THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

BY DAN GEARINO

A bipartisan group of elected officials is coming together to urge support for a proposed Coda battery plant in Columbus.

U.S. Rep. Pat Tiberi, R-Genoa Township, and Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman, a Democrat, said yesterday that they will co-chair a task force, joined by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, Rep. Steve Stivers, R-Columbus, Rep. Steve Austria, R-Beavercreek, and Republican Gov. John Kasich.

Coda, based in California, has asked the Department of Energy for a $500 million-plus loan to help finance the battery factory. The plant would initially employ more than 1,000 workers who would produce lithium-ion batteries for use in the company's planned all-electric sedan.

"Clean-energy manufacturing represents a tremendous opportunity for Ohio to re-industrialize our economy and put Ohioans back to work building the technology that will power the future," Tiberi said in a statement.

Coleman said both parties "need to work together to create jobs."

"My goal is for Columbus to be a manufacturing hub at the epicenter" of electric-vehicle production, he said.

Coda applied for the loan last spring. The Department of Energy has not indicated when it will act on the application. The task force's goal is to show widespread support for the project, which members hope will increase the chances that the loan will be approved and any other hurdles will be cleared.

"In working closely with each office since Coda's decision to have a significant manufacturing presence in Ohio, it is abundantly clear there is now a unified voice working across party lines striving to make Ohio a leading force in the global electrification movement," Forrest Beanum, Coda's vice president of public affairs, said in a statement.

While the Coda project is the only one on the group's agenda, there may be others in the future, the members said.