2016 State Agenda

The Chamber of Commerce of Huntsville/Madison County

We’re grateful to the members of the Madison County Legislative Delegation, Governor Bentley and the other leaders in State Government for their continued support of this region. A healthy partnership with the State is critical to our region’s continued success. Your support of the items listed below will help ensure the continued growth of North Alabama and the Tennessee Valley region.

Enhance Alabama’s Economic Development Incentives The Alabama Legislature made great strides in the 2015 Regular Session to update the State’s economic development incentives. We encourage the legislature to enact the following economic development incentive enhancements, to further our State and regional economic development efforts: u Provide research and development tax credits for work done in Alabama.

Thirty-six states, including all those surrounding Alabama, with an income tax, have such a credit.

u Allow a waiver of the three year ad valorem tax lookback requirement for

incentivized economic development projects.

u Pass 21st Century Tax Increment Financing (TIF) legislation that meets

constitutional muster.

u Provide additional incentives for projects and businesses utilizing Alabama’s

Water and/or Air Ports.

Pre-K-12 Education The Chamber strongly supports the Alabama College and Career Ready Standards and adoption of Next Generation Science Standards for Alabama. The Chamber supports the direction of Plan 2020, with an emphasis on clear, high goals that are both realistic and challenging for students, and the roadmap that the Plan provides to ensure all Alabama students are college and/or career ready.

The Chamber supports efforts that give school districts the flexibility and autonomy needed to meet the needs of their unique local student populations. We encourage legislation that provides special provisions for school systems under desegregation orders that are attempting to gain unitary status so that newly authorized charter school efforts cannot derail efforts to regain local control.

The Chamber encourages the legislature to work to protect current funding levels for public education and to identify additional revenue to enable our education system to fully implement AMSTI and Advanced Placement (AP) Classes. The Chamber supports fully funding the Alabama Foundation Program.

Research shows that children that attend high quality pre-K are more likely to enter kindergarten ready to learn, read at grade level by third grade, graduate from high school, enter college, and have higher earnings. The Chamber encourages state lawmakers to increase state investments in Pre-K programs so that all families that choose to enroll their children can do so.

The Chamber supports measures which increase the attractiveness of the teaching career, including a pay raise. Additionally, the Chamber supports creative solutions to address teaching sector needs such as signing bonuses for hard-to-fill positions and the concept of “adjunct teachers” who can bolster the regular profession with their subject matter expertise, especially in advance STEM areas.

Support Workforce Development The most critical factor in economic development is the availability of a skilled and educated workforce. Programs such as Regional Workforce Councils, K-12 Career Coaches and Career Assessments, and a statewide Longitudinal Data System are important components supporting our overall economic and workforce development strategy. The Chamber supports the Alabama Workforce Council’s requests for an additional $1 million for 10 regional workforce councils, $1.9 million for 12 additional K-12 career coaches and the Kuder Career Assessment software, and $1.2 million for a longitudinal data system that will improve the collection, availability and use of highquality education data to ensure student success.

The Chamber supports initiatives to better prepare our workforce, including continued investment in Alabama Industrial Development Training (AIDT) and a $300,000 increase in their budget.

To be able to provide postsecondary education training at our community colleges, the Chamber supports increased funding for Alabama Community College faculty and staff, particularly those that serve in high demand technical and/or STEM related fields.

Invest in Higher Education Huntsville and Madison County’s workforce is a critical national asset, and the success of our knowledge-based economy is highly dependent on workers who have at least a four-year degree, and often advanced degrees. The quality of the workforce at Redstone Arsenal, Cummings Research Park and the region’s economy is inextricably tied to The University of Alabama in Huntsville and Alabama A&M University.

Increase support for UAH

UAH plays a critical role in supporting the educational and research requirements of Redstone Arsenal’s federal missions as well as the corporate presence in Cummings Research Park, the second largest university-related Research Park in the nation. The important national and international role for Redstone Arsenal demands that the state of Alabama provide strong financial support to UAH to further enhance its programs and faculty to increase its national standing to an even higher level and enable more selective enrollment. There are more patents filed out of Redstone Arsenal when compared to any area in the southeastern United States. There is a great opportunity to establish new startup companies based on those patents. An investment by the state of Alabama in the establishment of the “Invention to Innovation Center” on the UAH campus would pay valuable benefits to Huntsville, Madison County, as well as the state of Alabama long into the future.

Enhanced support for Alabama A&M

Alabama A&M University ranks in the top 20 on US News and World Report’s list of Historically Black Colleges and Universities and is one of only two public universities to make the list. Additional State support to help A&M deliver strong Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) curriculum and support for expanding programs and facilities at Alabama A & M University is greatly needed.

Expanding STEM programs and facilities at Alabama A & M University will help produce the workforce our community requires.

Improve Local Infrastructure

Biosciences

Our community has recently made tremendous progress in funding infrastructure projects utilizing partnerships with the State, specifically, the 2014 agreement with the State of Alabama and the City of Huntsville to match funding to initiate $250 million road construction projects and the ATRIP road projects currently under agreement. The prospect of future rounds of Base Realignment and Closure however, make infrastructure improvements a continuing top priority for the community. The economic success of our region is reliant upon effective transportation networks that can efficiently move commuters, freight, and services that are vital for continued growth and development of the Tennessee Valley, inclusive of Redstone Arsenal.

