Kalitta wants to build at Willow Run, bring 600 jobs

Marco Salomone was giving a report on Aerotropolis to members of the Van Buren Township Downtown Development Authority at their regular meeting April 23, when VBT Supervisor Kevin McNamara announced a new development nobody knew about.
Salomone, who is the interim executive director for the Detroit Region Aerotropolis Development Corporation, was asked by DDA president Craig Atchinson what projects are being planned for 2019.
Salomone was reluctant to name developments until they were final, but Supervisor McNamara announced that Connie Kalitta is going to the township board pretty soon. He wants to build at Willow Run Airport, which is kind of tricky since you can’t buy land at Willow Run, only lease it from the FFA.
He said nobody wants to build at the airport for fear the FAA will decide to put a runway through their building.
McNamara said in Oscoda, Kalitta employs everybody in town and needs another maintenance building.
“We would consider it a hangar,” McNamara said. He said the MDEC gave $2 million for the project. He said Kalitta would create 600 jobs with the average salary of $38.25 per hour.
“We’ve gone back to the MDEC,” McNamara said, explaining, “We want to tack on that 20% of the new employees be VBT residents. … We’ll see how that goes. It should be before the board soon.”
In Sunday’s Detroit Free Press, a report on PFAS said Kalitta Air, at the Oscoda-Wurtsmith Airport, is the largest employer in Iosco County. The company ships cargo by air and also provides jet engine maintenance for others, including Boeing and General Electric.
The Free Press story said Kalitta has 240,000 square feet of hangar and engine shop space and company officials said they are interested in expanding there by one or two additional hangars, expecting to create 150 additional jobs. But the company wants protection from the U.S. government against liability from the existing PFAS contamination and the Air Force has refused, according to Arnie Leriche, who helped to organize a grassroots group engaged in the PFAS contamination problem at Wurtsmith.
Leriche said Kalitta doesn’t own the land, which is owned by the township redevelopment authority. It was given to them by the Air Force and the Air Force has a covenant on the deed, he said. That covenant allows the Air Force to do remediation, to do sampling, to even hold up a project until they clean up contamination, Leriche said. That cleanup is moving painfully slowly, he said.
McNamara also told the DDA that Ashley Capital is the big development coming this year with more than one million square feet and the first buildings two/thirds of that.
Salomone said the Subaru project in VBT is one of the crown events for Aerotropolis. He said they see Subaru causing a domino effect, falling for similar investments for the future.
“They really worked with us on Subaru,” said Ron Akers, VBT director of planning and economic development.
Akers said Ashley Capital will begin with two 600,000 square foot buildings to lease and, “I wouldn’t be surprised if they were filled easily.”
Salomone said Ashley Capital is very excited about VBT.
Salomone passed out the Aerotropolis annual report at the beginning of his comments and announced Huron Township Supervisor David Glaab was a new board member.
He said the Aerotropolis slogan last year was, “It’s time!” They worked on more marketing and advertising. He said they were in 11 publications, print and digital. “I was skeptical of the print advertising, but we had results from print.”
He said they were working on 60 or so projects last year. He said they hitched onto local groups for foreign contacts, such as the Detroit China Business Association, and Aerotropolis gave a tour to those in town from Beijing for a week.
Salomone said they attended events around the country and got hundreds of contacts for 64 projects and 151 sites.
He said the 2019 strategy is keeping the momentum going. The new slogan is “Accelerate.” He showed a brief video that is available on the Aerotropolis web site.
McNamara said regional transportation is a key and this area is a hub for air, railroad and high-tech internet. He said one of the largest banking centers in the Midwest is in VBT and now another one is pulling in. McNamara asked why this area is pulling in these sites?
Salomone said he didn’t know unless it was the inexpensive real estate.
DDA member Mark Laginess said there is a huge switch center in Grand Rapids.
McNamara said Chase is one of the biggest centers in the world and now another is coming and the township got calls from another.
Salomone said of the 60 projects last year, the data centers were very secretive.
DDA member Helen Foster asked if there was a leadership search for a permanent executive director. She asked if he was in line for the job.
Salomone said Aerotropolis has a 10-member board made up of eight entities and they make the decisions. When asked about the members, Salomone said the City of Belleville signed the original agreement but never paid any dues. In 2017 it didn’t re-sign the agreement.
He said Belleville wasn’t suitable for industrial developments anyway.
Members of Aerotropolis are Van Buren Township, Taylor, Romulus, Huron Township, Michigan Economic Development Corporation, Washtenaw County, Wayne County, Wayne County Airport Authority, CBRE and DTE Energy.
In other business at the April 23 meeting, the DDA:
• Approved work changes for Axiom Construction totaling $41,517.88 for work on the Placemaking project on Belleville Road, with DDA vice chairperson Carol Bird being recused from the vote because her business is next door. The changes include the third change by DTE for the utility connection, $12,213. Also, the contractor is unable to use the exiting soil due to the weather and unsuitable soil, said Director Susan Ireland, so they brought in 450 yards of sand and hauled away the unusable dirt, $13,377.38. The final change is for a new manhole structure to go around a surprise 6” gas main that was not marked by Miss Dig or any easements or additional documentation on record. DTE did not allow this un-identified gas main to be turned off and later they found out it is in service. Cost: $15,927.50. Ireland said $112,000 remains in the contingency fund. She said the building is expected to be done in August;
• Heard Ireland say that after the March meeting, Pioneer was informed it was awarded the contract for the streetscape maintenance and Randy Brown Landscaping was informed he was awarded the contract for the Belleville / Ecorse Road intersection after providing the missing bid information. Both have begun the spring clean-up and Brown will replace three dead trees out there, she said; and
• Heard Assistant Director Lisa Lothringer report that internet response to information on the Splash Pad brought 24,000 shares. She said construction is scheduled to begin on May 8 and kids should be running through sometime in August.