The voice for Alabama businesses.
The Business Council of Alabama on Friday unveiled a new promotional video and announced a statewide digital billboard campaign designed to support passage of its top legislative priority this session – the ‘Working for Alabama’ workforce development plan.
“Working for Alabama” is a comprehensive reform package intended to attract more Alabamians to the job market while providing businesses and industries across the state with qualified workers to fill available positions.
“An eager, trained, and qualified workforce is an essential ingredient in the recipe for a strong and healthy state economy,” BCA President and CEO Helena Duncan said. “Passing the Working for Alabama package through the legislature is the first phase of our effort while encouraging Alabama workers and business owners alike to take advantage of all that it offers is the second, and this campaign will help accomplish both of those goals.”
The 90-second video features Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth, who has made improvements in workforce development a cornerstone of his time in office, as he outlines the various features of the Working for Alabama strategic plan.
The video, which will be heavily promoted on social media outlets, may be viewed here, and its script reads:
I’m Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth, and today, Alabama stands at a crossroads.
We enjoy record high economic development and record low unemployment, but because of our success, there are too many jobs available and too few qualified workers to fill them.
Unless we expand and improve Alabama’s workforce, companies will begin to locate elsewhere and take jobs and wages with them.
That’s not going to happen on my watch.
And it’s why we have developed the Working for Alabama plan to ensure our state remains the economic leader of the southeast.
Working for Alabama is the most comprehensive, long-range workforce development strategy ever proposed in the history of our state.
It includes targeted, state-of-the-art job training programs…
Tax cuts to cover the cost of childcare and make housing more affordable…
A new high school diploma for students who want to focus on career tech instead of college prep
And programs to create long-lasting, high-paying 21st Century jobs…
The package is currently making its way through the Alabama Legislature, and I ask you to encourage your House and Senate members to support our initiative.
And once it is enacted, I urge you to take advantage of the many opportunities it offers.
By working together, we can get more Alabamians off of the sidelines and back in the workforce.
We can give our children and future generations an Alabama that works for them.
And we can all make an already great state even better.
In addition, BCA is utilizing digital billboards on heavily-trafficked roadways across the state to show Gov. Kay Ivey touting the need and benefits of the legislation.
Ivey recently headlined a news conference that announced the Working for Alabama initiative along with Ainsworth, Senate President Pro Tem Greg Reed (R – Jasper), House Speaker Nathaniel Ledbetter (R – Rainsville), Senate Minority Leader Bobby Singleton (D – Greensboro), House Minority Leader Anthony Daniels (D – Huntsville), and Duncan.
The various measures that comprise the reform and incentives package are currently working their way through the 2024 regular legislative session, which has seven meeting days remaining.
The Business Council of Alabama is Alabama’s foremost voice for business. The BCA is a non-partisan, statewide business association representing the interests and concerns of nearly 1 million working Alabamians through its member companies and its partnership with the Chamber of Commerce Association of Alabama. The BCA is Alabama’s exclusive affiliate to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers.