Molnlycke deal heads for town vote
A tax deal Molnlycke is seeking from Wiscasset voters January 14 would help with its costs to expand its Rynel plant on Twin Rivers Drive. File photo
A tax deal Molnlycke is seeking from Wiscasset voters January 14 would help with its costs to expand its Rynel plant on Twin Rivers Drive. File photo
Molnlycke's tax incentive deal with Wiscasset took months of talks between selectmen and the wound-care products maker.
Now it's up to residents to decide on the plan that would help Molnlycke nearly double the size of its Rynel plant and add 10 to 30 jobs.
The special town meeting starts January 14 at 7 p.m. at the Wiscasset Community Center.
Going with the plan makes the most sense for the town, Selectmen's Chairman Ed Polewarczyk said in an interview January 2.
It would keep more money in the town's coffers than if Molnlycke expands without the deal, Polewarczyk said.
Without it, the new property tax money from the expansion would add to Wiscasset's tax base, likely hiking the town's share of the county tax and cutting school aid and other state funding, Polewarczyk said.
The deal would shelter that tax money instead. Half would go to Molnlycke; most of the town's half would help pay off infrastructure debts. About $10,000 of the town's yearly share would go to marketing and other economic development efforts.
“To me, the (plan) is the only logical choice for Wiscasset,” Polewarczyk said.
James Detert, Molnlycke's business development director for the Americas, said he'll be at the special town meeting to explain the expansion plans and answer voters' questions.
“That's really what our focus is on, is doing the job of communicating what we're trying to do,” Detert said in a telephone interview January 2.
Detert said the project's goals have not changed since the company first announced the possible expansion in July 2013: The $5.5 million to $7 million, 32,000-square-foot add-on would provide space for Brennen Medical, a St. Paul, Minnesota-based company that Molnlycke picked up in 2012.
Brennen uses pig skin in a product that helps burns heal.
There would also be more space for Molnlycke's research work, making the Wiscasset plant even more relevant to the Gothenburg, Sweden-based company, Detert said.
Wiscasset Town Manager Laurie Smith said January 2 she has not heard any opposition to the tax-incentive proposal.
If voters pass it, the deal would still need an OK from the commissioner of Maine's Department of Economic and Community Development. It won’t go there until after the vote, Smith said.
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