The Chairman of the Madison County Commission and the Mayors of Huntsville and Madison and Redstone Arsenal leadership have jointly endorsed the following key projects as the top road priorities for the region:

The state of Alabama continues to increase its global presence in the biosciences.

Through research, job creation and recruitment as well as workforce development, the Huntsville/Madison County region is adding value to the state as a leader in this industry. The HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, the companies that reside on the Cummings Research Park Biotech campus, the companies that are in the greater Huntsville area, and the colleges and universities in North Alabama, are important components of this growing innovation economy.

State funding has allowed for the innovation of technologies, diagnostics and medical treatments, which in turn lead to better quality of life. The impact is demonstrated in better human health but also through numerous improvements in agriculture. Beyond the demonstrable benefit to wellbeing, there is tremendous direct economic impact of state funding for biosciences in non-profit research and the growing community of biotechnology and pharmaceutical based companies leveraging that research in the area. HudsonAlpha and its expanding bioscience hub of companies are generating discoveries and applying the results in therapeutics, medical devices and equipment, scientific services and life science product development. Additionally, HudsonAlpha’s education and workforce development programs are growing the next generation of scientists along with creating a genomics-literate society poised to successfully fill the roles of a bioscience-rich workforce. The chamber strongly supports targeted funding for bioscience innovation at Alabama’s colleges, universities and research institutes.

The chamber also champions increased efforts in growing the state’s bioscience sector.

u I-565 to I-65:

Add additional lanes along I-565 from SR 255 to I-65 to ease traffic congestion from increased passenger and cargo traffic moving along this important economic corridor.

u I-565/Research Park Boulevard Interchange Modification at Gate 9:

Funding these needed interchange modifications to support exponential growth in traffic at Redstone Arsenal and the adjacent Redstone Gateway development.

u I-565 and Madison Boulevard (Exit 13) Interchange Modification for

Resolute Way access at Redstone Arsenal: Improvements through the commercial corridor to address major traffic issues on a route critical to Redstone Arsenal and Research Park commuters.

u Research Park Boulevard from I-565 to North of US 72: Provide funding

to begin the design and construction of additional lanes to State Road 255 to support the recent exponential growth in traffic at Redstone Arsenal and Cummings Research Park.

u Arsenal Eastern Connector: Provide support and funding for implementing a

final Corridor Study and Preliminary Engineering.

u US 231 North and South Overpasses and Corridor Improvements: Funding

for the construction of the scheduled improvements at Memorial Parkway.

Funding is also requested for the preliminary engineering, right of way acquisition, and construction of the planned capacity projects required for access management at Memorial Parkway and Mountain Gap Road and Winchester Road.

u Interchange on I-565 west of Zierdt Road: Continued Alabama Department

of Transportation support for this locally funded project.

u US 72 East/ARC Corridor V from Shields Road eastward to the county line:

Funding be allocated and appropriated through any remaining ARC dedicated monies and any eligible MAP-21 funds as soon as possible to improve this much needed corridor.

u Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd/Northern Bypass: Interchange at Memorial

Parkway and extending the Northern Bypass from U.S. 231 to U.S. 72. Request support and funding for this project to provide more capacity and accessibility as a result of regional workforce traffic demand.

u Highway 53: Request to keep this project on schedule to begin construction of

the next segment to Harvest Road in 2015 and continue to build on progress made for this important corridor.

Health Care We congratulate the legislature for passing reforms of Alabama’s Medicaid program to control costs and ensure long-term sustainability by improving efficiency, addressing fraud and abuse, and ensuring access to quality health care for the citizens of Alabama.

Expanding Medicaid coverage would help to prevent the burden of the uninsured being shifted to the rest of the citizens of Alabama.

Support for Local Breweries, Wineries and Distilleries The joint legislative Alabama Alcohol Beverage Study Commission has approved three recommendations with regard to Alabama’s laws for manufacturing, distributing and selling alcoholic beverages. These recommendations are based on a series of statewide hearings, including one in Huntsville, to determine the competitiveness and consistency of Alabama’s laws compared to those across the country. The Chamber recognizes the economic impact of local breweries, wineries and distilleries and supports the recommendations of the Commission to improve the ability of our producers to sell their products. The recommendations are: (1) Allow licensed brewers and brewpubs producing less than 60,000 barrels of beer yearly to directly sell up to 288 ounces, which is comparable to a case, per consumer per day for offpremise consumption. The law would apply to both draft and package beer. Brewers and brewpubs would also be allowed to deliver up to two donated kegs of beer per charitable or non-profit event. Language limiting the location of a brewpub licensee to a historic area would also be repealed. (2) Allow wineries operating within Alabama to establish one ABC-approved off-site location to retail their wine. And (3) Allow spirit manufacturers within the state to sell up to 750 milliliters, or a ‘fifth’, per consumer per year for off-premises consumption. .

Telecommunications Infrastructure Broadband is an essential component of our infrastructure and critical to growing and diversifying our economy. The Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of Commerce supports policies that promote greater access to affordable wired and wireless broadband for all our citizens and businesses; encourages new investment and technology development and deployment across our community; and, promotes greater competition and choices for businesses and consumers. We oppose public policy that leads to excessive government intervention and regulation of the Internet, which will inevitably discourage investment and drive up costs for business and consumers.

For more about the Chamber of Commerce of Huntsville/Madison County, visit us online at www.hsvchamber.org.