Pasco Economic Development Council quarterly update

52:19Good morning. Happy Tuesday everyone. It's Bill Cronin from the Pasco EDC. Um we're located at uh one one.

52:31You guys know where we're at. I don't mail anything myself. Um It's my pleasure today to present to you the quarterly reports for both our agreement with the Memorandum of Understanding with the Board of County Commissioners as well as our progress on our agreement with the Penny for Pasco. And I'm going to go through these kind of rapid fire because I also have an announcement to make today. And I know if I do it right now, you won't pay attention to anything I say in the presentation. So just bear with me a little bit.

53:02We are going to start with the MOU slide, the um the other one.

53:13There we go. So if you haven't been to Santander yet, uh Santander Consumer USA had announced a project in Pasco County back uh September 30th of last year. Uh this photo is their entrance. And if you recall, this is the old Target, uh, super target at uh 54. And Sun Coast. Beautiful facility. And if you look, they even have the gates. It looks like you're going into a big high-rise with the staff coming in. This was part of Leadership

53:44Pasco that we're able to tour the facility. As far as our repart report card goes for our normal business, we are still doing really well. We've got three successes so far. Yeah. Uh our goal is ten for I'm sorry, uh twelve for the year. But uh when you look at where the wins and the leads are coming from, first of all, our pipeline, 76 projects, active projects, that's people who actually are looking to

54:14relocate their real projects, that's about double what we normally have. So pipeline is full, the leads are doing great, and if you look at the types of activity, I know that uh uh Chair Starkey will be very happy to see all the advanced manufacturing that's continuing to look in our area. Uh when you look at the what makes up those wins that we have so far, uh we're knocking the capital investment numbers out of the park. Uh everything's expensive these days for construction and and land, but um we're

54:44we're gonna do really well this year. Um Looking at what we're doing with existing business, we're still going out visiting companies. Companies are open. They want to meet with people, they want to grow their business. We had 15 face-to-face meetings this quarter, and then also 10 workforce referrals. We had two conferences. We actually attended two large trade shows this last quarter, which are NAOP and MDM East. And this is part of the MOU. We'll talk

55:14a little bit more about some of the international stuff under Penny for Pasco. But it just goes to show you that businesses are open again, things are moving, and people are marketing their communities. And it is a competitive environment for us out there. We attended a number of events. This quarter, and then also presentations to our locals. We had five organizations that asked us to come and present. This slide I usually go over fairly quickly, but I know there's probably going to be a question because this is earned marketing value. And for a

55:44lot of people, we don't understand. You know, can you put this in the bank? Can you take it with you? No, not really. But if we were to go out and purchase this type of media advertising that we're getting, or the the the the referenced um shouts and likes and all those types of things. It would be worth about two point five million dollars. And if you see that big swoop up uh this last uh at the end of the quarter, that was because we leveraged uh a program that Duke was using as well as um Uh another

56:14press release with Santander. So we piggyback and leverage on our private sector partners to get more and more information out about Pasco. So it's not just our tax dollars that are out there marketing Pasco. Uh web analytics again, some of those things that I think uh at nighttime you might want to read right before bed. And then uh audience we're at uh almost 10,000 uh on our social media marketing highlights. Up to 91 investors this this year. Uh so far

56:45on the private sector side, we've raised over $200,000 of our goal of over a half a million. We have 43 board members and policy council members, and the two newest investors are City National Bank of Florida and also Charles Perry Partners Incorporated or CPPI that you might know them as. Legislative agenda is pretty full and robust this year. We're working together, of course, with uh Ralph on your items and with our stakeholders

57:15at the policy council. And I see a lot of those items moving very quickly this year. And we'll we'll be heading back up to Tallahassee as well next month to continue to uh push and advocate for our our items. Two task forces have been Set up, uh first of which will be about the strategic plan. Our strategic plan 2.0 expired this year. I anticipate it's gonna look really similar, maybe with a little less emphasis on product, since we now have product. We also have a task force

57:45that's gonna revisit the two ULI uh studies that were done uh that the BOCC paid for back. In 08 and 13. So it's time to dust them off and see if those recommendations are still good. So we we're anticipating a lot of great interconnectivity between the county staff and our staff as we continue on both of those task forces. And then upcoming events for the MOU. Grow Pasco, February 26th. That's an all-day event.

