Issue link: http://alabamapower.uberflip.com/i/274792
When the global aviation company Airbus Group announced plans to build a $600 million Airbus aircraft assembly plant in Mobile last year, it was the culmination of years of hard work by a group of government and community leaders and businesses that included Alabama Power. E C O N O M I C D E V E L O P M E N T Attracting Airbus and Others 1 7 industries such as textiles, steel, automobiles — and now aircraft — its workers learned how to make products they had never made before. Alabama Power has been a leader in that training, partnering with businesses, schools and colleges across the state to teach the skills and make the plans needed for the future. That's why last year it joined the Alabama Department of Commerce, Alabama Community College System, university chancellors and members of economic development agencies across the state to implement "Accelerate Alabama," a three-year strategic planning program aimed at recruiting industries and creating new jobs. New businesses mean new customers for Alabama Power. They also grow the state's tax base and create jobs — a win-win situation for the company and for Alabama. Airbus had originally hoped to construct aircraft refueling tankers in the Port City for the Department of Defense. When those plans didn't materialize, the leaders refused to give up, using the relationships they had forged with the aviation company to make the aircraft design and assembly complex a reality. The first Airbus assembly plant in the United States, the facility at Mobile's Brookley Aeroplex, is expected to create more than 1,000 permanent jobs. It will build the popular A320 Family aircraft, a single-aisle twin-engine airplane, with construction of the first aircraft slated for 2015. Made in Alabama by Alabamians Bringing Airbus to Alabama was achieved in large part due to the state's workforce training programs. As Alabama added new