Abatement OK’d for company to build in Warren

Hiring for the new company’s jobs isn’t likely to begin until 2010.

By Ed Runyan

WARREN — City and Trumbull County officials have approved a 75-percent abatement on property taxes for 10 years for Reinforcement Systems Corp., a start-up company planning to build a factory and employ 65 people on the city’s West Side within four years.

County commissioners approved the abatement Wednesday.

The company will construct a 60,000-square-foot factory across from the Austin Village Plaza on West Market Street on the west side of the Martin Luther King Avenue Southeast intersection.

The $20 million to $28 million that RSC plans to spend on the building, equipment and inventory is “one of the largest private-sector investments in the City of Warren in a long time,” said Walter Good, Youngstown-Warren Regional Chamber vice president for economic development, retention and expansion.

The company’s breakdown of investment includes $4 million to $6 million for building construction, $6 million to $8 million for machinery and equipment, $150,000 to $300,000 for fixtures and furniture, and $10 million to $14 million for inventory.

In exchange for having to pay only 25 percent of the property taxes on its building for 10 years, the company has pledged to have 25 employees its first year, 40 by its second year and 65 by its third year, said Michael Keys, Warren’s community development director.

The company will make reinforcements for the concrete industry, such as steel rebar and steel mesh.

After three years in business, the company expects to have a payroll of about $2.9 million annually, Good said, adding that the average pay will be around $40,000 per year.

About 55 of the jobs will be manufacturing positions, with about 10 others being management, clerical and administrative, Keys said. It will probably be sometime in 2010 before the company begins hiring, he added.

Construction on the plant will most likely begin late this year and take one year, Keys said.

The city rezoned the 16.5 acres of land industrial to accommodate the company. The land has never been used before, Keys said.

The company was attracted by the virgin land, close access to the Ohio Turnpike and the area’s well-developed but uncongested interstate highway system, Good noted.

Higher fuel prices might actually work in the Mahoning Valley’s favor, Good said, because its location within one day’s drive from New York and Chicago and the Carolinas makes it attractive from a transportation-cost standpoint, Good said.

runyan@vindy.com