Economic
Development Newsletter
May/June 2005:
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Economic Development
Activity and Awards Highlight OOC’s Annual Meeting
Operation Oswego County held its 53rd annual
meeting in June.
George Joyce, president of the OOC board
of directors, emphasized the continuing significance of the manufacturing
sector to Oswego County’s economy as well as initiatives in
marketing and workforce development.
“As we look to the future, Operation
Oswego County’s efforts will continue to focus on helping
to make our existing businesses more competitive, helping to facilitate
investment and job creation/retention of our manufacturing base,
and continuing to promote and develop strategic initiatives to compete
for and attract new employers to our county,” Joyce said.
In 2004, projects assisted by OOC resulted
in the creation or retention of 493 jobs with over $65 million in
capital investment and 65 new, expanded or retained facilities.
OOC provided assistance to numerous projects
including:
- Novelis Corp. (Alcan)
invested more than $18 million for a tension leveler project and
casting center expansion. The projects were assisted by Empire
State Development grant funding of $700,000 facilitated by OOC;
- Sure-Lock Industries, LLC of
Red Creek relocated its hardwood flooring business to a 60,000-square-foot
building within the Oswego Warehousing compound on East Seneca
Street in the city of Oswego. The $1.4 million project created
16 jobs;
- Northeast Biofuels, LLC
initiated the acquisition of a 90-acre subdivision of Riverview
Business Park in Volney for a 100-million-gallon-per-year ethanol
production facility. The project is expected to create 60 jobs;
- As a result of being awarded Ben and Jerry’s
packaging business in 2004, Huhtamaki Consumer Packaging
expanded its operations and hired an additional 60 employees;
- Canal Commons is a revitalization
project in downtown Oswego which involves the acquisition and
renovation of 30,000 square feet for approximately 10 shops. Forty-five
jobs will be created;
- Northern Oswego County Health
Services, Inc. expanded its Pulaski Health Center facility
to improve the quality and accessibility of primary care, specialty
services and dental services. NOCHSI currently employs 80 and
served over 11,000 patients for a total of 37,000 annual visits
last year;
- Winter Harbor LLC, a
heated boat storage facility in Hastings, built a 40,000-square-foot
building to be used for boat storage, painting and repairs. The
expansion will create 28 jobs; and
- New York Chocolate & Confections
Company: an $850,000 HUD 108 loan was approved with assistance
from OOC to acquire four new refiners which will be integral to
expanding chocolate production capacity at the Fulton plant.
Three business organizations and a well-known
development leader were honored for significant contributions to
economic development and job creation in Oswego County.
The Ally Award for 2005 was presented to
Empire State Development, recognizing it as an
“ally” organization in the economic development process
in Oswego County. Over the last 10 years, ESD has provided funding
assistance of more than $6 million which has helped deliver more
than $74 million in private sector capital investment while enabling
job creation and retention of over 2,000 jobs at businesses including
Birds Eye Foods, Black Clawson, Crysteel, Empire Fresh-Cuts, Great
Lakes Veneer, Huhtamaki, Interface Solutions, Novelis Corp. and
Spear USA.
The Business Excellence Award for 2005 was
presented to Oswego County National Bank for its
significant financial support of small business development, for
its investment in the community by expanding to include seven branches
including five in Oswego County, for significant company growth
which necessitated the relocation and expansion of its corporate
headquarters and investment of more than $3 million to reutilize
a high-profile vacant property in Oswego.
The 2005 Jobs Award, recognizing significant
capital investment as well as job creation and retention, was presented
to New York Chocolate & Confections Company,
in recognition of its commitment to locate chocolate manufacturing
operations in Oswego County by investing $25 million and reutilizing
the former Nestle facility in Fulton and putting back to work more
than 70 full-time employees in 2004 with plans to grow to more than
300 as the company enters full-fledged production of chocolate products.
