On this episode of the Post Podcast Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams shares information about the Heart of America Development Corporation's land donation to the Microfactoy project.
Transcript:
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James Bell
The Heart of America Development Corporation has donated land for the Hays Microfactory. Grow Haye, Executive Director Doug Williams stops by to talk to us a little bit about the Heart of America group as well as that factory project. On this episode of the Post Podcast.
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
we had a donation of the land that the microfactory will be located on Heart of America development owns some property out in the commerce Parkway area surrounding Glassman corporation that development is one that heart of America developed and, and they were good enough to donate the lot at the corner of ninth and commerce Parkway to us to construct the microfactory on so that was that was great news.
James Bell
Absolutely, yeah, and these guys have been when we talk about the heart of America, and we're going to talk a little bit about today even, but they really are helping the community. And that's kind of their goal, right to help bring these projects to the marketplace, or heart of America,
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
which was started back in the 80s by a group of visionary people and visionary businesses who contributed some money and raise some capital and purchase some land out on what is now South commerce Parkway by the airport and started basically an industrial park. And they constructed the Sykes building early on and rented it to Sykes and they've been very active in commercial development for a long time. And you know, about a year and a half ago or so they got into the residential development as well with the Tallgrass second edition to the east of the technical college. So their their mission basically is to promote community development in Ellis County. And they have done a terrific job of that over gosh, almost 40 years.
James Bell
Incredible. We want to talk about some of the details of what they do and what they bring to the community. But let's talk first about this microfactory. We talked about it again a couple of weeks ago. And really it from from my recollection, the concept is kind of a co working space, but for industrial efforts, right?
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Basically, that's the concept. It's an incubator for manufacturing companies. And we received a base grant from the state of Kansas part of the ARPA money for $2.63 million to construct this 30,000 square foot micro factory, it'll be divided into 564, we don't really know yet, because we don't really know who's going to go in there. But it'll be split into sections. And we will we will offer it to prospective or existing manufacturers who are have a, maybe a guy's got a great idea, but he just doesn't have the room to operate and be efficient in his to develop his product, or a bigger company that wants to get a development of a new product off site. And they want a space to do it in. That's what this will be designed to do. It'll be constructed to be very manufacturer friendly, meaning there'll be a loading dock, there'll be high ceilings, high doors, the kinds of things that a manufacturer would need large electrical capability. And so hopefully, the concept is that we offer this at a at a bargain basement rent to these people for a few years. And then they develop their product, they grow their business, and then they move on to their own building, hopefully in the heart of America development where there will be some additional lots and and we roll the next one in. So it's a it's kind of an endowment for a long, long time. And we hope to really enhance the manufacturing capability within Ellis County because this is an area that we don't have an awful lot of we do have some manufacturing in Ellis County, obviously with the EnerSys and Hess and cross manufacturing and several others, but we don't have as much as we would like to have and typically with with manufacturers come good paying jobs. And, of course, workforce is the issue right now. But it hasn't always been and won't always be. And so we need to keep developing companies that are going to employ people and pay good wages.
James Bell
You know, and when I think when when, until very recently, we started talking about this microfactory project I when we when I thought about, you know, manufacturing, I thought about some of the companies you talked about, like Hass, or Rand says those giant companies that do employ a lot of people, but I've also come to realize that there's a lot of small manufacturer small entrepreneurs out here that maybe here's a great example down in lacrosse, the guy that they developed the flame throwers for agricultural use, you know, it's probably not huge operation. I don't know how many people work down there, but I can't imagine it's, you know, more than 20 or so. And this is a perfect project to help bring those people to Hays where we've also already done such a great job on the white collar side.
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Exactly. We need to promote manufacturing small manufacturing become big manufacturers. I use this example. If you looked at what they and has his operation in 1990 or 91. relative to what it is today. We want to find the next Dan has who can come in and has an idea or a concept and start developing products need some space to do it in needs some assistance perhaps in going through a patenting process? or what have you, we have a relationship with the technology development institute in Manhattan. And that's what they do they prototype products to help an inventor or a manufacturer patent those products. And so it'll be it'll be the incubator for that type of thing. And we're looking forward to it. I think it'll I think it'll have a big impact over a long, long period of time in our community, because it'll be a building, it'll be there for 50 plus years, for sure.
James Bell
Yeah. And, you know, I think it might also, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but help offset some of those manufacturing operations. Like I think about meat processing, the things that we can't bring to here because of either the geography or in this case, you know, water issues.
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
One of the reasons that we don't have a lot of manufacturing in Ellis County is because of some water restrictions. And so some things are just not going to work well here that are large water users. So small manufacturers make more sense. They're typically not big water users. And if we can diversify our economy with multiple small manufacturers, I take that over one large one, you go down to like Salina And historically, they've had large manufacturers down there, Philips Lighting, the what is now Kubota, Tony's pizza, I mean, they manufacture pizzas and food and that type of thing. And Kubota manufactures farm equipment and things and, and they employ, like 1300 people and those type of operations, we're not really looking for that we wouldn't have the workforce to meet that requirement either. But we can sure build our own and then gradually put companies in there that will go from two or three or four employees up to 15 or 20, and then hopefully, move out onto their own building and end up with the two or 300.
James Bell
You know, going back to the heart of America piece on this, you know, that organization, I'm kind of curious, like, how do they come to the decisions to fund like, I like a project like this, like did the land I think you said that they already own the land, or they just donated it to you. But you know, even thinking about the residential project, like how do they make those decisions?
