News from ECG’s Office of Economic & Community Development
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GA’s Energy Cities At Work Share the electronic version of fyi from our website locationgeorgia.com.
Access to Opportunity
L End-of-Year
2023
See inside how Crisp County solved the childcare crisis for its workforce.
Kelley Bush LaGrange
Shelley Zorn Thomasville
TC3 and an artificial intelligence lab
aGrange and Thomasville are bridging school-to-work with initiatives that will benefit their communities’ workforce for decades. “Workforce development is an ecosystem. We consider workforce development to include attainable housing, transportation, early childhood education and training. Equitable access is key - to all of those components” says Kelley Bush, Director of Workforce Development and Existing Industry with the Development Authority of LaGrange. Access is the great equalizer and some struggle for access. According to Beth Weigensberg, workforce researcher, in a Q&A with the *Brookings Institution, individuals that are often considered “hard-to-serve” are unwittingly left out. For example those who are homeless, formerly incarcerated, lowincome, and youth disconnected from school and employment often find it difficult to access existing initiatives within the eco-system. Availability is not accessibility. “In our initial school-to-work beta program in 2019, we uncovered tremendous barriers for the economically disadvantaged and vulnerable students in our community,” explains Bush. Enter the Troup County Career Center (TC3) serving credit-deficient students at risk of not successfully graduating from high school. The goal
is for these students to have access to the technological resources and pathways offered at the local college and career academy. Access is opportunity also in South Georgia. Members of the Georgia Artificial Intelligence in Manufacturing (Georgia AIM) team from Georgia Tech met with Imagine Thomasville and local Thomasville manufacturers and business leaders in fall 2023 to discuss how AIM grants could accelerate the transition to automation in manufacturing. With that, Southern Regional Technical College (SRTC) announced the creation of a new precision machining and manufacturing lab on the Thomasville campus to open in the fall of 2024. The lab will host two new programs, including precision machining and manufacturing engineering technology. These are programs that provide new bridges for school-to-work Georgians. “A lab for precision manufacturing at SRTC breathes innovation into existing industry, fueling their growth and ensuring a trained workforce is ready,” clarifies Shelley Zorn, Imagine Thomasville Executive Director with the Thomasville Payroll Development Authority. The leaders in Thomasville and LaGrange are operating along the same continuum, access to opportunity for meaningful work and successful living. *Brookings Institution is a non-profit American think tank that conducts research and education in the global economy and economic development.
A Partnership for Economic Development a statewide industrial development team
This partnership supports the work of Georgia’s energy cities
ECG is a well-established economic developer in the state; it
in recruiting industrial prospects. The collaboration brings
offers the Gas Authority a great partnership. Roughly half of
new resources to the statewide process, as the ECG team
the electric communities are also natural gas cities; the cities
serves on boards within the Georgia Department of Eco-
are already partners. Some of the well-deserved leaders are
nomic Development, Georgia Allies, and the Governor’s Elec-
named to 2023 Georgia Trend 500 Influential Leaders’
tric Mobility and Innovation Alliance. We have a great
ranking for their direct influence for Georgia success.
municipal story.
Arthur Corbin President, Gas Authority
Walter West President ECG
Initiatives Industrial Development
Technical Solutions
Retail-Commercial Development
Community Development
ECG and the Gas Authority offer: Project Managers excel in aligning company project needs with properties and communities across Georgia. They recruit business, organize site visits, and facilitate meetings between company executives and state/local representatives. ECG offers: market research and analytics geospatial analytics and design marketing and graphic design ECG offers: customized recruitment strategies that match a city’s unique qualities and aspirations for commercial development. ECG offers: tailored solutions for each community’s distinct challenges and opportunities that are actionable solutions. See ECG work product deliverables next panel
During the past 10 years throughout Georgia’s 118 designated “rural” counties with a population under 50,000, communities have welcomed 1,567 project locations or expansions bringing more than 74,000 jobs and over $23 billion investment into communities. November 2023, GDEcD Board Report
our energy cities
Investment in Rural Growth
Acworth Adairsville Adel Albany Americus Andersonville Ashburn Bainbridge Barnesville Blakely Bowman Brinson Buford Byron Cairo Calhoun Camilla Cartersville Chickamauga
Claxton Cochran College Park Colquitt Commerce Covington Crisp County
Millen Fitzgerald Monroe Forsyth Monticello Fort Valley Moultrie Grantville Greensboro Nashville Newnan Griffin Norcross Hampton Dalton Oxford Hartwell Dawson Hawkinsville Palmetto Doerun Hogansville Pelham Donalsonville Jackson Perry Douglas Quitman LaFayette Dublin Royston LaGrange East Point Lawrenceville Sandersville Eatonton Social Circle Louisville Edison Sparta Lumpkin Elberton Statesboro Madison Ellaville Sugar Hill Mansfield Fairburn Summerville Marietta
Sylvania Sylvester Thomaston Thomasville Thomson Tifton Toccoa Trion Union Point Vienna Warner Robins Washington Waynesboro West Point Whigham Winder
ECG Deliverables to Communities support for projects at home
Technical Solutions
To provide an incentive for job creation and private investment, designated locations are named Rural Zones. The Department of Community Affairs designates up to 10 zones annually. ECG developed materials to help the City of Blakely secure a zone.
