Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Moffitt Leaves As CCIC Director

Clark County's Industrial Council no longer has an executive director.

Mark Moffitt resigned the post effective May 1, but Brown Hardman, president of the CCIC, didn't tell the CCIC board until its regular meeting May 16.

Now, the council will have to go through the application process again. Moffitt was hired earlier this year to replace Flave Carpenter who retired.

After making this announcement, Hardman informed the board and members he had been in Little Rock talking with Del Boyette, with the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission (AIDC), about what Clark County and the CCIC need to be doing.

He said the CCIC's presence is well-known at the AIDC. In fact, the commission is keeping records on the prospects it sends to Clark County.

On the flip side, Hardman said the CCIC is considering two more industrial parks. These parks, he told the board, would be between 40 and 50 acres each. "We'll try to find something in the Gurdon area," he said, "and we're also looking at Country Club Road and Highway 8."

The Hwy. 8 location is being considered because of its visibility from the interstate. According to Hardman, when Rohr Industries first approached the CCIC about a location, it wanted I-30 visibility. This wasn't available at the time, so the company built a facility in the existing industrial park. However, Rohr has never occupied this structure.

The Gurdon satellite park will need utilities available once a site is located and purchased.

These "light" parks, Hardman said, can possibly attract more service oriented industries, maybe in the shipping end of the business.

He said if such a park is established in the area of Hwy. 8, the AIDC has informed him there is money available for a service access road.

"This window of opportunity is short," he said. "We need to take advantage of it now. These are more dreams, the money is there, but won't stay there forever."

Hardman said he hopes Gurdon Mayor Rick Smith will help look for a site for a satellite park in the southern part of the county.

He also said it is hoped these parks will have fiber optic capability installed as well.

Percy Malone told the members most prospects prefer interstate visibility and access, and don't necessarily want to locate in traditional industrial parks.

Satellite parks, he said, will give the CCIC an advantage other areas don't have.

"We'll be able to go after service industry jobs," he said.

Additionally, Malone said a survey has been done to see what kind of industries would be the best match for Arkansas. The results, he said, showed service oriented industry to lead the pack.

He continued saying a satellite park in the southern part of the county would also benefit the people of Okolona. "It would increase the number of people we can show for the work force, and shouldn't cost that much."

However, he said, many prospects are "building driven," meaning they prefer to have a structure already in place to examine.

Because of this, the AIDC and CCIC are working to see what the average size building a prospect wants to see is.

It is possible, he continued, one of these spec buildings could be erected at the Gurdon site once the final data is received.

Turning to the topic of Polycarbon, Malone said, "it's a done deal."

All the paperwork has been completed for the graphite manufacturing company, and now all there is to be done is finishing out the building, getting the equipment installed and workers in place.

Malone said on top of the two phases Polycarbon officials have discussed, a third phase could be added in Arkadelphia as well. Some things now being done in Texas could be moved to the Clark County site, he said.

This could mean more jobs than the 50 expected.

Malone told the board he's still trying to get some word from Rohr as to their intentions.

When the company first talked about locating in Arkansas, he said, the state put some incentives in the package to help attract Rohr to Arkadelphia.

However, these incentives were lost when Rohr failed to act.

But, he continued, a better incentive package may be able to be put together at this time should Rohr decide to occupy its 225,000 square foot structure in the park.

"We need to visit with them on their intentions," he said.