[AUG. 22, 2005] The Logan County
Board approved a request for a new Lincoln/Logan County Enterprise
Zone designation for a New Holland business. S.K. Davison Trucking
is planning to expand its operation by 3.44 acres.
S.K. Davison Trucking began its
operation in 1997 with four employees in a home office and four
tractors. The business has continued to grow and in 2004 employed
seven year-round workers and five seasonal workers, with an average
salary of $15,000 per year for seasonal workers and $23,000 per year
for year-round workers.
Owner Sharon Davison and husband Ed are planning to add a large
office/maintenance building and extend the truck lot.
The business currently runs nine tractors, of which four are
tandems. The Davisons will add trucks and increase their work force
by six, with two new drivers, office and maintenance employees.
S.K. Davison specializes in livestock, grain, rock, fertilizer
and asphalt transport.
The Davison property is contiguous to an already established
enterprise zone of 5 acres that was for a summer power "peaker
plant" that never materialized.
The board approved the request. The Logan County Regional
Planning Commission passed the request on Aug. 3. It still needs to
go before the Lincoln City Council, and then the request will be
turned in to the governing state committee for final approval.
An enterprise zone encourages commercial and industrial business
development by providing limited tax relief that helps offset
startup costs. Businesses are exempt from sales tax on construction
materials and receive graduated relief from property taxes.
They pay no property taxes for their first five years and 50
percent property tax the next five years. In 10 years they begin
paying 100 percent of the property tax. The property value goes up
on most properties that are developed and thereby the property taxes
increase.
Logan County planning and zoning director Phil Mahler and Lincoln
and Logan County Development Partnership director Rob Orr went to
the Aug. 15 board meeting of the Hartsburg-Emden Consolidated
School. Consideration is being given to extending the enterprise
zone to Hartsburg-Emden area. A corridor could be run up Interstate
55 and 155.
The Hartsburg and Emden area is an excellent opportunity for
industrial development with property available that has easy highway
and railway access. Developments would bring new businesses into the
community, boost local economy and begin providing increased
property tax support for the schools five years after a development
begins, Mahler said.
The Hartsburg-Emden school board agreed that they would
participate in the enterprise zone if it were expanded there.
Representatives of Illini Bio-Energy, the farm group that would
like to build an ethanol plant, were also in attendance at the
meeting.
