Company to build artillery range tower

A Tampa-based munitions maker has been spending its dollars renovating an existing building into a manufacturing facility.

They plan on spending $200,000 more on a new facility — a two-story artillery range tower.

The $202,400 range tower is the largest commercial permit issued by the Cherokee County Building Department last month, according to the Home Builders Association of Cherokee County monthly report.

A message left for the plant manager wasn't returned last week, but Cherokee County Development Board Director Jim Cook said the facility will likely be used to test the munitions manufactured at the facility.

Last October, DSE Inc. announced it would locate its new manufacturing facility in the former National Textiles plant on Hwy. 329. The company plans to employ as many as 215 workers within five years. The operations will be a mix of machining and assembly.

In other building news, the new Dollar General Store on Old Georgia Highway was the largest permit issued by the city in August.

Home starts improved a bit in the county in August. There were eight new homestarts in August, compared with seven from the same month a year ago. But the modest increase did little to reverse the year-long local housing slump, with the county down 10 housing starts from the same eightmonth period in 2007.

Last month, there was one new home start in the city. But it was an attention-getter with a whopping value of $405,682.

The city had two new homes in August 2007. Those homes had an average value of $56,000.