The ECG team builds technical documents and other marketing materials to support cities.
ICSC@Southeast Atlanta Retail Commercial Development
ECG staff represents the retail interests of the cities at the ICSC@Southeast Conference. We also assist with city-specific market analyses for potential retail growth. For visioning in placemaking initiatives, ECG staff helps create conceptuals such as this Community one on the right for Development Storybook Park in Adel. The park is complete with amenities; two other projects are in the pipeline.
Storybook Park library
Adel - Cook County
Southwest Georgia Tour an economic development bus tour
This 2023 tour prepped a host of state leaders who support industrial prospects. Leaders learn about the assets of Southwest Georgia, including available sites and buildings, quality of life and its unique assets. For a memorable visit, communities demonstrate firsthand existing recreational venues and dining opportunities for Georgia guests.
Southwest destinations: Albany, Blakely, Bainbridge, Cairo, Camilla, Thomasville and Whigham
Biz Profiles
Industry Insights
sector• electric vehicle Electric Vehicle 2023 Brief
Leade rs at Work
City Initiatives
trend• nontraditional childcare hours
trend• childcare crisis for Crisp County workforce
If you google childcare and workforce, many noted pundits and experts are sounding the alarm about accessible childcare and its interplay with workforce availability. Forbes, The Economist, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and others idenWhere to Charge? tify childcare as a critical component of economic development and growth. Without reliable childcare, employees can’t go • The ECG team led a discussion among cities to work. The Crisp County School System rose to such an occasion when key childcare providers in the community closed about charging station types, infrastructure their doors. In roughly six weeks, an empty wing of an existing school building became the port in the storm for families of and interim and long-term solutions. 98 children. “It wasn’t just school teachers and administrators in our system that needed our service. Hospital and law enforcement • In May, Blue Bird Corporation celebrated the employees were desperate for our program,” said Cindy Hughes, Superintendent of Crisp County Schools. grand opening of its 40,000 square foot EV “Because we are a government entity we met our short launch timeline with the help of the Department of Early Care and Build-up Center at the company’s main U.S. Learning, the state regulating body, that readily signed off on the initiative; every resource to which we turned stepped up,” school bus manufacturing plant in Fort Valley. Hughes remarked. • KIA will invest more than $200 million and creA host of volunteers put cribs together and other furniture was made ready for the building. School system central office ate nearly 200 new jobs at its West Point plant personnel devoted weekend time to meet the pending deadline. Staff was secured and once operational, high school stufor the assembly of the company’s highly antici- dents in the school’s work-based learning initiative provided additional staff assistance. pated all electric 2024 EV9 three-row SUV. On a promised Monday morning this past summer, Crisp County Schools was determined to launch the needed resource. The resource became a business and for now, the financial strategy is to break-even. • SK Battery America (SKBA) has exceeded its Following a fast deep dive into childcare facility operations, Hughes is confident round-the-clock care to help families with hiring goal of 2,600 employees two years ahead of schedule for its two lithium-ion battery non-traditional work hours is an optimal option. A need for 24-hour childcare may surprise some Georgians. “The workforce needs 24-hour childcare services,” confirms Hughes. manufacturing facilities in Commerce. See Deals of the Year for more EV news in Cartersville and Bainbridge.
