Senator Collins Speaks at Katahdin Higher Education Center Expansion Grand Opening

Click HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE for individual photos

East Millinocket, ME – Today, U.S. Senator Susan Collins delivered remarks at the opening of the newly-expanded early childhood education center at Eastern Maine Community College’s Katahdin Region Higher Education Center in East Millinocket. The renovated facility will offer increased access to child care and additional job training resources for residents in the region. Senator Collins secured $4 million in Congressionally Directed Spending to expand the Higher Education Center in the Fiscal Year 2022 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill.

“This Center will provide vital training and educational opportunities, supporting both local residents and the regional workforce,” said Senator Collins. “By bringing child care, higher education, and job training together under one roof, this project is helping to create a strong foundation for growth and economic opportunity in the greater Katahdin region.”

The Center offers courses for certificate, associate, bachelor and master programs, and they also provide customized training and apprenticeship training for business and industry. Onsite child care is available through the Katahdin Region Child Development Center, a partnership of Penquis and the Katahdin Higher Education Center.

In addition to this project, Senator Collins has secured funding to support economic redevelopment in the greater Millinocket region, including more than $7.8 million in Congressionally Directed Spending to repair and renovate the former paper mill site in East Millinocket, and more than $53 million in federal transportation grant funding to rehabilitate currently dormant rail tracks in Penobscot, Aroostook, Washington, and Piscataquis counties which will establish a freight rail connection to the One North Bio-Industrial Park in Millinocket.

###