Staff Photo by Angela LewisPeople walk down the sidewalk of the TVA building on Thursday morning.
The recreational areas owned by the Tennessee Valley Authority generate an annual economic value of nearly $40 million for campers, hunters, hikers and boaters in the agency’s seven-state region, a new economic study says.
But members of an advisory panel on TVA stewardship programs said Wednesday the true value of the lands is far greater in helping to preserve the region’s culture, biological diversity and water quality.
Barbara Wyse, a senior economist for the Portland, Ore.-based consulting firm of Cardno Entrix, estimates the annual value of TVA campgrounds, day-use areas and public lands at between $10 million and $37.5 million a year.
“The recreational benefits of these lands are what people said they most benefit from and what we were able to define most clearly in dollar terms,” Wyse told the Regional Resource Stewardship Council on Wednesday.
Wyse said recreational facilities represent only a fraction of the overall value of TVA stewardship programs over the utility’s 293,000 acres and 11,000 miles of shoreline around reservoirs such as Chickamauga, Nickajack and Watts Bar lakes.
TVA lost federal money for recreational and resource management programs in 2000 and must pay for them through user fees and excess funds from power operations.
In February, TVA will release a draft of its 20-year Natural Resource Plan for management of its public lands. It’s the first such plan in TVA’s 77-year history.
Tom Littlepage, chief of the water management section of the Alabama Office of Water Resources and chairman of the Regional Resource Stewardship Council, said the plan “will offer us a balanced strategic vision that isn’t driven just by economics.”
Russ Townsend, the tribal historic preservation officer for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and a Resource Council member, urged TVA not to shape its resource planning strictly by the dollar value of such programs.
“I would be very embarrassed if any of our tribal elders saw that we were trying to assign a dollar value to preserving our cultural heritage,” Townsend told the council during a meeting in Chattanooga.
Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6340.
TVA recreation value
* 63 day-use areas attract 735,000 visits a year, valued between $8.8 million and $29.4 million each year.
* 12 campgrounds attract 78,000 nights of camping annually, valued between $2.1 million and $7.2 million a year
* Other recreational lands attract 6.5 million visits a year, valued from $350,000 to $950,000
* Land stewardship programs help save TVA $18.5 million annually
* Lakes and streams attract 2.9 million participants; 3.2 million people view wildlife and 2.3 million people visit historic sites.
Source: Cardno Entrix valuation of TVA natural resource program