ECONOMIC AGENCY SEIZED AN OPPORTUNITY.(MAIN)

Byline: KENNETH C. CROWE II Staff writer

Economic development has its cloak-and-dagger moments, usually in early stages of a project when secrecy is paramount. That's how it was for the Saratoga Economic Development Corp.'s ``Project India.''

Since May 29, 2002, when SEDC President Kenneth Green unveiled the project to the Town Board, it has been known as the Luther Forest Technology Campus. But getting to that point took more than two years of concentrated preparation.

Pinpointing an exact date for the launch of Project India isn't easy. Even the name is a bit obscure, though SEDC says it was simply working its way through the alphabet and needed a code name that started with I.

SEDC first looked at the old Malta Rocket Test Site for a technology-related industrial park in 1984. But Jack Kelley, SEDC's senior vice president, said the current proposal dates to 1995, when the agency pursued a Sanyo manufacturing facility as the first concrete step toward developing a high-tech industrial base.

Green and Kelley said local officials at a 1998 Saratoga County economic development summit at Skidmore College urged them to find high-tech manufacturing and research …