Toledo's City Council voted Tuesday to spend $1.5 million to acquire residential properties to add to land it has already acquired as part of its plan to convince FCA US to build the next-generation Wrangler there.
The city hopes to buy 17 residential properties owned by 14 owners, giving Toledo a total of 105 acres of land adjacent to the Toledo Assembly Complex, as long as the homeowners agree.
"The vast majority of these owners have reached out to the city to sell," said Matt Sapara, the city's director of development. "The city will not use eminent domain for these acquisitions. If they don't want to sell they don't have to."
Toledo and the state of Ohio have been working since last fall to convince FCA US, the automaker previously known as Chrysler, to keep the Jeep Wrangler in Toledo.
Officials became concerned after Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne said it would be less expensive to move production of the Wrangler to another plant than it would be to expand and retool the Toledo plant.