58:15We've got several. Several speakers coming, I think close to 50 different uh leaders that will be teaching that day for startups and small business. Uh the keynote is Mr. Peter uh Kajyama, who wrote for the love of cities. He's out of St. Petersburg, Florida. Uh Netfest, Netfest is back to Starkey area. So we're we're gonna be at Starkey Market uh the end of March, I think March 31st. is the save the date we'll be putting out. And uh we're still talking about whether or not we'll continue

58:46to do uh the cowboy themed events of the past. So hopefully they'll give a boost to our Westernware companies here in the area. Uh and then annual wards will go back to September again. Uh so I'm going to head over to the Penny for Pasco and unless you have any questions on the MO MOU. Okay. All right.

59:07Oh me. Oh, I thought we went dark again. We're good.

59:11Okay. Oops.

59:23While we're waiting for that, I'll just say I think it was really cool that we had pastors come in and pray for us today. I pray for all you guys on a regular basis personally too. How fun. So Penny for Pasco. Uh if you look, you see a couple familiar faces in the in the picture there. Our Chair and Commissioner Fitzpatrick joined us as well as Representative Amber Mariano. And what you see there is a signing ceremony with the village or the town of Germersheim. And Germersheim,

59:54Germany, we've got a line. Relationship thanks to exchanges with River Ridge High School on the robotics program. And we finally, after many trips back and forth between, have finally put something in place where we've got an official agreement uh to promote each other's regions and to do more exchanges. Mind you, this was in the middle of COVID too. So this was this was November. We'll talk about the international piece of it. Ready sites uh In Eagle Industrial Park

1:00:26We're gonna get rid of that in a couple of minutes. Okay, so Eagle Industrial Park is taken. One of our ready sites uh is now off the book. Somebody's taken it. The program is working. Remember this was all about making sure that we had product. That is one of the sites that we'll be announcing. Uh international program, and I know that uh uh Commissioner Starkey's excited about this as well, too. Uh back in in October at the beginning of The quarter we led a trade mission, a five-track trade mission for Pasco. Um this

1:00:57is similar to what the governor would do for Team Florida events where you've got multiple tracks, uh but we had trade, we had a political track. Uh we had a foreign direct investment track. We had a track for Moffat Cancer Center, uh, and then we had a workforce development track where we learned best practices as it relates to um apprenticeships and uh their dual system of enrollment. Out of those meetings, uh we've got 11 strong meetings that eight of them are actually projects. Uh usually

1:01:27for us to to have a trip of that size, if you get one or two really good projects, that's a home run. To get eight Uh we knocked it out of the park. So and of the other three, the other three are elites. So this is one that we can continue to see activity. I I anticipate an announcement sometime soon on one of those big projects as well

1:01:47And Bill, you may not be aware that one of the companies from Carlsru came and visited our U utilities company and showing them the state of the art um process they use for lining pipes. That's right. And then um Uh Representative Mariano was so impressed with how Germany integrates workforce um training and the mindset that you need to be thinking about a career at in the schools that she asked us to ask for an additional appropriation and we're expanding

1:02:18AMSGOLS into another high school here. So It was a great trip. We're gonna talk about it more when the German Council General visits us, which I'll say in Commissioner Weightman. So, but great trip. Great job for you guys.

1:02:31Thank you. Thank you. And and we've had a couple companies that have already visited from Germany since that time. Uh and as you mentioned, we've got the Council General coming to visit uh shortly as well, too, uh acknowledging our work and Louf Tanza visit. Visited us uh a couple weeks ago as well too. So Liftanza has started new direct flights into Frankfurt. So uh we're making a big difference for Tampa Bay, but also on the international uh scene as well.

1:02:56We were the first group

1:02:59trade

1:02:59mission to go into Germany since the pandemic started.

1:03:04So yeah, and and Switzerland as well. So good good trip and uh uh very productive and I think you'll see several different types of return trips in the in the future, uh especially with that new agreement in place. We also had our global competitiveness committee meeting during this quarter. And then we participated as part of the three county region with a Select Florida conference. It was called.

