Strong communities aren’t built by chance. They’re built when people can earn a good living close to home, afford a home, raise a family and know their children will have opportunities without leaving the place they love.

For too many years, that was not the reality across northeastern Pennsylvania. Skilled tradespeople often had to travel hundreds of miles to find steady work, chasing projects from one state to the next while their families stayed behind. Too many young people believed the only way to build a successful career was to build it somewhere else.

A new wave of infrastructure investment is changing that. It is creating the kind of long-term, family-sustaining careers that allow workers to stay rooted in the communities they call home.

For members of my union, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 163, that can mean the difference between driving across state lines for the next job and making it home every night to eat dinner with their families. It means knowing the skills they have spent years mastering can support a career for decades.

One of the biggest drivers of this opportunity is the rapid growth of AI and the infrastructure that powers it. While most people think about AI as software, every AI system depends on massive facilities filled with electrical equipment that must be designed, installed, powered, and maintained by skilled electricians.

The workers building these facilities aren’t coming from somewhere else. They grew up here and are now raising families of their own. They stayed through years when steady work grew scarce, and some had little choice but to look elsewhere for opportunity.

Now, the surge of AI infrastructure can rebuild our region, create lasting careers, and strengthen America’s technological leadership at the same time.

For our members, the difference is already clear. Construction work once came in short bursts. You finished one project, packed up your tools, and hoped the next one wasn’t too far away. Today’s infrastructure projects provide years of construction followed by decades of maintenance and upgrades, creating stable careers instead of temporary jobs.

That opportunity is already taking shape here in northeastern Pennsylvania. More than 90% of the workers on our projects live in the communities we serve, in part because membership in IBEW Local 163 requires local residency. Today, most of our members are working on Amazon Web Services’ campus in Salem Township, part of Amazon’s $20 billion investment in Pennsylvania.

Those paychecks stay here in Pennsylvania. They support local restaurants, small businesses, and shops while helping families buy homes, plan for retirement and build lasting careers close to the people they love.

The demand for workers like ours is only growing. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects employment for electricians will grow 9% over the next decade, faster than the average for all occupations, with roughly 81,000 openings each year nationwide. As AI and cloud computing expand, so will the demand for the skilled workforce required to build and maintain their infrastructure.

Pennsylvania has an opportunity not only to attract these projects, but to become one of the nation’s leading sources of highly skilled electrical workers.

The stakes extend far beyond Salem Township. America’s ability to lead the next generation of AI innovation depends not only on the technology we develop, but on whether we can build the infrastructure to support it. China is investing aggressively in AI infrastructure, and the United States cannot afford to fall behind. Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned to meet that challenge because we have both the workforce and the industrial expertise to get the job done.

These investments also deliver lasting benefits to the communities that host them. The Salem Township project alone is expected to generate up to $3 million annually in property taxes for Luzerne County and the Berwick Area School District. Another project in the county is projected to bring in $14.6 million over 20 years.

Other communities across the country have shown what’s possible. In Loudoun County, Virginia, data centers now generate nearly half of the county’s local tax revenue while returning roughly $26 in revenue for every $1 in county services they require.

Attracting investment is only part of the equation. Pennsylvania must also invest in the workers who will turn these plans into reality. Electrical work accounts for 45 to 70% of the total cost of constructing a data center, making skilled electricians indispensable from groundbreaking through decades of operation.

At IBEW Local 163, our apprenticeship program provides tuition-free training that prepares Pennsylvanians for high-paying careers without the burden of college debt. To meet growing demand, we’ve introduced an accelerated four-year pathway that allows more workers to enter the field while maintaining the rigorous safety and performance standards our industry requires.

Pennsylvania lawmakers should continue supporting apprenticeship programs and responsible infrastructure projects that create family-sustaining jobs, strengthen local tax bases, and deliver lasting benefits for the communities that host them. Unnecessary restrictions or delays will not stop the growth of AI. They will simply push the investment, jobs and economic benefits to other states or countries.

The workers building this infrastructure aren’t anonymous laborers. They are our neighbors, veterans, parents, and apprentices. Their families have called this region home for generations, and their work is helping ensure the next generation can do the same.

Pennsylvania has always been a state that builds what America needs. By investing in the people who make that possible, we can strengthen our communities, grow our economy and help build America’s future.

Jillian Henderson is the business manager at IBEW Local 163.

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Jillian Henderson is the business manager at IBEW Local 163.