Malta and Stillwater town boards approves PDD for Luther Forest Technology Campus

Luther Forest Technology Campus (LFTC) is shaping up to be one of the largest economic development projects in New York State. LFTC will be known as a "world class" high tech manufacturing center with the latest state of the art capabilities, located 25 miles north of Albany within Saratoga County, bordering the Towns of Malta and Stillwater. LFTC will be home to thousands of high paying jobs within the region, which will assure that our children and their children will have good job opportunities without leaving the region or the state. This economic development project is projected to create more than 1,400 new high-tech jobs, thousands of construction jobs, and more than 3,000 indirect jobs. LFTC became a reality on June 3, 2002, when the application for a Planned Development District (PDD) was submitted to the Malta and Stillwater town boards. There have been many public meetings and public hearings, on creating the PDD and the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) over the past several years. Both documents were adopted by the Town of Malta on May 18, 2004 and the Town of Stillwater on June 14, 2004. The new approved PDD district contains approximately 1,035 acres in the Town of Malta and 315 acres in the Town of Stillwater for a total of 1,350 acres. Ten developable "pods" were approved within the district, which can accommodate up to 2 million s/f of ancillary development designated for different types of uses, including support services, research and development, offices and nanotechnology suppliers. The northeast corner of LFTC known as Pod 1 can accommodate up to "four" nanotechnology fabrication facilities including 200,000 s/f of clean room. LFTC will likely induce secondary growth outside of the PDD in sequence with the nanotechnology industry. Additional sites and buildings with existing infrastructure in surrounding areas will benefit significantly. Dennis Brobston, president of the Saratoga Economic Development Corporation knows that these secondary companies will want to locate nearby and has already begun meeting with property owners. "This is a great opportunity for owners to get their property pre-permitted." Brobston said, "Companies will be on a very short time frame" Some of the attributes of the project include 5.5 miles of on-site roads, over 7 miles of walking trails and 60% green space all situated on a relatively flat Greenfield site, with very few wetlands and sensitive areas. There will be other utility improvements happening in the area, including a new 28 mile waterline from the upper Hudson River, sewer line upgrades and treatment facility expansion, electric power at 99.999% reliability as well as telecommunications and natural gas. These attributes and improvements make the LFTC development a leader in the semiconductor industry. The proposed development at LFTC will not only create thousands of good quality manufacturing and construction jobs, but in return it will also create additional tax revenue, which makes the semiconductor industry an attractive business to state and local governments. Semiconductor companies work hard to be good neighbors by generating support in the local community by working with non-profit organizations and educational partners as well as contributing with computer technology, financial donations and employee volunteers. On June 23, 2006 all the hard work and dedication paid off when Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) announced plans for one of the largest private sector industrial investments in New York State history; a multi-billion dollar deal to build and operate the most advanced semiconductor manufacturing facility in the world at LFTC. The announcement of landing AMD has outweighed any challenges that we have faced over the years on obtaining the environmental approvals, zoning approvals, project funding, and the corporation of local governments. We continue to move forward and achieve our project goals in completing this major economic development project. Michael Relyea, president of LFTC understands how lucky we are to design a campus around a specific industry. "We're lucky to be building Luther Forest with a tenant in mind," Relyea said. "We've built this campus to be the home of a semiconductor facility." Jon Dawes is the Jr. deputy director of LFTC, Saratoga Springs, N.Y.