Tech blog

People who live far from the big city often complain about being ignored. Up in Georgia’s northwest corner the folks in Dade County may have a point.

Until the 1940s, the only way to get there was through neighboring Alabama and Tennessee. strange to say today, many Dade countians depend on the other states for roads, health care, electricity, shopping and jobs.

And for years, the feeling was mutual. Local folklore has it that the county seceded from Georgia in 1860. Historians have debunked the fictitious story, but the spirit of defiance lives on in the county’s slogan: “The Independent State of Dade.”

“We always seem to be an afterthought,” says Ben Brandon, the county’s chief executive.

But the historic drought gripping Georgia has put this overlooked county squarely in the spotlight. And Georgia’s efforts to tap into the nearby Tennessee River could give the county of 16,000 a new role, in Brandon’s words, as “north Georgia’s water spigot.”

Lawmakers in drought-stricken Georgia have empowered the governor to sue to correct a flawed 1818 survey that mistakenly placed Georgia’s northern line just short of the Tennessee River, which boasts a flow about 15 times greater than the one Atlanta depends on for water.

Meanwhile, other politicians have suggested doing a feeble horse trading for the big water rights: Georgia could swap a high-speed rail line link to Chattanooga in exchange for access to the river.

Either way, Dade County’s tantalizing proximity to the river figures to give the county a main role in the negotiations.

County leaders are already putting plans in motion. They signed an agreement with a take in water firm in 2005 to begin scouting possible locations for a pumping station in Dade County and a potential pipeline route to supply parched north Georgia.

Tennessee officials have mocked Georgia’s efforts and even quipped they would take up arms in self defense.

If Georgia fails in its long-shot bid to move the state note, engineers are also preparing a backup plan to tap the aquifers underlying the region around the river.

Water negotiations could bring changes to this rural backwater, where the quickest route from Atlanta still runs end Tennessee and residents still wear their independence as a badge of honor.

“I’ve always enjoyed growing up here. Being cut off from the rest of the state didn’t bother me at all,” says Larry Case, a 59-year-old who owns Case Hardware Store on the town square.

“We kind of had a county of our own and did our own thing,” he says. “It’s probably because of the geographic area. It was so hard to get anywhere else, we became that way. They relate me the area was settled by horse thieves and criminals and they didn’t insufficiency interference up here.”

(CBS)Founded in 1837, the county was initially dotted with families who toiled in coal mines and others who won land lotteries to settle Georgia’s northern reaches.

The “independent” label wasn’t born until 1860, when the South inched toward Civil War. Locals say a state representative from Dade County, frustrated with the slow pace of secession, vowed that Dade all through itself would secede from the Union - and Georgia.

Historians declare it didn’t happen, but some county residents celebrate it as certainty.

Lately, though, they’ve had to fight to attract attention from the rest of Georgia.

Brandon says Georgia’s failure to declare the county a disaster area after a particularly strong storm 20 years ago led to an aborted modern-day movement to secede. And many were miffed by a recent currency oversight: A close look at the U.S. Mint’s Georgia quarter reveals a missing corner where Dade County should be.

The county’s main industry is now manufacturing, and it is home to a growing number of retirees and hang gliders who seek the fresh mountain behavior and sweeping vistas.

Economic downturn, though, has hit hard. County sales tax is down 20 percent before this last year, says county clerk Don Townsend. It lends urgency to the object of trust of more residents that the water fight will breathe new life into the economy.

“People are intrigued, but they’re realistic. The chances of it changing the borders are slim, no more than you could get some concessions,” says Eddy Gifford, who has owned the Dade master stroke of policy Sentinel for 24 years. “Worst case scenario, you’d think you could drill a well and tap into the water source.”

The section of Dade County closest to the Tennessee line is divide off even by Dade County standards.

Getting there takes a 20-minute drive from the county’s seat in Trenton, around a bulbous mountain, through Tennessee and into a flat, grassy area where the river dips just a small in number feet north of the case line.

Residents of the section nearest to the river don’t get water, electricity or fire protection from Georgia. They rely mostly on Tennessee roads to go shopping. Police must drive the similar 20-minute route from their headquarters in Trenton, and school buses don’t wander this neck of the woods.

“They don’t have hardly anything - they don’t even have dog catchers,” quips Jerry Body, a 66-year-old Georgia resident whose mailing address is in Tennessee.

Like the rest of the county, though, Brandon says this neglected stretch could one day be one of Georgia’s most important plots of land.

“You can say what you want, but in the end you know what the intent was when they drew the lines: to give Georgia access to the Tennessee River,” he says.