Project Thunder Santander economic development agreement

1:34:16Chairman, we have one additional time certain it was for eleven fifteen. It's the Project Thunder, and I did see them in the audience. If you'd like to take that.

1:34:33Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Commissioners. My name is David Engel. I'm with the Office of Economic Growth. The item before you today is an economic development agreement for Confidential Project Thunder. It's for job creation and economic incentives. The company that'll be uh coming to Pasco County is Santander Consumer USA. Their parent company, Santander Bank, and the company. Headquartered in Boston has nine thousand seven hundred employees. Uh Mr. Cronin

1:35:03will be speaking to you about the uh exciting components of this project, and we have six guests before you today. Mr. Ernie Ocasio, he's the Senior Vice President for Program Management with Santander Consumer USA. Ms. Kim Moore, she's our senior managing director. She was the site consultant. She's with Newmark Knight Frank. And Mr. Bill Cronin is here, president and CEO of the Pasco EDC. And on Bill's team accompanying him is Mike Bishop, Tom Ryan, and

1:35:33Lauren Masselli. So at that, uh I'd like to introduce Mr. Bill Cronin.

1:35:39Thank you.

1:35:39Welcome.

1:35:41Thank you. Good morning commissioners and good morning county staff and citizens of Pasco County. Uh it is another great day here in Pasco County, and as many of you know, uh since about 2016. We've had a very difficult time in explaining why we have this big box building right at the entrance of our county at Suncoast and State Road 54. The super target has remained empty for four years despite our healthy growth. Well, I'm

1:36:11happy to say because of the specialized need of that building and the specialized use, we do have a special company that's is taking that building. And as David Engel mentioned, that company is Santander Consumer USA. Project Thunder came to us several months ago and it was a national site selection search conducted by Newmark Knight Frank's Kim Moore who is with us from the Dallas office. The goal was to locate a modern and efficient site that could accommodate

1:36:41future expansions. And this site was not just a building search, but it was also a search for sustainable talent pipeline in a community with great livability. Our labor force was so important because I'm happy to say that not only is Santander Consumer USA investing twenty-two million dollars in Pasco County, And not only are they upgrading and redeveloping one of our most prominent and visiting visible buildings, they're

1:37:11also going to be employing over 875 jobs here in Pasco County.

1:37:23And not only will these eight hundred and seventy-five jobs be here in Pasco County, the company will be paying over a hundred and fifteen percent of our current county average wage. And offering career opportunities for our bilingual workforce, which will likely help out our Hispanic population, which is largely our our largest ethnic population uh here in in Pasco, which will give them some new career pathways outside of traditional ag related jobs. The economic impact to gross

1:37:53county product to Pasco is a hundred and twenty nine million dollars over the next five years. Santander Consumer USA is an excellent addition to the business and professional services industry. their parent company, Banco Santander of Spain, is one of the world's largest banks And if you have an automobile loan in Latin America, it's probably from Santander. As a matter of fact, Banco Santander was named just last week as Bank

1:38:23of the Year in the Americas, Brazil, Spain, and Argentina by the Banker, which is a global financial intelligence organization in London. Their US subsidiary Bank O'S Consumer I'm sorry, Santander Consumer USA. is headquartered in Dallas, Texas. And they have additional locations in Texas, Arizona, Colorado. Puerto Rico and California and they manage accounts for over three million customers across all different

1:38:54kinds of pr credit profiles. We're really proud that they're going to be calling Pasco home. Uh and here from the company is Mr. Ernie Ocasio, who is the Senior Vice President. And I'd like to ask if Ernie would like to say a few words.

1:39:08Okay.

1:39:12Good morning. Thank you. Good morning. Well, I'd like to thank the uh county and the EDC for seeing us here today in support of our project. You know, Santander Consumer is excited about expanding into Florida and particularly Pasco County. The area is rich in resources and knowledgeable skills that are critical to our corporation. And we hope through these eight hundred and seventy-five new jobs is where people want to grow their careers. So thank you very much.

1:39:41Mr. Chairman Mariano.

