Governor looks at Poplar Bluff job growth in annual State of the State address

Job growth in Butler County was highlighted Wednesday by Gov. Mike Parson during his State of the State address.

“… At 3.1 percent, our unemployment rate continues to remain at historic lows, and has been below the national unemployment rate for 40 consecutive months … another example that Missouri’s growth is strong, and we are on the right track,” Parson said.

Workforce efforts have created over 40,000 new jobs since he took office, with the private sector driving those investments, not government, he said.

“Our big cities aren’t the only ones generating new jobs and attracting investment. Briggs and Stratton is creating 130 new jobs in Poplar Bluff,” he said, after listing growth in Kansas City and other areas.

Poplar Bluff is expected to see 130 new jobs over the next 12 months, with around 140-150 additional jobs in year two, according to information released by the company in August.

City council members are expected to discuss during their Jan. 21 council meeting incentives the city has agreed to provide as part of an agreement that helped keep the Poplar Bluff plant open as Briggs closed a location in Kentucky.

The incentives will include the extension of a 90% discount in real property taxes, and the addition of a discount on personal property taxes that would be assessed against $28 million in equipment, according to discussion Jan. 6 by council members.

The Briggs announcement was one of several in 2019 for Butler County, which also saw the addition of a new factory, Empire Comfort Systems.

The county recorded an unemployment rate of 3.8% in November 2019, the most recent data available from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

While slightly higher than the state average, the annual unemployment rate was 4.6% in 2018.

Unemployment rates for the county have dropped steadily since 2010, when they reached a high of 9.6%.

The job creation in Butler County, and other communities across the state, are just the beginning of successes Parson believes will help build further momentum.

“All of these are shared successes … and show that by working together, our investments in workforce development and infrastructure are succeeding,” he said. “I am proud to report we have exceeded even our own estimates, and the result has been better cost savings and more projects for the people of Missouri.”

Parson also touched on work by the Missouri Department of Transportation to “leverage every tax dollar to the fullest and make our transportation system safer for all Missourians.”

“… We got an even better return than expected on the infrastructure cost-share program you all passed,” he said, thanking members of the federal delegation, including Sen. Roy Blunt, for helping secure grants for Missouri projects. “I am excited to tell you that this nearly $50 million dollar investment will lead to nearly $150 million dollars in new infrastructure investment, and an economic impact of approximately $350 million dollars.

“The bold infrastructure proposals we all worked on together have netted $1 billion dollars in new projects for our state.”

Poplar Bluff may also benefit from the $50 million in allocations from the Governor’s Transportation Cost-Share Program.

Poplar Bluff City Council members discussed in December an application for $5.8 million from the program to help fund the effort to four lane Highway 67 south to the Arkansas state line.

It is one of the selected projects to be presented to the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission for approval this month.

Poplar Bluff would receive the third largest grant statewide from 20 projects to be funded by the program, under the proposals that have been passed to the commission for approval.

“They turned down a lot of projects. They had $97 million in requests,” city manager Mark Massingham said in December. “We were fortunate enough to receive almost $6 million of that.”