From: Porter, Paulette (GOV)
Sent: Thursday, October 07, 2010 5:04 PM
Subject: What the Governor's Talking about Today

Importance: High

What the Governor’s Talking about Today

Thursday, October 7, 2010

 

Governor Celebrates Partnership with General Motors Resulting in New Jobs, Investment in Michigan

The governor today visited the Orion Assembly Center in Orion Township to celebrate the announcement by General Motors that it will invest $145 million in the plant to produce Buick’s new small car and compact sedan, the Verano, and increase the workforce by 350 employees to 1,550.

 

In June 2009, GM identified Michigan as one of three potential locations for its new, small-car assembly project.  Rather than submit a traditional incentive package for this single project, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation proposed a “global solutions” Michigan Economic Growth Authority incentive that covered all manufacturing investments by GM in Michigan.  In total, the incentive package retains 20,000 workers and will generate a total investment of up to $2.5 billion in GM’s Michigan manufacturing operations.

 

Besides the Buick Verano, the Orion Assembly Center is also being retooled to manufacture a second small car which will be launched next year.  GM will be the only automaker, domestic or foreign, to build small cars in the United States for the domestic market.  The Buick Verano, the first compact car offered by Buick in 20 years, will launch in 2012.

 

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BHK Child Development Board Designated as Head Start Center of Excellence in America

The governor today announced that the BHK Child Development Board of Houghton has been selected as one of the 10 Head Start Centers of Excellence in a nationwide grant competition among Head Start programs.  In 2009, Granholm selected BHK as Michigan’s sole nominee to compete in the next round of the federal grant competition.

 

The five-year, $200,000 per year competitive grant award from the national Office of Head Start designates BHK as Michigan’s Head Start Center of Excellence.  The grant will help improve the quality of early childhood education across Michigan by allowing BHK to share its best practices with other Head Start programs and other providers of early childhood education.

 

Locally, BHK will expand and enhance several of its family involvement programs aimed at improving the school readiness of children.  BHK currently serves 447 children through its Head Start program and more than 2,000 children from prenatal through school age through a variety of services at more than three dozen locations across the western Upper Peninsula.

 

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