Industrial development in Union County and beyond is generating revenue that can be used by the county to prepare for future development according to Union County Development Board Executive Director Andrena Powell-Baker.
The Union County Development Board has proposed that the county make itself more attractive to industry by making $3.3 million worth of improvements to three industrial sites:
• The Trakas industrial site where the improvements will include re-certification ($55,000), construction of an entrance ($150,000), installation of a building pad ($400,000), permitting ($50,000) and architectural plans for virtual building ($50,000) at a total of approximately $705,000.
• Commerce Park where 60,000-square-foot shell building which could be expanded to 120,000 square feet would be built along with a 60,000-square-foot building pad for possible expansion at a cost of approximately $2 million.
• The Midway Industrial Park where a roadway would be used for road extension at a cost of approximately $595,000.
Powell-Baker and Board Chairman Joe Nichols proposed these projects during a meeting with members of Union County Council and Union City Council in March at the Union County Advanced Technology Center. In their presentation, Powell-Baker and Nichols said that much of the funding for these projects would not come from the city or the county but through other funding sources including the Union County Economic Development Fund.
“The funds for the speculative building (in Commerce Park) come from the county economic development fund,” Powell-Baker said earlier this week. “These funds come from a portion of existing industrial taxes that are set aside for economic development.”
Powell-Baker pointed out that the county’s economic development funds are generated in part by the multi-county industrial park agreements it has entered into over the years with Spartanburg County. There are more than a dozen of these agreements, many of them covering industries that located in Spartanburg County including BMW and, most recently a health care facility operated by Spartanburg Rehabilitation Institute, Inc. and MPT of Spartanburg, LLC. Even though these industries are located in Spartanburg County, Union County receives one percent of the tax revenue they generate, part of which the county allocates for economic development projects like the spec building.
“That account is funded by industries who pay taxes outside of our county,” Powell-Baker said. “That’s one revenue stream we proposed we use for our speculative building.”
Another revenue source generated by industry that the county uses for economic development is from the fee-in-lieu of taxes agreements with industries that locate in Union County. The agreements are an economic development incentive that allows industries to pay a lower property tax rate for a certain period of time. Revenue from those agreements is also earmarked by the county for economic development projects such as those being proposed by the board at the county’s three industrial sites.
Other sources of funding for the improvements proposed by the board come from the public/private partnerships that have been formed over the years between the board, the county, and the city and private businesses and industries like Lockhart Power and Broad River Electric. Part of the funding for the Trakas improvements would come through Broad River Utilities tax credits while the road extension at the Midway Industrial Park would be paid for in part with Lockhart Power Utilities tax credits.
Powell-Baker said public/private partnerships like these have helped the county prepare for and facilitate industrial development in the past and can continue to do so in the future.
“Its through public/private partnerships that we’ve been successful making improvements to our industrial parks in the past,” Powell-Baker said. “There’s no reason why we shouldn’t go forward with that model.”
By Charles Warner, Staff Reporter with The Union Daily Times
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