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McKesson Medical-Surgical picks Bartlett for new distribution facility

Updated Aug. 23 to corrrect that the $11 million in property taxes cited in the story is over the course of the 12 yeras of the Class 6B tax incentive.

Bartlett officials approved financial incentives Tuesday to bring a 400,000-square-foot warehouse, distribution and office facility for McKesson Medical-Surgical Inc. to the Cook County portion of the Brewster Creek Business Park.

The company, the largest distributor of medical supplies in the country, is a division of McKesson Corporation, which ranks seventh on the Fortune 500, village officials said.

McKesson plans to employ 200 people in Bartlett by 2024, with most of the jobs being full-time.

The village has been in confidential talks with Irving, Texas-based McKesson for a year and a half as the company weighed other sites for the facility. Bartlett and a community south of Des Moines, Iowa were the two finalists, Village President Kevin Wallace said.

"We're really excited," Wallace said. "It's a major project. It's a huge building."

Perhaps just as important, he added, is the potential for additional, ancillary businesses that may want to be located near McKesson.

Officials were able to announce the full deal Tuesday night after the village board approved several financial incentives. They include a waiver of building permit fees, a $50,000 grant to offset development costs eligible for funding by the area's tax increment finance district, and assistance in connecting the company with local workforce development groups.

Wallace said that among the reasons Bartlett made the cut was the intense demographic research the company did of the area's labor pool.

The facility will be the first development within the Cook County portion of the Brewster Creek Business Park, located west of Route 59 and north of Steans Road. To help it compete with the DuPage County portion, the Cook County Board approved a Class 6B incentive for the project's 26.3-acre site.

Over a 12-year period, the company is expected to save about $1 million per year through the 6B incentive, but property values will increase to the point that about $11 million in taxes will be collected during the same period, officials say.

The Brewster Creek Business Park already is home to more than 70 businesses and is distinguished by its food and high-technology precision manufacturing firms, according to the village.

The Cook County portion makes up about 145 acres of the more than 600-acre business park, but wetlands prevent a majority of the Cook County land from being developed, Bartlett Economic Development Coordinator Tony Fradin said.

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