Environmentalists, developers and residents met Thursday to comment on potential environmental impacts on redeveloping half of the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Muscle Shoals Reservation.

The public meeting at Muscle Shoals High School attracted a mix of people who have a stake in the redevelopment of the southern half of the reservation that has been publicly owned since 1918.

TVA officials are seeking commentary on a 452-page assessment of environmental impacts on redeveloping the property that contains a complex mix of wetlands, walking trails, historic buildings and slag heaps.

Dozens of residents attended and represented various interests in how to move forward with the property: complete preservation; development of a technical training school; film production center; and a mixture of industrial, commercial and office uses.

TVA officials stated in their environmental report that they favor a mixed use that includes industrial, commercial, retail, recreational and residential use.

TVA officials set up booths of various aspects that redevelopment could affect including air quality, aquatic biology and historic buildings.

“The thing I’m getting most from the public is jobs and economic development,” said David Bradford, Muscle Shoals mayor and director of the Northwest Alabama Cooperative District that is working to purchase the land.

“There’s enough property that can satisfy everybody,” Bradford said.

Cooperative officials are interested in developing the land for industrial, office and possibly commercial or entertainment uses, but no residential use, Bradford said.

“You have to have different types of property to market; this is a type of property that we would market that we don’t currently have,” Bradford said.

Environmentalists have said there is plenty of industrial and commercial land for development elsewhere.

Charles Rose, president of the Shoals Environmental Alliance, pulled out a marked copy of the report and pointed to one phrase that concerned him: “TVA proposes to dispose of this land where possible without use restriction other than those designed to protect TVA’s program interests or to meet legal or environmental requirements.”

Rose called the report vague and ambiguous and that restrictions would be conveyed after the land was sold.

“There are no protections afforded in this document other than what is afforded by state and federal law,” he said.

Rose said he favored industrial use of existing buildings in the reservation interior, but he was concerned with the protection of the peripheral area of wetlands and woodlands.

Gary Dan Williams, director of the Muscle Shoals Center for Technology, pitched his group’s idea of using the existing buildings for a technical magnet school.

Mike Curtis, a local musician and songwriter, came to pitch his group’s idea of a Branson-like music center for family-friendly complex of entertainment, sports, music and a potential film production center.

“Technical training could include the film industry,” Williams said.

Jack Agricola, a board member of the Alabama Chestnut Foundation and researcher into TVA’s forestry, met with Jon Riley, landscape architect, over by a map of the historic buildings in the reservation.

After asking several questions about how buildings would be prioritized for protection, Agricola got to the point: “Protect the whole thing; they’re all important in their own way,” he said.

The redevelopment threatens a four-acre site that researchers involved in the project say is crucial to developing blight resistant chestnut trees.

Agricola said the orchard was part of TVA’s legacy. “This is too important to lose history,” he said.

“There is often eligibility (of historic protection) associated with significant events,” Riley explained to Agricola.

Jessica Smith, of Sheffield, fired questions at Tony Hopson, a project manager for the environmental impact study.

She was puzzled why TVA preferred a mixed-use development compared with conservation since the public utility can’t make a profit.

She also questioned TVA’s statement that the sale of the property would decrease the its carbon footprint.

“The footprint would be taken over by whoever took over the property; that seemed disingenuous,” she said.

Smith wrote that she favored conservation of the reservation.

Trevor Stokes can be reached at 256-740-5728 or trevor.stokes@TimesDaily.com.