trend•
housing through a new lens
People continue to move to Georgia increasing the competition for reasonably priced homes. As in other U.S. locales, the housing affordability dilemma has led jurisdictions throughout the country to encourage more housing construction, whether by subsidizing affordable housing or relaxing zoning rules. A relaxed square foot requirement for new home construction is getting a second look as baby boomers want smaller homes, such as a “tiny home.” Georgia’s leadership is addressing housing supply needs with a newly established program, a component of the OneGeorgia Authority, providing flexible funding for developing housing and related infrastructure in rural parts of the state. These grants total $8.37 million in infrastructure development that will ultimately support over 500 units of housing in both single and multi-family developments. In some cases, the award recipients have demonstrated collaboration with real estate developers accepting a share of infrastructure costs. The City of Albany received an infrastructure grant for 29 single-family homes on six acres of land and the Douglas Coffee County Authority received an infrastructure grant to facilitate the construction of 65 homes near several large employers.
Expert Data
While childcare business models vary, other school systems in Georgia are entering the world of childcare. For its school employees, Adel and the Cook County School System are providing childcare.
A 2018 study of Georgia parents of children under five indicated childcare challenges are leading to significant disruption in parental workforce participation, both in the short term - workdays randomly missed, and long term - leaving the workforce.* The Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning (DECAL) awarded Imagine Thomasville, with the chamber of commerce, a $750,000 grant. The community demonstrated a need for nontraditional hours based on a local study by Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education that found no nontraditional hour childcare for Thomas Countians. These funds now supplement the cost of childcare to individuals and providers for employees working beyond 8-5. The grant from DECAL is part of a 2023-2024 inaugural pilot program designed to award grants to seven child care providers and six nonprofit and government organizations. Thomasville is the first recipient, outside the provider category, for funds. * Opportunities Lost: How Child Care Challenges Affect Georgia’s Workforce and Economy
Prospects choosing outside metro Atlanta continue to grow.
Energy Cities Share of FY 2023 Wins
Performance Accolades Deal of the Year Small Community
Anovion Technologies
GDEcD totals
Cartersville
announcements 426
investment $24.26B
by the Georgia Downtown Association
Bainbridge
FY 2023
jobs 38,406
Thomasville Named Downtown of the Year
Deal of the Year Large Community
Hyundai and SK On
see more info on Bainbridge and Cartersville on back panel.
The GA Economic Development Association names the deal of the year annually to the communities who land a signficant industrial prospect.
Remarkable Year of Growth sector manufacturing
sector manufacturing continued
Albany
Covington
Diamond Door Products, a family-owned steel manufacturer, expands replicating its Texas headquarters’ operations by early 2024.
Bainbridge
Anovion Technologies supplier of premium synthetic graphite anode materials for lithium-ion batteries, will build a new manufacturing facility in Bainbridge.The project will create more than 400 jobs and over $800 million in investment.
Cartersville
Hyundai and Sk On are building a battery facility for electric vehicles. (HAGA), a manufacturer of lightweight advanced materials for sustainable technology, will create more than 160 new jobs and invest $147 million. Qcells, a renewable energy solutions providers, will invest more than $2.5 billion to expand its solar module manufacturing operations. Dalton announced a Qcells project in 2022. .
Archer Aviation with Stellantis anticipate 650 taxi aircraft per year. The facility will be capable of expanding by an additional 800,000 square feet, which is estimated to support long-term production targets of up to 2,300 aircraft per year.
Dublin
Auto Parts supplier, Hwashin, will invest over $176 million to establish a new manufacturing facility in Dublin, Georgia, creating 460+ jobs and supporting the state’s e-mobility ambitions.
Sylvania
Idea Nuova, Inc., through its subsidiary American Home Manufacturing, will invest more than $19 million in a new manufacturing and distribution facility creating an estimated 80 new jobs.
Warner Robins
Recycled paper and packaging company, Pratt Industries will build a new production facility creating more than 125 jobs and over $120 million in investment. The
plant increases production capacity by 50% while initially creating 80 new local jobs.
West Point
Daesol Ausys Georgia, auto supplier, will build a new manufacturing facility in the City of West Point creating 140 new jobs.
sector agriculture and beverage Adel
Trulieve Cannabis Corporation company announced it would invest about $20 million in an indoor medical marijuana cultivation and manufacturing facility.
Cartersville
Yakult U.S.A., a Japanese probiotic beverage company, will build its second U.S. facility in Bartow County, creating more than 90 new jobs and investing an estimated $305 million in a new beverage production facility.
