Packaging Corporation of America plans to spend $5 million for new equipment and building improvements during a five-year period at its Waco plant in a bid to ensure the company will remain competitive.

Waco City Council on Aug. 17 approved a resolution nominating the project for Enterprise Project designation by the Texas Governor’s Office.

The designation could bring as much as $675,000 in sales and use tax rebates back to the company, depending on how well the company retains full-time workers, according to city documents.

The company plans to install new equipment, improve existing equipment and make building improvements to increase efficiency, the documents state.

It’s hard to say what the effect on the project will be if the designation is not granted, said Joe Pozek, PCA’s Waco general manager.

“We will cross that bridge if that happens, but hopefully it will be a nonissue,” he said.

The governor’s office had received 45 applications to be considered by the governor’s Economic Development and Tourism Texas Economic Development Bank for the current biennium, said Lucy Nashed, a governor’s office spokeswoman.

Fifteen have been approved so far, Nashed said.

Based in Lake Forest, Ill., PCA makes high-end graphics, corrugated boxes and sale displays.

City documents say it is the largest company of its type in the U.S. The total annual Waco payroll amounts to about $12 million, with an annual wage exceeding $44,000.

Should the company receive the designation, the city will benefit as well as the company, Waco Assistant City Manager George Johnson said.

The rebate money will help the company retain jobs as well as complete property improvements and additions that will add tax base to the city, Johnson said.

About 270 people work at PCA. When the economy improves, the company is hoping to add employees, he said.

Another Waco-based company doing similar work, Englander Container, recently expanded with the purchase of a manufacturing plant in Rogers, Ark. Englander has 160 workers, with 70 of them in Waco.

The two companies compete in some product lines but make others for each other under contract, Englander President Hal Whitaker said.

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