CLARION LEDGER
Clarion Ledger reports
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
PLANT FOR FACTORY-BUILT HOMES GOING UP IN COLUMBIA
Unity Homes, a nonprofit corporation, will build a $6 million modular home manufacturing facility in Columbia that will employ 89 people, Gov. Haley Barbour announced today.
"Modular housing is a major component of the state's strategy to develop affordable housing, particularly along the Mississippi Gulf Coast," Barbour said in a news release. "Unity Homes has developed an innovative approach to supplying affordable, energy-efficient housing for our citizens while providing long-term economic vitality to this region."
The 86,000-square-foot facility will be located on Airport Road in the Marion County Industrial Park. While the plant will employ at least 89 workers when it's fully operational - 51 of them by September 2008 - it potentially will employ more than 140 people by the end of its third year of operations, according to the news release. ...
The factory is expected to build 250 homes in its first year but be capable of building up to 800 homes annually. It will provide homes throughout the Gulf Coast and Delta regions.
"The unity behind Unity Homes is the partnership of local, regional and national experts, nonprofit organizations, financial institutions and diverse businesses that have come together to make Unity Homes possible," Paul Bogart, project director of Unity Homes, said in the news release.
Evelyn Brown, senior vice president of the Local Initiatives Support Corp., said in the release, "As a lender and equity investor in workforce housing and economic development, this is the type of project that provides jobs for residents and high-quality, energy efficient housing."
For the full story, visit the Clarion Ledger website: http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071030/BIZ/71030022