Pharma Company Seeks Merrillville Building
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowA former fieldhouse in Merrillville could be the new home of a pharmaceutical company. Town Councilman Shawn Pettit told our partners at The Times of Northwest Indiana Oh Pharmaceutical, a Korea-based company, plans to produce medical products in the building and has funding secured for the purchase.
Pettit told the publication the company has submitted a floor plan for the site and would remodel the building to allow for a laboratory and other amenities needed to make the products.
Following the town’s efforts in 2014 to acquire the facility with a $3.2 million bond issue, Oh Pharmaceutical has been leasing the empty building but now seeks to purchase it for the remodel.
Merrillville donated the property to the Purdue Research Foundation following the purchase so property taxes could still be collected from the site. The town has used that funding to make bond payments while the foundation manages the lease with Oh Pharmaceutical, which The Times says has been making monthly payments.
If the company purchases the building, Merrillville would be reimbursed for the remainder of the bond issue and could put it back into other funds or speculative projects.
“If we get our money and we can pay off that bond, then we would have excess funds that would go back in the Broadway TIF fund,” Pettit said.
He also told the publication Oh Pharmaceutical is expected to seek personal property tax abatement for about $10 million of equipment it will use to create its medical products.
To read the full story from The Times of Northwest Indiana, click here.