P&G SAYS CAPE PLANT IN RUNNING FOR ANOTHER COMPANY EXPANSION

With a $350-million-plus expansion project at the Procter & Gamble Co. plant north of Cape Girardeau still being carried out, the company says it is considering yet another expansion.

The Cape Girardeau area is one of a number of sites being considered for additional expansions by P&G, which is headquartered at Cincinnati.

Concerns about the current expansion were expressed following a column in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The Southeast Missourian received a number of calls concerning the column by Jerry Berger, which claimed that P&G was angered by the state's unwillingness to refund overpaid tax money.

Berger wrote that P&G was "close to pulling the plug" on a possible new $500 million production plant in Missouri.

"The article was both misleading and wrong," said Simon Denegri, a P&G spokesman in Cincinnati.

"There is no link between any disagreement on taxes and potential capacity expansions in Missouri or anywhere else," said Denegri.

He explained that a primary consideration for expansion is future costs of a project. "The tax area is just one of many of the cost factors," he said.

Denegri said P&G is looking at a number of sites for potential expansion. "There has been no decision on any location for new projects yet" he said.

As for the specific tax refund referred to in the Post-Dispatch column, the Missouri Supreme Court has ruled in P&G's favor, saying Missouri must refund three years of overpaid taxes.

"The sum, however, is much less than referred to by the newspaper," said Denegri. "In fact, it is less than half that amount."

Another P&G spokesman, who requested anomity, said, "We're always looking at different sites for different facilities, and we certainly wouldn't let something like this interfere in our selection."

The company and the Missouri Department of Revenue are in discussions concerning the ruling by the Missouri Supreme Court that P&G's three plants in Missouri were due refunds for sales taxes paid on the leasing of pallets.

In its ruling, the court ordered the state to refund what could be more than $1 million in taxes collected on the lease of pallets by P&G.

Quenton Wilson, director of the Missouri Department of Revenue, is familiar with the Supreme Court ruling and said the revenue department was not going to appeal it.