Income or Expense?
$475,688.03 or -($650,000) 

The University of Tennessee Board of Trustees should reconsider the fate of the above acreage at their meeting this Friday. The two excuses usually given for not doing so are "the decision to replace the diary farm with a golf course was made years ago" and  "money has already been spent on  golf course construction". Well the Trustees have thrown out prior decisions regarding tuition cost and staffing levels so why not the golf course? As for the investment in site work (pictured above), the best way to recoup the money is to repopulate it with cattle that can produce $475,688 worth of milk a year. The golf course would cost an additional $650,000 in maintenance annually. 

Nine months ago UT closed the states oldest and most productive dairy farm to make room for a athletic department  golf course and a private development project called Cherokee Farm.

The former dairy Farm is located on Alcoa Highway across from UT hospital.  Land for the dairy was donated to the University by Knox County  in 1916 to expand the original 1868 Land Grant farm. Until it's closure this summer the dairy produced over $475,688.03 worth of milk annually. Today the dairy sits largely vacant except for construction of the athletic department golf course that is blazing along under the athletic departments philosophy of "spend it or lose it".

Repopulate the dairy herd = $475,688.03 income annually.

No one is going to fund that silly 2 billion dollar “save the world” private "pork barrel" project. UT is  supposed to be the business of public education not private development.

Plow partially completed athletic department “fun park” = $650,000 savings annually

Even though huge amounts of cash are being squandered daily on construction in an attempt to out run budget cuts, throwing good money after bad will help no one. While $650,000 is the upper range to maintain 18 holes, considering the athletic departments fondness for extravagance it might not be enough to maintain their four hole course.

Get back to work winning games and making money to help the university.  

Please contact your local representative and ask them to modify the UT charter to combine athletics and academics so that the athletic department has to compete with education for funds. Additionally request they place the UT Dairy Farm in Knoxville under historical protection. We need to “speak up” from every county. Please forward this to all farm supporters.

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↑Summer view from north bank, site of proposed private “pork barrel” project.

↑Fall view of "fun park" from south bank at Alcoa Highway (barely visible on the right side of picture above)

↑Site for new UT diary in Blount county: While beautiful the Blount County site is not necessarily a good location for a dairy. The farm is low lying and located between a creek and a river… wet soil is bad for cattle and bad for water quality. Conversion of this farm to a dairy will be strongly apposed by surrounding subdivisions. The round trip commute time 1 hour and 10 minutes for students is an hour longer than the old farm.