Some landowners on Foxconn site not ready to sell

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Many people living in Mount Pleasant on the site of the proposed Foxconn campus, knew the official announcement about the location was coming, but not all homeowners are on board yet.

The proposal for the sprawling Foxconn campus includes three areas, all located in Mount Pleasant East of I 94. Area 1, bound by Braun Road and Highway KR will be the site of the 20-million square foot factory and officials say land owners there already signed off.

“Area 1 is already control through purchase negotiations so we will close on those options at the end of the year,” said Jenny trick, executive director of the Racine County Economic Development Corporation.

But areas two and three, which will be for future expansion and construction staging, aren’t a done deal.

“These houses disappear, the history disappears,” said attorney Thomas Devine.

Devine represents 25 people who own homes or small parcels of land, mostly in area two.

“Their big concern here is having their home taken from them, having their land taken from them,” Devine said. “Many of my clients have been out in that area for a century.”

Officials say the consistent offer to landowners, at least in area one, is $50,000 per acre. But Devine says to his clients, who don’t own huge properties, that’s not enough.

“It’s much easier to deal with an option that says we’ll pay you x number of dollars for every acre you have, if you have a large number of acres,” Devine said. “It’s just math. For my people, it’s not math.”

Officials say the initial focus was on area one, but they will be working to negotiate with land owners in the other areas soon.

“There’s three separate land situations and there’s three situations purchasing strategies for all those, said Mount Pleasant Village President Dave DeGroot.

Devine says though his clients aren’t happy about the situation, they are being realistic.

“They also recognize there certain inevitability to the process lie the Foxconn process and because of that you have to be practical about what your choices are,” Devine said.

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