Name: Teachers group details opposition to school reopening bill
Uploaded: 2021-03-01T15:22:00-0500
Duration: 1409196
Description: The North Carolina Association of Educators holds a news conference to discuss its opposition to legislation requiring schools to reopen during the pandemic and calling on lawmakers to uphold Gov. Roy Cooper's veto of the measure.

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The North Carolina Association of Educators holds a news conference to discuss its opposition to legislation requiring schools to reopen during the pandemic and calling on lawmakers to uphold Gov. Roy Cooper's veto of the measure.

<p>Carolina Association of Educators, and I am an elementary music teacher from Cumberland County. We appreciate you taking the next 30 minutes to hear the views of educators from across our state on Senate Bill 37. Why lawmakers should vote to sustain the veto of Senate Bill 37 and how are schools can reopen safely. So our organization in C A has said from the beginning of this pandemic that our schools can reopen when they reopen safely and reopen safely means that we want to make sure that all school staff has access to the vaccine, making sure that all schools are following the three ws washing hands wearing mask and physical distancing of 6 ft with no exceptions. And we want to make sure that all schools are transparent and reporting their virus infection data. Now we have heard that some politicians are throwing around some interesting rhetoric since the governor's veto of Senate Bill 37 on Friday. And while that makes for a sensational news story, it does not educate the public on how this bill would impact our classrooms during a pandemic. We need more light on Senate Bill 37. We want to underscore some simple facts about Senate Bill 37 to show how it would lead to some very risky decisions for our students and educators while we are still dealing with this deadly pandemic. So first, all school employees who are working in buildings with less than 6 ft of social distancing right now should be vaccinated immediately in any school, employee should absolutely be vaccinated before they are forced to go back into school buildings with less than 6 ft of social distancing. These buildings, with less than 6 ft of social distancing, do not comply with CBC guidance. It was a poll released today from public policy polling that shows a strong majority of North Carolina voters agree. The poll says that 56% of voters think that teachers should have the option to wait to return to school buildings until they have had the opportunity to be vaccinated. Only 34% of voters disagree with that. We want to be really clear here. There is no 6 ft social distancing requirement for elementary schools in North Carolina. Our states reopened rules for elementary school, also known as Plan A, not comply with the latest guidance from the Centers for Disease Control. To make matters worse, Senate Bill 37 as it is currently written, would totally remove the 6 ft of social distance rule for all school levels. Elementary, middle and high school. While we are dealing with this global pandemic that has new and more contagious strands strength excuse me of the virus spreading across the United States and have matriculated here in North Carolina, we hear again and again from politicians to follow the three ws to stay 6 ft apart. But when it comes to students and adults in school buildings, Senate Bill 37 says something else entirely. The bill says that schools do not need 6 ft of social distancing like the rest of the state. So lawmakers who are voting for Senate Bill 37 are telling educators across the state that students, educators and all of our other school staff do not need 6 ft of social distancing like the rest of the state, that is absolutely unacceptable. And so six Senate Bill 37 completely contradicts latest guidance from the Centers for Disease Control, issued just 17 days ago, C. D. C. That says all schools should keep everyone 6 ft apart to the greatest extent possible. I quote that directly from the document. In counties with substantial or high levels of community spread of the virus, the CDC says 6 ft should be required here in Wake County according to our latest numbers on community spread. CDC says that 6 ft of social distancing should be required. But we have Children and adults in school buildings right now which are not socially distancing at all. These buildings do not comply with the CDC guidance. In a few minutes, you will hear from teachers from other parts of the state who are dealing with the same issue. Senate Bill 37 says that 6 ft is totally optional for all schools, regardless of the level of community spread in the surrounding county. That is unacceptable. Senate Bill 37 refers to the C D. C in the Bills first sentence, but this bill totally ignores the latest guidance from the C. D. C. So politicians are citing the C. D. C and their bill and then totally ignoring the C. D. C s clear recommendation for 6 ft of social distancing for all schools. Lastly, we know that our schools can reopen safely if the public has a basic level of trust in the infection data, and that trust we know comes from transparency. Local school districts should report the number of people who are first infected inside