Canadian Company to Reopen Lewis County, W.Va., Glass Plant

Catharines, Ontario, plans to make crystal giftware and other decorative glass in the old GlassWorks plant. The Lewis County facility closed last year when a planned grant from the state Economic Development Grant Committee was delayed.

Also Thursday, state Economic Development Authority board members approved a $351,000 loan for a Wheeling health-care billing service and a loan guarantee for a Barbour County plastic sheeting manufacturer.

But EDA board members tabled a $3 million loan request for a proposed golf course in Pendleton when board members sought more information about the project, EDA Executive Director Dave Warner said.

The 18-hole championship golf course, to be built by Robert R. Locklin and his company, Golf Estate LLC, would be built on a 700-acre tract just off U.S. 33 northeast of Franklin on Troublesome Valley Road, Warner said. According to previous reports, the project would include upscale homes and be called The Highlands Golf and Sporting Club.

In Ohio County, Joseph Santinoceto Jr. and his real estate holding company, Santinoceto LLC, received preliminary approval for a $351,000 loan that would allow him to buy and renovate a 90,000-square-foot office building in downtown Wheeling. He would also use some of the money to buy equipment.

He would lease the building to his 25-year-old automated physician billing and management service, Santco Inc. He plans to add five jobs within a year and 17 in three years, according to an EDA fact sheet.

The EDA will insure 55 percent of a $275,000 loan from BB&T of Hurricane to Capredoni LLC. The glass company hopes to create 20 jobs in its first year and another 10 in three years. In recent years, GlassWorks employed more than 200 people.

The EDA will also insure 100 percent of a $300,000 loan from Monongahela Valley Bank that allows Santiago Plastics of Philippi to restructure its debt, Warner said. Santiago, with 15 employees, makes thin-gauge plastic sheets and rolls.

EDA board members also approved two U.S. Small Business Administration loan applications for West Virginia companies: An $800,000 loan under which an investment group called Bright Acquisition LLC will buy Bright of America Inc. Founder Bill Bright sold the 80-employee Summersville company in 1990 to Russ Berrie & Co. of Oakland, N.J. A $290,000 loan to benefit B&M Leasing Inc., a Ripley company that operates a garden center and farm supply business called Around the Farm Stores Inc.