How can Cook County keep its local businesses growing and thriving and how can Cook County attract new businesses to the area?
These are just two questions the Cook County-Grand Marais Joint Economic Development Authority wrestles with all of the time. And in a stressful business climate positive answers are harder and harder to come by. At the Tuesday, December 13 EDA meeting, the board listened to someone who works in the field and might have some answers.
That person, John Bennett, came before the EDA to talk about the University of Minnesota Community Leaders Business Retention and Expansion (BR&E) Program, a community consensus approach used to encourage the success of local businesses.
Bennett was introduced by Jim Boyd, a member of the Cook County Broadband Commission, who is helping to investigate whether or not Grand Marais, Grand Portage, the townships, community leaders and business owners would like to partner together in an effort to stimulate the local economy.
The program is more than 20 years old and has been used in more than 60 communities throughout the state, said Bennett, who is currently working with community members to bring broadband to the county. Bennett spent one year getting certified by the U. of M. to help train community members in the BR&E program.
Bennett said healthy and vibrant local economies depend on the well-being of that community’s existing business. By helping them [businesses] survive and grow, the community benefits, said Bennett, adding, “Forty to eighty percent of all new jobs are created by existing businesses.”
It is also easier to retain businesses than recruit new ones, he added, and odds are better of attracting new businesses if existing ones are happy with the community.
Boyd said that there is residual resentment that we are so dependent on tourism. “We need a community discussion to work through these issues,” he said.
Boyd added that Forest Lake confronted similar problems and worked through the BR&E program with great success.
Bennett said that the BR&E program involves community consensus building and the U. of M. Extension provides technical assistance, training and research, helps set priorities, and implements projects that will help communities become more vibrant.
If the local communities are behind BR&E and money can be found to fund the program, the first step taken would be to form a leadership team. That team would promote the program and coordinate task force meetings. The task force would be individuals who represent economic development organizations, chambers of commerce, business, government, local leaders and educational institutions.
Short-term goals include demonstrating support for local business and helping to solve immediate business concerns. Long-term goals include building local businesses’ ability to compete in the global economy and to establish and implement a strategic plan for economic development.
Before these things can get done, Boyd said he hopes the leadership team develops a survey that will help direct the, “hard, hard conversation that needs to take place,” and, he added, “a survey could tease out some of the underlying problems and we could get some resolution for these.”
Once a survey has been conducted, the Task Force would review and respond to businesses’ immediate needs, including linking businesses to the appropriate economic development programs and services.
Next, the survey results are analyzed and documented in a written research report, and from there the Task Force will use the report plus its knowledge of the community to develop a strategic plan.
Bennett said that a community should go through this process every six to seven years.
Costs for the BR&E program range from $12,000 for the standard program to $18,000 for the premium urban/suburban plan.
Until enough interest is generated in the BR&E program, Boyd said, it was premature to think of funding it yet. Boyd will be talking with all of the affected townships, business leaders up the Gunflint Trail and to any group that wants to be filled in about its potential to help build the economy of Cook County.
The EDA board passed a resolution supporting Boyd and Bennett’s efforts and will get a report from them in the next few months.
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