Nebraska

During Fiscal Year 2013, EDA invested $421,500 in eight projects in the State of Nebraska. These projects are expected to create or retain 85 jobs and leverage $125,000,000 in private investment, according to grantee estimates. EDA’s investments help Nebraska communities achieve bottom-up, locally-defined economic development goals and strategies.

EDA offers a complementary, balanced portfolio of grant programs designed to help rural and urban communities grow their private sectors and create jobs.

Investment Spotlight: Planting Seeds to Grow Manufacturing

South Sioux City, Nebraska is a community with tremendous potential, but in order to grow it needed to plant the seeds for its future success.  Like many communities, the South Sioux City area needed a long-term plan to develop its future workforce to meet the ever-changing needs of its businesses.

In September 2013, EDA announced South Sioux City as a recipient of an Investing in Manufacturing Communities Partnership (IMCP) planning grant, an Administration-wide initiative designed to accelerate the resurgence of manufacturing and help cultivate an environment for businesses to create well-paying manufacturing jobs in regions across the country.   In South Sioux City, EDA’s IMCP investment supports the Planting Seeds to Grow Manufacturing project in Dakota County.   The project is a collaborative planning effort that will bring together the region’s key stakeholders to address the shortage of a skilled and trained workforce in support of business and industry expansions and to attract new manufacturing firms.

Designed to bring together the key and relevant stakeholders of the region, such as local government, school districts, businesses, manufacturers, colleges, universities, and trade training centers, the local economic development community will form public-private partnerships that will build tomorrow’s workforce. By developing a plan that marries the training and skill needs of the business and manufacturing industries early in the educational setting, the project will seek to address the shortage of the skilled and trained workers starting as early as primary and secondary schools.   The goal is to engage young people early on to fill workforce needs, planting the seeds for future growth.