First let me say I’m neither in favor of or against bringing a meat packing plant to Whitehall. But I have seen what bringing a large meat packing plant to Lexington, Nebraska brought to that quiet, medium-sized town since it opened in 1990. Make no mistake, it brought a lot of business to the town that wasn’t there before but it also brought a lot of changes — some good and some not so good. Isn’t that the way it usually works?
The town saw a significant increase in population that created a mini-housing boom. New businesses opened, not just more of the same but new ones that offered jobs in fields that weren’t there before. New skills were learned and taught. New schools were built as well as new hospital additions. More doctors, teachers and police were hired.
Since many of the new people arrived from countries to the south of the United States, those new medical, teaching and police personnel had to speak other languages than English and existing personnel had to get up to speed. In particular, police, teachers and hospital personnel were hit the hardest with a substantial influx of people they couldn’t readily communicate with and who were used to doing things quite differently than long-term residents, and sometimes those differences caused conflicts.
