A local economic development group is pushing to designate 125 acres of land just outside Foristell as a future industrial “mega-site.”
The Greater Warren County Economic Development …
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A local economic development group is pushing to designate 125 acres of land just outside Foristell as a future industrial “mega-site.”
The Greater Warren County Economic Development Council (GWCEDC) is asking Warren County to change the zoning designation of this farmland along Veterans Memorial Parkway to allow heavy industry. No specific development is yet planned, said GWCEDC representative Steve Etcher, but the county’s action would make the site marketable for industrial use.
The ultimate goal, Etcher said, is to bring in a major manufacturing employer that will bring new jobs and outside money into Warren County.
“What we’re going after ... is ‘mega-sites’ that can handle major manufacturing that will be building 500,000- to 1 million-square-feet facilities,” Etcher said. “They come around all the time, and if you don’t have a place ready to put them, they’re going to go (somewhere else).”
The land to be rezoned is owned by the Roger and Janet Karrenbrock Living Trust, which is working with GWCEDC to market the land for development.
Etcher pitched the rezoning request to Warren County’s planning and zoning board during a Sept. 16 public hearing.
“Currently, about 60 percent of our population leaves our county every day for work. We want to reverse that trend. We want them to be able to live here, work here, and make a livable wage,” Etcher told the board. “But to do that, we have to be prepared. ... We’ve had four or five (development) projects where we were among two finalist sites, that we did not win ... because the site was not properly zoned.”
Planning and Zoning Administrator Vickie Vohsen said she supports the rezoning as a way to get ahead of increasing development interest and ensure controlled growth in the county.
“At the present time, Warren County is woefully lacking in sites in unincorporated areas that permit commercial and industrial development,” Vohsen said. “Rezoning the property ... would be the first step in the county’s efforts to provide industrial sites while regulating where they are located.”
Among the benefits of the site are its direct access to highway and rail transport, along with its separation from densely populated areas, Etcher added.
And yet, there’s almost no property in Warren County that doesn’t have at least a few neighboring homes. Several homeowners living on Archer Road, directly west of the proposed development area, came before the board to ask how they would be protected from the disturbance of an industrial neighbor.
“I don’t want that here unless there’s contingencies for us” such as soundproofing or buffering, said homeowner Rick Mattison.
In response, members of the zoning board asked if several acres could be left as an agriculture-zoned buffer area on the west side of the development property. All parties said they would be satisfied with that arrangement.
Hearing that, the zoning board voted unanimously to support rezoning the rest of the 125-acre area for industrial use. A final decision now goes to the Warren County Commission, which will consider the proposal in October.
