Nucor's Vulcraft Plant Sparks Southern Tier Resurgence Completed in September 2001, the $50-million steel plant built in Chemung, New York by Charlotte-based Nucor Corp.'s Vulcraft Division is anticipated to employ as many as 300 people in the next five years, but it is just one sign of a rejuvenated area.         The Nucor facility is the company's seventh in the country, and first in the northeastern quadrant. Notably, the 525,000-sq.-ft. (48,800-sq.-m.) plant is on Railroad Street, linking the steel girders of today to the steel rails of yesteryear, which now carry raw steel in by railcar. The company received a $1.4-million JOBS Now Capital grant in return for its commitment and investment. In addition, New York State Electric & Gas Corp. built a natural gas line from nearby Wellsburg to accommodate the plant, which makes joists, girders and decking. But cross-border collaboration with Pennsylvania officials was key as well.         "We had to bring gas five miles out of Pennsylvania to serve that site," says George Miner, president of Southern Tier Economic Growth. "Otherwise I don't think we would have gotten that project. The closest New York site was through mountains, and wasn't an easy engineering task."         Other recent projects in the Elmira area include a relocation of 300 data processing and mail-order jobs to Trinity Industrial Park by Northeast Data Center, on the brownfield site formerly occupied by a General Electric plant; the location of Spanish mass transit railcar maker CAF; and a machining facility operated by Philadelphia-based Synthes USA, a maker of orthopedic implants.         The Synthes project received an incentive package worth $14 million, but what impressed Synthes officials most was the high skill level available.         "We ran some blind ads for employment and they were overwhelmed," says Miner. "For every five applicants, three were qualified, and they weren't used to that. They came in and were able to pay a cost-saving wage relative to their other facilities in Philadelphia and Colorado, but still attractive in this labor market."         Miner is also impressed with the turnaround at the Trinity site, formerly a foundry location for General Electric.         "For a very reasonable cost, they were able to demolish the site and clean it up," he says. "We worked with the developer to build some spec buildings, and 110,000 sq. ft. (10,200 sq. m.) of spec space is nearly full. So we took a site that was a vacant brownfield eyesore and for $600,000 in cleanup expenses, we got about $5 million in capital investments in just the buildings and property."         As a sure sign of the town's progress, Elmira will host the New York State Empire Zones 2002 Fall Conference. Since being designated as an Empire Zone in 1988, the town has seen 171 businesses invest over $550 million dollars and create thousands of new jobs.