KIPLINGER PREDICTION: CAPE THRIVES

Some states will thrive; others will slump.

This was the latest prediction of Knight Kiplinger, who produces the Kiplinger Washington Letter, a weekly report on national economy.

Conditions nationally look spotty, he wrote in his latest column.

But:

-- Nevada will keep booming. There's a real "construction wing ding" in the Las Vegas area.

-- California will grow, but more slowly.

-- Tight labor could hamper Illinois, where unemployment is below 4 percent for the first time since 1974.

-- More growth is ahead for Kentucky, especially in the Louisville area, where UPS will add up to 6,000 more jobs.

-- And Missouri will grow in step with the national economy, lifting metro areas St. Louis and Kansas City, along with smaller cities such as Cape Girardeau, Columbia and Joplin.

The latter is good news for the Show-Me state and the Southeast Missouri area.

But it should come as no big surprise -- Manufacturing expansion and employment have taken off in Cape Girardeau and the area during past couple of years.

"A lot of activity has taken place in the past couple of years in Southeast Missouri, especially in the Cape Girardeau and Sikeston areas," said Phil Tate of the Missouri Department of Economic Development.

Tate, who has been in contact with the area a number of times during the past year, said, "Happenings in this area has attracted attention recently."

The area has also come to the attention of the Federal Reserve Bank's 8th District. In one of its quarterly "Beige Reports," it reported that more counties in Southeast Missouri added jobs than lost them.

"I think this speaks well for employers and employees," said Doug Groesbeck, chairman of the Cape Girardeau Chamber Board of Directors. "It says a lot for the economic network we have and for work force ethics, which have helped facilitate a number of expansions, not only in Cape Girardeau, but throughout the area."

Manufacturing has remained the state's leading industry since 1987.

Manufacturing and industry are giants in the Cape Girardeau County area, which ranks 11th among the 114 counties in manufacturing plants, noted John Mehner, president of the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce, which ranks among the top five (third) chambers in the state.

Cape Girardeau County has more than 130 manufacturing plants and provides employment to more than 7,000 people.

"During the past two years, we've seen some great expansions by existing businesses," said Mehner.

He was referring to the $350 million expansion announced in April 1997 by Procter & Gamble Paper Products and two separate announcements by Biokyowa during the past six months.

Some big announcements have also come from Sikeston and New Madrid -- a $35 million Good Humor-Breyers Ice Cream expansion at Sikeston and a $56 million Noranda Aluminum expansion at New Madrid.

Two big projects have been announced this year at Charleston, a $73 million prison facility and the Gates Rubber Co. expansion that will double the manufacturing abilities and add 170 new jobs.

A $100 million, 250-megawatt power plant, is under construction and expected to be in operation by mid-1999 in Dunklin County, west of Glennonville, on the east side of the St. Francis River. The project is owned jointly by Associated Electric Cooperative Inc. and Duke Energy Corp.

Associated Electric has announced plans for another power generation plant, at a site in Southeast Missouri, to be announced later.

In recapping Missouri's Top 10 economic development projects, the Missouri Department of Economic Development recently noted that the year's largest project in terms of dollar investment -- and one of the largest such projects in more than a decade -- was the $350 million P&G plant. When completed, it will increased the P&G employment by about 350, up to 1,700 workers.

Other big expansions:

-- $50 million for a new Kyowa Foods facility at Cape Girardeau, to go along with an earlier announcement of a $35 million Biokyowa expansion of existing agriculture products plant, an investment of more than $85 million. Both are owned by the same parent company, Kyowa Hakko, headquartered in Tokyo.

-- $100 million, 250-megawatt power generation plant, being constructed jointly by Associated Electric Cooperative Inc. and Duke Energy Corp.

-- $56 million Noranda Aluminum expansion.

-- $35 million Good Humor-Breyers Ice Cream expansion.

-- $30 million power plant, to be constructed at a site to be announced.

This totals up to more than a half-billion dollars -- $621 million.

In addition to industrial expansion there are about a dozen subdivisions in the area that are in various phases of development in Cape Girardeau. Subdivisions also are being built in Jackson, Fruitland, Scott City, Malden and Sikeston, and housing construction is evident at Marble Hill, Perryville, Chaffee and other communities.