Pipe and Foundry offered $35 million to move as Tepper eyes uptown stadium sites
Local governments in Stanly County are offering $35 million to lure Charlotte Pipe and Foundry to relocate its plant to the county, a move that would free up prime real estate Panthers owner David Tepper has been eyeing in uptown Charlotte.
Stanly County and the town of Oakboro, where a portion of the site would be located, voted this week to offer a combined $35 million to the company. Oakboro is about 45 minutes east of uptown Charlotte.
Pipe and Foundry has long been mum on its plans for the uptown site. The company’s board still needs to decide whether to accept the offers from the county and Oakboro, spokesman Brad Muller said in an email Wednesday.
The firm’s facility in uptown Charlotte occupies about 55 acres on South Clarkson Street, a few blocks from the Panthers’ Bank of America Stadium. The company, which employs over 500 full-time staff at the site, melts scrap metal into pipe.
The land that the current plant is on has been referenced as a potential destination for a new Carolina Panthers stadium.
Panthers and Charlotte MLS team owner David Tepper spoke multiple times in the past year about a desire to build a stadium in the next decade in uptown. In November, Tepper told reporters that the Pipe and Foundry site was one potential location.
Potential stadium site
The Panthers are past the major hurdles on their new practice facility in Rock Hill and could turn their attention to a new stadium soon.
Bank of America Stadium, less than a mile away from the plant, is in the midst of renovations that will upgrade the stadium for NFL games, concerts and the addition of a Major League Soccer team in 2021. Built in 1996, Bank of America is among the oldest stadiums in the NFL.
Tepper also has expressed a desire to build a retractable roof on a potential new stadium to set up North Carolina to hold a men’s basketball Final Four for the first time since 1994.
Funding of a new stadium will likely be hotly debated among local public officials and also team fans. The city already agreed to invest $110 million in tourism dollars for the new MLS team, which will most likely be used for building the team’s headquarters and practice facilities at the former Eastland Mall site, as well as upgrading Bank of America.
“If we can do something (in uptown), we would do that. To have something in Charlotte is great,” Tepper said about the new stadium in July. “If we can do it someplace near where we are, where so many people can walk to it, that’s a great place for a stadium. So you’d like it to be as close as where you are as you could in the future.
“There is different land around, so we may have to do something (elsewhere), But again it’s going to (have to) be with the city. We can’t do stuff by ourselves.”
The city’s $110 million MLS contribution could also be used for building an entertainment district that links uptown and the Gateway District. Tepper has been vocal about wanting to create an entertainment area near the stadium, similar to what’s been done in other cities, like Pittsburgh.
Tax breaks
Stanly County’s Board of Commissioners voted Monday to offer tax breaks that work out to about $22 million over 20 years, the Stanly County Journal first reported. The town of Oakboro would provide an additional $13 million, according to Stanly County Manager Andy Lucas.
In exchange for those tax breaks, the manufacturer would invest at least $325 million and create a minimum of 400 jobs.
Last year, an incentives package was signed into law by Gov. Roy Cooper that was specifically for a “heritage manufacturing employer,” or one that has been operating in North Carolina for 100 years at minimum, the Observer has reported. It would apply to a firm that has invested or plans to invest at least $325 million in the state.
The legislation allows the company to be eligible for the state’s Job Maintenance and Capital Development Fund.
Though Pipe and Foundry, which was founded in 1901, was not named in the bill, it meets those requirements.
This story was originally published May 6, 2020 at 2:27 PM with the headline "Pipe and Foundry offered $35 million to move as Tepper eyes uptown stadium sites."
