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Editorial: Area’s pitch for Boeing plant will take the max

Sun., Nov. 6, 2011

Boeing Co. has decided to name the updated version of its best-selling 737 the 737 MAX.

Spokane County officials and business leaders hope to bid on the potential new assembly plant for the airplane, for which there are already more than 600 orders. The bidding effort will take their max, and that of many others in the area as well.

This would easily be the community’s most ambitious economic development project ever, encompassing the construction of huge building, the infrastructure to support it, and training hundreds of workers who would become a blue-collar elite. A worker certified in airframe and power train work can earn $90,000 two years out of school, says Todd Woodard, Spokane International Airport marketing director. He and Robin Toth, vice president for business development at Greater Spokane Incorporated, are leading the effort to court Boeing, which in January is expected to put out a request for information that will launch its search for a new plant site.

The company likely would choose a site by the end of 2012.

The company could try to wedge additional capacity somewhere near its Renton or Everett plants. In Eastern Washington, it could look to Spokane or Grant County, with its cheap electricity and expansive runway near Moses Lake.

Texas is reportedly waving a $50 million check at the company, and other bids could be forthcoming from Alabama and Kansas.

Consultant Accenture is preparing an in-depth analysis of Washington’s strengths and vulnerabilities in the competition for the MAX. Its report is due before the Legislature’s special session later this month. Woodard expects a plan of action for lawmakers, probably for next year’s regular legislative session.

Spokane hardly figured in Accenture’s assessment until representatives came for a visit. They found an airport with a recently extended runway, and a new aircraft painting facility, with hundreds of acres of available land nearby easily accessed by railroad and Interstate 90. There are several aerospace suppliers on site or nearby, with a total of about 80 in a regional aerospace consortium. Spokane Community College and the Workforce Development Council are increasing education opportunities.

Though small by West Side standards, the Spokane area’s capacity to support a major aerospace plant has increased several-fold since Boeing built its first plant here in 1990. Triumph Group Inc. subsequently bought the factory.

Tuesday, Spokane County commissioners could vote on a temporary ordinance that would allow construction of a building big enough to accommodate an aircraft assembly plant. It will likely be the first of several steps local governments will have to take to position the community for a Boeing bid. The most far-reaching measure would have to go before voters: the creation of a port district to help finance infrastructure improvements, even a plant that could be leased to the company.

Voters roundly rejected a district in 1982, but there was nothing like a Boeing plant at stake to win support. If – if – a port comes to a vote, it will be a referendum on how badly the community really wants jobs. As badly as Texas?