02/15/2018 Minutes
PARIS ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
MONTHLY MEETING
Community Room
1125 Bonham Street
Paris, Texas 75460
Thursday, February 15, 2018
4:00 P.M.
MINUTES
Board Members Present: Staff Present:
Richard Manning, Chairman Michael Paris, Executive Director
Marion Hamill, Vice-Chairman (arrived 4:04 pm) Chris Stout, Economic Development Associate
Tim Hernandez, Secretary/Treasurer Paula Brownfield, Administrative Assistant
Derrick Hughes
Ray Banks
Ex-Officio Members Present: Guest(s) Present:
John Godwin, City Manager (arrived 4:14 pm) Brittany Martin, McClanahan & Holmes
Mary Madewell, The Paris News
Legal Counsel: City Council Liaison:
Stephanie Harris, City Attorney Paula Portugal
Call to Order.
Mr. Manning called the meeting of the Paris Economic Development Corporation to order at 4:00 p.m.
on February 15, 2018.
osed.
Discuss and possibly approve Minutes of the January 23, 2018, Monthly Meeting.
Mr. Manning asked if the Board Members had a chance to look at the minutes. The Board had no
changes. Mr. Manning made a motion to approve the January 23, 2018, minutes. Mr. Hughes seconded
the motion. Vote was 3-ayes, 0-nays and 1-abstention by Mr. Banks.
Discuss and possibly approve January 2018 Financials.
Mr. Hernandez went over the financials pointing out there were two pay periods in January and the
Administrative costs were normal. The item listed under Associations for $500.00 is the yearly TEDC
membership dues. In Marketing $3000.00 for TEAM TEXAS was our yearly marketing fee and
$1000.00 for ONCOR-PLASTEC was our portion of booth space at the PLASTEC Conference. Mr.
Banks inquired on the TEDC charge of $400.00 and Mr. Paris answered that it was for the TEDC
Winter Conference in San Antonio. Mr. Paris said when American Spiralweld looked at two
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properties, Oliver Rubber and Superior Switch, we realized the Phase I studies done in 2003 were not
current. GHD Services completed a new Phase I study for $5800.00, a Phase II strategy for $1900.00
and the extra fees of $91.38 were to obtain documents. Berg-Oliver is for a wetlands study of the 140
acres. The rest of the items were normal expenses. Mr. Banks asked about the TD Ameritrade amount
and it was concluded that it was a retirement expense. Mr. Banks made a motion to accept the
financials as presented. Mr. Hughes seconded the motion. Vote was 5-ayes to 0-nays.
Discuss and possibly approve the yearly Audit Report for the 2016-2017 year as presented by
Brittany Martin of McClanahan and Holmes.
Ms. Brittany Martin with McClanahan and Holmes presented the PEDC yearly audit. The audit was
the Balance Sheet
under Accrued Liabilities. Mr. Hernandez asked if the statement was converted from a cash basis to an
accrual basis. Ms. Martin answered that it was. On the Income Statement most items were very
consistent except for a difference in the Personnel and the Administration accounts is due to employees
becoming permanent and not contract labor. Other Financing Sources was unique this past year with
the return of land from Powder Innovations; and SuRRMA return of income from the Highway 24
project. Mr. Banks asked Mr. Paris when the final payment from SuRRMA would be received. Mr.
Paris said he would check on it. Mr. Banks questioned item 4 - Retail and Office Structure on page 10
under Commitments. He asked if this was Paris Lakes and Mr. Paris affirmed it was. Mr. Banks stated
that this commitment expires May 31, 2018, and if Paris Lakes did not meet the requirements by then
we were not under any obligation to them going forward. Mr. Paris said it was his understanding and
he would examine the documents. Mr. Manning asked about the Excess Expenditures on page 6 which
says that for the year ended on September 20, 2017, our Personnel expenditures exceeded the budget
by $6002.00. Ms. Martin said that page 12 shows the budgeted amounts and the actual amounts. Mr.
Hamill made a motion to approve the 2016-2017 Audit Report. Mr. Hernandez seconded the motion.
Vote was 5-ayes to 0-nays.
