ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
OF WAYNE COUNTY, INDIANA
Board Meeting Minutes
Monday, February 1, 2016
BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT:Clark, Cohen, Elzemeyer, Frame, Green, Jackson, Parker, Upchurch,Warner, Witte

BOARD MEMBERS ABSENT:

Barrett

STAFF PRESENT:

Shaffer, Doty, Henry, Geres

GUESTS PRESENT:

Burns, Denny – Wayne County Commissioner
Martin Emery, Millicent – Palladium-Item
Oakerson, Trevor – Wayne County Area Chamber of Commerce
Oler, Ron – Richmond Common Council
Plasterer, Jeff – Wayne County Council
Sowers, George – Attorney for EDC
Thurlow, Kim – Ivy Tech Corporate College

CALL TO ORDER
Board Chair Witte called the meeting of the Board of Directors of the Economic Development Corporationof Wayne County, Indiana to order at 4:01 p.m. on Monday, February 1st, 2016, in the EDC board room.
Witte welcomed new board member Tim Frame who is filling for the remainder of Bill Quigg’s term. He
allowed both Tim and Larry Parker a few minutes to give a brief biography.
APROVAL OF MINUTES
Witte stated the minutes from the January 11th board meeting were on pages 2 - 5 of the board packet.
Motion by Elzemeyer, second by Green to approve the January 11th, 2016 minutes as presented. Motioncarried.
TREASURER’S REPORT
Warner reported the treasurer’s report could be found on pages 6-11 of the board packet. He reported
the EDC was under budget in the month of January by $307.97 and no line items were over budget. He
reported the $8,000 for rent paid on 1400 Industries is then reimbursed to the City of Richmond and acontribution of $5,900 from an anonymous donor for the cleanup of the old Reid Hospital property wasthen paid out of contractual professional services. He reported account summaries were on page 6.
Motion by Green, second by Cohen to accept the January 2016 financials as presented. Motion carried.
Warner reported on a correction to 2015 funds being returned to EDIT consolidated. Rather than returning$24,038.28 from discretionary, the correct amount is $24,023.99. The total of $113,917.33 being returned
was reported correctly.
Warner stated the discretionary account would need closed out as all funds are being returned and there
is no longer a need for the account. Motion by Green, second by Upchurch to close the discretionary
account. Motion carried.

EDC STAFF REPORT
Geres – Geres reported on getting an intern from Earlham. Youxi Zhou, who is majoring in International
Studies and minoring in Japanese Studies will work every Wednesday and Friday from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm
until May. Geres will be her supervisor and she will assist Geres with research and data updates,
administration functions, assist Valerie with planning her trip to Japan, and attend BRE visits with staff.
Geres also reported on working on the monthly budget, completing annual reporting requirements,scheduling BRE visits for Henry and Shaffer, updating contact information for the local elected officials,
and attending both the Wayne County Area Chamber of Commerce dinner and the Osborn ribbon cuttingat their new headquarters.
Henry – Henry reported on continuing to work with the high school career center and connecting
employers to it. He reported Paragon Caskets hired two interns to work in production and just hired two
more interns from the CAD program to assist with designing blueprints of their building. Contract
Industrial Tooling is planning to also start students from the career center. He reported on meeting
representatives from Jay County to discuss a three-county partnership on a website that hosts local joblistings. He reported on reaching 89% of the goal to reach Certified Work Ready Community status. He
reports needing 18 more of the emerging workforce and 65 more of the transition workforce to get to100% of the goal and needs to do this by the deadline of May. Shaffer added Henry and Doty are finalizing
the e-blast to be sent out which will convey the importance of the program to the community. He reported
the Excel Center is now a testing site and students can start taking Work Keys testing there. Lastly, hereported on attending two BRE visits alone, two with Valerie, and continuing to work with 7 othercompanies in various stages of expansion.
Doty – Doty reported on a strong start with OnVine Media and that the EDC has gained 27 new Twitter
followers in the first two weeks of the contract. She reported on her assistance with the Omen USA jobs
announcement, working with Omen on the content, circulating the state’s news release, scheduling times
for Valerie to comment to local media, etc. She also reported on working with Mike Bennett on anupcoming Brightside story about Bed Butler.
Shaffer – Shaffer reported on continuing to be very busy with new attraction projects. Two new projects
generated in January, with one being for a call center, and Project Sailfish being a food processor. She
reported Project Sailfish comes with a lengthy RFI and at a good time when the intern starts to show heran example of the types of questions businesses ask when considering communities for expansion. She
reported Geres has started the RFI. She reported Project Horizon and Project Dove continue to be activewith weekly calls with consultants, they are investing in site due diligence, and are finalizing the incentive
package. She reported Project Autumn is still active, but she feels Wayne County is there back up site
based on how quickly the other projects are coming along as compared to this project. She reported on
meeting with Hull Property Group who purchased Richmond Square Mall and city officials to discuss theproposed investment that Hull is considering and how the city can be a partner in the project. She reported
on attending Osborn’s ribbon cutting on their new headquarters here in Richmond. The project brought
34 professional positions to the city and she reported this is there 4th expansion in 10 years. Each timethey expanded they were bringing a new line or department from another operation to Richmond. She
also reported on attending several meetings concerning the wastewater in Western Wayne to move thatproject forward. She attended the Environmental Infrastructure Working Group to discuss funding
opportunities with several stated and federal funding agencies, met with Milton Town Council members,
met with the new Connersville mayor, and attended Western Wayne Regional Sewer District meetings.

COMMITTEE REPORTS
A. Finance – Warner reported the finance committee met on January 28th, reviewed the general ledger,and reviewed the business that was discussed earlier in his treasurer’s report.
B. Executive – Witte reported the executive committee also met on January 28th, signed signature cards,approved the claim for the GIS Interlocal agreement, received news of the intern, discussed theupcoming contract renewal between the county and the EDC, and recommended approval of theOmen EDIT application.
C. Industrial Park – Warner reported the committee also met on January 28th. He reported the article inthe Sunday paper summed up what the Industrial Park has been working on, that if we land one ortwo of the active projects we will be without marketable land. They also discussed wastewater inWestern Wayne and that the Strand feasibility study may need to look at possibilities needed evenmore capacity.
OTHER BUSINESS
A. EDIT Application #16-184
Shaffer reported on EDIT application # 16-184 for Omen Casting Group, dba Omen USA. She
reported this was a dream project to work on, that everything moved so quickly. The company
initiated their search in October, made two site visits to Richmond, and were working to finalize thelease by the end of December. This operation is a high pressure aluminum die casting of automotive
parts. Omen is headquarted in Hatzor, Israel and has two other operations in Portugal and Russia.
Richmond, Indiana will be their fourth location. The company will be investing $16M by 2019 andanother $7M by 2021, plans to hire 100 employees with starting wages of $14/hour for a total
payroll of $3,328,000. The company is requesting a $275,000 EDIT grant for assistance with thisproject. The lead generated through the Indiana Economic Development Corporation by RollieHelming. Shaffer stated we won this project, not just through the work done at the EDC, but by all
the individuals involved. Omen was impressed by the effort given by all parties, including thebuilding owners and design group. Motion by Green, second by Clark to approve EDIT application#16-184 for $275,000 out of the consolidated EDIT fund. Motion carried.
ADJOURNMENT
Witte adjourned the meeting at 4:33 p.m.
NEXT BOARD MEETING – Monday, March 7, 2016
at EDC of Wayne County, Richmond, Indiana at 4:00 pm