the school buildings. Virtually no school districts currently do that. So we do want to acknowledge and thank the new handover. County schools, um, for taking steps to publicly report the number of secondary transmissions after our local partner, the New Hanover County Association of Educators, called on the local school board to make those numbers public. And contrary to the claims of Senate Bill, 37 people are being infected by this virus. Inside the schools, you will hear from Elizabeth Bud, a New Hanover County elementary School teacher, who will share details on that. So at this point, I will turn it over to Kevin Rogers, our government relations manager, to take a few moments to spotlight some key lines of Senate bill 37 the states of the state safe school, too kid and the recent CDC guidance that was recently released to safely reopen our schools and you see this information together. We think parents across the state will share our concerns and will agree lawmakers should vote to sustain the veto of Senate Bill 37. Kevin, the floor is yours. Thank you very much. President Walker. Kelly. Uh, good afternoon, everyone. Kevin Rogers, government relations and communications manager with N. C. A A. Uh, I don't want to take up too much time, but I do want to go through a couple important documents. That sort of lays out what we're talking about here So you can see what we're talking about in a very clear way. And we'll have a few visuals up here as well for you to be able to work through that. Get this up one second here. All right. All right. So, um, first Senate Bill 37 itself. The first three sentences of SB 37 specifically refer to the C D. C. Of course, Senator Disease Control. Um, and they clearly off the authors of SB 37 are implying that the CDC is incredible and expert resource, which, of course it is. Uh, but nowhere in the bill to the authors refer to the latest guidance at the CDC. Released a little over two weeks ago, which shows how our schools should reopen safely with the 6 ft of social distancing quote unquote to the greatest extent possible whether the 6 ft should be required in counties with substantial or high levels of community spread. Um, it says it shall be in the discretion of the local board, whether in person instruction shall be provided under plan a minimum social distancing Plan B Moderate social distancing or plans is necessary to address the needs of different school settings. What this basically says is that local school boards can fully reopen any schools under plan A. The problem is that under plan, a 6 ft of social distancing is not necessary. It says that it is highly recommended, but it is not required. So if you look at Page six of the safe School Toolkit, it clearly shows 6 ft of physical distancing is required for schools and Plan B, which is the hybrid option. But 6 ft of physical distancing, is not listed as a requirement for schools to fully reopen and plant A. So as SB 37 allows all schools to fully reopen under Plan A, it allows all schools to fully reopen without the 6 ft of social distancing requirements. SB 37 refers to the C D. C as a credible expert at the top of the bill. But how does SB 37 actually comply with the CDC guidance to safely reopened schools? The answer is that it doesn't, and that is a huge problem. So now if we move to the C. D. C s operational strategy for K 12 schools through phase mitigation, this is the document that CDC released 17 days ago which more, uh, more detailed way gives schools guidance how they should reopen safely under the phase mitigation tag. You can click in there and go to the table, which shows that schools and counties with substantial or high levels of virus transmission or community spread should receive should require 6 ft of physical social distancing. These colors should not be confused with the state's color codes. They're not the same thing. They're very similar, but they're not the same thing. And how does the CDC judge counties to be in areas of substantial or high levels of virus transmission or community spread? The CDC says that we can grade a county by calculating the number of infections over a seven day period and dividing by the population. And when we do that, almost every single North Carolina county by CDC standards should right now be requiring 6 ft of physical distancing in all of our schools. That includes high school that includes middle and that includes elementary. But SP 37 does not consider these rates of community spread when allowing local school boards to fully restore all of their schools without the 6 ft of social distancing. It really appears to the offers at the authors of SP 37 like the site, the CDC that they don't like to think about the actual guidance C. D. C is offering That is a problem. So I hope that makes all of that clear a little bit clearer going into all of those particular details. Uh, President Walker Kelly Lee turned back over to you. All right. Thank you so very much. Um, so we do have to educators with us today. Um, So first we have Elizabeth Bud from New Hanover County. Good afternoon. My name is Elizabeth Bud, and I'm a second grade teacher at Marie Ville Elementary School in New Hanover County, our elementary schools fully reopened to plan A on March 8th. We will not have 6 ft of social