THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 14, 1995 TAG: 9507140428
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
LENGTH: Short : 47 lines
A second Peninsula site may be in the running for a $100 million electronics components plant.
Representatives of Mitsubishi Consumer Electronics America Inc. visited the Stonehouse development in James City County in early June to look for a possible plant site, said Joel Mostrom, president of Stonehouse Inc.
The Mitsubishi representatives also toured Newport News' Carleton Farms Industrial Park during the same visit, looking for what city officials said would be the site of an electronic components plant.
Neil Morgan, Newport News' assistant planning and development director, said Wednesday that Mitsubishi officials had indicated his city was the only Peninsula site being considered. But he said the city was told later by Virginia Peninsula Economic Development Council officials that Mitsubishi also was visiting James City County.
``It was my general impression that the interest in that (James City County) site went up as the negatives in our site went up,'' Morgan said, referring to a controversy over a historic mansion next to Carleton Farms.
The Lee Hall mansion became a point of contention when city officials said Mitsubishi wanted to use it as an executive guest house. A local museum group - the War Memorial Museum of Virginia - had wanted to restore it for public viewing.
Mostrom, whose company is a subsidiary of Chesapeake Corp., said he understood that Mitsubishi was visiting Stonehouse at an early stage and as one of many potential sites.
He said the company told him it was interested in about 50 acres of the 220-acre Stonehouse Commerce Park. The park's only occupant is the county's shell building, and Solarex Corp. recently announced plans to build a solar-cell plant there.
Alan Witt, chairman of Newport News' Industrial Development Authority, which has been spearheading the effort to lure Mitsubishi, said the company's time line is different from what city officials were told.
``Time and fact are altering everything I was told,'' Witt said Wednesday. ``Weeks have transpired, and it obviously isn't as short term as I was led to believe.'' by CNB