MIDDLEWAY, W.Va. —  An investment firm is hoping to bring a million square foot water packaging facility to Middleway in Jefferson County, an idea that has caused concern for residents of the historic town.

Sidewinder, LLC is the single purpose LLC for the Middleway project.

Sean Masterson is a managing partner in Sidewinder.

He says he and his business partner purchased the former 3M plant property in Middleway about four years ago, and they started thinking about ways the property could be utilized.  Masterson says he and business partner Jeff Fishbeck reasoned that a bottling plant would make sense.  While they are not in the water packaging business, Sidewinder promotes the idea that “Mountain Pure would work closely with an end user, a third-party distributor of packaged water and other beverages to provide reliable, clean spring water.”

“Jeff and I have been business partners for 15 years,” he said.  “We invest in multiple different businesses and asset classes.  We look for areas that we can come and make a positive impact from an economic standpoint and from a community standpoint.”

He said the property had been ordered remediated by the DEP.  Previous owners had gotten a ‘clean site’ letter with restrictions that would not allow residential or daycare use, or the like.  He said they would not use the existing building, which has since fallen into repair and importantly, sits above a toxic plume which should not be disturbed.

Instead, their plan involves two stages of building construction on the property, the first a buiding of 300,000 square feet and the second, a building of 604,000  square feet.

As for a bottling plant, “There’s a lot of water around here that 3M and (prior to that ) Kodak were using for years,” Masterson says. “They were pulling over a million gallons a day.  It’s a number that sounds like a lot, but it’s been used for years by those two prior operators.”

Masterson says stress tests they had conducted on the water table indicate the business could extract 1.728 million gallons a day before reaching an inflection point, which the aquifer could be stretched too thin.  He maintains that draw would not be the goal of the bottling company. “We’re permitted for a thousand gallons a minute,” Masterson says.

The idea of large scale extraction from nearby aquifers is not sitting well with some area residents, particularly after two years of severe, historic drought in the Eastern Panhandle.

Protect Middleway was formed to stop the bottling plant, according to Middleway resident Stacey Chapman. “The four things we are concerned about are the impact to the rare morrow wetland, the traffic that would come through historic Middleway. We fear for our safety and damage to our homes. There is a toxic plume under the old 3M plant and we are concerned that would move with this large scale-water extraction.”

“The number one concern is the large-scale water extraction,” Chapman says.  The building itself is a million square feet and their acreage is much larger than that.”

Despite Sidewinder’s assurance that the water would not be extracted from nearby Lake Louise, Protect Middleway’s Chapman is doubtful.

“They have a study that they’ve been citing.  The expert hydrologists that we have spoken to say that study is woefully inadequate for the Karst geology that we have running through our counties,” Chapman says. “There are no guarantees that they wouldn’t drain the water supply and the expert hydrologists that we’ve talked to say it will create a cone of depression that will go out for miles.”

Currently, all the residents of Middleway are on wells.

“I want water in my well for my home,” Chapman says, “but there are some very large farms that use water from their wells and there is zero that Sidewinder has said that reassures us in any way they wouldn’t be impacted.”

Masterson says, “It’s sourced from a well that is at the end of Russell Lane, it’s a mobile home park that we own.  So, it’s not coming directly from Lake Louise.  It’s adjacent to Lake Louise.”

Masterson made a distinction about the water source 3M/Kodak used versus the well they will be using. “They were drawing at the end of Turkey Run,” Masterson says. “There was a water treatment plant and a sewer plant down there that 3M and Kodak were operational, so they were pulling water from the underground aquifer.”

“Where our well is, we drilled that.  And we had to customize build a  pump because there was so much water and upwell pressure. There is a lot of water that has been used for a long time.”

The water would then flow through a pipe that would be laid out along the narrow Leetown Road that runs through Middleway.  “It comes up via a pipeline and the pipeline goes through an agreement we have with CTUB and goes directly to the front door of our property.”

Masterson says they already have a contractual agreement with the Charles Town Utility Board.  “We will pay for the water treatment plant.  We will pay for the construction of the pipeline.  We will pay for the maintenance of the pipeline.  They will own the pipeline.  We are going to give them the water treatment plant.  We are also giving the citizens of Middleway in that area 50,000 gallons a day for if and when the Charles Town Utility Board ever decides they want to provide municipal water to that area.” He adds Sidewinder will place fire hydrants in Middleway.

