relatively new wa-
ter plant – a little less than 30 years old – and it’s de-
signed to be a regional supplier. So we have capacity
for about 32 million gallons a day and we’re presently
running about 12 or 13 million gallons a day. So, we’re
good on that front. And we have a new state-of-the-art,
two year-old waste water treatment plant. So we don’t
have any extraordinary needs that we have to fill.”
In addition to being able to maintain its infrastructure
despite the economic challenges faced by the citizens
of Hickory over the last several years, the city has also
managed to maintain its rich cultural life. “We have
an active arts community; we have a symphony, we
have an art museum, we have a science center, and
community theatre – things that very few cities, our
size, enjoy,” says Wright. “But we felt we needed to do
more.”
