THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 16, 1995 TAG: 9504150235
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CARRICK MOLLENKAMP, RALEIGH NEWS & OBSERVER
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
Geraldine Dearborn's job as a real estate consultant based in Virginia Beach is to secretly scout sites for large company expansions that can change rural horse country into high-tech valleys. Usually, in the initial stages of a search, she will not reveal the name of a company despite questions from economic developers.
In North Carolina, the deal she was handling was code-named ``Project Geraldine.''
The project was Motorola Inc.'s $3 billion semiconductor plant, headed for the outskirts of Richmond. The company said Wednesday that after a search of 600 sites, it chose West Creek, a 3,500-acre business park in rural Goochland County.
The $22 billion electronics and computer company also considered Treyburn, a Durham corporate park, for the plant that one day will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, employing 5,000 people, to make the semiconductor chips that end up making billions in revenue for Motorola.
In the end, Treyburn lost. But Dearborn said that North Carolina could be a player for another major move by Motorola in the next five to 10 years.
``I would guess that a major site could come to North Carolina,'' Dearborn said. ``It could come a lot sooner.''
But last week, Virginia was the winner.
For North Carolina, the two-year chase began with a memo to Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. in October 1993 from his Department of Commerce staffers. ``It's real and it's big,'' the note said about a tip that Motorola was searching. Department of Commerce officials knew it might be Motorola, but they didn't know much else.
The note was included in a 7-inch-thick file that recorded every move North Carolina recruiters made to win Motorola.
Among the findings revealed in the file:
North Carolina's incentive package was nothing more than roads, power rate discounts and amenities like membership in Treyburn Country Club. The only unusual offer was a training facility at Durham Technical Community College.
In October, early in the chase, Don Johnson, Motorola's site director, asked where the ``meat'' was in North Carolina's package, according to a memo to Hunt. The ``meat'' never came.
State recruiters also were concerned that press coverage in North Carolina might hurt the project. Noted specifically was The News & Observer and its reporting on the project, Treyburn, Durham schools and environmental concerns in the watershed.
An update to Phillips from Carr noted that Motorola officials said the Richmond Times-Dispatch was ``less controversial, less nosey about the project and more of a booster.''
But press coverage aside, North Carolina seemed to be losing the project. In late February, officials with the Greater Durham Chamber of Commerce, which had taken a lead role in recruiting Motorola, scrambled to come up with additional incentives.
But not knowing what Virginia had offered made it difficult for North Carolina officials to come up with anything to match.
By February, Durham chamber officials had a sense that the project was in trouble, based on conversations with Motorola officials in the company's Research Triangle Park operation.
On Feb. 24, a fax went out to a group of Durham leaders and state officials. There was information, the fax said, ``that suggests that we must take immediate action or the project may be lost.''
It was. by CNB