The Pulaski County Council has begun the process of making two sites eligible for tax abatements. Council members approved preliminary resolutions Monday designating the JSI Steel property and a piece of land near the intersection of U.S. 421 and State Road 14 as economic revitalization areas.
Community Development Commission Executive Director Nathan Origer said JSI may be looking to request an abatement next month. “They are preparing to make some significant investment out at JSI, and their designation expired earlier this year,” he explained. “So we need to re-designate it and then set a time at the January meeting for a public hearing for that.”
Origer said the other proposed economic revitalization area is located on the southeast corner of U.S. 421 and State Road 14/County Road 200 South, just south of West Central Schools. A company is exploring the possibility of setting up a value-added agriculture business there, with the potential for up to 30 jobs. “That’s still slowly moving, but this is one step that we can take to have it taken care of,” Origer said. “Nobody will be coming for a tax abatement, I don’t think, in January, for a request for that one, but we’ll be able to have the ground ready to go and the worst thing happens, the property doesn’t sell, the project doesn’t happen there it’s just a mark on a piece of paper that says it’s eligible for tax abatements. There’s nothing invested in it from the county’s point of view. It’s just one step to make it all happen a little bit more smoothly if we get to that point.”
Council members will hold public hearings and decide whether to finalize the economic revitalization areas next month.
