WESTBROOK – After waiting for nearly three years, Idexx Laboratories is breaking ground in two weeks on a $35 million expansion of its corporate headquarters on Eisenhower Drive in Westbrook.

Code Enforcement Officer Rick Gouzie said Idexx this week submitted an application for foundation work at the site. The Planning Board gave unanimous approval to the company’s site plan in September 2011.

“I anticipate approval,” he said.

Betsy Richards, manager of corporate communications at Idexx, said the company, internationally known for its veterinary and water-quality testing equipment, will break ground on April 3.

“There’s a lot of positive energy here,” she said.

The company began in 1985 in Portland with only nine employees. It moved to its present location in Westbrook in 1991. It now has a workforce of more than 1,800 people.

The new, 107,000-square-foot, three-story building will be connected by an enclosed walkway to the company’s existing headquarters. Richards said Idexx will reserve the first floor for meeting space, a fitness area and cafeteria for its employees, and other amenities.

The second floor, she said, will serve as an open-concept, collaborative office space. The top floor, she said, will remain unfinished for now, ready to accommodate further expansion as the company grows. Richards said the new headquarters could accommodate as many as 300 new employees.

“We continue to grow each year,” she said.

Richards said the company also anticipates being able to expand its laboratory space in its existing building after moving some office personnel over to the new headquarters, which is scheduled to be finished in the fall of 2013.

The company’s existing building and property is valued at about $25.1 million, with an annual tax bill of about $437,775, according to city records.

The city first encouraged Idexx to build the expansion in 2006, whcn the City Council approved a tax increment finance district, or TIF, on the property. According to the terms of the TIF, Idexx would only pay a third of any new taxes related to any expansion.

“Clearly, this is the type of investment we envisioned when we negotiated the (TIF),” City Administrator Jerre Bryant said this week.

The company’s expansion project has been in the planning stages for about three years, but has been on hold ever since executives at Pike Industries announced they were stepping up operations at Pike’s quarry, located at the corner of Spring Street and Eisenhower Drive, just up the road from the Idexx complex.

Along with an angry backlash from area residents who worried about noise and damage from vibrations caused by production blasting, Idexx officials were concerned about Pike building a new asphalt plant on the property.

In fact, there was talk at the time of the new quarry activity prompting Idexx to scrap its expansion and move out of the city altogether. Mayor Colleen Hilton, who began her first term at the height of the dispute, said she worried about the city losing one of its largest and more modern industries.

“It certainly weighed heavily on me, and motivated the city to help resolve the dispute,” she said.

For months following her inauguration in January 2010, the city held a lengthy series of discussions with Pike and forged a consent agreement between Pike and the city in Cumberland County Superior Court, where Pike agreed to a series of restrictions on its operations. While many residents and some neighboring businesses and industries continue to fight Pike in court, Idexx is not a party in those lawsuits, and company representatives made it clear as of last summer that they were proceeding with plans to build the complex.

Idexx cleared its last hurdle in September 2011 with the Planning Board. The approval contained a number of provisions, such as a series of fees to be paid, but officials in the planning department said the provisions are routine, and no different from those attached to any other project approval.

The city has other benefits beyond new tax revenue, Bryant said. Keeping Idexx based in Westbrook, he said, reinforces the city’s image as a supporter of new, modern industrial technology.

“Idexx is a company that could be located anywhere in the world, and it’s a priority to make sure they keep growing and investing right here in Westbrook,” Bryant said.

Hilton also noted that Idexx has made thousands of dollars in contributions to local charities and organizations through the years, cementing its reputation as a good neighbor.

“They’ve really been very good to the city of Westbrook,” Hilton said.

This is a rendering of Idexx Laboratories’ planned $35 million, 107,000-square-foot expansion to its Eisenhower Drive headquarters in Westbrook. On the right, a covered walkway will connect the new, three-story building to the company’s existing complex. A ground breaking for the project is scheduled for April 3. (Image courtesy Idexx Laboratories)