MILLINOCKET – The Millinocket Area Growth Investment Council is moving forward with its planned business resource center at Katahdin Paper Co.’s Engineering and Research facility.

MAGIC signed a lease in November for nearly all of the 59,000-square-foot facility and is looking for businesses interested in becoming tenants, according to Executive Director Bruce McLean.

The building is expected to house anchor businesses, incubator companies and resource organizations such as the Katahdin Entrepreneurship Education Program and the Finance Authority of Maine, he said.

Consisting primarily of office space, the facility would be suitable for professional offices, light manufacturing and research and development, McLean said.

“We’re trying to maximize the space we have and create the best jobs that we can,” he said.

As the landlord for the facility, MAGIC is working out a lease price of roughly $10 per square foot, which would include heat, electricity, water, sewer and air conditioning, McLean said.

The building contains infrastructure for phones and Internet service, although individual tenants would be expected to connect the service, he said.

Brims Ness – a water filtration sensor company formerly based in a Portland incubator – has begun moving into the facility and will serve as one of its anchor tenants.

The University of Maine also might become a tenant at the center. For the last two months, the school’s Pulp and Paper Process Development Center has been storing a 95-ton calendar paper machine at the facility.

UM officials are in the process of analyzing the technical and financial aspects of installing the machine on-site in the facility’s pilot plant.

For information about the facility, contact McLean at 746-0024.