PRESS RELEASE

December 01, 2008

When the Satsop Development Park was first conceived, community leaders believe the Park’s former Turbine Building would one day be home to a special company with the vision to see opportunity reflected in the facility’s unique, super-sized assets.

That day has finally come. In November, Brown-Minneapolis Tank Company (BMT-Northwest) signed a 15 year lease with seven 5-year options, with the Grays Harbor Public Development Authority for the Turbine Building complex and 10 acres of surrounding property. The company has begun moving its manufacturing operations from its plant on the Olympia waterfront, where it has been for over 85 years, to its new flagship facility at Satsop Development Park. “Our hope it to have our processing equipment in place by year-end and be out of the Olympia facility by early January,” said Chuck Travelstead, CEO and President of BMT. Company headquarters are in Albuquerque, N.M.

BMT-Northwest manufactures large-scale steel tanks and equipment for various industries, including the petrochemical industry. “We call ourselves a modern blacksmith shop,” Travelstead said. “We can build everything from a heavy-duty mailbox all the way to very large specialty structures and tanks weighing many thousands of pounds for our customers.”

“BMT’s move to the Satsop Development Park is a major step forward in the growth of the company, as well as the growth and future development of the Park,” said Tami Garrow, President and CEO of the GHPDA. “Our primary goal has always been, and continues to be, to create jobs at Satsop. BMT-Northwest is bringing more than 60 family wage jobs to our community, with the promise of expansion and additional growth,” said Garrow.

“BMT-Northwest is the perfect fit for this facility,” said Ron Rogstad, Chairman of the GHPDA Board of Directors. “Because we got involved with BMT as a potential partner before doing the work on the Turbine Building, it made it easy to figure out how to renovate the structure to meet the company’s present and future needs.”

The GHPDA spent over $6.5 million to retrofit the 300,000+ sq.ft. facility, the Park’s infrastructure, and improvements to its barge slip on the Chehalis River. A $5.053 million grant from Washington State’s Job Development Fund covered much of the cost of the conversion; PDA cash reserves of $1.5 million plus an additional $250,000 from the County’s .09 Infrastructure Fund (a state program that returns a portion of state sales tax to rural counties for economic development projects) made up the balance of funding. Conditions for the grant required the GHPDA to have a prospective tenant who would create and retain family wage jobs. In addition, BMT-Northwest is expected to invest more than $3 million of their own capital in additional improvements to the building.

Having a signed lease in hand is gratifying, Rogstad said. “We are so pleased to have BMT at the Park; they pay good wages and may be able to attract other businesses to the area. They are a real asset to the County,” he said.

In 2005 BMT-Northwest realized that neighboring residential development along Olympia’s waterfront, the approaching end of their lease and the subsequent sale of a portion of the property they occupied would require a move from their original location. Rollie Irwin, Vice-President and business manager of BMT-Northwest, was literally driving down the highway having visited potential sites in Aberdeen and Hoquiam when he spotted the towers from the highway and saw the exit sign for Satsop Development Park.

“For two months I had been scouring the countryside looking for a facility in the local area. I had been to the north and the south side, so I decided to see what was west,” Irwin explained. He followed the signs and drove through the Park. He then contacted the GHPDA and started the process.

There are several factors that made the Park’s Turbine Building ideal for BMT. The facility was originally designed to house two electricity-generating steam turbines for a nuclear power plant that was never finished, fueled or fired. The large scale of the facility makes it unrivaled throughout the country, Irwin said.

The building is 600 feet long, 207 feet wide and 150 feet tall. There are two 250-ton cranes that were initially installed in the building that travel the entire 600-foot length. The building has two floors and a “mezzanine,” along with drive-through access.

“We are able to locate our entire operations in Olympia to about 2/3 of the first floor. This very large facility gives us the capability to do our existing operations in a more productive manner,” explained Travelstead. “If I look at the third floor, it is a very large shop environment that gives us a unique capacity,” he said. “The existing cranes and the large size give BMT the ability to manufacture and move objects that weigh a million pounds.”

BMT-Northwest will also be using the Park’s barge slip on the Chehalis River. Originally the slip was used to receive, and later ship, large pieces of equipment to and from the Park during construction of the nuclear facility; now, BMT will utilize it to ship large components from their facility out to their customers.

BMT was also motivated by the Park’s location. By staying within the region, the company was able to retain most of its workforce. “We are very fortunate to have a number of excellently trained, highly productive employees; if we had been forced to move further away and lost those employees it would have been a detriment to our company,” Travelstead said.

He has also been encouraged by the quality of potential employees that have expressed interest in working at BMT. “We are excited that the local workforce who have been traveling to distant jobs may now have the opportunity to return home and secure good paying jobs.”

“We want to emphasize that this project is why the Satsop Development Park was created – it’s about jobs. Not just the $8 million spent in 2008 on construction projects alone, but also the economic impact the Park has on the County,” Garrow said.

“There are more than 40 businesses at the Park, both tenants and telecom customers, with over 500 employees,” she said. The Park’s tenants contribute an estimated annual payroll of $24.5 million and the assessed value of the businesses located at the Park now approaches $58,598,738. Park businesses contribute real estate and personal property taxes as well as leasehold taxes and sales taxes to local and state coffers, Garrow said. The Grays Harbor Public Development Authority is not a taxing authority, and the Satsop Development Park receives no local taxes or other local funding. “The Park is self-supporting, and our businesses are proud to contribute to the local economy in ways that matter to all of us – jobs, taxes, purchases of goods and services. Grays Harbor businesses are the backbone of our community and we are so pleased to welcome BMT to the Harbor.”

BMT-Northwest’s move into the Turbine Building is especially welcomed. “It’s been satisfying work to transform this gigantic building from an eyesore to an asset that will become a highly productive facility for BMT-Northwest, to create jobs today and into the future,” Garrow said.

Such a large-scale project is never easy and requires a team effort, said Travelstead. “We really want to thank the cadre of people involved, starting with Tami Garrow and the GHPDA, the State of Washington staff who helped with the Job Development Fund grant, and the County Commissioners with the .09 rural infrastructure fund,” Travelstead said. “It’s great to see all these things come together. Rollie and I appreciate everything everyone has done and we want to make sure they know that.”