1:03:35Continue to do enhanced marketing on the ready sites, getting lots of looks there. Workforce Connects assisted 15 targeted industries already in the first quarter. 487 visitors are using use the website for matching for Workforce Connect. So that's wonderful because we don't always see those people face to face. They use our our equipment and our system to do that matching. And then the executive success program, and that's a new one. You're gonna see more and more of that this year.

1:04:06But for those new companies that moved in, uh, so Metler and companies like that that that we've all worked with, this is a way to get them acclimated into our programs and they're all taking part of a uh almost like a CEO roundtable program or a leadership PASCO program. uh throughout the year to learn about economic development. And we hope that they'll become more engaged at the end of that process. And then Smart Start hosted a vendor fair. The food part of Smart Start is just growing like gangbusters.

1:04:36We have 47 members right now in the incubators. That's the most we've had. And the crate is now open, but the crate park is not open yet. But you can visit the crate over at the Grove next to our other incubator. I am going to stop there because I think you guys want to hear about something else, another announcement that we did a sneak preek last Thursday at the economic forecast. But I'll start out to say it's a great day in Pasco County. Regardless of

1:05:07the rain and the cold, it is once again a great day in Pasco County. I'm happy to announce that Amazon Mm-hmm. has uh committed to build a five hundred thousand square foot facility uh up at State Road 52 and Bellamy Brothers Road. This facility is gonna uh employ over five hundred people. And this is not your typical sorting facility. Uh this is the good stuff, you guys. There's there's some s there's some Amazon projects that are

1:05:37out there that may not be as competitive because they have to be in certain areas. This is one that you fight over. And because there's a certain amount of technology in robotics, this is a robotic center, which means that our students at the um career academies, studying robotics, people working through AM skills, all have the opportunity to be able to work on these machines and robots. Uh these are not the low-paying jobs of of typical sorters. This is the good stuff. And We got their attention because

1:06:07of the way that we operated uh and handled their first project. We told them we want the good stuff. They listened. They came back and they delivered. So at 10 o'clock this morning, Amazon issued a national press release about four of these competitive projects in Florida. Ours was one, but we just issued the press release today, uh, with quotes, of course, from the board too, um, to to announce it in Pasco, because the Pasco went. Is one of the coolest ones. And

1:06:37I do have a quote from Amazon that they sent me late late last night. And he said, and this is from Sam Blatt, the project manager for Amazon. He said, Uh to Pasco County. Given an Eagle Industrial Park's location and the availability of the quality of our workforce in the region, Pasco County was a natural fit for Amazon's new sort center. Shared Sam Blatt, Economic Development Manager for Amazon. It's been a pleasure working with Pasco County's staff and the

1:07:07team of the Pasco EBC. That will be on in your your email boxes ready. right now with the new announcement on there. They are breaking ground any day. Uh you'll see the activity and it'll probably be at about eleven months of construction. Uh so we should be looking at the end of the year of a state of art facility right at fifty two in Belmont.

1:07:31It's a big deal.

1:07:33Just a shout out to the staff too. So uh Dave Engel and and Sally Sherman, the staff, uh as well as utilities and and Mike's group work really closely on this project. You might remember as part of the CPEV. Um footprint out there and was one of the first to break out showing that the activity is there. So we are ready.

1:07:53And AMSkills has received funding to um uh really blow up our robotics training program and we're gonna be Uh working with Wendell Crin with Aero Robotics Academy. So we're real excited to um be able to help Amazon get their workforce. It's just perfect. Yeah.

1:08:10And I appreciate it. And though congratulations and and David and the entire team, congratulations. What a big win for Pasco County and really the entire region when we think about our region as well. Um And I'm happy to join your team. I'll be I'll be with you again this Wednesday. Um so excited about that. Question for you and may and maybe David as well. So we see a facility like this come to Pasco County. And the quote we just heard was because of the workforce you have in the area, right? We look around

1:08:40fifty four and the fifty six corridor. And one of the objectives of this board and and your team and David's team is to help us bring jobs and or create jobs in Pasco County so our residents don't continue to leave this area on a daily basis. That's right. That was one of my objectives when I first came on the board in 2014. I know my fellow commissioners as well. Um so we look at the growth along the fifty-four and fifty-six corridor. What can we do or what should we do? To

1:09:11preserve some of these job-creating sites along that corridor. Because as we run out of land, and David, you can come up as well, my friend. As we continue to grow in that area and we lose, and we've seen that happen recently, losing some of these job creating sites. two things that cannot create the jobs that we need. eventually we could run out of space.

