Fanestil Meats has been awarded $1.6 million grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to relocate out of the flood plain.
Owners Dan and Jan Smoots announced the grant, which will help fund the relocation of Fanestil Meats.
“Flooding has been a regular occurrence since we bought the plant in 1997,” a letter from the Smootses stated. “In our second year of ownership, we had a bad flood that caused a lot of damage and we were shut down for several weeks. It seems like, about every other year, we have a fairly serious flood and it causes a lot of headaches and unnecessary company cost.”
The grant money has been set aside with the State of Kansas. The Smootses have been working on the grant for two years through FEMA and the Kansas Department of Emergency Management.
“We are excited for the opportunity to build new and relocate,” the letter stated. “I am cautiously optimistic we can make everything work out, but we still have a few hurdles to get over. Right now we are working with the City of Emporia and Lyon County to select an appropriate site and resolve the final hurdles before we can get moving.”
The Smootses hope to start construction this spring or early summer.
“The new facility would be a little bigger than the one we are in today and would be designed to streamline our processing operations,” the Smootses said. “The existing Fanestil site would be leveled and turned back into green space.”
The Smootses thanked Steve Samuelson, Lyon County flood plain manager, and Rick Frevert, Lyon County Emergency Management.
Fanestil Meats has seen a large growth in business with 2009 being its best year of growth.
“We will probably be adding to our 80-employee work force again this year,” Smoots said. “Our growth has been in all aspects of our business, which includes sales to retail grocery stores, food service sales and private label processing for other companies.”
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
Congradulations Dan and Jan, I hope you use this opportunity to do some Agro-tourism. The best chance for new jobs are the hometown businesses and we should do everything we can as a community to help. The number 1 industry in America is tourism and we need to play to it. The Emporia dream is not over, Emporia is an adventure. What new industry and Emporia want is very simple--they want an Emporia as good as its promise. Emporia is a tune that must be sung together. Thank God Emporia finally got some pork coming out of Washington. It's about time we got some bacan. If you want the real fruits of life, you have to go out on a limb--never, never, never settle for second best. Our town was looking for that needle in the haystack, we didn't find the needle, but we discovered the farmer's daughter so let's be gentlemen and give her the respect and honor she deserves. We have a winner here, so let's not bunt, it's time to hit it out of the ballpark. And l'm round'n third and head'n home.
March 13, 2010 at 11:15 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
gg (anonymous) says...
Did Fanestils start a baseball team? Are you a cheerleader Reddog?
March 14, 2010 at 11:16 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Steve_Corbin (anonymous) says...
Just a thought, not sure if either would work, but have they looked into an excisting building like Lenze or the old coors/Debauge building? but then with todays technology and building standards it may be more cost effective to start from scratch.
March 14, 2010 at 12:36 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
les_herschler (anonymous) says...
Reddog is a cliche waiting to happen...
March 14, 2010 at 12:42 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
neighbor (anonymous) says...
Great news! Congrats Fanestils.
March 15, 2010 at 1:05 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
create (anonymous) says...
This is fantastic news for a property sale, for construction employment and for Fanestil's added employment not to mention improvements to meat processing itself. All of those plusses are exactly what the Washington stimulus package was designed to do. This is proper usage of our tax dollars when several areas are able to profit at the same time. This is what President Obama was talking about in the beginning.
Well done, Fanestils! Now the rest of us need to remember what brand to buy when we are shopping for such things as sausage and Party Time ham and my favorite, baked beans and beef.
March 15, 2010 at 10:02 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
les_herschler (anonymous) says...
Akami: 25? I can't do 1!
March 15, 2010 at 10:14 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
neighbor (anonymous) says...
Not to mention they are moving out of the flood plain.(same thing should have been done in the case of New Orleans)
$1.6 Million is not going to build thier new plant, knowing our local real estate mindset, most of it will be spent on location and preperation, but it's a good start.
March 15, 2010 at 10:14 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
justaflushaway (anonymous) says...
I agree with you Steve, In fact they could simply just walk to work as they just live across the street south of there, They could even use the acreage east of their home to build. I sure would, but then I'm not rich or talented, have a hard time making a hamburger.
March 15, 2010 at 10:29 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kcfan (anonymous) says...
I had heard that they had already purchased the Lenze building. Hills is currently using it until their offices are done, but again I hear that they could be moving out as early as this week. All hear say, but timing seems pretty good with story release.
March 15, 2010 at 3:36 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
booker5m (anonymous) says...
People are moving out of the trailers to Lenze til plant is done
March 15, 2010 at 7:06 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )