“I am 72 years young and am going on 45,” Mr. Piatt said. “I live to work. It’s a challenge. I love to get things done.”
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Jack Piatt is feeling pretty good these days.
After years of planning and a round of litigation, the 72-year-old chairman of Millcraft Industries Inc. is finally getting to build a long-awaited hotel at Southpointe, the sprawling commercial and residential development in Pittsburgh.
“Why do I need a hotel?
Because it is the challenge of doing a hotel. And we do what we say we’re going to do,” said Mr. Piatt in a recent interview at his office in the 600-acre development he helped start back in 1982.
Mr. Piatt, whose company is the largest residential developer at Southpointe, has a reputation for never backing away from a challenge. But, until this summer, it looked as if the development would have to wait a few more years.
Southpointe homeowners had claimed in a lawsuit that a hotel and other proposed buildings would obscure their views. The parties reached agreement and the homeowners finally dropped the suit — filed against several park developers — and Millcraft got the go-ahead to build a 175-room Hilton Garden Inn.
Millcraft, in return, dropped a suit it had filed against the Washington County Redevelopment Authority — which controls development activity at Southpointe — that involved development rights at the park.
With the litigation out of the way, Millcraft announced plans in late June to build the hotel, as well as well as a 70,000-square-foot office building and a 30,500-square-foot medical center in the park.
“My opinion of Jack never changed throughout the dispute,” said Washington County Commissioner J. Bracken Burns. “He was the visionary who dreamt up Southpointe. And he had dibs on building the hotel. I thought it was appropriate to go his way. Without the tenacity he showed, it would not have worked out.”
But Mr. Piatt, a lifelong Washington County resident who lives in Meadow Lands, just down Interstate 79 from Southpointe, is nothing if not persistent.
He never went to college. After being discharged from the U.S. Army, he went into the heating, ventilation and air conditioning business.
“I did that for a few years and then went into the machine shop business,” said Mr. Piatt, who started Millcraft Products in 1957 with $1,500 and a rented space in an old glass factory in the city of Washington.
“I am a machinist by trade,” he said.
The decision to go into business for himself proved fortuitous because the machine shop was the genesis of Millcraft Industries, a multifaceted, multimillion-dollar company with interests in real estate, as well as the manufacturing and marketing of equipment for the steelmaking and coal industries. Besides having three plants locally, Millcraft also has a facility in Birmingham, Ala., as well as real estate interests in Florida.
“He got into real estate to grow the business,” said Chris Fitting, Millcraft vice president, explaining Mr. Piatt’s transition into the real estate development.
One of his more prominent real estate developments is the Holiday Inn in Meadow Lands. Mr. Piatt was the original owner of the Washington County facility.
“What eventually happened was that real estate became strong enough to be its separate division,” Mr. Fitting said.
It was in 1982, while on his way to Greater Pittsburgh International Airport, that Mr. Piatt happened to notice a vacant stretch of land sitting along Interstate 79 in Cecil Township, an observation that proved to be a turning point.
Mr. Piatt had been involved in a commercial and residential development in Florida and thought a similar project would work well in Washington.
“Someplace where you could work, live and play,” he explained.
Mr. Piatt was able to persuade Washington County officials to buy the land from the state for $776,000 and a master plan was drawn up for what eventually became Southpointe. And after the interstate interchange was installed, the park boomed.
“He has always been the idea man of the company,” said Mr. Piatt’s son, Jack, who runs Millcraft Products, the manufacturing side of the family business.
Another son, Rod, owns the golf course at Southpointe and works as an independent developer.
“He has vision,” said Jack Piatt II of his father. “Sometimes it’s a little far out, but most of the time it is right on.”
Added Dr. James McMasters, an orthopedic surgeon at Allegheny General Hospital who has made real estate investments with Mr. Piatt: “He is a savvy businessman.”
Now, with Millcraft’s plans for the medical center, office building and hotel, Mr. Piatt’s vision is about complete. But, don’t mention retirement. It’s not in his vocabulary.
“I am 72 years young and am going on 45,” Mr. Piatt said. “I live to work. It’s a challenge. I love to get things done.”
MS. ELLIOTT may be contacted at [email protected]