Ohio’s largest-ever economic development project comes with a big employment challenge: how to find 7,000 construction workers in an already booming building environment when there’s also a national shortage of people working in the trades.

At hand is the $20 billion semiconductor manufacturing operation near the state’s capital, announced by Intel earlier this year. When the two factories, known as fabs, open in 2025, the facility will employ 3,000 people with an average salary of around $135,000.

Before that happens, the 1,000-acre site must be leveled and the semiconductor factories built.

“This project reverberated nationwide,” said Michael Engbert, an Ohio-based official with the Laborers’ International Union of North America.

“We don’t field calls every day from members hundreds or thousands of miles away asking about transferring into Columbus, Ohio,” he said. “It’s because they know Intel is coming.”