Discuss the
Mr. Banks asked Mr. Paris if he could give a name of one or more companies that have come to Paris
to look at a site as a as a result of contact at the conferences that he attended. Mr. Paris said the first
contact was Paul Ghany from Columbia. He met him at FABTECH with the Oncor group. Mr.
company works with KIA and other car manufacturers doing after-market components. He
belongs to SEMA and knows of Bodyguard. His company is looking at assembly of components not
manufacturing. Mr. Ghany will be coming back at the end of March to talk to Bodyguard and looking
at space for his company. The second contact came from Select USA, his name Shrinath Sundaram
from India. He has close ties to the US Consulate and India Chamber of Commerce in Houston. A
group met with him about a flight school at Cox Field and a medical device component that sends vital
statistics to a doctor via satellite. He is looking for a place to manufacture the component. Mr. Paris
stated these were the two primary businesses that visited Paris based on his travel.
Mr. Hamill left at 4:30 p.m.
Mr. Hernandez commented that the first trip listed was to Germany and represents over 31% of the
total Marketing budget.
Hannover Messe. Mr. Hernandez asked about the type of companies that go to Hannover Messe. Mr.
Paris stated the European American Investment Council has given us leads for foreign companies
ready to invest in the US. The EAIC came through the Longview EDC. We do not want other
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communities to benefit from foreign investment without us taking advantage of this opportunity. Mr.
Mr. Paris reminded
everyone that even though the Hannover Messe conference is 30% of the Marketing budget we are not
using the total amount that we could use. We have accumulated approximately $300,000 in marketing
funds. Mr. Manning asked about the $8,000.00 registration expense and was told it included hotel and
travel expense within Germany. Mr. Hughes stated that
reminded the Board there were no guarantees on the number of prospects we receive at any conference.
The Board asked Mr. Paris for more information at the next meeting.
The staff met a couple of weeks ago with the subject being productivity. We plan to follow
up leads with the Sales Funnel.
J Skinner has met the first phase of their performance agreement. We reviewed the ADP
report and the Workforce report and they have exceeded the 55 new employees by 12 to
70 new employees. J Skinner documented 203 full-time employees. In the next six months
they will need to retain these jobs and meet their performance agreement before the
$400,000 will be paid.
lized their paperwork and a check for the forgivable loan is being
processed. The promissory note is for $400,000.
Potters Industries was required to maintain their workforce of 23 full-time employees and
to add 10 extra full-time employees by December 31, 2017. We received documents from
them showing a total of 43 full-time employees at the end of the year. The final payment
of $8,000 is being processed for Potters.
Paris Lakes contract is being reviewed in anticipation of the final date on the contract,
May 31, 2018.
We are asking for clear information on the guarantee of the loan for HWH. A letter asking
for documentation of the loan was mailed to HWH.
The ag company is being talked to about the rail spur we gave to them. We sent a letter
asking that the rail spur be cleaned up.
American Spiralweld application for the Texas Enterprise Fund has passed its due
diligence through the Department of Economic Development and Tourism. It is now in
front of the Governor, Lieutenant Governor and the Speaker of the House. The 30 day
review process has started and a 14 day extension can be filed to complete the review. We
are looking at Paris leadership traveling to Austin to support the application. If American
Spiralweld chooses Paris, they will be building on the southern part of the Business Park.
The PEDC will be doing Phase II cleanup on old Superior Switch and Oliver Rubber
properties. Mr. Banks asked what the testing of the soil showed. Mr. Paris said the primary
element is barium and our first goal will be to remove the barium around the rail spur.
GHD advised us that it could take up to a year to clean up the property. Berg Oliver did
the wetlands study and the wetland can be remediated very quickly.
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PLASTEC Conference was in Anaheim last week. 75 leads were created. Robotics is the
biggest thing.
Community visits were Paul Ghany and Shirith Sundaram.
Our office wants to welcome visitors. We always want to invite to Paris.
Convene into Executive Session:
a) Section 551.087; Deliberation of Economic Development Negotiations to deliberate
Commercial and Financial Information and Economic Incentives relating to the
following: Commercial real-estate development.
1) Discuss Land Purchase
2) Project American SpiralWeld
Chairman Manning convened the Board into Executive Session at 4:57 p.m.
Reconvene into Open Session and possibly take action on item(s) discussed in Executive Session.
Chairman Manning reconvened the Board into open session at 5:25 p.m.
No items were acted on.
Discuss Future Agenda Items.
Mr. Paris asked about putting travel on the next agenda and if the Board wanted both a discussion and
approval. Mr. Hernandez replied that he would like more discussion. Mr. Paris said he would put more
detail into travel at the next meeting.
Adjourn
Mr. Banks made a motion to adjourn. Mr. Hughes seconded the motion. Vote was 4-ayes to 0-nays.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:27 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Paula Brownfield
Administrative Assistant
Paris Economic Development Corporation