1:09:33Yeah.

1:09:34What could we build more s have more spec space? Could we could we have more um ready sites. What can we do as a board To assure our residents five, ten, twenty years down the road, the jobs are gonna be here. So we don't have to leave this area all the time. Yeah,

1:09:53you you and and you know I have strong feelings on this as well too, because it is the the solution to a lot of our transportation problems is to make sure people are employed here and not somewhere else. And and if you take that a step further and you look at MPUDs. the way they're designed, you can actually live, work, and play in one of these MPUDs. You can have a job. live there and shop there and commercial. And that's what they were designed to do is to have everything there contained and also to make sure the tax base was paying for each each of those components.

1:10:24But I think the m the main thing and and I look at you guys for this as well too is to make sure that that the developers are continuing to to um commit and and and take care of those int uh entitlements regarding employment center. that we cannot trade employment center entitlements out for anything. I think that the jobs come first Um if if you're gonna trade it for housing and things like that І totally throws the whole uh purpose of

1:10:54an MPUD out the window because if you don't have the jobs in the MPUD. Then you're getting on the road and you're driving somewhere else every day. So I'd I would say all of these MPDs and these large planned unit developments, we need to continue to make sure that everyone still honors those employment center entitlements and and hopefully fills those first. Because if you fill the employment center first, there's less chance of residents saying, Oh no, we don't want that company here. Uh once people

1:11:24are in place, they don't always like to have somebody locate next to them. But if we get the jobs there first then the people who have the jobs are gonna want to locate right next to it.

1:11:34Um How important it is, and David you can jump in as well, is when you look at our major corridors like 54, 52, State Road 56, to have those sites along that corridor because of the access to 75, the Sun Coast. 275. Yeah.

1:11:52Yeah. So so anytime you're moving people, you want to be close to to uh a highway. And uh uh you look at where where Moffitt has located, that's 14,000 jobs. You all have made vast improvements on the transportation network to serve them, but that is workforce that will be coming from everywhere. So making sure that the the transportation is there, 54, 56, same exact thing. If you've got transportation set up to move people, that's where your jobs should also be.

1:12:22And it's I would I would assume it's difficult. Once you lose a site To something that's not true. You can't use typically get that back, right?

1:12:29That's that's exactly that uh well, it unless you redevelop that great we don't want to be in the redevelopment business. We'd rather be in the development business.

1:12:38Would you agree, Dana?

1:12:39Uh well I do agree, sir, and uh your question is a very important question and to that end The Planning and Development Department and the Office of Economic Growth, with the cooperation and participation of the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council is doing a light industrial IL Employment Center study. And we should have that study available for presentation sometime this spring. Uh we want to do an assessment of the county and our land use and provide adequate guarantees and recommendations to the board to

1:13:09preserve the space. We are getting a tremendous amount of development opportunity moving up from I four. And in fact, uh the the county administration is w and and OEG is working with the developer now to increase, not decrease the industrial entitlements.

1:13:25When uh so I'm hearing from a lot of the residents, a lot of the citizens in the area that, you know, they're getting back to work, you know, in the offices. They're not you know, we know a lot of people came home. There's still some people at home. But more and more people are going back to the offices again. Um depending on you know what your your strategy with is within your corporation, um that's happening more and more. But I'm hearing from people that are having a difficult time finding office space in Pasco County. Now is that a good thing? That means yeah, people are having, you know, they want to keep their companies here. But again, what can we do as a team to increase

1:13:56that office space that needed? And it doesn't have to be, you know, uh a Company that's gonna take up 500,000 square foot. We have a lot of small businesses that need, you know, 2,000, 3,000, 4,000. Is there more opportunities to have um either the ready sites or spec office buildings? Especially, I think about two, and I hate to be parochial and talk about districts, but you know, that's one of the issues I'm having in my district and district two, is that people are having to go outside the area to find office space. A lot of entrepreneurs in that

1:14:26area. Um they don't and as they grow, they can't always work in other homes anymore. We heard that recently from some of the some some folks during a public hearing about how they're looking for office space now. But they can't find it 'cause it's full. Yeah. Is there opportunities now to work together as a team to bring more spec office along that fifty four or fifty six corridor, especially in the Land O' Lakes, um Land O' Lakes, um Wesley Chapel kind of loot's area, uh I would say um east of uh forty one. East of forty one.

