Airport Industrial Park Lands a Tenant
It’s not every day that the Valley’s top political brass gathers for a press conference to announce that a business is moving to a new location in the same neighborhood.
But on Friday, Mayor Richard Riordan, Board of Supervisors President Zev Yaroslavsky, Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar) and City Councilman Richard Alarcon climbed a hill overlooking the tarmac at Whiteman Airport to do just that.
In a move that several of the leaders characterized as symbolic of the Valley’s economic resurgence, Arc Machines Inc., a manufacturer of high-precision welding equipment, announced it will leave its old Pacoima site to become the first tenant in the newly created Whiteman Airport Industrial Park.
Until Arc Machines was selected by the county-owned airport to move into the industrial park, the president of the 250-employee company feared he would have to relocate out of the area.
“We didn’t want to but we were definitely considering leaving because we couldn’t find a space that suited our needs,” said Mindaugas Gedgaudas, who was worried about uprooting employees who live in the area. “This meets our needs 99%. It’s almost perfect.”
The city and county recently spent $1.3 million on grading, sewer systems and street repairs to transform a 9.1-acre area around the airport into an industrial park with the potential to accommodate several manufacturing companies.
The project, like the current effort to develop the former General Motors assembly plant in Van Nuys, was financed by a federal economic development grant.
By moving into the Whiteman industrial park, Arc Machines will receive California Enterprise Zone benefits, including tax incentives for hiring new employees and upgrading equipment.
“This is a win-win situation,” said Yaroslavsky, who praised the various governmental agencies involved in the project for working together to get it off the ground.
“We had this underutilized asset and we saw an opportunity to put a package together that would benefit everyone. The Valley needs businesses like this to stay competitive in the next century.”
