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Nixon Hopes Centene Expansion Will Trigger More North County Projects

St. Louis Public Radio | By Jo Mannies
Published September 2, 2014 at 4:50 PM CDT
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Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon says that Centene Corporation’s plans to build a new claims processing center in Ferguson doesn’t just create jobs.

It’s also about sending a message.

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"We're very heartened by their willingness to make an investment,” Nixon said Tuesday. “It now sends a signal, not only in St. Louis but around the world that North County is open for business."

Nixon offered up praise for Centene at the beginning of his luncheon address to members of the Regional Chamber and Growth Association.

Based in St. Louis, Centene is one of the nation’s leading players in the health care industry. It services government health-care programs, including low-income people covered by Medicaid.

Centene announced Tuesday that it plans to build a new claims processing center in Ferguson, as part of a regional effort to help the economy in the north St. Louis County area that has been hit hardest by unrest in recent weeks.

Centene’s planned expansion would create 200 new jobs, as well as provide new facilities for worker development and training, including a day care and cafeteria.

Nixon said he has known about Centene Corporation's plans for almost a week. The company will receive economic incentives through the state's Missouri Works Training Program. The state plans to partner with St. Louis Community College to offer job training for prospective workers at the new Centene operation.

Copyright 2021 St. Louis Public Radio. To see more, visit St. Louis Public Radio.

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Missouri News centeneferguson
Jo Mannies
Jo Mannies has been covering Missouri politics and government for almost four decades, much of that time as a reporter and columnist at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. She was the first woman to cover St. Louis City Hall, was the newspaper’s second woman sportswriter in its history, and spent four years in the Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau. She joined the St. Louis Beacon in 2009. She has won several local, regional and national awards, and has covered every president since Jimmy Carter. She scared fellow first-graders in the late 1950s when she showed them how close Alaska was to Russia and met Richard M. Nixon when she was in high school. She graduated from Valparaiso University in northwest Indiana, and was the daughter of a high school basketball coach. She is married and has two grown children, both lawyers. She’s a history and movie buff, cultivates a massive flower garden, and bakes banana bread regularly for her colleagues.
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