distancing. Our school district is helping to keep everyone at 3 ft, but no promises. I want to highlight the third paragraph of SB 37 that suggests that no adults have been infected with the covid virus by Children inside our schools. This is absolutely not true, and I've seen it firsthand. New Hanover County schools is reporting 19 known cases where students, educators or staff were first infected with covid. Inside our school buildings, there are at least two known cases in which adults were infected by students, and those are only the ones that have been confirmed. Our district is the only one that we know of that is publicly reporting infections that originated inside our buildings. New Hanover County schools is doing this because educators in New Hanover County demanded full transparency of infection data. I, along with 2000 other New Hanover County educators, received the first dose of the Covid vaccine last week. I am so relieved to have the opportunity to get my first dose, but there are about 4000 other educators that are still waiting for this. When our elementary schools fully reopened in one week without 6 ft of social distancing, they will not be complying with CDC guidelines to reopen safely. If SB 37 passes, this will allow all schools to fully reopen without 6 ft of distancing, which is out of compliance with the CDC guidelines. Any lawmaker who votes for SB 37 is implying our students, educators and staff don't need or deserve 6 ft of distancing during a pandemic. Everyone else deserves 6 ft of physical distance during a pandemic. So why don't students and educators deserve it as well? Thank you so much. Thank you, Elizabeth. Next, we have MEREDITH Newman from Colbert's County. Good afternoon. My name is MEREDITH Newman. I teach second grade at Patriots Sem Elementary in Concord in Cabarrus County, just north of Charlotte. Our school is already fully reopened in Plan A for Children in pre K through third grade. All of our 4th and 5th graders are welcome to return and plan A and Chicken Excuse me in two weeks with no 6 ft social distancing rule, I was fortunate to be able to find a vaccine, but our school district has not had any mass vaccination clinics, like other counties, have helped for their school staff. Cabarrus County, just north of Charlotte, has typically had one of the higher rates of community spread in our state. As of the latest number of cases reported on the state's covid dashboard, Cabarrus County currently has a high level of community spread. The CDC states counties with a high level of community spread should require 6 ft of social distancing in our schools. Of course, that is not able to happen in all of our elementary schools as we welcome back 4th and 5th grade students in Plan A fully reopened. And if Senate bill 37 becomes law, I have no doubt that our school board will vote to fully reopen our middle and high schools and force all Cabarrus County public educators to work in buildings without 6 ft of social distancing, not in compliance with CDC guidelines. It is mind boggling to me that our politicians are constantly talking about the three ws wearing a mask, washing hands and staying 6 ft apart from each other. But when it comes to educators, these politicians don't care about 6 ft of social distance for educators and staff inside our schools. Senate Bill 37 references the C D. C. But then blatantly ignores the latest guidance of the C. D. C. To reopen schools safely. I agree with my colleagues here. If lawmakers are voting for Senate Bill 37 they are telling educators and school staff that we don't need 6 ft of social distance during a pandemic like everyone else deserves. Thank you. Thank you, MEREDITH. Um and so that concludes our portion of the conference. You would like to ask a question, please put your name and station in the chat box. Um, and we will answer them in the order they are received. Thank you. Mhm. Yeah. Mm hmm. Mhm. Yes. All right, Don. Hi. Insist on um thanks for taking questions. Um, I wanted to ask you about the plan, a social distancing and the schools that are open with that. Now, is there a change you'd like to see with the DHHS guidance and from Governor Cooper about the plan A for elementaries that are that are open now, or Anil are allowed to open now. So thank you for your question. Done. So what? We are, um, wanting to make sure we are not suggesting that schools that are already currently in Plan A, which means no social distancing of 6 ft. We are not asking for them to move to Plan B. Um, one of things we know is that there are ways in which our schools can accommodate all students and still maintain 6 ft of social distancing. We know schools are having to be creative at this moment. Um, schools can have classes in gyms, cafeterias or cafa torrey ums if they have the cafeteria, auditorium model or libraries. We know that there are schools across the state who are utilizing outdoor spaces, and the portable temporary portable structures or large tents with outdoor heaters could be built for this, uh, kind of flexibility. We also do know that the state is sitting on a $5 billion rainy day fund, and so we know is possible for our schools to get the funding to be innovative. However, our politicians are not thinking of innovation, innovative solutions to