Jeffersonville mayor celebrates 'huge' investment from steel company in southern Indiana

JEFFERSONVILLE, Ind. (WDRB) -- An abandoned building on Maritime Road in Jeffersonville will be renovated later this year and transformed into a steel processing painting facility.

United Steel Supply, based in Austin, Texas, announced this week its plans to open a processing and painting facility at Ports of Jeffersonville after purchasing a 100,000-square-foot building. The company is one of the largest steel processors and distributors in the U.S., and a joint venture with Indiana-based Steel Dynamics Inc. (SDI) makes it the fourth-largest U.S. producer of carbon steel products.

"With this company coming in taking an old, empty building, refurbishing it, making a $10 million investment in the city of Jeffersonville, this is huge," Jeffersonville Mayor Mike Moore said Wednesday.

The company purchased the building from the port and entered a 75-year land lease on 11.5 acres. The new facility will be located a quarter mile from SDI's Jeffersonville facility which will be a key supplier for the new operation.

"I think they'll start doing immediate remodeling of the facility and try to start hiring employees here in the near future," said George Ott, director of the Port of Jeffersonville. "(The Ports of Indiana) generated over $8.7 billion of economic impact for the state (in 2023). That supports over 49,000 jobs."

John Launius, vice president of One Southern Indiana, called what's built at the ports "critical infrastructure" and said its growth is also a boon for the region.

"Jeffersonville and southern Indiana, as a region, continues to get the attention of a lot of investment," Launius said. "For the first time in One Southern Indiana's history, we actually hit the $1 billion capital investment mark in 2023."

Jeffersonville will become United Steel Supply's fifth facility. It has other plants in Terre Haute, Indiana, Mississippi, Oregon and Texas.

United Steel Supply will begin renovating the building immediately, with initial operations scheduled to begin in later this year.

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