EVELETH -- Three projects that would create 59 new jobs on the Iron Range are up for consideration Thursday by the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board.
CrossUSA, a Burnsville, Minn.-based information technology consulting company that has programming centers in Sebeka, Minn., and Watford City, N.D., plans to create a programming center in Eveleth that would employ 50 people over the next three years.
A $500,000 Iron Range Resources loan would help finance the $1.3 million project. Equipment, leaseholder improvements, employee recruitment and capital needs would be financed by the loan.
Employees would be paid a minimum of $20 an hour and receive a benefits package, according to Iron Range Resources documents.
A $200,000 loan to Range Monument and Granite Works in Virginia toward a $973,000 expansion would create five new production jobs at $12.50 an hour plusbenefits.
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The company, which has produced monuments and markers since 1912, has seen its sales of granite countertops double each year since 2002. The construction of new upscale homes on Lake Vermilion and other Northeastern Minnesota lakes has created a new market for its countertops.
A $100,000 loan to Premier Plastics Inc. of Hoyt Lakes would help pay for construction of a $400,000, 5,000-square-foot storage building. The building would house raw materials and finished goods, freeing up space in a 30,000-square-foot main building for additional manufacturing growth. Four new jobs at $10 an hour plus benefits would be created.
Iron Range Resources is an Eveleth-based state agency charged with diversifying the economy of the taconite assistance area, which runs from Cook County southwest to Aitkin County.
The 13-member Iron Range Resources Board meets at 11 a.m. at Iron Range Resources headquarters south of Eveleth to consider the projects.
