Berry Plastics is asking Douglas County to give the company access to $11.7 million worth of federal recovery zone bonds to help build a warehouse and distribution facility in Lawrence.

County commissioners will consider the proposal during their meeting at 6:35 p.m. today at the Douglas County Courthouse, 1100 Mass.

Berry Plastics — which in Lawrence also does business as PackerWare — in filings with the city has expressed interest in building a 600,000-square-foot warehouse that would cost about $21 million to develop.

Company officials have said the new distribution center would create 11 new jobs in the next five years with an average wage starting at $14.75 per hour. An application with the city did not specify where the site would be, but it estimated the project would provide 350 construction jobs.

The county received authority last year as part of the federal economic stimulus package to allocate $11.7 million worth of the low-interest bonds for projects that would create jobs.

“These would be very beneficial financing tools, particularly on a size of a project like the Berry project,” said Diane Stoddard, a Lawrence assistant city manager who will present the plan to county commissioners.

Berry officials are already seeking to get a piece of about $30 million in low-interest recovery zone bonds the state can issue. But the company is competing against others for those state-issued bonds, including Lawrence-based Bowersock Mills and Power Co.’s $17 million request to finance a plan to build a new hydroelectric power plant on the north banks of the Kansas River.

Stoddard said if county commissioners approved the plan for the county-issued bonds, the city could reduce Berry’s request for the state-issued bonds to $9.2 million.