Welcome to the Business Journal Archives
Search for articles below, or continue to the all new BusinessJournalDaily.com now.
Search
Port Authority Adopts $9M Budget to Support Development
By Dennis LaRueEAST LIVERPOOL, Ohio -- The $9 million budget adopted Monday night by the Columbiana County Port Authority reflects its role as midwife in economic development throughout the county.More than $7.5 million in state and federal grants, $1.13 million from rents, local sources and income for services provided, and $325,000 in miscellaneous sources, including utility surcharges to tenants constitute the 2005 budget the chief financial officer, Stephen Cooper, presented.Marketing chairman Charles Presley commended the chief executive officer, Tracy Drake, for keeping utility expenses under control, which includes passing on the rate increases to the authority's tenants at 1250 St. George Street, the Louthan (Ferro) building, and in Leetonia at the authority's World Trade Park.The authority's four full-time employees were granted an across the-board 3% pay raise. Drake did not receive a pay raise.The resolutions adopted reflect the progress made at the properties owned by the port authority, from the Intermodal Industrial Park, Wellsville, to the former NRM Refractory site outside Columbiana.The board agreed to pay another $21,250 to W.R. Coles and Associates, Nashville, Tenn., for the remaining design work needed for the pier and dock system at Intermodal park. Coles has designed the system from its inception amending the earlier fixed fee increases his compensation to $274,250. The port authority should advertise for bids in the marine structures at Intermodal in next month and for a conveyor system in July. Coles will oversee construction of the work he designed, Drake said.CMG Inc., owned by Cynthia M. Gadd, has formed a partnership with Soaring Eagle, Fifth Avenue, and will keep its electronic base in the space its has rented on St. George Street. CMG will pay monthly rent of $296.56, including a utility charge of $50, to the authority. "This is a success story for us," Drake told his board. "They're expanding with Soaring Eagle by creating a school to teach software applications to engineers," he said. Craig Newbold heads Soaring Eagle.GRS Holdings LLC was granted a lease in the Louthan (Ferro) Building at $695.25 per month, a figure that includes $139 for utility surcharges. GRS imports porcelain products, reassembles and repackages them here before shipping them to domestic customers throughout the United States.Buckeye Transfer Inc., Columbiana, "is another major success story," Drake told the board. The logistics and trucking firm "is working to create additional jobs in the aluminum business" at the brownfield site, Drake said.Buckeye's president, Lee W. Stoneburner, has spent more than $1 million on the former NRM buildings and hired more than 100, he noted. Stoneburner just bought another trucking company, Dark Trucking, that should bring more jobs to Columbiana County, the port authority CEO said.All this goes a long way to replacing the 200-plus jobs lost when NRM went out of business, he observed.Visit the Columbiana County Port Authority at www.ccpa-ohioriver.comContact Dennis LaRue at [email protected]"