Westchester County Business Journal 10/15/2012 Issue

Page 1

Biz

WCBJ ®

INSIDE

WESTCHESTER COUNTY

BUSINESS JOURNAL

YOUR only SOURCE FOR regional BUSINESS NEWS | westfaironline.com bob rozycki

Nearly 200 jobs to end with plant closing

Cappelli sells City Center

BY JOHN GOLDEN jgolden@westfairinc.com

Page 3

A

I

f architect Chuck Napoli has his way, downtown Chappaqua will be radically reshaped. Napoli, a Chappaqua resident, has proposed a $15 million to $20 million, 68,000-square-foot project of 20 retail stores, with a residential development proposed on what is now the parking lot behind stores on South Greeley Avenue that would extend into Bell’s Middle School field, which would be used as a carport. A brand new turf field for Bell

n Elmsford manufacturer that stood to be awarded more than $4 million in state tax credits to aid the company’s move to Putnam County instead will relocate to Pennsylvania by early next year and close its Westchester plant, idling nearly 200 workers

Middle School would be above the carport. The idea is still in the early planning stages. Napoli is making a presentation Oct. 16 at the New Castle Town Board meeting. He would need approval and permission from the school district, the town, and the owners of the stores on South Greeley before he could proceed. Napoli’s plan is nothing new and was not initially his. The proposal has been kicked around the town since 1985, and was even mentioned in the town’s master plan of 1989. Another downtown plan in 1995 mentioned the proposal,

here. San-Mar Laboratories Inc., a developer and manufacturer of personal care and over-the-counter health products, recently notified the state Labor Department that it will close its plant at 4 Warehouse Lane Dec. 31 and lay off 188 workers. The company in 2010 was awarded a grant of up to $750,000 from Empire State Development (ESD), New York’s chief economic development agency, for equipment purchases to keep the company in its 135,000-square-foot plant in the Elmsford Distribution Center, where owners agreed to invest about $1.9 million in improvements and create 115 additional jobs. But those plans changed in 2011 when San-Mar was acquired by a financial holding company, SML Acquisition L.L.C. One of San-Mar’s founding principals told the Business Journal last December that the company was looking at sites to build a new plant in Putnam County where it could expand its production line and modernize its technology. Empire State Development this year approved a little more than $4 million in Excelsior tax credits for job creation and retention to assist the company in its move within the state. But a state official said San-Mar owners rejected the tax credits incentive and no contract was signed. State officials were told the San-Mar employee who completed the funding application was not authorized to do so and had been fired. The company’s new ownership remains largely a mystery

Chappaqua, page 6

Plant closing, page 6

Chuck Napoli’s vision for downtown Chappaqua BY SAM BARRON sbarron@westfairinc.com

October 15, 2012 | VOL. 48, No. 42

V H

on the auction block • 4

Good Things • 36


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.