these problems. Uh, they are perfectly fine. Uh, pushing public school educators and employees into school buildings without the 6 ft of physical distancing, which doesn't comply with the CDC guidance. Um, but one of the other things I will add quickly to wrap up this answer. Um, if our state is going to push students and staff into buildings that don't comply with the CDC guidance and four school districts to have to make decisions to vote to send students and staff back into buildings, um, then our parents should be clearly informed about that. These decisions increase the risk to everyone and contradict that guidance from the CDC. I think we have a question from Keeley Arthur from W R E o Hi, Kelly. Hi, Tamika. So this is a bit of a jumping off point from what you're all talking about today, but some preliminary data is out on state test scores and much lower than what we've seen Pre pandemic as an educator, how do you balance that wanting to get back in the classroom where students probably will thrive more and also the pandemic concerns. So thank you for raising that question, Keeley. I will say that educators want to be back in school buildings with their students because we do know the benefits of face to face instruction with students. Um, we also know that data that preliminary data has a lot of holes in it as well. Um, we know that every student who should have taken a test, Um, not because there are a variety of issues that play right. We have, uh, students who don't have, uh, consistent internet access in order to access virtual instruction. Um, we also know that parents also had very, very valid concerns about testing, Um, that were raised, particularly in person testing during a pandemic. Um, and so we know that there are challenges to be raised by virtual instruction. We know our educators continue to work with their parents, um, and continue to find ways to try to reach all students. And so we are looking forward to data that is more comprehensive. And we also acknowledge, right. Like I said, it's a pandemic in the middle of a pandemic. And so we do not want to compound student trauma with the stress and anxiety of standardized testing. Thank you. Okay, if there are no other questions, I think we will wrap another five seconds or so. All right. Thank you. Um, if anyone is interested. Uh, if you didn't ask for recording permission and you'd like a recording, uh, feel free to send me an email. It's kevin dot Rogers at N c a a e dot org Once again, it's kevin dot Rogers at n c e dot org, and I'll be happy to send you a recording. And otherwise, we thank you very much for coming today. Thank you so much for being here today.</p>

Matthew Burns

Teachers group details opposition to school reopening bill

NCAE President Tamika Walker Kelly

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I'm meteorologist, Amy Wilmeth in the WRL severe weather center. We have some nice weather to wrap up the work week. We'll have mostly sunny to partly cloudy skies. High temperatures today will warm into the lower eighties. We have a ridge of high pressure that's east of us right now and that's blocking the rain and the storms that are well west of us from making it into North Carolina and that will continue through the day tomorrow and most of Tuesday as well. But there have been numerous severe thunderstorms west of us from parts of the Midwest into the plains and down into the deep south as well. We've had numerous tornado reports, lots of damage reports coming out of especially Oklahoma from storms last night. One fatality in Oklahoma as well. This has been a very rough storm system and they're likely going to have another round of severe weather again. West of us, there's a level three out of four risk for at least part of Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana. Uh for us, we're going to stay nice and quiet for the next couple of days. High pressure is going to kind of rule for now keeping all of that rain well to the west of us for the next couple of days. By the time we get to Tuesday, the high pressure system starts to move a little bit away from us and weaken a little bit. And by Tuesday night, we'll have the potential for a couple of showers. Here's 10 p.m. Tuesday, a couple of showers possible. Wednesday morning at five A ma few light showers possible and really on and off throughout the day, we'll have that potential for a stray shower or maybe even an isolated thunderstorm on Wednesday. It doesn't look like we'll get a ton of rain, but it really is our next best chance for rain. It's about a 30% chance for a shower storm on Wednesday. It's going to stay warm for the next several days. Highs in the eighties on every single day of the seven day forecast. The warmest day being Friday with a high of 87. Saturday is the common race for the cure and the weather hopefully will cooper with that. We have about a 30% chance for a shower or storm lows in the mid sixties and then high temperatures will climb into the low to mid eighties. Saturday afternoon.

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Boviet Solar plans to spend $294 million by the end of 2027 as part of the deal, state economic development officials said Friday. Commerce officials approved an incentives package worth up to $16.4 million.

