Cheese company will build plant in Elmore County
250 will have jobs the first year at packaging facility
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Statesman staff
Edition Date: 10-18-2005
One of the largest natural cheese packagers in the United States announced Monday it will build a $27 million packaging plant near the Mountain Home Municipal Airport in Elmore County.
Marathon Cheese Corp. of Marathon, Wis., will employ 250 workers during its initial year of operation after opening the facility next December. The privately held company expects the payroll at its first plant in the West to double within five years.
A company spokesman said Marathon will ship bulk cheese to Mountain Home, where it will be cut and packaged for sale under various brands including Kraft Foods, Land O' Lakes, Sysco, Sargento and Schreiber Foods.
Marathon Cheese Chairman and Chief Executive Officer John L. Skoug said state and city officials "were very aggressive in terms of the incentives they were able to offer."
The city of Mountain Home offered a 40-acre plant site to Marathon to recruit the company to southwestern Idaho. The site is a portion of the more than 300 acres owned by local developer Stan Scott. Scott agreed to donate the 40-acre site to the city at no cost in exchange for extending city services to his remaining property adjacent to the site.
The state also promised to provide up to $500,000 in a rural development grant and another $50,000 in a Gem Grant to the city to help pay for public facility extension to the site and as much as $1.65 million in Idaho Workforce Development Training Funds to train workers for the new plant.
"This is a huge opportunity for Mountain Home and Elmore County, where diversity is critical to the stability of an economy so closely tied to Mountain Home Air Force Base," said Gov. Dirk Kempthorne at a groundbreaking ceremony where the project was announced.
"We now have three legs to our economy — the Air Force base, agriculture and manufacturing," said Mountain Home Mayor Joe McNeal. "This project gives us an economic boost that will help us accommodate any future developments at the base."
250 will have jobs the first year at packaging facility
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Statesman staff
Edition Date: 10-18-2005
One of the largest natural cheese packagers in the United States announced Monday it will build a $27 million packaging plant near the Mountain Home Municipal Airport in Elmore County.
Marathon Cheese Corp. of Marathon, Wis., will employ 250 workers during its initial year of operation after opening the facility next December. The privately held company expects the payroll at its first plant in the West to double within five years.
A company spokesman said Marathon will ship bulk cheese to Mountain Home, where it will be cut and packaged for sale under various brands including Kraft Foods, Land O' Lakes, Sysco, Sargento and Schreiber Foods.
Marathon Cheese Chairman and Chief Executive Officer John L. Skoug said state and city officials "were very aggressive in terms of the incentives they were able to offer."
The city of Mountain Home offered a 40-acre plant site to Marathon to recruit the company to southwestern Idaho. The site is a portion of the more than 300 acres owned by local developer Stan Scott. Scott agreed to donate the 40-acre site to the city at no cost in exchange for extending city services to his remaining property adjacent to the site.
The state also promised to provide up to $500,000 in a rural development grant and another $50,000 in a Gem Grant to the city to help pay for public facility extension to the site and as much as $1.65 million in Idaho Workforce Development Training Funds to train workers for the new plant.
"This is a huge opportunity for Mountain Home and Elmore County, where diversity is critical to the stability of an economy so closely tied to Mountain Home Air Force Base," said Gov. Dirk Kempthorne at a groundbreaking ceremony where the project was announced.
"We now have three legs to our economy — the Air Force base, agriculture and manufacturing," said Mountain Home Mayor Joe McNeal. "This project gives us an economic boost that will help us accommodate any future developments at the base."
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