Abstract:
In the last eighteen months Cleveland County has lost 900 jobs, and in January 2001, its unemployment rate topped 8.2 percent. However, an incentives package offered Wal-Mart by Cleveland County and the city of Shelby will soon reverse that. The company will begin construction of a huge distribution center in 2001. When completed in 2002, the center will employ 500. It is Cleveland County's largest industrial expansion in forty years.