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Well, they have a board of directors that looks at projects and keeping in mind their mission to promote community development. And they see that, you know, that's why they purchased these land purchases they've made both on South commerce Parkway as well as the heart of America edition, by Glassman Corporation. They look for ways that they can promote growth and development. And so a couple years ago, we visited with them and we said, you know, we, historically they had been a commercial developer or industrial developer, you know, they've had land for that use. But our comment was, you know, if we don't solve our housing problem in Hayes, we're not going to have any employees to go into those commercial enterprises. And they were good enough to step up to the plate and invest a lot of money into this housing development, which is going very well so far. So it's turned out well, but so they they have been open to look at different things, but at the bar at the base of it all, is that their interest in community growth and development in our community, and and they've really stepped up in any number of occasions and done that.
James Bell
Yeah, I you know, I wonder how normal is this in municipalities, especially out here in western Kansas, where they have an organization like this a nonprofit that kind of helps spur that economic growth?
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
I think it's, it's fairly normal in different ways. A lot of times the municipality itself will own an industrial park, the city will make an investment or the county will make an investment in an industrial park and develop it and, and put the infrastructure in place so that companies can come in there and, and build a building and start less common with a not for profit, like heart of America. The beauty of the heart of America deal is we've we've partnered very well with the city. You've got gro Hayes, Heart of America and the city of Hades or the city of Ellis or wherever it might be that jointly work towards these things. And that makes it a lot easier to make some things happen when you when you've got that many people with a vested interest on a positive outcome.
James Bell
Yeah, and we've talked a lot about the collaborative efforts between you know, Hayes and Ellis County and Ellis County in trigo. County, and really the whole area and everybody has to work together to make this thing work, or we're all going to be in troubled long run, right?
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Well, absolutely. I mean, we're all joined at the hip in one way or another. I know each community has their own issues. Each community would like to have their own growth and some retail and some jobs and whatnot, I understand that housing. But at the end of the day, all of us are in this western Kansas ecosystem for lack of a better term. And what's good for Joaquina is good for Hayes. What's good for Hayes is good for wall Keaney, you know, or Ellis or Victoria or Russell, whatever it might be. We are very closely tied together.
James Bell
Yeah, no, I don't think we really actually talked about this, but the heart of America or the heart of America, the group, are they just a MOS county or just hates
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Ellis County? Okay, so their mission is to promote development in Ellis County. And they've they've helped way back when I think they had some role in the wheelchairs a Kansas move to Ellis. When they expanded from I believe lacrosse to Ellis, I was a little before my time in this position. But they were they were involved with that, as was our organization. And so Ellis County as a whole, they they want to promote development throughout Ellis County, and they don't go outside the Ellis County borders, but they do it. They do go beyond the Hayes borders for sure.
James Bell
Okay. And again, as part of that collaborative effort, you know, what's good for us is good for Phillips County and Brooks County,
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
believe it is?
James Bell
Well, you know, Doug, I don't really have anything else on the heart of America thing. I wonder if you have any other last thoughts or anything else we want to talk about in terms of that microfactory project?
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
Well, you know, I think for people to understand it better, we've kind of described what it is, the financial piece is somewhat interesting, you know, the state of Kansas, Department of Commerce put out these base grant applications and we and 417. Others applied, believe they granted 33, so we're very fortunate to receive it. But the project is about three and a half million dollars. And so the state wants a match from the organization is doing it. And in the case of gro Hayes, they wanted to match it from us. So of 26%, which is about seven or 800 $900,000. And factor that into the fact that we don't really know where construction costs are for sure today, because it's really a moving target. That's why a donation like the land donation from Heart of America is so important because we're going to scramble to to come up with that additional match money, we may be able to get some grants, we may be able to borrow it, whatever the case might be, we felt it was too important not to happen, when we've got the opportunity to get this amount of funding from from a grant from the state. We're just going to make it happen. And so we've we've dug in and done that, and we're in the process of applying for some other grants and that kind of thing. And, and hopefully those will come through but we're, we're burning our ships on the shore on this one, we're going full speed ahead and going to get this thing constructed. And we'll figure out how we pay for the rest of it. At that point in time. We've we've established the funds, it's just a matter of where they come from and how we do that. And so we're excited to get going on it. As with all projects like this, it's slow to get started. And you've got to get architectural plans, you've got to get bids, you've got to get all kinds of permitting and that kind of thing. But we're eager to get going and keep keep watching it ninth and commerce Parkway, it won't be real quick. But I'm hoping maybe sometime late summer, early fall, you'll start seeing some activity out there. If nothing else, somebody with a bulldozer moving around dirt to get the site ready.
James Bell
Yeah, I love that. And it's a two year timeframe. It has to be done in two years. We need to be done in two years. Yeah. You mentioned the base grant that put that together. That was an interesting list. And we've got just about a minute or so left, a minute or so left. But I wonder if you want to talk about that. I thought it was kind of surprising the projects that they chose to fund out of this thing
Grow Hays executive director Doug Williams
little bit. You know, it was if you read the the requirements for the grant, it was primarily to be economic development. And I think many, many applications were for infrastructure. And one could argue that infrastructure is economic development, but I think they were looking for more impactful type things. His direct economic development, was also heavily skewed, which probably comes as no surprise to eastern Kansas. I think Johnson County got maybe half the funds, perhaps. But nonetheless, you know, there was great interest in it lots of applications. We were very pleased. I think we had the right project. We put in some applications for some other projects, too, that we did not get. And so in in hindsight, when I look back, I can see why the microfactory was appealing to them because it's pure economic development. You know, when what what develops out of that facility will employ people and provide good quality jobs and that's what at the end of the day, that's what's really important.
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