The strategizing is beginning in Madison County.
By the time it’s over in six months, public and private leaders are expecting an economic roadmap for the county’s future growth and success.
“The benefit of this will be to bring more jobs to Madison County, property values will increase and we’ll see better infrastructure,” Madison County Supervisor Gerald Steen said.
A partnership between the Board of Supervisors and the Madison County Foundation, an organization of business leaders, is funding a $100,000 study by Taimerica Management Co. to construct a strategic plan for development. The work is getting started now as the consulting group aims to pull in community comments to assess Madison County’s strengths and weaknesses to determine the county’s path.
“If you’ve got the will, we’ll get this done,” Ed Bee of Mandeville, La., president of Taimerica, told a gathering of representatives from local business, government and education last week at their first strategy session.
When the final report is in, businesses and government leaders should know how best to attract new companies and industries here and what types of jobs to go after, said Mark Bounds, president of the foundation.
“We’ll see the private-public sectors out recruiting investments and seeing those tax dollars come to Madison County,” he said.
A similar study was funded by the county 10 years ago, but supervisors and other officials say they saw little return on their investment.
“In 2002, in a sense, it didn’t work,” Board of Supervisors President John Bell Crosby said.
Now, the united efforts of the community with the backing of the consultants should ensure the upcoming study is put to use, he said. “We’re going to do all we can and work harder at it. There’s no doubt in my mind.”
Bee said the study will also analyze the county’s competitiveness from a corporate site selection process to find the county’s strong points to emphasize when going after new businesses and the weaknesses that can be improved. “That assessment will improve the county’s attractiveness,” he said.
Taimerica will conduct interviews to find the high spots and low opinions in addition to putting out leadership surveys, Bee said.
“We’ll do a lot of interviews with a lot of companies. People will tell us things they might not want to tell you. We’ll get the facts and figures and we’ll use that to determine the strengths and weaknesses,” he said.
An August workshop is planned for the public and private officials to set economic development priorities for the next decade. “Once we do that, we’ll develop an action plan,” Bee said.
“There will be thinking outside of the box – what you can do differently,” he added.
“For this to be successful, the plan needs the support of businesses, civic groups, educational groups and the public section. Where you’re all working together, you’ll stay together.”
