Nearly 75,000 potential new jobs in the pipeline, NC's top economic developer says

A public-private partnership for North Carolina to use tax incentives to lure companies to or to get existing companies to expand in the state is juggling 248 projects at different stages of progress as it settles into its 10th year.

Chris Chung, who has led the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina for nearly its entire existence, updated officials on the state of economic development Monday during a meeting of the group’s  Economic Development Accountability and Standards Committee.

The details of the economic development projects are kept confidential. And some are in various stages of reality, ranging from tire-kicking companies trying to learn more about what North Carolina to companies intent on landing or expanding in the Tar Heel state and ready to ink an incentives deal.

Chung said that as a whole, the 248 projects represent nearly 75,000 potential jobs and over $66 billion worth of capital investments, though it’s unlikely all would materialize. North Carolina is often competing with multiple states for each project.

Chung said there is one trend: Many of the potential expansions are blue collar, industrial jobs. Of the 20 projects that kicked off in January, he said, none were for office jobs — no call centers, corporate headquarters, banking expansions or the like. The same was true of December, he said, and part of a nationwide trend. “If you talk to anybody who’s in the office real estate business, we continue to see that same view where we sit,” he said.

The group has identified potential megasites for factories or other such development — developable tracts of at least 1,000 acres. And there are 15 other smaller sites, of a few hundred acres or so, that have also been identified as having potential for smaller scale operations, Chung said.