<p>To, to all of you and we bring you greetings. I would like to also extend gratitude to other elected officials who are joining us today. If you'll please stand. Thank you. I want to also start by expressing how thrilled we are to have you here today. We are proud of our city here in Greenville. And I think that pride is evident in this room today and why wouldn't we be proud? Greenville is a thriving hub of, of eastern North Carolina. We have a growing population, a diverse based manufacturing manufacturers, top notch educational institutions, state of the art, medical facilities and vibrant art and entertainment scenes. The people in Greenville are as friendly and as talented as they come. We all work well together and that is a tremendous, tremendous key to progress. There are so many reasons to be proud of Greenville and today I'm thrilled that our city is getting even better with all of that being said, I would like to introduce to you a Greenville native and Chief Deputy Secretary of Commerce Jordan Richard. Well, thank you so much. Uh Mayor Pro Daniels. Uh it is a beautiful day and uh uh especially great day to be back home in Greenville, North Carolina. Uh So, on behalf of uh our North Carolina Secretary of Commerce Michelle Baker Sanders, uh Good afternoon. Uh Today really is not only the celebration of an incredible partnership uh with the city of Greenville, Pitt County, uh the Greenville Eastern North Carolina Alliance, the Department of Commerce, our, our partners across the state. Uh But it's also calls to celebrate uh some really exciting news and the first uh such announcement this year in Pitt County across the state in North Carolina, we are uh already ahead of our pace from last year. Uh Having a wonderful year in terms of economic development. Today is a wonderful announcement of that. Since January across the state, we've announced uh 39 projects and this will be our 40th, more than 3600 jobs across North Carolina and over $2.5 billion in economic development investment statewide. And today's news uh is also great as we celebrate the 250th anniversary of Greenville, North Carolina. Over those 250 years, we've seen Greenville change and evolve and the evolution of Greenville as a community is parallel to what we've seen across the state from an economy once dependent on agriculture and tobacco. Pitt County and Greenville is transformed into an economy that's supported by medicine uh and advanced manufacturing and clean energy jobs like we're here to talk about today. Uh having grown up here and watch that evolution and watch Downtown and Dickinson Avenue evolve and having gone to school across the street at CMXS Middle School, it's especially gratifying to be back and to be working on wonderful announcements like this. Uh And today, it's also an incredible honor to introduce uh someone who I've had the great pleasure of working for in Raleigh for the past 7.5 years. Uh He's been working to build a stronger North Carolina uh where everyone has as an opportunity to live in safe communities, get a quality education, uh have good access to great jobs and great health care. Uh And where everybody has a chance to live lives of purpose and abundance. And today he'll share with the Greenville community some outstanding news. Uh that'll help get us closer to North Carolina, North Carolina. That's more diverse, more inclusive works uh even more for all the people of this great state. Uh So it's my honor now to introduce to you the 75th governor of North Carolina Roy Cooper. Thank you so much, Greenville, aren't you proud of Jordan Witcher? Let me just say, Chief Deputy Secretary of the Department of Commerce. And uh you might notice that I have a lot of people in my administration who are from Eastern North Carolina. It's because I grew up here and I know the kind of people that they are. So I am so happy to be here. With you today, seeing so many friends and familiar faces uh and to celebrate what's gonna happen today. Uh Thank you Marquita for being here, Representative reader. Thank you for, for, for being here. Thank you representative for you. Uh Thank you, appreciate all of you guys candy. Thank you for coming. Very grateful for you coming and being part of this. Um II, I wanna thank Mayor Pro TEM Daniels and say thank you very much for your hard work here. But it's great to join with you today with an outstanding announcement for the city of Greenville, Pitt County, eastern North Carolina and I am our entire state. I am so proud to announce that Bovi at Solar, an international renewable energy company has selected North Carolina for its first North American solar panel manufacturing facility that will create 900 jobs and invest $294 million right here in Greenville, North Carolina. Our economists predict that this project will lift North Carolina's economy by more than $2.9 billion over the next 12 years. This economic development. When shows us how teamwork, teamwork and that's a fitting word here in front of Dowdy Ficklin Stadium, teamwork and our amazing workforce. Keep bringing advanced manufacturing jobs to our state here in Pitt County. You have a great legacy of manufacturing, making everything from life saving pharmaceuticals to packaging personal care products and now comes important components for clean renewable energy. North Carolina is becoming an epicenter for clean energy that's putting money in the pockets of North Carolina families and small businesses. And