Jacklin Donates 28 Acres For UI Research Park
The University of Idaho Foundation accepted a 28-acre land gift from the Jacklin Land Co. Thursday, advancing a proposed Post Falls research park one step further.
UI officials plan to construct the 40,000-square foot Riverbend Research and Training Park building using the acreage as collateral. The Jacklin family has set aside 100 acres near the Post Falls Outlet Mall for the park, with the agreement that the UI will get an additional acre for every three acres sold to businesses recruited there.
The 20 members of the UI’s private fund-raising arm cast their unanimous support in the Thursday meeting, which was closed to the public at the last minute due to “sensitive negotiations with donors and the private sector.”
One interested party is Lockheed Martin Corp., a major defense contractor with an eye toward opening an office near Coeur d’Alene.
“If they come to North Idaho they will consider (the park) for some of their activities,” UI President Robert Hoover said Thursday after the meeting. “They are bringing some people up to look at the site and see how it might fit into their plans.”
The possibility of a Lockheed presence visibly buoyed Post Falls Mayor Gus Johnson, who attended the meeting along with city administer Jim Hammond.
“Lockheed Martin is looking to rent space in that building,” because of potential federal contracts to clean up mining wastes in the Silver Valley, Johnson said. “We are more than comfortable with this project. We are excited. It is going to work.”
Others are more guarded in their optimism.
One of the conditions the Foundation attached to accepting Jacklin’s land was that they ultimately be satisfied that a “financially sound plan is developed for construction and operation of the facility.”
And Hoover, in comments after the meeting, said “whether or not the park materializes” the UI will continue expansion in Idaho’s Panhandle, indicating his own uncertainty about the project’s feasibility.
“I happen to believe it’s a pretty sound idea,” Hoover added. “But the trick is still that one of these four or five options financially materialize. We have many more options now than we did several weeks ago.”
Foundation member Parker Woodall, president of Coeur d’Alene branch of Washington Trust Bank, said the university and foundation may have to come up with a cash down payment to make the project financially viable.
That could come from a group of donors or major corporate underwriters. An unnamed Fortune 500 company is among the corporate entities being courted for the park.
Other companies considering locating there include Wisconsin-based Phillips Plastics, Packet Engines, a growing software developer in need of expansion room, and Advanced Input Devices, a rapidly expanding keyboard manufacturing company.
“There’s still a number of considerations being looked at as the right way to do the finances,” Woodall said. “In the end it needs to be structured so the rent pays the bills.”
, DataTimes