By Justin Leighty, Truth Staff
jleighty@etruth.com
GOSHEN -- Cequent Performance Products wants a five-year tax phase-in of nearly $4 million to add another 47 jobs to its College Avenue facility.
The Goshen City Council will consider the request at its meeting this evening.
Personnel at the local Cequent plant referred questions to the company's corporate headquarters in Michigan. Cequent personnel in Michigan hung up on a call seeking comment, and a message seeking comment from a spokesperson for TriMas, Cequent's parent company, wasn't returned Monday.
Mark Brinson, Goshen's community development director, had some of the details, though.
"They are projecting hiring an additional 47 employees, and those are, the job title will be, operators," Brinson said. The jobs will be added this year, Brinson said.
"The average hourly wage would be $11.39," Brinson said. With benefits, that works out to $17.65 an hour, he said.
Cequent now employs 362 people in Goshen, Brinson said.
The phase-in would cover $3,967,204 in equipment to be added to the plant between now and December, according to documents given to the Goshen City Council.
"This is something they've been talking about doing for a number of months," Brinson said. The Goshen facility had to compete with Cequent facilities in other states, and won't be a done deal unless the council approves it, he said.
What it means is that for five years, the additional value of the equipment won't be part of Cequent's personal property taxes. The city gains not only jobs, but Cequent agreed to pay 15 percent of what they would've been taxed. That money would go to Goshen's redevelopment commission, because under state law it "has to go for economic-development use," Brinson said.
The city granted Cequent a seven-year phase-in of $9 million in 2005. That came with a promise of 26 jobs, but by the end of 2005 Cequent added 76 jobs.
The company makes cargo, towing and hitch products and vehicle accessories.