Willits mayor heading group planning to rehabilitate former Remco plant

The rehabilitation of a derelict Willits industrial complex that generated decades of lawsuits and debate over its toxic pollution is moving closer to reality.

Escrow on the sale of the former Remco Hydraulics property is expected to close within a week or two, said Willits Mayor Bruce Burton, who is among the partners buying the land from the court-appointed trust managing it for owner PepsiAmericas.

Burton, Willits developer Ed Mitchell and their sons are planning a mixed-use business park they hope will house a brewery, manufacturing, businesses and government agencies on the roughly seven-acre property along the city’s main drag.

Burton said he hopes the project, estimated to cost ?$10.6 million, will generate the kind of well-paying manufacturing jobs the city has lost over the years.

“I’m really looking forward to the challenge of trying to put some businesses back into that facility,” Burton said. “Historically, that property was one of the best employers in town.”

Remco once employed about 260 people, Burton said.

He declined to divulge the price his group is paying for the property. The Skunk Train at one time had been in contract to buy the property for $200,000, according to general manager Robert Pinoli.

The train had been first in line to buy the property, with plans to create a new Willits depot at the location along Highway 101 near the city’s gateway sign, but the contract fell through last year over changes to the sales agreement.

The issue concerned restrictions put on the property in connection with its ongoing cleanup.

The Willits Environmental Remediation Trust, which manages the property, also requires buyers to be responsible for any contamination that might be found underneath buildings if they’re removed.

The trust was appointed by a court to oversee the site for PepsiAmericas, which inherited the property’s toxic liabilities when it purchased other companies that once owned ?Remco.

Burton said he’s not concerned about finding toxic materials under the buildings largely because his group isn’t planning to tear down the structures.

“We want the buildings,” he said. They include a 180,000-square-foot ?warehouse.

The city of Willits last month gave permission to the trust to leave the buildings intact, reversing an earlier agreement that required the buildings to be dismantled and removed before the property could be sold. The city also gave tentative approval for the proposed uses of the ?property.

Remco Hydraulics Inc. was founded by Willits industrialist Robert Harrah in about 1945. Over the next 50 years, it produced a variety of hazardous chemicals as waste, including hexavalent chromium, used on hydraulic cylinders between 1963 and 1995.

Hundreds of people sued over contamination from chemicals traced to the property, claiming the pollution made them ill.

Some 300 lawsuits have been settled and most of the toxic pollution has been cleared, but the trust continues to be responsible for monitoring and controlling groundwater contamination on the ?property.

Willits City Council members have said they are looking forward to the blighted property’s rehabilitation, but at least one has concerns about the sales process and whether the council’s approval of the sale had adequate public input.

Councilwoman Madge Strong said she’s concerned that the Skunk Train’s contract may have fallen through because of miscommunication with the trust.

Burton said his group’s purchase of the property doesn’t preclude the Skunk Train from putting a depot at the site.

“We’d be very pleased to work with the railroad,” he said.

His main goal is to create more manufacturing jobs in Willits, which has lost more than 2,000 such positions since the late 1980s, Burton said.

They were among the city’s better-paying jobs, he said.

“I like things to be made. I like to see people making products,” said Burton, who owns a redwood lumber mill.

He expects significant progress to be made on rehabilitating the Remco site within the next 12 months.