ATLANTA — Gov. Brian Kemp joined other political leaders near Social Circle Tuesday to turn shovels at a ceremonial groundbreaking for the future Rivian electric automobile plant.
The government-subsidized project is expected to create 7,500 jobs by 2030, after construction begins in earnest next year and the first vehicle rolls off the line in 2028.
The company says it will eventually make 400,000 automobiles a year there.
Rivian paused construction last year but then inked a $6 billion loan with the U.S. Department of Energy and announced plans to move ahead in January.
Georgia taxpayers had already purchased and prepared the land that the state is leasing to the company through a quasi-governmental third party.
The unusual transaction was a way around local zoning that restricts the 2,000-acre property to agricultural uses.
Nearby landowners sued in Morgan County Superior Court, hoping to force the project through the normal zoning process.
But the state intervened and moved to compel the plaintiffs to pay its legal costs, asserting the lawsuit was frivolous.
A judge ruled for the nearby landowners last week, saying they raised an unanswered question about whether the state could bypass local zoning for a for-profit project.
One of the landowners, Alan Jenkins, held a protest sign at the edge of the property as Kemp and the others were digging.
Georgia “fouled” legacy farmland to prepare the land for the company, said Jenkins, whose sign called for protecting the local watershed.
“Rivian, a touted green company, is taking advantage of the state having done the dirty work for them,” he said.