Car czar to visit Fenton to announce $1.6M for Chrysler plant rebirth
St. Louis Business Journal
February 15, 2010
by Kelsey Volkmann and Lisa R. Brown
President Obama's car czar Ed Montgomery plans to visit Fenton on Thursday to announce nearly $1.6 million in federal funding to get the former Chrysler plant ready for re-use.
The money, which Missouri, St. Louis County and Fenton officials applied for last year, will go toward environmental studies of the plant so potential buyers would know the property's issues and how much it would cost to fix them, Fenton Mayor Dennis Hancock said. The funding from the U.S. Department of Commerce would also toward marketing the facility, he said.
St. Louis County officials and the City of Fenton are splitting the remaining 30 percent, or about $500,000, of the total $2.1 million price tag of the market analysis.
"It's been awhile since we've had good news on the property," Hancock said Monday. "This is the beginning of the next life of the property."
The 5-million-square-foot property is for sale to the highest bidder, and prospective buyers have been taking golf cart tours of the sprawling complex.
Old Carco, formerly known as Chrysler LLC, hired Clayton, Mo.-based NAI Desco to market the Fenton property after interviewing several commercial real estate firms.
Old Carco has not established an asking price or a time-line for accepting bids, and is not entertaining offers to lease or subdivide the 295-acreproperty at I-44 and I-270 in South St. Louis County.
"They will evaluate all reasonable offers received," said NAI DESCO principal Daniel Hayes, who is the listing broker with Vice President Floyd Sweeney. "They would like to be out as quickly as possible."
Chrysler's South plant, which assembled minivans, closed in October 2008.
Employees at the North assembly plant assembled Dodge Ram pickup trucks until it closed in July 2009. At its height several years ago, the two plants had a total of more than 5,000 employees.
Sweeney said he's already started taking interested buyers on golf cart tours of the property that includes the South Plant that fronts I-44 and the adjacent North plant, which each total about 2.5 million square feet of space.
"We're getting some interest from major manufacturers both foreign and domestic," Sweeney said. The South plant is vacant, and the North Plant still contains some robotic equipment that could be negotiated as part of a sale. The property includes an on-site wastewater treatment facility, rail access and an electric substation.
Hancock said he believes the best use may be in razing the buildings and starting over.
"When I look at it that way, I see all kinds of potential, with its highway access and flat ground. It's one of the most prime locations in the St. Louis region," he said.
Auburn Hills, Mich.-based Old Carco is seeking to sell seven shuttered assembly plants no longer owned by the "new" Chrysler Group. The Chrysler Group, which emerged from bankruptcy in June 2009, is owned in part by Italian carmaker Fiat, the United Auto Workers, and the U.S. and Canadian governments.
In November 2009, Old Carco sold a 272-acre, 3-million-square-foot former Chrysler plant in Newark, Del., to the University of Delaware for $24.25 million. The school is still evaluating long-term uses for the property, but in a statement said it will be used for creating a research and technology campus. The University of Delaware is holding an auction in February to sell off hundreds of pieces of machinery and equipment that it acquired as part of the sale.
