Stephen Grimme, who joined with three other building industry executives to form U.S. Pacific Builders Inc. in 1989, said Belize, a small Central American country, is where the action is for him.
William Deuchar, head of U.S. Pacific Builders, said yesterday that Grimme, who was an employee and is still a stockholder, explored the Belize opportunity on behalf of the company and decided to go with it on his own.
U.S. Pacific, which has offices in China and Vietnam and a major operation in Portland, is expanding in those directions and expects to be doing about half its business next year in Portland, while keeping Honolulu as the home office.
Construction in Hawaii has less opportunities than outside, Deuchar said.
Grimme chose to stay with the Belize business. Located on the southeast side of the Yucatan peninsula and bordered by Mexico on the north, the Caribbean Sea on the east and Guatemala on the west, Belize was a British colony until 1981.
Grimme said he and some other Hawaii investors have purchased a 37-year-old sawmill in Belize, along with 2,700 acres of land, a license for logging on 38,000 acres and a 300-acre orchard.
With 180 miles of coastline and a vast tropical barrier reef, Belize is right below Cancun, a burgeoning Mexican resort, and an hour and half by air away from Miami. "It's about the size of New Jersey and has a population of 200,000," he said.
Grimme said his group will be looking for more opportunities there and in South Florida and the Caribbean.
The 150-employee U.S. Pacific Builders, where Grimme was general manager, continues to operate under the other three founders, William Deuchar, Richard Ackerson and Kirk Clagstone.
Grimme came to Honolulu in 1987 to open the Hawaii offices of A.T. Curd Builders Inc., a company headquartered in Glendale, Calif. Two years later he and the other three bought the Hawaii operations of A.T. Curd Builders and formed the new company.
In addition to the retail-entertainment complex at Aloha Tower, the company built the Kaahumanu Shopping Center on Maui, condominium projects such as the Courtyards at Punahou and Vista Waikoloa, and other developments.