as we've learned in North Carolina the last few years, a clean energy economy is a strong economy, providing American security. North Carolina is a leader in that 19 billion in capital investments and nearly 16,000 good paying manufacturing jobs created here since 2021 with the fourth largest producer of solar energy in the country. And with our bipartisan clean power plan that will get us producing zero emission clean energy by 2050. That means a lot more solar panels need to be made right here in North Carolina. This announcement means that they're going to be made right here. And North Carolina's emergence as a clean energy leader has fueled our growth and helped set us apart as the number one state to do business in the country for two years in a row, we all get to celebrate that recognition and much of the credit goes to our well trained, dedicated and diverse workforce, the people of North Carolina, they make up the best workforce in the country. And Bovi at solar is gonna find out about that. And our university Chancellor Rogers, thank you for hosting this today. Our university and community college systems including East Carolina Pitt community College and our research institutions and workforce partnerships help North Carolina stay first in talent coupled with our central east location, East coast location and includes easy access to transportation infrastructure by land, plain sea. And of course our excellent quality of life. North Carolina continues to be a top choice and we don't take opportunities and announcement like these for granted because we know that companies like Bovi at solar can choose to locate anywhere in the world, but they chose us. And that's why we must continue to increase our investments in education, workforce training in our public schools and in early childhood education, that is absolutely critical. This announcement is the result of strong collaboration by company executives, elected officials across both aisles and economic development professionals. In addition to Secretary Sanders and the Department of Commerce, I'd like to thank our Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina that works so well led by Chris Chung works so well with our Department of Commerce, our North Carolina General Assembly. Those members are here today, our Golden Leaf Foundation, our Greenville Eastern North Carolina Alliance, Pitt County Electric Cities, Greenville Utilities Commission and the city of Greenville. At this time, I would like to, to welcome to the podium, the CEO of Bovi at Solar, Jimmy Shea. And I'd like to present him with a gift on behalf of the people of North Carolina, Jimmy. If you could come forward, Jimmy, this is a piece of pottery made one of our, by one of our famous artists uh Ben Owen. And on it has the great seal of the state of North Carolina and it has a part of it. Our, our motto, Si Quam Beri, which means to be rather than to seem, we want you to know in North Carolina we are who we say we are. And we look forward to this partnership for years and decades to come. Congratulations. Thank you for being here. Uh This is uh cup of the Chinese tea. Oh, outstanding. Thank you very much. Well, on behalf of the people of North Carolina, we accept this gift and hopefully we can sit and drink some tea and talk about the great success of this company. Thank you, Jimmy very much. Thank you. Mm Let uh let me begin to say uh by saying, thank you to the press, our partners and everyone who took the time to join us at today's event. Uh We are around to be receiving this investment grade and uh we are excited uh for how it uh will enable us to get our first us solar panel manufacturer facility up to and running and uh created, created uh economic uh uh our opportunities for the pul air. Yeah, for those who uh who aren't familiar. Let me introduce the about the poet founded in 2013 poet, solar head office in Unite, unite us Germany and our group uh headquarters in Vietnam. We have a proven track record of successful working with many of the industrial leading players. And our PV module are known for their power performance. And quality. This is evident because Bo has uh maintained its uh pos uh position at a Bloomberg new energy financing T one solar module manufacturers. Since 2017, we have been written at the top performance on people's PV module reliability uh score card since 2019 BB. Successfully completed. And in the independent e estimate of bo uh uh water solar manufacturers facility in 2022 the US uh solar industrial had been in K for water solar since we first uh entered the uh in 20 17 as of 2020 f uh three world solar PV sales and the PV models manufacturing capacity is more than three gigawatts and it's a shar a total of more than 6.6 gigawatt since uh in fabric, manually operating in us. Marketing. We are dedicated uh to helping to build uh American solar manufacturers uh with our new facility and uh filing, you know, cutting power in uh petit county, North Carolina and the, the natural. Uh let me tell you more about our plan for the manufacture plant. First one of the project, we use the building to manufacture our solar modules per to will including contracting uh start uh start off the art 500,000 to 60 thou uh 100,000 square foot factory on 34 acres to manufacture of PV cells which are used to build the solar panels. The location is expected to output the two gigawatts of solar and the two gigawatt uh PV cells since the future, uh uh will