From the News Service
of Florida and staff
Gov. Rick Scott will add 200 more jobs to his tally this week when he trumpets the opening of Keystone Terminals at the port in Jacksonville, and the terminal’s first customer, Vulcan Materials.
While the jobs, to be announced this morning at the terminal, will be created on Scott’s watch, they’re been in the works since before he was elected.
Scott and Mayor Alvin Brown are expected at this morning’s 9 a.m. grand opening.
Scott will add the 200 jobs to the tally he’s keeping as part of his pledge to create more than 700,000 in two terms. Scott recently said that since he took office his administration has created 76,800 jobs, and a spokesman said Tuesday that was based on Agency for Workforce Innovation figures through May.
Keystone recently finished construction of the $100 million port terminal that followed a long legal fight with the Jacksonville Port Authority over use of the site. Keystone, primarily a coal company, first announced plans to build the terminal in August 2009.
Still, the new project will be a showcase for Scott’s vision of a major economic driver over the next several years: increased use of Florida ports — although the ships Vulcan will use aren’t the larger ships that will fit through the expanded Panama Canal that Scott wants to lure to use Florida ports.
Vulcan, which has already offloaded its first shipment at the terminal, will ship limestone from its quarry in Mexico using ships that can fit through the current Panama Canal.
Keystone will also use the terminal for coal and aggregate shipments by rail. Privately held Keystone, based in Fort Myers, sells coal and other fuels.
For Scott, even if the jobs are being created as the result of an expansion announced almost two years ago, the event could serve as a harbinger of what has become a major economic development goal: making Florida into a prime place on the east coast to dock for cargo ships, the way it already is for cruise ships.
Florida is currently a long way away from being the global container ship magnet that Scott envisions, with the state’s ports currently behind New York, Charleston, Savannah, Norfolk and other east coast ports.
Several experts said in a recent St. Petersburg Times story on the governor’s ports aspirations that the state isn’t geographically suited to become a major shipping hub, in part because once goods get to the state they’re far from the rest of the country.
But it noted that other factors, such as established trade with Latin America and the coming canal expansion could help boost the state.
Scott has already pushed $77 million to Miami to deepen the shipping channel there to accommodate the larger ships that will use the Panama Canal after its expansion, and pledged continued efforts to improve infrastructure at many of the state’s 14 ports.
For Vulcan, one development that would really make the Jacksonville project successful would be a turnaround in construction, particularly in North Florida.
“This is a strategic location for Vulcan to efficiently supply aggregates to all parts of Jacksonville due to its central location and easy access to I-95 and I-10,” Scott McCaleb, Vulcan’s Florida Rock Division vice president said last month.
The Daily Record reported in June that Vulcan will use its 10 acres to ship aggregates through the terminal. Examples are crushed stone, sand and gravel. The materials are used to build roads and nonresidential properties.
Vulcan also is one of the largest producers of other construction materials, including asphalt and ready-mixed concrete, and is a leading producer of cement in Florida.
“We plan on being there for a long time, and hopefully the real estate market will continue to get better and we will be able to grow more and more,” said McCaleb.
The company also has high sales goals for its newest location.
“Vulcan will sell limestone and granite from the Keystone Terminal with sales revenues anticipated to exceed $20 million per year,” said McCaleb.
“Vulcan will sell limestone and granite from the Keystone Terminal with sales revenues anticipated to exceed $20 million per year,” he said.
The company also hopes to take advantage of improvement in the energy sector as the operator of the port’s only private coal terminal.
Scott’s scheduled today began with broadcast interviews, followed by a senior staff meeting by phone at the Hyatt Downtown. More broadcast interviews are scheduled after the Keystone grand opening, followed by staff and telephone call time at the Hyatt.
On Tuesday, Scott visited Naval Air Station Jacksonville and met with Brown as well as with media.