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Local businesses hope Biden will visit during Charlotte stop

CHARLOTTE — Vice President Joe Biden is coming to Charlotte for a night, and several local businesses are hoping that his visit will generate some buzz for them.

Biden will be in Charlotte along with former mayor and current Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, who is pushing a campaign called Grow America, aimed at getting more funding for critical infrastructure.

Biden is scheduled to speak at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Extravaganza Event Center on North Tryon Street, and owner Mark Middlesworth was busy getting things ready Wednesday morning.

The Secret Service was helping prepare the old warehouse for the speech, four days after Middlesworth got a call from a Charlotte public relations person telling him that the vice president wanted to use his facility.

"... And I was like, 'Who is this? Come on, now.' Sure enough, it was for real. And so from 10 o'clock Sunday morning it's been non-stop (getting) ready for the vice president," Middlesworth said.

He said he plans to be at work by 4 a.m. to prepare for the Secret Service security sweep.

Biden is not scheduled to make any side trips, but not far away, in Charlotte's No Da neighborhood, Amelie's Bakery is hoping for a vice presidential drop-in anyway.

"I tweeted this morning, asking for former Mayor Foxx to bring him over and have a brownie. I mean, he's going to be in NoDa anyway, it would be awesome for him to stop by here," said Stefanie Haviv, who handles social media for Amelie's.

Haviv said Foxx was a regular at Amelie's while he was mayor of Charlotte, and she is hoping that he can convince Biden to drop in.