$15 million added to price tag of proposed KC Honeywell campus
By KEVIN COLLISON
The Kansas City Star
Add $15 million more to the infrastructure costs associated with a plan to replace the aging nuclear weapons plant at the
Bannister Federal Complex.
That is the estimated cost for utility work needed to develop the 185-acre site of the proposed Honeywell Federal Manufacturing & Technologies campus in south Kansas City, according to the city’s Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, the development agency assisting the project.
The federal General Services Administration is pursuing a plan to build a $500 million complex for Honeywell northwest of Missouri 150 and Botts Road. The new plant, which would continue making non-nuclear parts for nuclear weapons, would employ 2,100 people when fully operational in 2013.
The GSA already had estimated it would cost $29 million to build two highway interchanges off Missouri 150 for the facility. There had been no agency estimate as to the cost of additional utility work, including a ¾-mile sanitary sewer connection and storm sewer and other work.
The $15 million figure for that additional infrastructure work is in the preliminary development plan being reviewed by the Planned Industrial Expansion Authority, said Al Figuly, agency executive director. The board is expected to consider a final plan late this month or in early July.
The cost of the interchanges and other infrastructure work is significant because a private developer is expected to build the plant, then lease it back to the government for 20 years, according to the GSA proposal. That approach would place the 1.4-million-square-foot facility on the tax rolls, generating about $5.2 million in local property taxes annually. The current Bannister facility is on tax-exempt federal property. The approach also would allow the developer to use tax incentives to help pay for the required public improvements.
The financing plan for the interchanges includes $11.8 million in local property tax abatements, $4.7 million in capital assistance from Kansas City, $10 million from the Missouri Department of Transportation, $1.1 million from Jackson County, and $1.4 million in private contributions.
Pat Klein, the city capital improvements program manager, said the $4.7 million in capital assistance has been endorsed by the city Public Improvements Advisory Committee, with $2.7 million already budgeted.
Figuly said there has been no final determination of how the additional $15 million in infrastructure cost would be paid for.
The timetable for final consideration of the plan by the Kansas City Council has been delayed a couple of weeks. Brad Scott, GSA regional administrator, said the council was not expected to consider it until Aug. 9. The GSA wants to choose a developer Aug. 21.
To reach Kevin Collison, call 816-234-4289 or send e-mail to kcollison@kcstar.com.
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