Microsoft breaks ground in Quincy

QUINCY — Listening to the speeches welcoming Microsoft to the area, Debra Chrapaty found herself becoming a little emotional.

"I got a little choked up," admitted the corporate vice president of MSN Operations for Microsoft following the groundbreaking ceremony Tuesday afternoon. "We take for granted sometimes that we're Microsoft, and it's very easy to kind of forget the kind of impact that we can have on a local community. The level of grace through the people and how much this means to them makes me doubly excited to be here and to be a part of this community."

Various representatives from throughout Grant County were on hand at the Microsoft site at D Street NW in Quincy, where ground had already been plowed, to welcome the corporate giant to town and watch dirt turn for its planned new data storage center.

"We envision a large opportunity to ignite the community here by putting this facility in Quincy," Chrapaty told reporters.

Time tables for the project are very tight, Chrapaty said, adding that there has been tremendous partnership with the city, community and entities to keep the project on schedule.

"If you think about it, we first saw the site in December," agreed Michael Manos, senior director of MSN infrastructure services for Microsoft. "Almost by the next December, we'll have the first building up and online."

Microsoft has two data centers in Tukwila and two in California, but the company leases them through partnerships, Chrapaty said, it does not own them.

"What's truly unique about Quincy is that this is the first time that we've broken ground," she said. "So we feel very invested in the community of Quincy."

Chrapaty said about 50 full-time employees would be on staff at the data center when it goes live in February 2007, in addition to non-full-time employees, including those working on landscaping, perimeter security and those employees working through contract agencies.

Asked what the salary would be for those systems administrators, she replied that the company has very standard salary structures, and so anyone working in Quincy would get paid the same as they might in Redmond or elsewhere.

Manos said that hiring will begin approximately four to six months before the facility opens in February, and the company is looking for employees with two- to four-year degrees and general skills. The company will recruit locally, Manos added. The number of employees could grow depending on the adoption rate of Microsoft services, he said, and how the company develops into the site.

"Our goal would be to have most of the folks here hired locally," he said. "Whenever we have to, we'll go outside, but we'll be looking for resources here in central eastern Washington."

Manos said the company has 74 acres of land purchased, enough to hold three buildings, each approximately 450,000-square-feet each.

"As long as more and more people use Microsoft services and Live services, we'll continue to and eventually fill these buildings up," he said. Microsoft services includes all informational services, and Live services fall under the Windows Live brand name.

New York City-based Turner Construction, operating out of its Seattle office, has 30 workers on the Microsoft site, superintendent Al Arthofer said.

"I've been here since March and (seen) incredible cooperation from the city, building department and the port," he said. "I've never experienced such cooperation before from public officials."

"This is the exact time when all the hard work has come to fruition and now we're actually out digging," said Curt Morris, commissioner of the Port of Quincy, which sold the land in its industrial park to Microsoft. Morris pointed at the company's assertions that the data storage center will be one of the biggest facilities for their company. "The notoriety of having a company such as this here brings other people."

"(We're) very happy to know that what we have done has actually paid off to this extent," Port of Quincy commissioner Patric Connelly said, pointing out that a Washington-based company chose a Washington city to locate its new project over all of the other places it could have selected.

He added that the port is waiting to close its deal with Yahoo! and working on several other projects, including the long-awaited intermodal park and a medical manufacturing facility.

Quincy Valley Chamber of Commerce executive director Lisa Karstetter echoed Chrapaty's emotional sentiments.

"It's just so exciting to have something that's this large of an impact in Quincy," she said. "Microsoft is like scoring the winning goal in a game, and I don't know what the game is, but I'm glad that we got them."

Karstetter said the chamber is receiving a lot of response from interested entities following the news of Microsoft coming to town.

"I think they were the start of a lot for us, the start of something big," she said. "I guess maybe if we just keep dreaming big, it will keep growing, I hope."