State budget includes money for Burke. McDowell business megasite

On Monday, Burke and state officials are expected to announce a $35.8 million allocation in the state budget to Burke Development Inc. for a business megasite that will be in both Burke and McDowell counties. N.C. Speaker of the House Tim Moore, R-111, is expected to be in Burke County on Monday for the announcement.

The megasite will be a total of 1,343.44 acres, with about 200 acres in McDowell County and the remainder of the property located in Burke County. It is located off Interstate 40, Exit 94.

Alan Wood, president and CEO of BDI, said $12.3 million of the allocation will be for water and sewer on the property and the other $23.5 million will be used for purchase of the land and development of the site.

Burke County has the only potential megasite in western North Carolina, said Burke County Manager Brian Epley. He said it could become the economic catalyst for the next 15 to 20 years in the region.

Epley said the world of economic development is changing rapidly. That means bigger projects, he said.

While the $35.8 million is a lot of money, it’s just the starting point for creating the megasite, Wood said.

“It’s very expensive to develop a site of this size,” Wood said. “So we will be very jealous of how we market this and who our end targets are, because it’s a one-off. Once we use this, once we find that right person, once we find that right company, the odds of putting together something of this magnitude again in western North Carolina, and here specifically, are very, very rare.”

He said they will make sure the end user is a good partner, a good steward of that property, and it’s to the best advantage of the people of Burke County and the community.

Wood said he could see it being one user or he said he can see three or four large users for the property.

Epley said they are going to be very selective with who the end user is. That means making sure it offers a high number of jobs, is a sustainable company, not a startup, and to make sure that the wage is higher than the average wage in Burke County. He said the average county yearly wage is in the $40,000 range.

Epley said this is their one shot to really challenge the status quo and try to get something that may offer an average yearly wage of $75,000 or $80,000 and a massive tax base.

While Wood and Epley said there are no potential companies ready to locate to the site, they hinted at what it could potentially attract.

Wood talked about what is going on in the Southeast with major car corporations. He said Scout Motors has announced an electric vehicle manufacturing site in Columbia, South Carolina; Toyota is building a battery manufacturing facility in Greensboro; Vietnam automaker VinFast is building a facility in Chatham County; BMW just announced a $2 billion expansion for electric vehicles in Greenville; Volkswagen is set in Chattanooga, Tennessee; Mercedes is six hours down the road; and Ford just put a major electric vehicle manufacturing facility in Tennessee and battery plants in Kentucky, according to information from Ford.

In addition, Epley said the reason those manufacturers are locating in the Southeast is because there is a company, Albemarle Corporation, that plans to reopen what is believed to be one of the largest lithium mines in Kings Mountain. Lithium is used to make electric batteries. According to a Sept. 28 story from WRAL, Albemarle and Caterpillar signed an agreement to develop Albemarle’s lithium mine site in Kings Mountain. WRAL says the Department of Defense has committed $90 million to revive the mine, which closed in 1988.

Wood said the purest and best form of mica, which is a component of the batteries, is mined in western North Carolina.

“So I’m not saying that either one of those is the end-all,” Wood said. “But I just think that looking around the state, looking at what’s going on, talking with the developers, the recruiters here, talking with site consultants, all over the Southeast, there are more large projects sitting right now than there are sites. And there are very, very few good sites. Those are gone.”

Wood said there is still work to do concerning the site, but it is undeveloped land that is clean, with no cultural or environmental issues or any protected species.

He said the site is right off I-40, water and sewer are nearby, Duke Energy has electrical infrastructure nearby and Norfolk Southern has a main line that runs along the northern border of the site.

Wood said they will work to remove everything they can think of that would be an issue for a potential end-user of the site.

“It’s like shining an apple,” Wood said. “You only get one shot at having a nice shiny apple and promoting this thing the first time. And it doesn’t mean you’re going to sell it the first time but once it gets out there two, three, four, five years, everybody’s seen it. So we want to make sure when we have it polished and ready to go, that it is truly polished and ready to go.”

Epley said the megasite has the opportunity to transform economic development in Burke County.

“Whether it’s one large company or multiple midsize companies, It will, without question, be the largest center tax base investment and the largest job creation component in the history of Burke County,” Epley said. “And in leveraging the state to help us make that a reality and trust in those relationships, it’s good policy work by our board of commissioners.”