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WHEATFIELD — The Niagara County Industrial Development Agency Wednesday granted a package of tax breaks to Viatran Corp., which plans to move from Grand Island into a Wheatfield business park.
The agency board voted, 8-0, to approve a payment-in-lieu-of- taxes agreement and sales tax breaks for the company, a manufacturer of pressure and level measurement devices.
Viatran will be moving to and expanding a 20,000- square-foot building in Calamar Development’s Woodlands Corporate Center off Shawnee Road. It has pledged to add 25 jobs to its 46-person work force within three years.
IDA Chairman Henry M. Sloma called Viatran “a good company to have in Niagara County.”
Viatran had been considering other locations, both inside and out of the state, as well as out of the country, said Lawrence
D. Witul, the agency’s assistant director.
The company’s new site already had a PILOT agreement with the IDA, and the board’s action Wednesday essentially cut out the property Viatran will be leasing and restarted the timetable for the tax breaks already granted on that site, Witul said.
The company currently is leasing space on Industrial Drive on Grand Island from one of its chief competitors, according to an application made to the agency.
The deal is a standard industrial PILOT, the terms of which include an 80 percent property tax abatement in the first two years of the agreement.
In about year nine or 10, there is a 50 percent property tax abatement; in the 16th year, the property is completely back on the tax rolls.
In addition to the property tax breaks, Viatran also will be exempt from paying sales tax on building materials.
Terms of Calamar’s existing PILOT were not changed, said IDA attorney Mark Gabriele.
In other agency matters, the board:
• Approved a $40,000 loan to Jacobs Ladder LLC of North Tonawanda.
• Approved an agreement to rent about 2,500 square feet of space in Vantage Center, the agency’s headquarters building on Lockport Road, to Total Solutions. The company will pay $19,500 for an annual lease.