http://www.marshallnewsmessenger.com/news/content/news/stories/2005/10/11/20051011MARMECARTITAN.html

Development group helps Marshall economy prosper

Weatherford International moving to Marshall
By MIKE ELSWICK
Managing Editor

Weatherford International Inc. should start work on a new $1.5 million facility in Marshall Business Park within 60 days on an operation that should represent a local investment of $30 million within three years and have an annual payroll estimated at $2.5 million for at least 60 employees.

That news came after the board of Marshall Economic Development Corp. approved a $350,000 incentive package during a special meeting Tuesday afternoon. After the MEDCO board met and approved the package at 4:30 p.m., the Marshall City Commission held a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. also to approve the item.

The city commission was required to add its approval since the incentive package involved more than $50,000 in city funds.

MEDCO board member Rusty Howell, who had been working with Weatherford officials for more than a year, said the average position will pay $57,000 a year plus benefits. The Marshall site is expected to employ at least 40 full time positions within the first year, representing a local payroll of more than $1 million.

"This is a significant development for our community," Howell said. "Weatherford is a dynamic, rapidly growing company and we look forward to playing an important role in their growth."

The 14-acre Weatherford site in Marshall Industrial Park will be inside the Marshall city limits meaning the city could reap at least an estimated $55,000 annually in property taxes, according to City Manager Frank Johnson. Depending upon what portion of the company's sales and services were subject to sales tax, he said that could add another estimated $60,000 to $80,000 a year in city revenues.

Johnson said besides the city's share of property taxes the tax rolls of both Harrison County and Marshall Independent School District should benefit.

Howell said by Weatherford's third year in operations locally the company is expected to create at least 60 local jobs. The company's investment by the end of the first year in rolling stock, payroll, facilities and inventory is expected to be at least $10.8 million and could be as much as $16 million, he said.

Mayor Ed Smith lauded the efforts of Howell and MEDCO.

"Anyway you look at it, this is a good deal for Marshall," Smith said. "We appreciated the time and effort you have put into this."

Smith said MEDCO's efforts in securing new industry, jobs and capital investment for the Marshall area in recent months is unprecedented in MEDCO's history. The city commission unanimously approved its motion to allow MEDCO to spend the incentive funds.

Howell said the incentive package will allow Weatherford to lease the industrial park site for a token $1 for three years. At the end of that period, Weatherford is scheduled to pay back $129,000 to MEDCO, which will make MEDCO's net investment $221,000, he said.

"We're not giving them anything else," he said. "There are no tax abatements, no job creation credits."

Louis Brock Sr., chairman of the MEDCO board, said the securing of Weatherford represents the best return on investment of any MEDCO incentive package.

"This will have the best return of the city of anything we've done," Brock said. "I know TSTC (Texas State Technical College) is a high dollar investment but this one will return money to city coffers."

Brock also thanked the on-going work that Howell has done to bring the new industry to Marshall.

"We owe him a big round of thanks because it is through his diligent work over more than a year that Weatherford is coming here," Brock said. He said Howell has paid his own expenses on the city's behalf, including trips to Houston to visit with Weatherford executives, without asking to be reimbursed, Brock said.

The Marshall site will be a Weatherford open stimulation service center where oil and natural gas well frac trucks and equipment will be based, Howell said.

Last June Weatherford officials had tentatively committed to open the service center in Longview. While no one from Weatherford was present at the meetings in Marshall Tuesday, a prepared statement said their decision to move from Longview to Marshall was based on Marshall being a hub of fracturing activity in East Texas and Northern Louisiana, the area's strong labor pool, reasonable cost of living, and the incentives MEDCO offered, according to John M. Jameson, vice president of operations for Weatherford Completion Systems.

"The addition of this new stimulation service center underscores our commitment to and belief in the long-term growth and viability of the oil and gas business in this region," Jameson said in a press release. Weatherford already has a strong presence in East Texas with five service centers and four manufacturing facilities, he said.

"Rusty Howell was very influential in our decision to choose Marshall," Jameson said. "We evaluated several communities in the area and he, along with the other council members, helped convince us that Marshall was the best fit for our needs today and in the future. The synergy is there."

In a story published last June, Weatherford officials indicated they had verbally accepted an offer by Longview Economic Development Corp. to provide up to $400,000 in incentives. Weatherford representatives told LEDCO at that time they needed to review the details of the contract before giving a final approval.

