Could the new state budget open up the path for a Toyota battery plant near Greensboro?
Could North Carolina’s new state budget help Randolph County land thousands of manufacturing jobs?
Tucked into Senate Bill 105 is a provision that would appropriate $320 million to the Greensboro-Randolph Megasite, an 1,800-acre site that sits near the Randolph-Guilford county line.
Economic developers have long hoped to use the site to land an auto manufacturer, and, in 2018, the state narrowly missed out on luring a joint Mazda and Toyota manufacturing plant to Randolph County, The News & Observer previously reported.
The Mazda-Toyota plant ultimately was built in Alabama.
The new budget could make Randolph County much more attractive to business, as the state would foot the bill for prepping the site for construction.
Some $135 million of the money would go to the N.C. Department of Transportation for road improvements, with $100 million going toward site prep and wetland mitigation, and $35 million of it going for additional road work. An additional $185 million could be used to reimburse the manufacturer for site improvements.
To get the money, though, a future tenant would have to promise at least $1 billion in investments and 1,750 jobs, according to the text of the budget. The budget notes that a potential tenant, which is not named in the text, could grow its investment at the site to $3 billion and 3,875 jobs.
State economic development leaders have declined to comment on whether there is a tenant ready to invest in the Randolph megasite. But there has been some speculation that Toyota is taking a second look at the property.
That’s because the investment numbers in the budget are similar to ones outlined recently by Toyota. In October, the Japanese car maker said it would invest $3.4 billion into a battery plant in the U.S. over the next 10 years.
The company said the first phase of its production would start in 2025 and include an investment of $1.3 billion and the creation of 1,750 jobs.
On Friday, Bloomberg News reported, citing anonymous sources, that Toyota could pick the Randolph megasite for the expansion. However, no final decision had been made, Bloomberg reported.
Toyota declined to comment about the Randolph megasite.
In a statement, the company reiterated that it plans to invest $3.4 billion through 2030 to start battery production in the U.S. for electric vehicles, with an initial 1,750 jobs being created.
“Further details of the project, including the site location, production capacity, business structure, etc., will be shared in the near future,” a Toyota spokesperson said in an email.
Pat Ryan, a spokesperson for N.C. Senate Leader Phil Berger, declined to comment on the bill.
North Carolina Commerce Secretary Machelle Baker Sanders declined to say if there was a specific company in mind with the bill.
“This is about being prepared,” she said in an interview. “And so we will see what happens, and we will continue to have conversations.”
Christopher Chung, the CEO of the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, which helps the state recruit companies, also declined to say whether a specific company was looking at the megasite.
“That said, over the past several years, we appreciate how the Governor and Legislature have shown time and again that they will work together to make North Carolina as competitive as possible for transformative job-creation projects that benefit the entire state,” he said in an email.
“Not only does that collaboration help the state win more deals, it also sends an important signal to companies that economic development is a bipartisan, team effort by our state leadership.”
If an investment from Toyota does happen, it could be “transformational,” said state Rep. Jon Hardister, a Republican from Greensboro.
“If you get a large manufacturer, not only is it a lot of jobs, but they are jobs that pay well,” he said in a telephone interview. “And when you have large manufacturers, you tend to have ancillary companies as well.”
Hardister said that the money in the budget was requested by the state’s Commerce Department and economic development officials. He said he had heard a company was currently looking at the site, but declined to share its identity.
“We all know how close we came to getting Mazda-Toyota,” he said. “That saga played into the numbers that are in the budget.”
This story was originally published November 20, 2021 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Could the new state budget open up the path for a Toyota battery plant near Greensboro?."
