It’s a story that virtually every community in Virginia can only hope for. The large manufacturing center on the edge of town that has been idle for more than a decade finds a new owner and a new lease on life.
That story is unfolding in Danville where city officials disclosed last week that the former Dan River Inc. No. 8 Mill, commonly referred to as the White Mill, has a new owner with plans to give new life to the old textile mill as a center of technology. It has the prospects of an investment of hundreds of million dollars that will create hundreds of jobs.
The story could not be better for Danville, where unemployment is hovering around 14.5 percent in an economy that is as bleak as they come in Virginia.
The old textile mill’s new owner is White Mill Development LLC, which is headed up by Gibbs International Inc. of Spartanburg, S.C. The firm is expected to invest $400 million in the sprawling mill that has been vacant for more than a decade.
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That investment could generate as many as 400 high-tech jobs that, as Mayor Sherman Saunders said, will “transform downtown.” The project will also be good for Virginia’s dwindling economy.
The state Tobacco Commission has agreed to invest $2.45 million in the project, while the Danville Regional Foundation has committed a $1 million investment toward it. Karl Stauber, president and CEO of the foundation, said his organization was excited to be a “partner in the economic and cultural transformation” of Danville’s downtown.
City Councilman Fred Shanks pointed to the construction jobs that will become available as the mill is transformed from the center of a fading industry to the center of a new enterprise with a robust future.
John Geiser, vice president of White Mill Development, said it will take some time to get the mill ready for its new life. “It needs a tremendous amount of work inside and out,” he said, adding it will be 12 to 18 months before the building is ready for its new tenants and as many as nine months before it can be shown to prospective tenants.
Plans call for the building to house information technology companies, secure records storage and other high-tech firms. Geiser said he is optimistic about the potential for hiring as many as 400 people because “there is a significant demand for high quality technology space.”
Rebirth of the gigantic White Mill comes none too soon for Danville or for the state. That investment and those jobs will go a long way toward rebuilding the economy that has left both the city and the state out of breath for several years.
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