Howell has been working closely with Weatherford since then to help convince them to go with the Marshall option, MEDCO officials said.

Development group helps Marshall economy prosper
By MIKE ELSWICK
MARSHALL - Success has been the name of the game for this city's economic development agency in the decade that Marshall taxpayers have been footing the bill to help grow business here.

Rusty Howell, chairman of Marshall Economic Development Corp., said Marshall's investment in the agency is paying big dividends and should reap even more. MEDCO is funded by a half-cent sales tax approved by city voters in the early 1990s.

Howell cites several projects as evidence that MEDCO is bringing jobs, increased tax revenues and capital investment to the city.

Texas State Technical College, an expanding Blue Cross Blue Shield claims processing center and a $400 million investment by Entergy in a new electric generating plant are among the projects MEDCO has helped attract to Marshall, Howell said. As important as those projects are, however, he said one of MEDCO's most important recent decisions might have been placing Lou Ann Nisbett in MEDCO's top job as executive director.

Though Nisbett is new to her position, she is not new at working to improve Marshall, Howell said. She was the city's business development coordinator for more than three years before taking a job about two years ago as business retention specialist for the Longview Economic Development Corp.

Nisbett started her job at MEDCO on March 1. Howell said an important part of her duties will be working with present business and industry to ensure that MEDCO is meeting their growth needs. Nisbett said her goal is to personally meet with representatives of all Marshall industries by January.

"Statistics show that 80 percent of a community's growth comes from within," she said. "This means that most of our growth comes from our local industries and only 20 percent from new prospects."

She said last week that she has already visited with 16 companies in her first weeks on the job.

"Several are anticipating expansions, and just about everyone I talked with speaks highly of the quality of the work force in Marshall," she said.

Nisbett said that in spite of the national recession and economic slowdown since September's terrorist attacks, Marshall companies as a whole have continued to expand.

Blue Cross, which MEDCO helped bring to Marshall in 1997, recently announced plans to expand its Marshall Mall site and add 125 jobs, Nisbett said. The company employs about 418 and expects to have 543 later this year. The expansion will allow the company to accommodate up to 650 employees.

One of MEDCO's earliest projects, helping recruit TSTC to the city, also continues to grow, Howell said. The TSTC campus has new dormitories under construction and plans to add a new administration building and library, he said.

Nisbett said another MEDCO-assisted project, the acquisition of the former Woodlawn Abrasives by Black and Decker and the expansion of those operations, is growing. Black and Decker purchased the company in 1999 and built a new plant in the Marshall Business Park.

Employment in the past three years has more than doubled, going from about 40 to 83 workers, Nisbett said. Black and Decker built a 33,000-square-foot building that can be expanded to 110,000 square feet.

Of the Entergy project, Howell said few people realize the natural gas-fired power plant will be able to produce nearly as much electricity as AEP/Southwestern Electric's Pirkey Power Plant, also in Harrison County. But it will do so with only 30 to 40 employees, he said.

"This plant is going to have a significant impact on this community for years to come," Howell said. "The Marshall school system alone will receive over $60 million in the next 20 years from increased property taxes."

During the next 20 years Harrison County's tax rolls will receive an estimated $11 million boost from Entergy, Howell said.

Howell, who has been on MEDCO's board for much of its history, said that when it was organized officials knew they would have to be aggressive to compete with larger neighboring cities, Shreveport to the east and Longview to the west.

"We decided the only way we could compete was by offering cheap land," Howell said. MEDCO acquired the land for TSTC and for the business park and has used land as an incentive to lure new business.

The business park has 11 tenants, and MEDCO recently moved ahead with about $1 million in infrastructure work that will open up another 250 acres for development, Nisbett said.

MEDCO has also been involved in two successful business incubators, Nisbett said. Now the Business Development Center and the Center for Applied Technology at TSTC have occupancy rates in the high 90 percent range, she said.

The business incubators assist startup and newer companies by providing office space, shared services such as receptionist, and shared office and communication equipment, Nisbett said.

"They can really help keep costs down for new businesses," she said.

Howell said MEDCO's momentum, combined with city efforts to upgrade infrastructure including streets, sewage and drainage systems, should help position the city for positive growth.

Posted with permission by the Longview News-Journal
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