Entering his fourth year as Bedford County mayor, Chad Graham recently explained the need for a “culture change” in the county. Graham grew up about a mile outside Bell Buckle.  

“It was a close-knit community―everybody knew everybody,” he said, while economically and socially, everybody was similar and the “apparent divides” we see today were not prevalent.  

His family worked technical careers: his grandmother retired from the box plant; his grandfather worked with the highway department; and his dad was a machinist with Schmiede. Graham said it somewhat influenced his decision to go into the technical career of becoming a paramedic.  

Education is key  

More than anything, his parents encouraged him to get an education.  

“There’s no question that education is the key to getting out of poverty or raising your standard of living for both yourself and your family,” Graham said.  

Even though he said he “learned more out of school than in,” the basic K-12 education served as a foundation. Graham graduated from Cascade High School, with around 30 other students, in 1985. He eventually attended the University of Alabama where he studied paramedic emergency services as he was always interested in public safety and “wanted to give the patient the best outcome.”  

Graham went on to become the director of Bedford County Emergency Medical Services from 1997 to 2014. Historically, those directors have a “shelf life of 5 years,” he said.  

Even though politics and EMS may seem unrelated, Graham said, “I think it’s one of the things that helps me today in the challenges we face because I worked for Bedford County as an employee...as well as in leadership.”  

Graham said he is a “product of the Bedford County school system,” and has worked within the county his entire career. That path of educating students then providing local jobs is one of his goals as mayor.  

“We should always be striving to improve who we are and what we do,” Graham said. “People are more educated than we’ve ever been, but we have less ability to fend for ourselves than we ever have. And now here we are in the 2020s and we’re saying we can’t find people to work on your air conditioning, we can’t find people to work on an electronic vehicle.”  

That’s the catalyst for going “back to the basics” in education. On a higher education level, the new Tennessee College of Applied Technology facility in Shelbyville will affect future generations by providing the opportunity for them learn the much-needed technical skills of local industry.  

It is part of the “culture change” Graham emphasized — that is, asking commissioners to have faith in investments that may not have immediate results.  

“We have the daily things that we have to do to make sure business happens, but it’s powerful whenever we can make a difference into the future with things that we know will leave it better than when we found it,” he said.  

“It’s going to take a culture change, and it’s going to take people making hard decisions.”  

Robust industry  

As the County works on the education side, the focus has also shifted to providing jobs for those young professionals the County essentially creates.  

“The things that are going to bring them here — the ones that can be that entrepreneur or business professional — is you have to have a strong education system...and we have to have industry,” Graham said.  

“Not that we sell out to urban,” he said. “You know, we want to keep the rural setting where we can. We want to be respectful of tradition in every way we can.”  

The challenge lies, Graham said, in recruiting industries. That begins with reworking the “economic model” of Bedford.  

Surrounding counties have their competing assets: Coffee County has I-24 running through it; Maury County is attracting auto industries; and Rutherford has all the amenities to attract young professionals.  

Now, the goal is not for Bedford to become those other counties, Graham said. Instead, industries looking to come to Bedford need assets like direct access to U.S. 231 and robust gas, sewer, and water to support their endeavors, Graham said.  

“They want to see investments now, not just promises,” Graham said. It’s one of the reasons why construction of a “spec building” (essentially, an example industry building) will begin on the 231 North Business Park in spring.  

But, “The county is not in the market for hiring,” Graham said.  

For example, Bedford is losing young professionals to Rutherford and Williamson counties who pay more in positions from emergency services to public school teachers.  

“If we don’t continue to strive to have market-value for what we’re paying for those positions...we’re not going to hire those people,” he said.  

There are some practical things the county can do to further alter the economic model.  

Using his background in emergency medical services, Graham said there needs to be a “culture change” in how equipment is purchased. Graham said the county uses equipment until it’s “non-functional” and then they have to buy tens of thousands of dollars of new equipment.  

“You wouldn’t do that in business, so we shouldn’t do it in government,” he said.  

Graham said he would like the County to predict items needed and come up with funding models early on, so taxes don’t have to be raised.  

Uplifting everybody  

“Now, having a Publix, or a Chick-fil-a, or a Puckett’s — any of those things that would help enrich the nightlife, or the downtown, or the daily quality of your options — are important and good. But that’s not really why people are ultimately going to move here,” Graham said.  

Graham said he wants to enrich Bedford County to lift “everybody,” not just bring in high-end people.  

“I was always told growing up, don’t forget where you come from,” Graham said. “I’m not trying to displace people that have needs. I’m trying to help them. And education is how we help them. Ultimately, this is my community. I want my grandbabies to grow up in Bedford. Unfortunately, we’re in that ‘building time’... and I hope that I’m around long enough to show you that we can cash-in on the big investments...But if not, I’m satisfied that we’re leaving it better than we found it.”