Marshall, Otto listen to redvelopment plans for amunition plant

Thursday, July 29, 2010
(From left) Kansas State Senators Bob Marshall, R-Fort Scott, and Bill Otto, R-LeRoy, listen to Great Plains Development Authority CEO Dan Goddard and Past Chairman James McCarty while touring the Kansas Army Ammunition Plant near Parsons Wednesday morning. Goddard and McCarty told the senators of the economic impact caused by the plant's closure. Workers from within a 70-mile raduis of the plant, which included Fort Scott, once worked there. (Submitted photo)

PARSONS -- Southeast Kansas legislators toured the Kansas Army Ammunition Plant here Wednesday and got an inside look at how the 2005 Congressional Base Realignment and Closure Act (BRAC) is challenging the entire area. Sen. Bob Marshall, R-Fort Scott, and Rep. Bill Otto, R-Leroy, are joined by the Great Plains Development Authority CEO Dan Goddard and past chairman James McCarty, while they get a briefing on the history of the plant. A tour of the 14,000-acre facility followed.

With a salary base nearly double that of most Southeast Kansas counties, the plant attracted employees from a 70-miles radius -- an area that includes Fort Scott -- and its closure has created an economic impact throughout the Southeast Kansas area.

Built in 1941 in support of the WW II war effort, the Ammunition Plant originally employed more than 7,000 people. At the height of the Gulf War its employment was at 1,700. Military contracts included assembly of the sophisticated Sensor Fused Weapon and Tomahawk Missile. Production ended at the plant in Dec. 2008.

The authority is a quasi-municipal corporation working with the Department of Defense to acquire the property for redevelopment. The property includes a dam, water and waste water treatment plants, 33 miles of rail, switching yards, 106 miles of road and other infrastructure. The authority's plans include a 6,700-acre large tract industrial park. The Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks is acquiring 3,000 acres of the property that has helped boost the Parsons area to the No. 7 best whitetail deer hunting in the country, and Army contract-operator Day & Zimmermann, Inc. is negotiating to acquire 4,000 acres to continue munitions production.