Another Big Firm Planning Umatilla Move

    One of the area's fastest-growing companies this week announced plans to move its operations to Umatilla. RCM Utilities, currently based in Eustis, has purchased an estimated 10 acres in Umatilla with plans to construct a 30,000 square foot building to house its three-dozen employees.
    “We’re laying the groundwork to move back into town,” said Chris Creech on Monday. Creech, who founded RCM in 2018 said Umatilla is where RCM “needs to be.”
    "Most all of us are Umatilla people," Creech said of the company's staff, which is expected to grow to nearly 40 in the coming months as the firm, which offers a variety of water and wastewater services to utility providers, adds another division.
    Creech said he has had to move RCM twice already as the company quickly grew, said it is his hope that the move into Umatilla will be a lasting one.
    “We want to move one more time.”
    RCM purchased land that currently houses a fernery off Lake Ferns Road, off Golden Gem Drive and near the city’s soon-to-be mostly abandoned wastewater plant. Along with the planned move of Phillips Manufacturing to the area, the city is seeing the potential of creating a small commercial enclave in the area.
    In fact, Creech praised Umatilla’s efforts to bring jobs into the city.
    “Between Phillips and us, there could be 150-200 jobs coming to that area,” Creech said.
    Creech said city manager Scott Blankenship’s drive to bring career-style jobs to Umatilla has helped encourage Creech.
    “Scott has been phenomenal. He wants us there. He is a great partner for economic development.”
    Creech shares the vision of Umatilla as a place where people live and work, having grown up in the community. A 2007 graduate of Umatilla High School, Creech worked during high school and after graduation at Dan's Discount Feed, before joining Utility Technicians in 2008. After starting as a 'helper on a truck', Creech advanced in the company until 2015, when he went to work in that utility company's office with its then owner, Scott Purvis. In 2018, it was time to go out on his own.
    “I never envisioned this would be my trade,” Creech said. “It’s been a wild ride.”
    The construction project could be a year or more away, as the work needed to make the site ready and the road to the property upgraded are expected to take some time.