EVANSVILLE —A plastics manufacturing firm will be the first occupant of the former Whirlpool factory.
Plans for the business locating there were discussed Monday morning by city and county officials during a site review. The business was not identified.
After reviewing specifics on the plan — such as establishing street addresses and water line hook-ups, the project was approved, said Brad Mills, executive director of the Evansville-Vanderburgh Area Planning Commission.
Mills said site plans states at least 20 people will be employed by the plant, which molds plastic pellets into various items. The amount of space the company would occupy in the giant former refrigerator factory was unknown, Mills said.
On April, 1, the Kunkel Group announced it had purchsed the property. The group paid $2.9 million for the property on U.S. 41 and it was separated it into two parcels. One side still is occupied by Whirlpool's product development center, and that eventually will be separated from the rest of the facility.
Whirlpool also leased back from Kunkel some of the space that Kunkel purchased from the manufacturer. That leased space will provide additional room for the product development center, which employs about 300 people.
In 2009, Whirlpool closed the factory but said it would keep a design center if it were offered a number of incentives by local officials. One of those was a plan to have the city and Evansville Regional Airport buy 105 acres the company owns near the corner of U.S. 41 and St. George Road. The plan also was to buy the buildings on the property near that intersection and turn them into a tech park.
Last month, it was revealed those plans were not accepted by Whirlpool.