For the first time TCL’s $26 million workforce training center gets this much in state taxpayer money
For the first time, the proposed $26 million workforce training center for the Technical College of the Lowcountry’s New River Campus in Bluffton will get funding. The center would allow the college to add four new programs and expand upon three existing programs.
Gov. Henry McMaster approved the $13 billion state budget with $10 million appropriated for the center Tuesday, completing South Carolina’s budgeting process for fiscal year 2023-24. The school expects to fund the remaining $16 million through local government and private industry support, according to Mary Lee Carns, TCL’s vice president for institutional advancement and workforce development.
“Our state relies upon technical colleges to ensure that the industries we bring to South Carolina have the workforce that they need in order to thrive,” Sen. Tom Davis, R-Beaufort, said. “This workforce training facility...really helps check that box in terms of making our part of South Carolina attractive for private companies to call home and to create jobs.”
The Arthur E. Brown Regional Workforce Training Center, which was first proposed in 2016, would expand capacity by 850 students. That would be a nearly 42% increase from the college’s most recent 2,042 student enrollment. At 50,000 square feet, the facility would be 19,000 square feet bigger than the current New River Campus building.
Carns said they don’t expect any additional money from the state and that they’ll start soliciting local government and private funding once the new fiscal year begins July 1. She estimates that project bidding and construction will begin in 2024 once they complete raising the $20 million for construction. The other $6 million of the $26 million project will go towards new faculty and other administrative costs.
The school’s $15.3 million culinary institute, which open for students in 2021, was also funded by a mix of state and local government, and private organizations.
Beaufort County is “interested in participating” in the project, according to County Administrator Eric Greenway. He said they’ve already had some conversations, but “have to work out some details about the training center before the council can make that final determination.”
He said it’s too early to say how the county would raise their potential contribution and how much it would be.
The center would allow the college to add four new programs:
▪ Precision manufacturing
▪ Electric vehicle technology
▪ Automated systems technology
▪ Supply chain/logistics
And expand upon three existing programs:
▪ Cybersecurity
▪ Computer technology
▪ Business/accounting
“We’re having kids learn, (who) we want to stay in the local area and actually gain employment right here because we’re so short on workers,” Rep. William G. Herbkersman, R-Bluffton, said. “We’re also giving the opportunity for some of the military to go back to school and pick up gainful employment through that.”
