Oconee County industrial park work getting under way

WALHALLA Land clearing is already under way and earth moving should begin Monday at Oconee County's next major industrial park, Oconee officials said Friday.

Some of the preparations on the site off S.C. 11 in the Richland community will involve lowering the levels of some of the property perhaps as much as 20 feet, according to Russell Johnson, project and marketing manager with the Oconee County Economic Development Commission.

Richard Blackwell, county economic development director, said the county is getting ready to meet some industry deadlines.

"Lots of people are talking about Oconee County and how aggressive we are about preparing for the future," Blackwell said.

The master plan for the roughly 400-acre park calls for eight industrial sites, which Blackwell said the county will seek to prepare as certified industrial sites, increasing their marketability.

In October the County Council committed $2.5 million to begin the first phase of the park's development in view of an industrial prospect that had already showed interest in locating to the site.

The Phase I development was moved up months ahead of a rough schedule outlined by county administrator Scott Moulder earlier this year because officials say a yet-unnamed advanced material manufacturer could commit to locating at the site if it can be prepared to fit the manufacturer's own timetable.

According to Moulder, the company "wants to be up and running by the first quarter of 2014."

County officials said the manufacturer was interested in the site's planned 300,000-square-foot pad and the total investment was estimated at about $10 million and would lead to about 100 jobs. The initial plant size would be about 100,000 square feet.

The 54-acre Phase I tract is intended to have industrial sites of 300,000 square feet, 100,000 square feet and 50,000 square feet. The plans also call for installing over a half-mile each of 8-inch waterlines and 10-inch gravity-flow sewer lines, as well as over 2,900 feet of 28-feet-wide asphalt roadway.

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Oconee County industrial park work getting under way