A couple that teaches flight lessons out of Sanford plans to open a facility in Halifax County that will build small airplanes designed in the Czech Republic.

Their company, LSA America, will receive state and local incentives worth up to $272,000 if it meets it goals of hiring 34 people and investing $400,000 in the production facility, Gov. Bev Perdue's office announced.

LSA is a four-year-old company started by Doug and Betty Hempstead, who also run B Bar D Aviation, the Sanford flight school. LSA has been the U.S. distributor for the Allegro light sport aircraft and recently bought the Czech company behind the brand.

Worldwide production will be out of Littleton, said Doug Hempstead. The company had considered opening its manufacturing facility in Wisconsin, but decided on Halifax County.

The U.S. Commerce Department has awarded Halifax County a $779,203 grant to make infrastructure improvements to the business park where Empire Foods plans to open a manufacturing plant.

Raleigh developer Greg Hatem announced in September that Empire would open a food processing facility in the Halifax Corporate Park.

The company expects to have its new facility operating by June. Empire Foods will be the first tenant at the new, 700-acre Halifax Corporate Park.

The federal grant is being issued through the Economic Development Administration.

Empire is expected to create 200 jobs over the next five years at its facility. The company will receive state and local incentives worth nearly $2 million if it meets hiring goals.

Empire is focusing on selling large packages of fruits and vegetables to hotels, restaurants, school systems, the military and other institutions.
 

As textile plants have continued to close across North Carolina, the state is seeing a number of food producers step in and open or expand facilities in those areas of the state.

The latest to do so is Reser's Fine Foods, which announced this week it is expanding its presence in Halifax County and adding 500 new jobs over five years.

One of the byproducts of the decline in textile manufacturing in the state is that a number of counties now find themselves with an abundance of water and sewer capacity not being used.

If there's one thing textile manufacturers and food processing plants have in common it's that they both require a lot of water and sewer capacity to operate their businesses.

Ed Reser, CEO of Reser's Fine Foods, said this week that among the reasons his company picked Halifax in 2000 was its abundance of water and sewer capacity.

In Randolph County, where cereal-maker Malt-O-Meal has opened a plant, economic development officials are using their water and sewer capacity as a major selling point in trying to land food processing companies.

Reser’s Fine Foods, an Oregon company that makes prepared foods and salads, announced today it will expand its plant in Halifax County and add 500 jobs over the next five years.

Riser’s said it will invest $15 million in 2010 as it expands its plant in the Halifax Industrial Center. The company received a $1 million grant from the One North Carolina fund.

Reser’s, headquartered in Beaverton, Oregon, makes prepared salads, dips, side dishes, Mexican foods and other products under a variety of brand names. The company has facilities nationwide.

“We are convinced North Carolina is the best strategic location, and we are excited to expand there. We plan to build a facility that the people of Halifax County and our employees are proud of, and one that will continue to produce great products,” Reser’s CEO Al Reser said in a release.

Governor Beverly Perdue is scheduled to make a jobs announcement in Halifax County today at 3 p.m.

The event will take place at Halifax-Northampton Regional Airport. Perdue will be joined by Dale Carroll, deputy secretary with the N.C. Department of Commerce.

The unemployment rate in Halifax County in November was 13.6 percent, among the highest in the state.

Edgecombe County, which borders Halifax to the south, had the highest unemployment rate of any county in the state in November at 16.6 percent.

The statewide unemployment rate was 10.7 percent in November.

Halifax County is home to Roanoke Rapids, a city that borrowed more than $20 million several years ago to build the Randy Parton Theater in an effort to spur economic development.

The theater failed and the city ended up taking control of it and renaming it Roanoke Rapids Theater.

District 2 school board candidate John Tedesco has fired back at opponent Cathy Truitt for her recent attack ads accusing him of being a pawn of Ron Margiotta and Western Wake.

In a wide-ranging interview in this week's Garner Citizen, Tedesco called Truitt "divisive" and a "hypocrite." He claims that Truitt, should she be elected, will become "marginalized and ineffective" because of the ads.