Wawarsing and Ellenville officials are at the ready to try and keep local business Gillette Creamery within town limits. The ice-cream distributor has grown beyond the capacity of its current location in the village, and finding a suitable location within the township that will meet all of the businesses needs is proving to be a difficult task, one that has already taken about four months since it began. The ice cream distributor's chief operator, J.B. Gillette, appeared at the last joint meeting between the town and the village on Monday, March 10 with Lance Matteson, President of the Ulster County Development Corporation (UCDC) and CEO of the Industrial Development Agency (IDA), to discuss the recent efforts UCDC has been making in terms of keeping the business here.

"We are giving this very high priority, we are working very hard to try and solve this problem," said Matteson.

If and when a suitable site for the business becomes available, town officials will be able to do their part by making the approval and permit process as quick and painless as possible. While unwilling to comment specifically on their progress, Matteson was guardedly optimistic about the possibility of keeping Gillette Creamery, which employs over 70 people, from leaving the area.

"We're making headway," said Matteson. "We're at the point of making sketches of layouts on one site that looks promising. This is a complex process because you have to deal with the owners, and you have to deal with all of the environmental and infrastructure issues — the connections."

The clock is ticking, however, as the Gillettes are going to have to make a decision soon.

"The time frame is very tough," said Matteson. "We need to get this done in a way that can accommodate the company within the next year, basically, which means we have to start the development and construction very, very soon."

Gillette elaborated on the specifics of the timetable.

"We have to begin building in about eighteen months. So we know it's going to take twelve to eighteen months from the time we purchase a piece of land before that building's going to be done, so this timeframe is really getting close. On or about Memorial Day weekend, a few weeks, give or take either way, we've got to know where this piece of land is," said Gillette.

What some would think would be an obvious choice for expanding the creamery, the former home Schrade complex, the site less than ideal due to retrofitting issues, which would be both costly to the Gillettes and inconvenient to the property owner.

There are also a few factors contributing to Gillette Creamery's attraction to areas outside of town, including a lack of sites tailor-made to the business's needs in Wawarsing. Because they are a distribution company, closer proximity to the New York State Thruway, according to Matteson, would be a prime location, as it would cut down on shipping costs, while other unforeseen costs of such a location may make it less desirable. However, the two Empire Zones within the town's borders — one within the village and one outside of it — are part of what's driving efforts to keep the business local, as taking advantage of the zone's tax benefits is a situation they don't want to pass up. Should the business be unable to find a suitable location within the zone, the IDA can provide similar tax benefits, though none nearly as extensive as those provided by the Empire Zone program.

In a follow-up interview, Matteson elaborated on some of the tasks ahead for not just Wawarsing, but all of Ulster County and the Hudson Valley region to try and stimulate its flagging economic situation. Matteson discussed making more potential business properties "shovel-ready," which, in Ulster County, generally means having infrastructure like water, sewer, and electric ready to function at the property line for when the business moves in, as well as having a completed general environmental impact statement for the property. The King's Highway industrial corridor in Saugerties, for example, has recently received county funding to start creating more shovel-ready sites, a process which has already made a difference, according to Matteson.

"Just having that approved, so that businesses along that industrial zone corridor know that it's coming, has already stimulated development and jobs growth," he said.

Matteson also talked about many of Wawarsing's assets that could potentially draw more businesses to the area through a similar process.

"The good thing about Wawarsing is that you do have some appropriately zoned sites or some sites that could be zoned appropriately in an expeditious way," he said. "You have existing buildings that are zoned industrial, and you have a tradition of manufacturing and industry in Ellenville and Wawarsing, which is significant. You have lots of electrical power capacity, you have water, sewer, you have Empire Zone, which means favorable tax treatment — all of those things are very positive. Many communities do not have any or most of those elements."

On a more general level, Matteson also said that he and UCDC are working to bring businesses to Wawarsing to take advantage of the empty industrial buildings left by Hydro and Schrade's departure.

"This is a very, very high priority for the UCDC, and I'm working very hard on that. There are some leads…nothing I can talk about specifically right now, but I can say on a general level that I do routinely market the Hydro/Schrade properties to prospects that call or that are referred to us by the state or the Hudson Valley Development Corporation. The HVDC had a representative in the Schrade building not too long ago so she could better market it to her leads as well, so we're definitely working that problem, and we have a few specific prospects that are in discussions."

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