Mount Pleasant has completed the first land acquisitions required for Foxconn Technology Group’s plans for a 22-million-square-foot LCD campus project near Interstate 94 and Highway KR.
Credit: Curtis Waltz / www.aerialscapes.com
The village exercised options to purchase 1,400 acres in the project area in December. The first of those transactions was completed on Friday and four more were completed Wednesday. In total, Mount Pleasant purchased 171.6 acres for $8,835,300.
Mount Pleasant officials announced Thursday afternoon the village would close on about 1,700 acres over the next week.
“This is a great step forward as we continue to look to a spring groundbreaking for the Foxconn
project,” said Dave DeGroot, Mount Pleasant village president.
Mount Pleasant is acquiring the land for the project before turning it over to Foxconn. The purchases are funded by a $60 million cash deposit Foxconn made in December and special assessments the company is paying as part of a tax incremental financing package.
Not all of the land will be purchased through options. The village will likely use eminent domain for a number of parcels, particularly smaller ones located near roads that will be undergoing construction. Those plans have sparked a lawsuit from a group of landowners who say they will be paid a fraction of what their neighbors will receive. Attorneys for Mount Pleasant have filed a motion seeking to have the case dismissed from the U.S. District Court for Eastern Wisconsin.
The land around where the Foxconn campus will be located is divided into four different areas.
Area I, located between Highway KR, Braun Road, Highway H and Interstate 94, will be the site of Foxconn’s main campus.
The land north of Braun Road to Highway 11 and generally between the interstate and Highway H is referred to as area II and will likely be home to Foxconn suppliers.
The land between Highway H, 90th Street, Braun Road and Highway KR is being called area III. The space will be used for construction staging and eventually be home to Foxconn suppliers and infrastructure.
Land located north of Highway 11 is included in the TIF district for potential development in the future.
Two of the parcels the village closed on in the last week were located in area I. A one-acre lot owned by David and Theresa Novak at 5115 E. Prairie View Drive sold for $343,000, well above its assessed value of $205,400. A 24-acre agricultural parcel at 4222 Highway H, owned by Thomas and Barbara Riedel, sold for $1,252,250 or $52,177 an acre. The vacant land was assessed at $5,300.
The three other parcels were owned by Thomas Fliess Jr. and Cherie Fliess. Two were located in area II and the third was in area II. A 79.6-acre parcel at 11016 Braun Road sold for $3,889,450 or $48,862 an acre. It was assessed at $19,900. A 22-acre parcel on Braun Road sold for $1,106,300 or $50,286 an acre. The land was assessed at $4,700. The area III parcel owned by the Fliess family at 4436 90th St. had 45 acres, which includes a house and other buidings, and was assessed at $324,900. It sold for $2,244,300.
Mount Pleasant is also partnering with the Racine Habitat for Humanity to direct items from homes acquired in the Foxconn process to Habitat’s ReStore.