1:14:56East of Collier, for example. We're in desperate need in that area. Yeah,

1:15:00yeah. So so it I think uh and we're touching on We're touching on the the the market and uh the supply and demand that's there. When when most of us first got here There was very little space, office or sites, and we saw we put some effort on sites. We do have some spec office that's available, different pricing and different uh uh class A, class B, those types of things. But what it's gonna take, it's it's about risk mitigation for these investors. So if there's a way, uh, for example, the the spec buildings

1:15:30that we have. We were able to use Penny for Pasco to help mitigate that risk, um, to provide some guarantees if they were able to to um to build it and market it towards the type of jobs that we're looking for. Um I think.

1:15:48Yeah. So I think I think that comes down to developer looking at the risk and the return. So if there's a return that's higher for retail for example, um than for office. Somebody's got to be able to look at that gap and say, can we fill that gap to make it attractive for them to do uh speculative office?

1:16:12Beautiful building that we went to recently.

1:16:14Yeah, and I think I think there's a receptivity still to talk about white paper type application Applications should we have somebody that is keenly interested in doing spec. Uh but spec is ri risk and all of this is about risk mitigation and how we can lower the risk for those investors. Thank you.

1:16:31Mr. Cronen, do you are you do you think we need more ready sites? Do we need I I I agree that we need more industrial sites? Should we be out there? Yeah.

1:16:41Looking for more ready

1:16:42sites, and how would you suggest we do that?

1:16:44So so we have uh Tom Ryan, who is our business recruitment uh uh director, and he is his forte is recruitment and getting out and selling. Uh he is also a real estate by by trade, he's a uh a realtor, he understands it. He's been responsible for the ready sites program since we started it. We've got about twenty seven hundred. Acres available right now of ready sites. Some are better for certain industries than other. So it really depends on what type of industry, if we

1:17:14need to get another site. Uh I've asked him to to focus right now on continuing to market the sites that we have and getting more jobs in there because success begets success. I mean I think now that you see one of the ready sites going to a big company like this, we'll start getting calls for the other ready sites as well. But the answer is yes. We're always short of product here. And uh uh especially buildings and speculative space, uh but then also.

1:17:42And so a lot of the spaces that I mean most all these studies all these spaces that I've seen here are greenfield spaces. What about redevelopment on important corridors? For example, 41 Um 19 and investments and incentives uh in areas where we can redevelop that where we've seen property values go down and we have We have built empty. Commissioner Moore, we have empty office spaces all over this area. So I welcome anyone to come down here. There's a lot of opportunity on fifty-four. Um

1:18:12with with empty spaces. So uh I I really for me in the next few years my focus gonna be on especially my district um redevelopment so that we take some of these buildings that are just sitting there blighted and empty And we can refill those with some of the folks you're bringing here. That would be a really big win for the county.

1:18:32And you've had you've had g three really good wins in the redevelopment area. that did exactly that over the last couple of years and that would be Florida Avenue Brewing, which was an incredible redevelopment. Uh Santander, which was the target building. And and I'll tell you that building is beautiful, but so hard to find a tenant that's gonna take that big a space. And uh and that worked out well. And then uh lastly you you had uh in Shurum over in uh nineteen that was in the

1:19:02mall that uh uh took one of the old strip stores there and now has uh hundreds of employees working in in the IT area too

1:19:10much. And I think and Dave's re uh report, David Engels report is gonna come next, you're gonna hear some more about some of these opportunities.

1:19:16Yeah.

1:19:16And of course it's exciting what's going on up in uh your area.

1:19:21You can't forget fifty two and everything that's happened there. David knows that We've been talking about all the jobs that are coming to that area.

1:19:28Yep.

1:19:28And they're just Not quite. They're just reaching that radar and coming in. So there's a lot of jobs gonna be right there. So

1:19:36get ready. I think with thirty nine ninety-eight and uh uh three oh one, all of that new realignment, you've got a lot of people that are coming down I four going straight up into Pasco County rather than coming all the way to seventy-five and heading north. Right.