1:39:48So again, muchas gracias to Sentander. Um thank you again for um for both uh Sentender Consumer USA and Newmark Knight Frank for their support and commitment to Pasco. A special thank you to our Board of County Commissioners for your consideration and of course uh the staff at the county, uh David Engel and Sally Sherman and and their shop worked with us through the site selection process. So I'm gonna turn it

1:40:15I just wanted to welcome um Ocasio, Mr Mr. Ocasio here. I I know that name as Santander. I I spent a month at the University of Santander in Santa in Spain when I was seventeen, so um I know your namesake I guess. Um but um you're in my district and I and I welcome you to Pasco County. Thank you. Thank you so much for choosing us. Thank you.

1:40:41Any other questions? David.

1:40:47Do what now? Uh Jack Mariano? Oh Jack.

1:40:52Go ahead. Uh Mr. Cronin. Mr. Cronin, I want to thank you again for doing a phenomenal job, bringing a top-rated company. Mr. Casio, welcome. And we look forward to uh having your business grow here in such a great way.

1:41:04Yeah. You know I was thank you and welcome you to Pasco County. So we'll do all we can to make it feel like home. It feels like home to us and we'll make it feel that way to you.

1:41:15Mr. Mr. Chairman, I was so surprised and saddened when the target closed. I even called their corporate offices. Um but I think we're ending up with m something much better than a large uh retail corner. So great corner, great great job. Thank you.

1:41:33Turn it back to David so you guys can make it official, okay? Thank you. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Bill.

1:41:40The uh incentive is uh simple. Uh For the eight hundred and seventy-five jobs, uh the PASCO EDC recommends uh one million seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to be paid out over a ten-year period. and a ten year tangible tax reimbursement Totaling up to $342,000, which will be years one through five, fifty percent of their tangible tax, and years six through ten, twenty-five percent of their tangible tax.

1:42:10This in fact is the most cost-effective job creation incentive that we've offered uh a company. It it's equivalent to three hundred and ninety-one dollars a job. So on that note, I'd like to recommend approval of this item.

1:42:25Um I move approval.

1:42:26Second.

1:42:27We got a motion and a second. All those in favor excuse me. Roll call vote.

1:42:33District two, Commissioner Moore.

1:42:34Aye.

1:42:35District three, Commissioner Starkey.

1:42:37Aye.

1:42:37District four, Commissioner Fitzpatrick. Aye. District five, Commissioner Mariano. Aye.

1:42:42Aye. Thank you very much, Commissioner.

1:42:44District 1, Chairman Oakley. Get them all in.

1:42:49And that makes it unanimous. We're welcome, welcome you to Pasco County. Thank you. Okay.

1:43:00If if you don't mind, can we do a quick photo up? We'll leave you if you need to stand there, but we've got a sign and we can stand in front.

1:43:06Oh

1:43:06okay. That'll

1:43:07be

1:43:07fine.

1:43:09Should we stand up here or come down there? Yeah, yeah. We'll

1:43:13just stay where we're at. Yeah.

1:43:14Right. This is our first COVID photo.

1:43:19Yeah.

1:43:22Maybe earn a tablin fund? Sure. Yeah, yeah. Maybe we can help. Well, I don't if we need to pay for that, so

1:43:28I'm gonna ask you to sign

1:43:29this.

1:43:36Maybe we can stagger a little bit. Thanks.

1:43:43Just take measure up.

1:43:52Just a little bit.

1:44:05Thank you.

1:44:10Or what?

1:44:11Don't break the money. Can we put this? Well, that's not a check.

1:44:15Yes.

1:44:16Thank you. Do you have Sharpie? Oh we've got one. And then you got the shovel. Okay. All right, we have another time cert.

1:44:27Don't do that in the afternoon. It's just a video.

1:44:36Oh.

1:44:39Yeah, we could I don't I don't really want it now, but yeah. We're just signing it, right? Yes, it's up to the administrator.

1:44:48You could have just

1:44:48done it for me, right? An agenda done rank and people because you got people.

1:44:59Yeah, but they're they're but but they're there for the one in the I mean you could add I'd