Nancy J. Bellow was honored
with the 2005 Martin Rose Economic Developer Merit Award for her
support of Oswego County’s workforce development initiatives
for more than 10 years as director of SUNY Oswego’s Center
for Business and Community Development and for serving as director
of the Workforce Development Board of Oswego County and spearheading
a strategic workforce development plan in 2004 to help address the
human resource challenges of industry clusters in Oswego County.
Bellow was also recognized for serving on numerous boards and committees
which play an integral role in economic development including OOC,
the Greater Oswego Chamber of Commerce, Women’s Network for
Entrepreneurial Training, Leadership Oswego County, Small Business
Development Center and Oswego Health.
The OOC board of directors also elected Paul
Kurtzman, executive director of Oswego Industries Inc, to the board.
Re-elected to another three-year term were Ronald Darrow, William
Galloway, Andrea McCabe, Louis Pettinelli, Bruce Phelps, Joseph
Russo, Corte Spencer, Lloyd “Buddy” Stemple, and Steven
Thomas.
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Heckethorn Honored
as “Volunteer of the Year”
The New York State Economic Development Council
(NYSEDC) named Dee Heckethorn its 2005 “Volunteer of the Year.”
Heckethorn is a retired commercial banker from Oswego who serves
as a member of the board of directors for Operation Oswego County.
NYSEDC is New York State’s principal
organization representing economic development professionals.
The “Volunteer of the Year” award is presented to an
individual whose leadership and dedication to community improvement
through quality, sustainable economic development has led to new
capital investment, helped create or retain jobs, and improved the
quality of life in the community and the state.
Heckethorn was nominated by OOC in recognition
of his work as an unpaid leader in more than a dozen organizations
in the community. He has been a board member of OOC since 1985,
and the County of Oswego Industrial Development Agency since 1984.
Additionally, he has served on the Workforce Development Board of
Oswego County, the Greater Oswego Chamber of Commerce and the Adirondack
North Country Association, which named Heckethorn its “Member
of the Year” in 1999. He also received the “Community
Leadership Award” from Leadership Oswego County in 1999.
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Treadwell Named
SBA “Financial Service Champion”
L. Michael Treadwell, executive director
of Operation Oswego County, received the 2005 “Financial Service
Champion” award from the U.S. Small Business Administration’s
34-county Syracuse district.
Treadwell was nominated by SUNY Oswego’s
Small Business Development Center which is co-sponsored by the SBA
and SUNY Oswego through the Center for Business and Community Development
.
“For the more than 20 years that Mike
has served as executive director of OOC, he has been a staunch advocate
for small business. Under his leadership, OOC became a SBA certified
development company and since then, OOC has facilitated over $8.6
million in SBA 504 loans,” said Nancy Bellow, executive director
of the CBCD.
Treadwell was instrumental in developing
the Oswego County Industrial Development Agency’s revolving
loan program which has provided over $13.5 million in loans to small
businesses in the county. He also developed the countywide Micro-Enterprise
Program which provides training and small, low-interest loans to
start-up businesses located in the county.
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OOC Wins Statewide
Awards
Operation Oswego County was recently recognized
with three awards for New York State Economic Development Council’s
(NYSEDC) 2005 marketing and promotional materials award competition.
OOC’s print advertisement for the “Power
for Progress” low-cost electrical energy program for new and
expanding businesses in Oswego County was awarded NYSEDC’s
top honor of “Best in Class.” The ad was created by
OOC and Steve Chirello Advertising to attract new business and create
jobs using low-cost power produced by Entergy Nuclear Northeast
at the James A. FitzPatrick Nuclear Power Plant in Scriba.
Honored with a “Certificate of Excellence”
was OOC’s website www.oswegocounty.org.
For its brochure titled “Here, Turnover
is a Good Thing,” OOC was awarded an honorable mention. The
publication was designed by Steve Chirello Advertising to showcase
OOC’s two small business incubator facilities, the Start-up
Facility in Phoenix, and the Oswego County Business Expansion Center
(BEC) in the city of Oswego.
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