Crossville City Council Tuesday donated a roughly 7-acre parcel in the city’s Interchange Business Park to the Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) Crossvile.

TCAT has already been using and maintaining the parcel for its commercial truck driving program, which is TCAT’s “largest output program,” according to a letter from TCAT Crossville President Cliff Wightman. He said TCAT Crossville has no room for expansion at its Miller Avenue location and has money for equipment and improvements but not for property purchase.

Wightman told the council in a letter that he thinks having TCAT on the site would “contribute as muck to the economy as a comparable sized industry” and that a TCAT campus would also help market the Interchange Business Park, near I-40 and Hwy. 127 North.

Wightman said that the truck driving program averages 70 graduates annually and can be doubled with an expansion. Most students are from Cumberland County, he said, and that truck drivers average $67,000 annually.

“A satellite campus is a big deal for TCAT Crossville,” Wightman said. TCAT Crossville is also looking at expanding into Bledsoe County to help with overcrowding at the Crossville campus.

City Manager Greg Wood said that the city often needs to train commercial drivers and suggested that council request “some (complimentary) slots” each year.

The council also accepted a property donation from TAP Publishing/Cosby Harrison Co.

The parcels are on Dunbar Street, adjacent to the TAP facility on Fourth Street, and according to property records are appraised at $20,000 and $5,000, respectively.

TAP/Harrison is dissolving and looking to get the property off its books.

Slightly complicating the donation is a narrow strip of property that separates the TAP parcels. Newly appointed city attorney Randy York told the council that he’s had no success in contacting the owners, listed in records as Randy Reagan and Holly L. Collins of White House, Tenn.

The property is appraised at $500 and has accumulated back taxes since 2012, now between $200 and $300, York said. He said the property will likely be sold for those back taxes at the end of the year.

Council member Rob Harrison abstained from the TAP vote.

In other action, the council:

APPROVED a mobile home variance for a property on Cook Road.

APPROVED new sidewalk along Neechum Street beside First United Methodist Church. First Methodist is looking to build a concrete retaining wall to help stop erosion of its playground and requested the city “meet that wall” with a sidewalk. Wood said the sidewalk would cost around $3,000. Harrison abstained from the vote.

APPROVED reduction of the speed limit on Old Mail Road between Miller Bypass and Adams Avenue to 25 mph, from 30 mph. Mayor James Mayberry said that he’d received complaints about construction trucks on the narrow street and had witnessed it himself.

APPROVED the consent agenda, a group of items that are considered as a whole. Council members retain the privilege of removing an item for separate consideration. No items were removed.

HEARD a report from Crossville-Cumberland County Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Ethan Hadley. Hadley said that the chamber had received an $18,000 grant from the Tennessee Department of Tourism Development. He told the council that Crossville-Cumberland County has risen to 15th in the state as far as tourism dollars spent here, up from 19th two years ago and 16th a year ago. He said some $170 million in direct tourism dollars are spent here.