Location chosen for steel plant


March 8, 2008 at 12:30a.m.

Location chosen for steel plant

The plant is expected to employ 1,000 eventually.

STAFF/WIRE REPORT

UNION CITY, Tenn. (AP) — A Warren-based company has chosen Blytheville, Ark., for a new $500 million steel mill over a site in northwestern Tennessee.

The Union City Daily Messenger reported Thursday that the states were competing for the Warren Fabricating and Machining Corp. plant with tax incentive packages.

The project includes a steel mill plant, a fabrication shop, a heat treatment facility and a melt shop that would eventually employ up to 1,000 people.

The company notified Tennessee last month that it had picked Blytheville over the Cates Landing economic development project on the Mississippi River near Tiptonville, state economic administrator Kingsley Brock told the Daily Messenger.

Calls to the company by the Associated Press on Thursday were not returned. A secretary said Friday that the company would have no comment. The company has plants in Hubbard and Niles as well as Warren.

A spokesman for Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe said earlier Thursday that he couldn’t comment on whether a steel plant was headed to the state.

Joe Holmes, a spokesman for the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, said his agency doesn’t discuss pending projects until after a company announces them. He said he did not know of any pending economic development announcements.

Economic development officials said Tennessee’s incentive package, valued at about $219 million, included tax abatement, job tax credits, job training as well as funds for infrastructure. Brock said local, state and federal officials were involved in the campaign.

Chamber of Commerce officials in Blytheville didn’t respond to the newspaper’s request for an interview about its incentives.

According to its Web site, Warren Fabricating and Machining Corp. manufactures large steel fabrications and heavy machining. The main industries it serves are surface mining equipment, steel mills, power generation and large press manufacturers.