Lt. Gov. Jon Husted talked the excitement that is happening here in  Voltage Valley on Tuesday, Feb. 9 and spoke on how planning and developing a viable workforce is key for the Valley and for Ohio.

Youngstown State University's Excellence Training Center on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Commerce Street is a $12 million project earmarked for completion in March 2021.

Husted started off reflecting back to the November 2018 announcement of the closure of GM Lordstown, and the Valley has come a long way since that announcement and the eventual closing of the facility in March of 2019.

On Jan. 14, Husted announced how the settlement money the Ohio Tax Credit Authority would distribute funding from the General Motors Co. tax credit agreement. 
 
The Ohio Development Services Agency and General Motors would give $12 million in community investment to the Mahoning Valley. The community investments are required as part of the settlement for GM's repayment of its Job Creation and Retention Tax Credit incentives. In 2008, GM entered into Job Creation and Retention Tax Credit agreements, which resulted in $60.3 million in tax credits.
 
Husted said that $12 million was set aside to help the people of the Valley, including the $5 million for the YSU workforce partnership.
 

The $12 million includes:

  •  $5 million to Youngstown State University for workforce development in partnership with Eastern Gateway Community College, and funding for the YSU Energy Storage Innovation and Training Center.
  • $3 million to village of Lordstown for design and construction of a new water tower
  • $2.5 million to Eastgate Regional Council of Governments will pay for local infrastructure improvements, and the Mahoning Valley

  • $1.5 million to Mahoning Valley Manufacturers Coalition for support community workforce development.

"We are going to build the workforce of the future," Husted said, referring to the new GM/LG Chem battery plant being built in Lordstown, Lordstown Motors, and "the jobs that will come from having a successful new economy."

Husted said innovation, investment and talent are the key elements for success and prosperity and said the Valley has everything it now needs.

 YSU Energy Storage Innovation and Training Center is exciting as a foundational element of that future, Husted added.

YSU President Jim Tressel called the Excellence Training Center an "extraordinary opportunity" that started several years ago.

"When we began dreaming about what it was that we [YSU] wanted to contribute to the region and to the state of Ohio, I remember sitting with the Lt. Governor, who, at the time was Secretary of the State... and two challenges, I remember vividly he gave..." Tressel said. 

Tressel said that Husted stated that research needed to get commercialized to make a different for the region and state, and that the region needed to do a better job creating the workforce that could make a difference for new industry, manufacturing, for the digital world.

Starting with a consortium of partners, including Eastern Gateway Community College, with the Valley's career and tech centers, with the local innovators - YBI, America Makes, Mahoning Valley manufacturers, along with the YSU facility - all working together to be on the 'cutting edge' of what needed to be done for the Valley and for the state, Tressel added. 

YSU Small Business Development Center, which Tressel pointed out was ranked as the number-one development center in the US, also helped advise 529 businesses along the way, and helped to create 600 new jobs in 2020, and helped with $58.2 million of sales growth with the companies they advise and exported to 86 countries and $39.6 in export growth. 

Stating his pride for Development Center, and now for the Excellence Training Center, which is scheduled for completion soon. 

The Excellence Training Center will offer expanded learning for industrial maintenance, robotics, 3D printing, CNC stamping, machining, all available in one facility Tressel said. 

In the past year, the Workforce Education and  Innovation and YSU entered into a partnership with IBM and the YSI-IT workforce accelerator, to help fill the more than 700,000 unfilled IT jobs in the US.

Husted said these types of collaborations are key for bringing in new jobs, bigger salaries for Valley and the state.