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Media Clips Businesses to create 6,200 new jobs in LA
Rusty Costanza/ The Times-Picayune Officials in September break ground on the Federal City project in Algiers, one of 32 projects statewide expected to attract 6,200 jobs. BATON ROUGE -- The state has gotten 32 commitments from businesses ranging from bakeries to the military to move or expand their operations in Louisiana, creating more than 6,200 jobs in the process, the state's chief business development officer said Wednesday. Since the Jindal administration took office in January, eight of those 32 companies have been announced for the New Orleans area, Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Stephen Moret said. The 32 companies are projected to create 6,216 jobs, retain 8,310 jobs and bring a capital investment of almost $2 billion, he said. • See the major state-courted business development projects announced this year for the New Orleans area. Moret said his numbers do not include temporary construction jobs for the projects. Most of the jobs will start to filter into the state in the next two or three years, he said. Moret's comments came at a joint meeting of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Consumer Protection and International Affairs and the House Commerce Committee. The two panels get quarterly updates on economic development activities by Moret's office. He said that his data also show that the number of indirect jobs created by the operations could number almost 11,000. If the companies continue their plans and hire the people they claim, it will mean about $44 million a year in tax revenue to the state. Moret said that some of the numbers of jobs and investment dollars may change a little but not very much. "This doesn't include the hundreds of small businesses" That can grow or be created by the large companies, he said. "These projects will generate billions of dollars in new sales to small businesses. The largest project announced this year, he said, was a joint venture by the Shaw Group and Westinghouse Corp., in Calcasieu Parish, which is proposed to create 2,900 new jobs at a modular nuclear manufacturing facility. That project is expected to cost $100 million, he said. The second-largest, he said, is the propesed construction of additional shipyards by Edison Chouest in Terrebonne Parish. That Project is expected to create 1,000 new jobs and create 300. Rep. Nickie Monica, R-LaPlace, asked Moret about the prospect of landing the $2 billion Nucor Corp. pig iron plant in St. James Parish. Moret said the stat's chances "are looking pretty good" for the community of Convent to edge out a Brazilian site for the plant. Moret said that there are "a number of issues we are working through" such as the details of the stat's incentive package -- which he did not disclose --- and environmental permits. Even with the closing of two paper and wood pulp mills in the state and others under "significant distress," hurricane -devastated crops, tighter credit and a weakened national economy, the state is faring better than other Southern states and the nation in business activity, he said. He also said that the federal government is anticipated to spend billions of dollars on hurricane levee construction and coastal protection in south Louisiana, and the petrochemical industry has about five years of backlogged constriction, work that should keep the job market humming. Moret said the state will focus on attracting digital media and high-technology companies in the months ahead as well as retaining existing businesses and helping them grow. |
