Nearly 8 years ago ADM purchased the land that was formerly known as the Faries Park Golf Course in order to expand their company grounds and that day has finally come.  Residents in the former park area aren't necessarily in full agreement.

The Decatur City Council voted 5-0 at Monday's meeting to re-zone much of the area into two new tracts of heavy industrial zone.  Residents in the area voiced their concerns over the decision.

City Council member Larry Foster says the council vote to support ADM was still difficult…



The new development will include an energy substation as well as a cutting edge carbon dioxide sequestration facility.  The residents in the targeted area, identified as the Beck Compound, were mostly behind the expansion but still expressed concerns; mainly surrounding their property values and they wanted assurance that ADM would not impede further at a later date.  

ADM says the company sees no development potential in that particular area and is not willing to guarantee anything, since they aren't even considering expansion in that direction.  

The council and many members of the community say the upside greatly outweighs the downside with this new expansion creating 8 to 1 0 permanent positions while creating 250 local jobs.  The sequestration lab likely will bring researchers from around the globe to Decatur to learn more about the exploding study of the low-pressure CO2 storage.