Bloomingdale City Council approved the first phase of a 4.5 million square foot warehouse project known as the Ottawa Farms Tracts during last Thursday's council meeting. The large-scale, long-term project anticipates the building of nine warehouses on more than 400 acres of land over the course of the next decade.
McCraney Property Company, a Florida-based company that develops and manages commercial/industrial, office/flex, office and warehouse distribution properties, is the developer for the project. McCraney received approval for tract A, the first warehouse building comprising about 33 acres, located off of Bloomingdale Road and adjacent to the city's main visitor attraction, the Ottawa Farms.
The warehouse project stirred controversy in the small and quiet residential town when Ottawa Farms' owner, Pete Waller, requested that a significant portion of his agricultural land be rezoned to light industrial in 2019.
The six-person council was evenly split on the rezoning decision, with then-mayor Ben Rozier breaking the tie with a yes vote. In a previous interview, Rozier told the Savannah Morning News that Waller had talked about possibly deannexing and incorporating his land into the neighboring city of Pooler if Bloomingdale did not approve the rezoning,
Ottawa Farms encompasses nearly 800 acres of land south of residential neighborhoods near U.S. 80. About 150 acres will remain agricultural, according to previous interviews with Waller. The third-generation farmer recognizes residents’ desire to preserve the last-remaining farm in Chatham County, but he said the math is no longer there to maintain farmland in this region.
Skyrocketing property taxes have rendered the agricultural business unfeasible. To keep the land in his name, Waller is renting, not selling, the parcels to the warehouse business.
Residents and city officials across western Chatham County are resisting the pressures of industrialization as the rapid growth of the Port of Savannah continues to bolster the logistics and manufacturing industries.
In January, Bloomingdale's council unanimously approved an eight-month moratorium on applications for industrial and multi-family developments while the city assesses its infrastructure capacity and ensures current land use falls in line with the city’s comprehensive plan.
More recently, Garden City followed suit by imposing its own moratorium on industrial rezoning applications, citing a need to increase residential builds in the industrial and commercial-heavy municipality.
Goals outlined in Bloomingdale's 2021 comprehensive plan include preserving the small city charm by discouraging heavy industry and large, multifamily, high-density developments such as apartments, which would strain the city's limited infrastructure capacity.
However, with the warehouse park in tow, city officials hope the project can be a financial windfall to the city of 2,800. Attracting light industrial and the jobs that come with it is also part of Bloomingdale’s long-term goals to sustaining the municipality's economy.
According to previous reporting from the Savannah Morning News, the $300 million investment would create upwards of 1,000 new jobs in a city with 300 to 500 jobs.
Nancy Guan is the general assignment reporter covering Chatham County municipalities. Reach her at nguan@gannett.com or on Twitter @nancyguann.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Warehouse project coming soon to Bloomingdale's Ottawa Farms