A City’s Craft - More Livability Good Karma in Commerce “I remember as a young cashier the flow of textile workers that frequented the bank to cash their weekly checks on payday. Faces became familiar from the Oxford textile plant, a sportswear mill, in downtown Commerce,” explains Natalie Thomas, the former cashier and now Main Street Manager. It was an important economic engine. Today, the Oxford Building on First Street has new life as a brewery and retail on ground level. The formula for success was corralling stakeholders, citizens, city planning and potential developers to agree on the optimal use of the Oxford Building, a 200-year-old structure. Developers were solicited and a group of North Carolina-based developers was a match. Thomas is thrilled with the rehabilitation and looks forward to the next step, 14 residential condos on the second level. In October 2023, 1818 Brewing opened with its craft beers, live music and family environment. New souls roam the Oxford building bringing fresh life to the historic First Street space. 1818 Brewing joins Strange Duck Brewery in the successful craft beer business in Commerce.
Covington Is Expanding
Town Center
This development is a 180-acre mixed-use project. It features hotels, retail, green space and housing. Once completed, the community estimates over 34,000 visits per day.
No Excuses in Douglas Find Energy City Douglas on the map. It is a rural community in South Central Georgia away from metropolitan hubs. The community is not near a major interstate and airport service is from the municipal airport. Yet a recounting of its economic development wins calls for kudos. National chains readily add up the pluses in selecting Douglas. The city is home to more than 161 goods producing firms and nearly 670 service firms including shopping, dining, hotels and professional services. Matt Seale, chamber of commerce executive, unequivocally points to collaboration for the city’s stellar performance. The city, county, the school board and each respective leadership walk the walk and talk the talk for compromise. “One entity does not wait to see who accepts compromise first. We all address: here is what is required. And rural is not an excuse,” Seale asserts. These are just a few recent businesses: Hobby Lobby, Marshalls, Starbucks, Chick-fil-A, Publix, and Harbor Freight are here. Walmart Distribution reinvested in its Douglas facility to the tune of $400 million. Pilgrim’s Pride broke ground on a $75 million expansion.
Fostering Georgia Growth
Office of Economic & Community Development is a liaison between growing companies and the ideal community that can meet their needs.
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Contacts Daryl Ingram..................770.335.6990 dingram@ecoga.org Michelle Holbrook.........678.313.2768 mholbrook@ecoga.org Not on the mailing list? Request your copy at info@locationgeorgia.com or download an electronic version at locationgeorgia.com.
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it’s march 2025, mark the calendar.
Deals of the Year Cartersville Nearly 200 economic developers gathered in Midtown Atlanta in November to celebrate the outstanding achievements made throughout the state this year. In the large community category Hyundai Motor Group and SK On won the Georgia Deal of the Year award for a battery facility they are building in Bartow County. To supply Hyundai Motor Group’s plants in the U.S., stakeholders estimate it will create more than 3,500 new jobs through approximately $4-5 billion of investment in Bartow County. This project is one of the largest ecoMelinda Lemmon Executive Director, Cartersville-Bartow County Department of Economic Development nomic development projects in state history. Established in 2021, SK On is the lithium-ion battery subsidiary branch of SK Innovation and currently employs more than 2,000 Georgians at its SK Battery America facility in Commerce. Bainbridge Small Community Deal of the Year was awarded to Bainbridge leadership. Anovion Technologies, a supplier of premium synthetic graphite anode materials for lithium-ion batteries, will build a new manufacturing facility in Bainbridge. The project will create more than 400 jobs and over $800 million in investment in Decatur County. Anovion, a climate tech-driven advanced materials company, is one of the first qualified U.S. suppliers of synthetic graphite anode materials for use in e-mobility applications. Graphite is the largest battery material used in electric vehicles by mass, more than copper, nickel, manganese, cobalt and lithium. Georgia Quick Start, the nation’s top-ranked workforce development program, is turning an old primary school in Cartersville into a new training center.
ECG Office of Economic & Community Development 75 Fifth Street NW Suite 850 Atlanta, Georgia 30308
Give a quick read to the Blog on locationgeorgia.com website. See what the cities are doing, replicate best practices, and make sure your story is there for others to read. Send your press releases to ECG.
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GA’s Energy Cities At Work
City of Covington
Archer Aviation
Partnership with Stellantis Electric air taxi 350,00 sq. ft. manufacturing Transport passengers by 2025