Silgan Plastic gets $38 million incentive

FORT SMITH — City directors Monday cast a $38 million lure in hopes of landing a new industry to generate jobs and give a boost to the local economy.

The directors, in a special meeting, passed a resolution of intent to issue $38 million in industrial development revenue bonds to Silgan Plastic Food Containers Corp. if the company would move to Fort Smith and build a 100,000-squarefoot plant that would employ 150 workers.

Silgan Holdings Inc., Silgan Plastic Food Containers Corp.’s parent company based in Stamford, Conn., had more than $3.6 billion in net sales last year, according to its website. It is a leader in manufacturing metal and plastic food containers.

Fort Smith Regional Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Tim Allen told directors the company has more than 100 manufacturing plants worldwide.

“We have a chance of locating a really world-class company in Fort Smith,” Allen said.

Allen said the resolutions the directors passed

Monday were incentives to persuade Silgan to move to Fort Smith. The governor’s office and the Arkansas Economic Development Commission were partnering with the city on the project that has been in the works for about a year.

Allen said last week Fort Smith was competing with several other cities around the country for the Silgan manufacturing plant.

The industrial development revenue bond resolution

said $9.5 million of the $38 million would be spent on real property and $28.5 million would be spent on facilities. Allen told directors Silgan was looking for about a 15-acre site in Fort Smith.

The directors also approved a resolution to participate in the tax-back program, formally the Consolidated Incentive Act of 2003, that would refund state and local taxes Silgan would otherwise pay in purchasing equipment and materials needed for construction of the new plant.

Silgan initially was referred

to as “Project Platinum” on drafts of the bond issue resolution and tax back resolution. Allen and city officials would not identify the company last week when Monday’s special meeting was announced because of nondisclosure agreements they signed.

Silgan had to be identified Monday because the company’s name had to appear on the resolutions the directors considered.

The resolution for the bonds says Silgan would be interested in moving to Fort Smith “if permanent financing for the project can be provided through the issuance of revenue bonds under the authority of the act.”

The act the resolution referred to was the Municipalities and Counties Industrial Development Revenue Bond Law.

Even though the city issued the bonds, Silgan, not the city, would be responsible for repaying them. Silgan would benefit under the program by being allowed, for 10 years, to pay 50 percent of the property tax amount it would otherwise have to pay if it were not participating in the bond program.