help bring our top performance PV modules to our variable clients to foster stronger connections with the independent uh power products. EP CS product uh developers, solar in, in installs and the contractors. We will have product uh they need uh in increase the deve deployment of uh uh U utilities, commercial industrial and uh dangerous solar project. We will require a strong workforce to product pro produce these solar panels so we will hearing about uh 900 employees uh over the next five years, job are expect expected to increase engineers, product workers. And so on, on behalf of uh B solar, I would like to thank everyone in involved in making this uh weight of product uh possible. The first is the governor uh Rio Cooper and uh and the secu uh secondary security Sanders and the North Korea development of the commerce tr uh territory uh D feature and the e economy uh economic uh developer partners of the North Korea Carolina, North Carolina General and Een North Korea uh communi Community College System, Go Goen Le found uh Foundation, Yanda down uh and the team at the Greenville East, North Carolina Islands, Kelly Andrew and the Peter County developer office, as well as the Pitter county government, Kathy Howard and the leadership team at the Greenville Utilities Commission City of the Greenville Electricity of the North Carolina and our advances today, our dream are coming true. We are upon the to begin pro product in our pe models in the US, bring our manufacturers exciting excellence to our most important uh solar market, creating jobs and the ma uh making up in impact. Solar energy in the United States is a bombing driving by its many benefits. Solar is an economic engine, a source of clean cheap um produce energy set and make a electricity affordable for customers and improve the air quality for health uh communities. We are surrendered to help uh future wills rep reputation for the green. I I can economic and uh manufacturing. We look forward to working with all of our partners, our path towards a cleaning future in the United. Thank you. I wanted to make sure I recognized Senator Candy Smith and Representative Glory Steam Brown and Representative reader, the legislature helped us a lot with this too. So, thank you very much for. Ok. Mhm. Good afternoon. My name is Anne Lord Huggins and I serve on the Pitt County Board of Commissioners. In conclusion of this momentous announcement, we must emphasize how truly honored we are that Pitt County was chosen over the many communities that were under consideration for this project. We are not only announcing the selection of Pitt County for a new industry that will bring strong economic growth to our community, but we are celebrating the collaboration that have developed and will continue to develop among Pitt County. Our partners and this esteem company. This announcement is the culmination of shared vision. This company's vision for its first us manufacturing facility in a business friendly asset, rich and welcoming community and Pitt County's vision for growth through strong industry partners that create highly skilled high paying jobs for our citizens. This vision will come to life in the, in the gr in the green corporate park and we look forward to our continued partnership to make this project successful. Beyond expectation. On behalf of Pitt County and the Board of commissioners, we extend our appreciation to each and every individual who has contributed their time, expertise and passion to make today possible. Most importantly, we extend heartfelt thanks to Bovier Sola for choosing us to communicate, to commemorate. Excuse me, this day, we would like to present a sculpture crafted by local artist Jordan Pera titled Connecting the Links May this day be a continuation of connections that will ensure your continued success. We are honored to be your partners and your chosen community. Welcome to your new home, Pitt County. OK. And I accept this on behalf of pick him and now and welcome to the podium, Thomas Taft Junior Board of Directors of Greenville, NENC Alliance for a toast. That's good. Not a force of guys. II, I had a prepared speech, but I'm gonna take this in a slightly different direction because II I, everyone has, has talked so much about the relationships and everything else. That got us to this point. But all I can say on behalf of Pitt County and on behalf of the Greenville NC Alliance is we won. We have won, we have beat out other communities, phobia technologies to come here. It's everything that we've all been working for, for years and years and years. I look at so many of you out here that uh were participants in that. And again, all I want to say is we won. Pitt County won North Carolina won. Thank you, Governor Cooper. Cheers, everyone. Cheers. Thank you. I don't mind. That's fine. No, no, no, no. Well, I would just add that this is the single largest jobs announcement in Pitt County's history. Uh, I don't believe we've had a governor here in, uh, about 15 years to announce anything, uh, economic development, a new, a new, uh, I'm sorry. But, uh, but either way we're proud to have you here. We're proud to have you guys here. Cheers again to a victory for Pitt County here here. Thank you. Thank you very much. Ok. Thank you so much. I'm ready to provide. Yeah. Yeah. Ok. They see. All right. Right. Yes. That's first. He said going across the way, come back in time.</p>

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