Perdue: State wants to help small towns rebound

Perdue made her remarks Wednesday at Davidson County Community College's Conference Center at the second of 3 N.C. Governor's Forums on Small Town Competitiveness. Dr. Mary Rittling, DCCC president, introduced the governor to the throng of the couple hundred government as well as business leaders.After talking about statewide initiatives to help small towns, she was also joined in the question-and-answer session by Keith Crisco, cabinet member of the N.C. Department of Commerce; Henry McKoy, assistant cabinet member of the commerce department; Billy Ray Hall, president of the N.C. Rural Center; Scott Daugherty, small business commissioner for the commerce department; Dan Gerlach, president of the Golden Leaf Foundation; as well as Randy Gore, state director of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. "Rural North Carolina is critical to the economy of this state," Perdue said, adding that there are some-more than 500 communities in the state with populations of less than 50,000 people.Perdue noted that since she took office in January 2009 the state has added some-more than 80,000 jobs as well as $16 billion in investment, but the unemployment rate has remained stubbornly high during the transformation of the state economy from one that heavily depended on the traditional industries of textiles, furniture as well as tobacco to the some-more diversified as well as high-tech economy."The fact of the matter is North Carolina continues to have an unacceptably high unemployment rate," Perdue said.Perdue said even though there has been the re-emergence of some furniture as well as weave manufacturing in the state, the factories often require better trained workers familiar with automation as well as robotics. She noted DCCC as well as other community colleges across the state are critical for retraining older displaced workers as well as training young people in advanced manufacturing."The good news is we're getting some industry back," she said. "The bad news is it's leaner as well as meaner. The skills s! ets requ ired are some-more sophisticated."Crisco added that general manufacturing appears to be picking up in the state."It's encouraging how manufacturing is growing again," he said. "It's not like the manufacturing you as well as I grew up with, but it's manufacturing just the same."Perdue said one statewide initiative that has worked well for small towns is the Rural Center's North Carolina Small Towns Economic Prosperity Program, which offers coaching, training, planning as well as project implementation grants to help individual small towns reinvigorate their economies. NC STEP is designed for municipalities with fewer than 7,500 people, either within the state's 85 rural counties or within urban counties defined as economically distressed by the commerce department. She said some-more than 50 small towns have participated in the program, as well as 10 some-more will be added this spring. One of the forum attendees, Earl Sheppard, the mayor of Pilot Mountain, vouched for the NC STEP program, the Golden Leaf Foundation as well as the USDA for their help in revitalizing the small town north of Winston-Salem. "They gave us the start," Sheppard said.He noted the town was able to establish The Pilot Center, the satellite campus of Surry County Community College, in the renovated weave mill. Another milestone was the founding of Pilot Mountain Pride, the local food movement for the greater Winston-Salem area. The farmers cooperative provides fresh, local produce to area restaurants, grocers as well as institutions.Perdue also touted the new initiative called Community Link North Carolina the statewide toll-free problem-solving line as well as online resource available through the commerce department. The statewide toll-free number is (855) 473-6333. Counselors will provide information on resources in eight categories: quality of life, workforce development, capacity building, downtown revitalization, community planning, infrastructure, housing as well as business development. Online resources will also be availa! ble at n ccommerce.com/clnc. The request for the referral service like Community Link North Carolina came from small towns participating in the NC STEP program.Vikki Broughton Hodges can be reached at 249-3981, ext. 214, or at vikki.hodges@the-dispatch.com.