Japan’s Panasonic Corp. selected Kansas as the location for a multibillion-dollar mega-factory to produce electric vehicle batteries for Tesla and other carmakers, Gov. Laura Kelly announced Wednesday.
The decision comes five months after the Democratic governor and Republican-controlled Legislature rushed to approve a taxpayer-funded incentive package of as much as $1 billion, the state’s largest ever, to attract the company and the promised “thousands of jobs,” even though most of them didn’t know what company was in play. Kelly said Wednesday that the actual incentives will total $829 million over 10 years.
