By Phil Riske | Managing Editor/Rose Law Group Reporter
Under federal law, 10,000 immigrant visas per year are available to qualified individuals seeking permanent resident status on the basis of their engagement in a new commercial enterprise. Permanent resident status based on EB-5 eligibility might be available to investors who have invested – or are actively in the process of investing – at least $1,000,000 into a new commercial enterprise they have established.
The program gave birth to the planned PhoenixMart in Casa Grande, a 1.5 million square foot commercial complex to promote small and mid-sized manufacturers’ and agents’ products directly to consumers, businesses and international buyers. Phoenix Mart will be the newest and largest sourcing center in the United States. There are similar complexes, Yiwu and DragonMart, in China and Dubai. Foreign investors in PhoenixMart are from China.
PhoenixMart plans call for 585 acres of a master-planned community and 1.7 million square feet of multi-functional wholesale, retail, entertainment and convention center space.
Problems finalizing EB-5 funding caused an 18-month delay in the project, which is said to provide 3,000 direct and 4,000 indirect jobs upon completion, estimated for the fall of 2014.
Casa Grande beat out New Jersey and a location outside of Atlanta for location of the complex.
The job creation numbers are a result of an updated economic study, Casa Grande Mayor Bob Jackson told Rose Law Group Reporter.
“Certainly there are not 7,000-plus people in Casa Grande looking for work,” he said. “It is anticipated that prospective employees will come from the Valley and the Tucson area.“
Jackson said the jobs, including warehousing and multi-lingual customer service representatives, will work well with the city’s employee base.
“In addition, this multi-million dollar project will offer an excellent opportunity to local small businesses as well as new businesses to get exposure to international markets,” he said.
Most of the initial investment of $150 million for the construction of the project will come from foreign sources under the EB-5 Program, which requires the creation of 10 permanent new jobs for each $500,000 investment.
Casa Grande, which has yet to decide how much of its funds will be put into PhoenixMart, has been working with AZ Sourcing for almost two years to bring this new concept project to Arizona. AZ Sourcing and its affiliates are the developers and operators of this project.
The PhoenixMart project will be funded 40 percent by AZSourcing private investment, and 60 percent by federally approved EB-5 investors.
Arizona Sourcing CEO Steve Betts says there are misconceptions about PhoenixMart.
“The biggest thing missed in other stories is that PhoenixMart is the first sourcing center developed for primarily American businesses and products and not primarily Chinese products like in Yiwu, China or Chinese and European products in DragonMart outside of Dubai,” Betts said . “This gives American small and mid-sized businesses leverage or the power of numbers to access international and domestic markets efficiently.
Betts told Rose Law Group Reporter the other unreported, but interesting, fact is the “Phoenix” in PhoenixMart is not the city, but is the mythical bird and represents American businesses regaining their prominence in international markets and export industries.
Betts says the PhoenixMart location at the center of the SunCorridor has locational advantages of the interstate highways, the double track rail line, one day shipping to the ports, and its 40-minute proximity to Phoenix International Airport.
For a PowerPoint presentation on PhoenixMart, click on Storyboard_updated by 05282013_V3
