Louisiana Preps Mega Site for Auto Makers and Suppliers

"Many southern communities today seek automobile manufacturing and some have been successful. Louisiana was one of the very first to be successful," says Don Pierson, assistant secretary at Louisiana Economic Development.

Indeed, Shreveport has been home to a General Motors (GM) plant for more than two decades. GM recently chose to reinvest in its Louisiana facility, retooling the plant to the tune of $800 million to manufacture the Colorado pick up truck. GM later invested another $250 million to support the manufacture of its Hummer H3.

All told, Louisiana has seen more than $1 billion in auto industry investment since the turn of the century, with dozens of new tier-one suppliers locating there. Now, Louisiana is vying to win the next automotive industry announcement with its Franklin Farm site. The 1,440-acre site offers the auto industry a prime location along the Interstate 20 Southern Auto Corridor, with easy access to suppliers in the region via the state's multimodal transportation infrastructure.

In fact, the state-owned Franklin Farm site is within 125 miles of over 100 auto suppliers with an abundant labor supply at hand. The site even gives automakers room to grow, with an additional 4,000 acres surrounding the core site for expansion or to serve the needs of auto industry suppliers. What's more, the property is located in a Renewal Community that offers lucrative tax credits and incentives. The State of Louisiana also offers generous tax incentives.

In terms of utilities infrastructure, the shovel-ready Franklin Farm site offers an unlimited water supply from the Mississippi River Valley alluvial aquifer. It also offers 500KV and 115KV electrical transmission lines, as well as 18" and 30" natural gas lines and fiber optic on site. Franklin Farm is well above the 100-year flood plain on Holly Ridge .

"We have labor to support a 3,000 to 4,000-person auto assembly plant," says Mary Jo Hanover, business development services coordinator for Louisiana Economic Development. "We are willing to provide workforce training and we have a governor who is willing to help streamline the approval processes."

Of course, Louisiana is home to dozens of colleges and universities and has the highest-funded worker-training program per capita in the country. Louisiana workers are first in productivity measured by value of shipments per production worker, according to the U.S. Census, and the fourth most productive in the U.S. in value added per production worker. A right-to-work state, Louisiana has the least number of hours lost due to work stoppage.

The Franklin Farm site is less than 50 miles from the Port of Lake Providence on the Mississippi River , which offers access to 31 states. It is also within 600 miles of Houston , Dallas/Ft. Worth, Nashville , Mississippi Gulf Coast, Atlanta and St. Louis . At the same time, the site is some 100 miles away from the nearest plan, so automakers have a buffer that ensures labor forces don't overlap.

"As we look to the future and see Toyota in San Antonio to our west and Nissan in Jackson to our east, we've located attractive land and we think we are an outstanding candidate for consideration," Pierson says. "We have invested a lot in the third-party confirmation needed to show that the Franklin Farm site is a first rate location for an automobile manufacturer."

To learn more about Louisiana and the Franklin Farm site, call 225-342-3000 or visit www.LouisianaForward.com.