By Jessie Burchette
jburchette@salisburypost.com
A Maryland-based janitorial supply company with a NASCAR Nationwide team wants to move into the county-owned Speedway Business Park off Peach Orchard Road.
Ray Hackett, owner of J&R Supply Corp. and Ryan Hackett Racing, has offered to purchase the lot at the $56,500 listed price.
The Rowan County Board of Commissioners has set a public hearing for its Sept. 15 meeting to consider the sale as an economic development project.
That would allow for an outright sale without going through the upset bid process typically used in the sale of county property.
The company is not requesting incentives.
Commissioner Jim Sides suggested he would like to see the sale go through the upset bid process, but he also noted that “people are not beating down our door with offers.”
Commissioners will decide at the Sept. 15 meeting on the method of sale.
The upset bid process, allows anyone to upset the sale by increasing the offer during a 10-day period.
Robert Van Geons, executive director of the Salisbury-Rowan Economic Development Commission, has met with Hackett and said he is interested in building a facility to serve his son’s racing business, as well as his wholesale janitorial supply business.
Ryan Hackett also races in the dirt track and ARCA series.
Other racing-related businesses already operating in the park include Morse Measurements, which provides precision testing for race cars to help them go faster and a shop owned by Sprint Cup driver Dave Blaney.
If the sale is approved, only three unsold lots will remain in the park, which includes the N.C. Quarter Midget Association track.
Other businesses in the park include CMW Holdings, a company that supplies bushings to the trucking industry, and East Coast Fabricators, which does high-end metal fencing.
Last year, commissioners rejected another businesssman’s offer of $42,500 for the lot. Although $42,500 was the listed asking price on the county Web site, a majority of the Board of Commissioners voted to increase the asking price to $53,000 after getting a new appraisal of the property.