County development office sees positives

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

The Van Wert County Board of Commissioners had several pieces of good news to share about its economic development efforts during a meeting held Tuesday.

Commissioner Todd Wolfrum announced on Tuesday that the county has received a $50,000 grant during the eighth round of the Local Government Innovation Fund grant program. The $50,000, awarded by the Ohio Development Services Agency’s Office of Redevelopment and Energy, was the maximum award possible this time around, but only half of the original $100,000 grant request denied by state officials in Round 7.

The denial of the $100,000 grant, due at least in part to other local development officials questioning information in the grant application, was also a spur to the commissioners’ decision to end their participation in the economic development contract with the Ohio State University Extension development program.

Just as important as the grant award to the county development program was the receipt of information from the state recognizing the county office as the lead local economic development agency.

Wolfrum said the designation by JobsOhio, the regional link to the ODSA, of the county development office as the official development link to the state means that all state-generated development leads will now come first to the county office, rather than the OSU Extension program, as had been the case previously.

He added, though, that the OSU Extension program would continue to handle development leads within the city of Van Wert, at least at this point.

The county will also now be conducting the official business retention and expansion (BR&E) visits to local companies, something also previously done by the OSU Extension development program.

“The commissioners being the lead agency for economic development in the county, JobsOhio has licensed us to do the BR&E visits,” Wolfrum said, noting that, in conjunction with new directives from the state, those visits would take less time, involve fewer people and seek less information.

According to Wolfrum, instead of members of a BR&E Committee visiting each company on the list, provisional County Economic Development Director Sarah Smith will be making the visits alone, unless companies request a larger group visit.

The commissioner said the new BR&E guidelines reflect the state’s interest in making BR&E visits less time-consuming and more “business friendly” for participating companies.

Also during Tuesday’s meeting, Smith provided an update on a list of more than 20 projects she has been working on, including finding a site that could serve as a possible centralized location for local development agencies, although Wolfrum stressed that’s not going to happen overnight.

The list also includes projects under way or proposed at the Van Wert County Fairgrounds, a Community Development Block Grant set-aside for downtown development in Van Wert, new projects at the Van Wert County Regional Airport, Wren Ball Park Association projects, the possibility of a CJ Highmarks restaurant coming to Van Wert and the use of search engines designed to help solve business-related issues.

One area of responsibility that will likely stay with the OSU Extension development office for the foreseeable future is the effort to certify the 1,500-acre industrial megasite located north of Van Wert.

Wolfrum said having OSU Extension Educator Cindy Leis continue to work on certifying the site would be the best use of resources for that project. He also said that, while the county is now the lead agency for revolving and microenterprise loans, more discussion is needed on how those programs will operate in the future.

He also stressed that he, his fellow commissioners and Smith would continue to look at all reasonable economic ideas for the county, whether from local individuals or other development agencies.

“We’re happy to work with anybody,” Wolfrum said. “If the city’s economic development office or anybody else in the community might have ideas, we encourage them to talk to Sarah and get those contracts with the state through JobsOhio.”

In another meeting that could have substantial development impact on the county, the commissioners met with Dan Litchfield of Iberdrola Renewables for a preliminary discussion on the proposed Dog Creek Wind Farm that would be located in the northeast portion of the county.