MACON, MO. -- Macon will welcome a new business to town sometime next year. The public transportation company OATS, Inc. is planning to relocate its Northeast Regional headquarters from Shelbina to Macon.
The brand new facility will be built on 4.5 acres of land in the industrial park purchased from Macon County Economic Development. OATS says after more than 30 years of business they simply outgrew their Shelbina facility.
"They were looking for something that was easy to get to from all areas. They do a lot of training programs and this will be a very well utilized facility," said Macon County Economic Development Executive Director Denise Bennett.
Bennett says Macon is very open to new businesses and looks forward to Oats expanding to Macon. She says this will help the local economy through the purchase of food, gas, and of course the land they bought.
The employees from Shelbina will have the option to trasfer to Macon but it's likely that new jobs will also be available.
OATS plans to break ground in the next six to nine months.
Funding for the project was made possible thanks to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and MoDOT.