The construction area would be close to a slated 300-home development south of the Emerald Pointe RV Resort.
By MOLLY MOORHEAD
Published June 29, 2004
ZEPHYRHILLS - A St. Petersburg-based lumber company has a contract to buy 40 acres off Paul Buchman Highway east of the CSX railroad tracks, where it plans to build a new plant.
Cox Lumber, which has 28 operations in Florida including Land O'Lakes and Bayonet Point, wants to build a roof truss manufacturing plant, door assembly plant and lumberyard on a parcel south of Chancey Road between the tracks and Emerald Pointe RV Resort.
Executive vice president Russ Brandes said construction could begin early next year. He said no site plans have been developed yet, but facilities similar to what Cox plans in Zephyrhills employ 60 to 90 people.
Brandes said the company, which sells mainly to homebuilders but does some retail, was attracted to Zephyrhills for two reason.
"One of the things we look for is an area that's growing, and we think Zephyrhills is growing. We also look for a railroad."
Brandes stressed that plans are still tentative.
"We have not sat down with the city to make sure we can do all the things we want to do."
City planner Todd Vande Berg said the city is trying to lure industry to the area off Chancey Road, but there are other considerations.
"It is our industrial corridor (where) we're trying to attract industrial-types of uses along there," he said. "We just have to be careful."
A 150-acre parcel south of the RV resort is slated for a 300-home development. It shares a corner with the planned lumberyard, although a stand of trees provides some buffer.
And a 270-acre dairy owned by Neil and Rita Rucks at Buchman Highway and Chancey Road will one day be busy with 800 houses and commercial plazas.
That land borders the railroad tracks, but Vande Berg said site plans show most of the housing will be at the far edge of the property, a ways from the planned lumberyard.
He said the plans for the three parcels are necessarily conflicting.
"I think we can develop it in a manner where we can address the needs of the residential and industrial."
