ORANGETOWN, NY-The Rockland Industrial Development Agency approved a package of sales and mortgage recording tax incentives earlier today for the largest development project in its history—the Bloomberg LP data center—valued at $845.6 million in total investment.

Construction on a 131,000-square-foot building at 155 Corporate Drive in Orangetown has already begun. Communications company Bloomberg LP has signed a 15-year lease for the building with Russo Development of Carlstadt NJ, the owner of the 13-acre parcel. According to figures provided by the Rockland IDA, Russo Development projects to spend $135.6 million on construction, land acquisition, and soft costs on the project. Bloomberg LP's investment in its data center will total $710 million over the next 15 years. The data center is being developed by a joint venture of Russo Development and Sentinel Data Centers of New York City.

A spokesman for Bloomberg LP says in connection with its planned data center in Rockland County, "We conducted an extensive search of over 100 sites for our new data center and Orangetown really fits the bill in every way."

At a session this morning at the Orangetown Town Hall, the Rockland IDA approved sales tax exemptions for the developer/owner for up to $65 million in furniture, fixtures, equipment and construction materials ($5,443,750 in sales tax exemptions) and exemption on the mortgage recording tax on up to $105 million in applicable financing, which would amount to as much as $1.365 million in taxes exempted. The agency also exempted Bloomberg on sales tax on up to $36,431,250 on up to $435 million in applicable furniture, fixtures and equipment costs in connection with the project. The Rockland IDA also agreed to a 12-year PILOT with a sliding scale tax abatement schedule. The town of Orangetown had previously agreed to a PILOT and on Tuesday evening, the Pearl River School District reached a preliminary agreement on a 12-year PILOT, as well.

According to Lisa Sikora, director of marketing for Russo Development, construction is expected to be substantially complete by April 30, 2014 with Bloomberg taking occupancy about that time. Russo Development, which has built a number of data centers, including one for the New York Stock Exchange in Mahwah, NJ, signed the lease with Bloomberg about a month ago. Russo Development handled the lease discussions in-house while Bloomberg was represented by CBRE's Howard Fiddle, Craig Reicher, Jeff Hipschman and William Hassan.

The project is expected to generate 574 direct and indirect construction jobs and 80 full-time jobs once completed. Direct construction costs have been estimated at approximately $72.7 million.

Orangetown Supervisor Andrew Stewart credits Russo Development for performing considerable work on a speculative basis to obtain municipal approvals as well as invest in the infrastructure that made the site shovel ready.

“They invested and the town invested in creating a site plan that was going to work” he says, “that enabled them to meet the time frame for the data center.”

Richard Struck, an IDA member and director of economic development for Orange & Rockland Utilities, says the deal with Bloomberg “will put Rockland County on the map as a potential location for other data centers.” The Bloomberg data center will be the first inclusive data center in Rockland County.

Steve Porath, executive director of the Rockland IDA, says that with New Jersey offering lucrative incentives for data center projects, “Quite frankly, to get a company with the statute of Bloomberg is a major coup for the county.”