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MassDevelopment In The News
A Silver Lining Lined with Silver
May 28, 2006: The Springfield Republican, Editorial by Kenneth Ross
We've made it to another Memorial Day weekend, which is a reason for optimism all by itself.
But we've also made it through the Enron trial, another Yankees-Red Sox series, another American Idol, the breakup of Paul and Heather, and another cold, wet spring.
We're also bearing up well through the ambient economic gloom of New England, which seems impervious to splashes of reality.
So it was a pleasant surprise to learn last week that Performance Food Group plans to build a warehouse on former Smith & Wesson property in Springfield.
Performance Food Group, which acquired Springfield Foodservice in 2001, sells and distributes more than 66,000 national and private label food and food-related products to approximately 44,000 restaurants, hotels, cafeterias, schools, healthcare facilities and other institutions.
It is based in Richmond, Va.
The best part of the PFG deal is that it saves 270 jobs that might have been lost to the Worcester area.
The next best is that it promises to create another 200-plus jobs over the next several years.
Performance Food Group's new facility will occupy 32 acres of the 85-acre site, although it will account for nearly half of the developable acreage, since the overall site includes 20 acres of wetlands that can't be used for commerce and industry.
David B. Panagore, the city's development director, said he, Mayor Charles V. Ryan, and Philip Puccia, executive director of the Springfield Finance Control Board called on PFG last summer.
They were responding to word from MassDevelopment, the state's development agency, that PFG was looking to move to the Worcester-Auburn area.
"They told us how they wanted to leave, how they felt the city hadn't been good to them at their present location on Taylor Street," Panagore recalled.
"The Control Board wanted to retain those 270 jobs," he said. "The bulk of the jobs were at entry level and were filled by Springfield residents."
He said the city was motivated by the desire to balance the retention and creation of jobs for people who needed them the most.
"At PFG, if you've got a GED, you can make $38,000 a year in the door, and you've got the potential to increase that to $50,000."
PFG's move is slated for the fall of 2007. The city will work to find occupants for its present space.
Panagore said the city doesn't plan to move quickly to fill the remaining acreage at the Smith & Wesson site off Roosevelt Avenue.
"Our goal for the remainder of the site is to find a new user to Springfield," he said. "We will be looking for something different from PFG," he said.
But, he said, if a company is talking about 200 new jobs paying above the median income, Springfield will listen.
And with any luck, we won't have to listen to each other saying how depressing things are.
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