Governor Andy Beshear’s first proposed budget was announced Tuesday when he presented it to lawmakers in Frankfort. The budget focuses heavily on education, health care and more.

Included in the budget is funding to help alleviate the overcrowding in prisons across the state. Beshear called the corrections issue “the biggest challenge,” which he has addressed by planning to invest in the former Otter Creek Correctional Facility in the Wheelwright community of Floyd County. In the next two years under Beshear’s budget, an additional $109 million would be allocated to corrections.

Floyd County’s people agree, saying the prison could also bring life back to their communities.

Several in the community believe the entire region would benefit from the 200 potential jobs and the economic outreach of those jobs being brought into the Wheelwright area.

The surrounding communities would also get that opportunity of the jobs. The state’s investment could prove even more beneficial in the long-term, which is something many people in the region haven’t seen since the decline of the coal industry.

Officials say they are optimistic about the prison and hope to see movement soon.