Libbey Glass is set to receive further financial assistance from local government officials hoping to safe jobs at the Shreveport (Louisiana) plant, which is the company's largest N American facility. The Caddo Parish Industrial Board, received preliminary approval recently from the state to sell up to $40M in revenue bonds to build Libbey Glass a warehouse and distribution facility in west Shreveport. The industrial board will own the 60,000 square-foot facility and lease it to a Chicago-based real estate investment trust, which in turn will lease it to Libbey, in a 20-year arrangement, saving the company interest expenses, while keeping costly real estate debt off the publicly traded company's books. To protect local jobs, the tax-abatement agreement includes provisions requiring Libbey to maintain 900 jobs for the first 5 years.