Masterson insists Sidewinder is averse to negatively impacting the wells of residents and farmers.  He says their study shows that won’t happen, but adds Sidewinder is in the process of establishing a trust through the Bank of Charles Town that would “That will actually hold a million dollars.  Anyone whose well is impacted, they will write a form.  Bank of Charles Town will release the money to whomever they want if a well is impacted based on certain criteria.

He says there will be well monitors in place. “We don’t believe there will be any issue, but we want to make sure that the community knows we are aware of it, we acknowledge their concerns, and we are putting safeguards in place.”

As for the pipeline, Masterson says that, too, has already been approved by the state.

Jessie Norris of Protect Middleway says many residents were caught off guard that Sidewinder was going before the planning commission.  Her group contends there were not enough opportunities for the public to know about the large-scale project in advance and few opportunities to make comments.

Once they understood the scope of the project, so many residents came out for a recent public hearing that the meeting went on until midnight, according to Norris.

Among the reasons Sidewinder LLC cited for locating the packaging plant were West Virginia’s regulatory environment which “promotes strong business development opportunities,” as well as the location’s proximity to major transportation hubs and proximity to a large percentage of the nation’s population.

“The proposed site will be located at 1 Grace Street in Kearneysville, West Virginia. The primary access to the site comes from WV Route 51 to Leetown Road and onto Grace Street.

The site is well situated, squarely at the intersection of the Northeast, the South and the Midwest, reaching nearly 60 million Americans within 200 miles and roughly 100 million Americans within 300 miles,” according to the project website.

The West Virginia University Bureau of Business and Economic Research conducted a study on the economic impact of Mountain Pure. Economist John Deskins of WVU, ongoing operations at the Mountain Pure facility “will support nearly $27 million in total spending in West Virginia annually, beginning in 2027.” The study estimates the bottling facility would support over $720,000 in tax revenue to the state government and local governments within the state each year.”

“With construction anticipated to begin in 2025 and conclude in 2026, the capital investment for the bottling facility is estimated to be between $150 and $175 million. Construction of the facility is estimated to support 841 jobs annually over the construction period. The 841 construction jobs are anticipated to earn a collective $48.5 million annually,” according to information released related to the study.

Sidewinder anticipates the plant will employ between 120 and 160 workers who would earn an average salary of $60,000 and a total of $8.4 million in employee compensation annually.

Sidewinder laid out the site’s history on its explanation page:

The site was originally occupied in the 1980’s by Berkeley Woolen Company and used for textile manufacturing before it was acquired by The 3M Company. 3M converted it into a photographic equipment and supply facility. After the change of ownership in 1996 and 2004, the facility continued to be used for printing plate manufacturing until 2006. Since 2006 the facility has been vacant, but the ownership changed again in 2015 when Commercial Liabilities Partners WV, LLC purchased the site from Kodak and in 2019 when Shenandoah Extraction and Processing, LLC acquired the property. Finally in 2021, Sidewinder Enterprises, LLC purchased the site from Shenandoah Extraction and Processing, LLC, as the concept for Mountain Pure was born.

On Wednesday evening, Sidewinder, LLC invited the public to a community open house at the Middleway Volunteer Fire Department.

Other opportunities for the public to learn about the project or make their opinions known, according to Protect Middleway:

–January 21 at 6:00 pm Middleway Town Hall for residents by Protect Middleway.

Located at Grantham Hall/Union Church

–February 5 at 4:00pm   CTUB Special Meeting to discuss an agreement with Sidewinder.

– CTUB is welcoming community input.

February 11 at 7:00pm Jefferson County Concept Plan Public Workshop on the Mountain Pure Bottling Project.

– At this workshop, the planning commission will listen to public comments before considering whether to accept or reject the project. Location is tentatively Jefferson High School. Comments are to be emailed to the  [email protected] by February 4th at 5pm.

Mountain Pure Site Plan (Mountain Pure)

Members of Protect Middleway were guests on Monday’s Panhandle Live.  Sidewinder Partner Sean Masterson was a guest on Wednesday’s Panhandle Live. 

Panhandle Live is heard weekday mornings beginning at 9 a.m. on the Panhandle News Network. 

Panhandle News Network reporter Luke Wiggs contributed to this story. 

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