1:19:51So all those all those jobs will require housing.

1:19:54Exactly. Yeah.

1:19:55Afford and some of them need to be somewhat affordable.

1:19:58Yeah,

1:19:58they

1:19:58gotta be affordable and and workforce housing.

1:20:00We're gonna have everyone living in Hernando and driving down here if we don't watch it. So

1:20:05Yeah. Do we have a comparison of we have about nine thousand sing single family home permits that we approved last year? And then how many jobs did we approve last year? I think we approved we've brought in more jobs last year than approved single family homes.

1:20:22Yeah. So so the jobs, your jobs are usually on a three to five year forecast window. So the jobs that we announced, so for example, the the an the announced five hundred jobs today, obviously those jobs don't start until after the building is built.

1:20:35Correct.

1:20:35Okay. So so some of that is uh forecasted. And some of it is is real time. But you still have a lot of people

1:20:43moving here regardless. But we still have that large percentage, and Commissioner Mariano brought it up last week too. I fifty to sixty percent of people that are leaving to go to Hillsborough County every single day for their jobs. We want to keep them here. Exactly. Right?

1:20:57Yeah, we would love we would we would love to keep them here. Yeah, yeah. And not have them clogging the roads. Um I did listen to a a a report this week on uh that the Tampa Bay area has like a Point five percent. uh availability of housing. It I mean we're we have one of the tightest housing markets in the United States.

1:21:18One of the most expensive, right?

1:21:19And one of the most expensive.

1:21:20And people still are moving here. So what's that tell you? We've got some good stuff.

1:21:23We're doing good things. All right. Thank you so much for

1:21:25the

1:21:26Madam Chairman

1:21:28Mariano. Okay. We got another presentation. So

1:21:30Bill The job you've done since you got here has been phenomenal. It just builds and builds momentum. Uh we are now, as you say, getting all these uh free advertisements that just help us promote with great, great stories, uh priceless I think. Um I think Commissioner Starkey touched on a good thing, is the redevelopment is a is a big issue. And as far as office space goes, I'll tell you when Representative Mariano was looking for office space. The the selection's minimal.

1:21:56Yeah.

1:21:56Now the great job we did I think down in Trinity was great. Um I think if we can do something along the nineteen card it would be great. Um we can create some jobs that'll be there, create some opportunities, we're willing to look forward to it. What I would like you to take a look at as well, though, is take a look at Penellas County, what they do for redevelopment, their regulations, compared to ours. Because we're tr we treat we treat it differently than what they do for different reasons, and that may be a hindrance that's coming up. I am told by people even in the market that is a place. If you would take a look at that,

1:22:27I'd appreciate it. And just keep one site in mind, uh, and you had it on your slide, was the HC. HCA regional hospital up in Bayonet Point, their expansion. Hundred million dollars coming in, hundred new jobs plus more, there's gonna be more office space out and around there too. If we can reach out and kind of like scope that situation out a little bit more and and find something to where these expansions gonna come and everything else around it would be awesome. But thanks for the tremendous work you're doing. Thank you, Commissioner.

1:22:54Thank you. Thank you very much. Oh well, I'm sorry, one more

1:22:57has something to add because he's sitting there like a little kid.

1:22:59Well he's got a great report coming.

1:23:02I just had some anecdotal comments. I I just wanted to, you know, congratulate everybody about Amazon and I wanted to point out that our current planning team and Matthew Campbell, our business support manager, were integral and intrinsic on getting this project off the ground. From a technical side. It's a very complicated state-of-the-art facility, and I wanted to put them on the table and give them our thanks. Secondly, for the first time since I've been here, the rate of job growth in Pasco County year over year was

1:23:33seven percent against out residential, which was five percent. We've never had that acceleration in rate of change.

1:23:40And and you know, when um I recall too that um my husband when he was chair at PE D C he said that the manufacturing was four percent of our local economy and look at where we're going now. Look at where we're going now.

1:23:56We're we're we're really one of the only places that has land and people. Uh and when these big projects look, you know other places in Florida have people, they don't have land, and if they've got land, they don't have people. So we're we're in a really good situation right now.