Plans to expand the Barnstormer brewery to Midland have been cancelled.
The Barrie based company had plans to build a beer production facility in downtown Midland that also included a retail space and restaurant. However, a routine inspection at the site showed the soil had high levels of contamination.
“It would have increased our production, four or five fold from what we now,” said creative director Brad Ariss.
The good news is the levels are well below provincial guidelines and doesn’t pose immediate health risks. However, Barnstormer officials say the need for another space is becoming dire and the company doesn’t have time to wait for the land to be cleaned up.
“We just launched a distilling arm and the problem that we have now is because it's already been listed at the LCBO it's quite a small operation, so the distilling arm definitely needs an expansion at this point,” said Ariss.
The plan would have included 50 new local jobs for the town.
“Very disappointing because we were looking forward to that in our downtown,” said Midland Mayor Gord McKay. "I understand and it's something we've got to do, and we will do, to clean Midland."
Company officials say Midland is where they want to expand and are still looking there, but have also started to search elsewhere.
