Keith Folkmann didn’t mind shutting down production Wednesday afternoon at his Lawrence plant, giving his 110 employees a couple hours to play basketball, eat snacks and relax on the production floor.

After cranking out 500,000 hydrostatic pumps and motors since opening the place in April 1999, he figured they’d earned a break.

Sauer-Danfoss Inc. employees are celebrating a milestone in production. The company has made 500,000 hydrostatic pumps and motors since opening in April 1999. Workers took time out for Wednesday's celebration which included games and refreshments.

“We’ve reached a milestone,” said Folkmann, director of plant operations for Sauer-Danfoss in the East Hills Business Park. “We think a half-million pumps and motors is a pretty big deal.

“It demonstrates our success in starting up a new operation in Lawrence, Kansas, and exemplifies the quality of the people and the success of what we’re trying to create here.”

Wednesday’s celebration also reminded Folkmann and others about the struggles of economic development.

Since the plant’s opening, Lawrence has lost out on a number of major job-creating projects. The biggest was a planned $42 million warehouse and distribution center for American Eagle Outfitters Inc., which would have been added to the business park but instead left for Ottawa after people objected to the project’s anticipated tax breaks, American Eagle’s wage scale and occupation of farmland.

The loss soon gave birth to a new Lawrence Chamber of Commerce task force, called ECO2, told to devise a plan for acquiring space for new industrial development, coupled with preservation of open space.

	www.sauerdanfoss.com

After two years of haggling, the group intends to meet April 2 to wrap up a draft plan that could pave the way for a series of new initiatives most notably, a possible public election in November to start a 1/4-cent sales tax to finance acquisition of land for development and open space.

The tax could generate $20 million in 10 years, which would be divided evenly between industrial projects and preservation of open areas.

Kelvin Heck, co-chair of the ECO2 task force, considers the effort essential to Lawrence’s future especially after learning of Sauer-Danfoss’ milestone.

“We need to be celebrating these things on a more regular basis here in Lawrence and Douglas County,” Heck said. “I think it’s a very good step in the right direction. I’ll be curious to see how ECO2 finally gets resolved there’s still a lot of public process to go through but we want to be celebrating a lot of Sauer-Danfosses and DSTs and those sorts of things.”

Heck said that the draft ECO2 plan would be presented to the Lawrence and Douglas County commissions, and municipal governments in Eudora, Baldwin and Lecompton. Meetings will be scheduled to collect input from the public before a final proposal is devised.

At his plant Wednesday, Folkmann is hopeful that the project clears a path for another company like his to move into Lawrence. Sauer-Danfoss has invested $23.5 million in land, construction and equipment since 1999, pumped out more than $200 million in sales and created wages for 110 employees that average better than $15 an hour.

“Companies are anxious to find locations where they’re welcome,” he said. “ECO2 is a good opportunity to make that happen.”