By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1
A new speculative building at the South Cooper Industrial Park is a possibility.
The Barren County Economic Authority Property Committee members unanimously recommended putting out a design and construction bid package for at least a 50,000 square foot speculative building on Lot 2. That lot has a graded pad and is next to the Union Coating and Chemical building at South Cooper Industrial Park, which is off New Bowling Green Road.
“As we are getting close to the closing of our original spec building on Lot 1, we want to start looking at our next steps out there,” President and Chief Executive Officer Maureen Carpenter said. “We’ve had some discussions about Lot 2 — building a spec building …. My recommendation would be for this committee to recommend to the board that we move forward putting together a bid packet.”
Carpenter has repeatedly defended speculative buildings, saying they increase companies’ speed-to-market, which makes Barren County more attractive. Bluegrass Dairy and Union Coating and Chemical have both chosen to locate in speculative buildings. Bluegrass expanded into the speculative building, while Union is a new business in Barren County.
The committee’s recommendation is not final; it will be presented to the full economic authority board members at their next meeting on May 8.
Committee members also discussed the possibility of a capital campaign to, as Committee Chair Larry Glass put it, use the momentum gained by the recent investments. The property committee members also briefly discussed the idea of purchasing new property, with Carpenter saying they “need to be looking at what’s next” while still selling South Cooper locations, which already has its utilities in place.
No formal action was taken by committee members on either of these topics.
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