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Florida Computerized Machinery will move into a $9-million building in June. It may add as many as 25 new jobs, its owner says.
By JAMES THORNER
© St. Petersburg Times, published February 27, 2000
ODESSA -- A manufacturer of machine components from Hillsborough County is relocating to Pasco County with the promise of creating dozens of new jobs.
Florida Computerized Machining is building a 48,000-square-foot plant at the West Pasco Industrial Park in Odessa. The company expects to leave its factory on Race Track Road near Oldsmar by June.
Fortified by a strong economy, the company, which employs 63 people, plans to add as many as 25 jobs by the end of the year, president and owner Greg Roan said. Workers earn an average of $32,000 a year.
"Over the next couple of years we're hoping to get a lot bigger than that," Roan said.
Florida Computerized Machining, which Roan founded as a two-man operation in 1988, makes metal, plastic and wooden parts for use in aircraft loaders, race cars and cellular communications.
For six years, Roan has plotted a move to Pasco. But lack of adequate financing usually killed the deals. What finally lured him north, Roan said, was Pasco's lower taxes, less crowded roads and quality of life.
The new factory, a metal shell body on a concrete foundation, represents a $9-million investment in Pasco.
In return, the company is asking the county to waive thousands of dollars in transportation impact fees and sewer and water hookup charges.
"The incentives we give are not huge," said Mary Jane Stanley, executive director of the Pasco Economic Development Council. "They are kind of like icing on the cake."
West Pasco Industrial Park, home to about 40 companies, stretches north from State Road 54, opposite Tampa Bay Executive Airport.