MASON CITY, Iowa (AP) — Prestage Farms has told Mason City and Cerro Gordo County officials that the company will no longer consider the city as a site for a new pork plant.
Early last month the City Council voted 3-3 on a motion and thus failed to approve an agreement with the Clinton, North Carolina-based company to build the $240 million plant in Mason City.
The Mason City Globe Gazette reports that Prestage expressed its gratitude to supporters of its proposal and lamented in a statement Thursday that it "did not adequately address the misinformation campaign that our opponents effectively used to influence public opinion."
Prestage has said the plant would have employed around 1,800 people. Plant opponents raised environmental issues and expressed concern about possible harm to property values.
