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County Commissioner Joe Meek is also the EDC president.
County commissioners on Feb. 23 were unanimous in their support of the 16-page, three-year contract with the EDC, and happy that old beefs with the EDC were addressed in the contract. Not only that, but County Commissioner Joe Meek chairs what is now being called “the new EDC.”
The interim president of the EDC is John Seifert, who took over after Randy Welker tendered his resignation, which was, perhaps strangely, effective on Halloween 2009. The county commission targeted the EDC for criticism under Welker, and blasted Welker at commission meetings for the size of the EDC’s budget, its unresponsiveness and its overall philosophy.
Now, however, the county is happy.
Under the new contract, the EDC and Chamber of Commerce are partners in business, and the chamber will handle the administrative oversight of the EDC, as well as other functions, and the agencies will share resources, offices and more. Despite what has been reported by other news media, the EDC has said it will not discontinue its attempts to attract business to the county, but it’s not going to be the exclusive focus of the agency. Instead, the EDC will also help the small businesses in Citrus County.
“In addition to continuing to focus on recruitment of industry in a new fashion,” Meek said, “we’re going to be brpadening our focus. We (the EDC) will be assisting new and existing businesses with finding employees, working with Workforce Connection in an alliance. We will be helping businesses write business plans through the Small Business Development Council.” Meek said that help will be made possible through a series of other alliances too, such as the SCORE and the Citrus County Chamber of Commerce.
Meek said the EDC will get “more bang for their buck” by using the chamber’s resources than going it alone.
Meek also told commissioners on Feb. 23 that the new EDC contract will address the issues the county commission had before the county allowed the contract with the old EDC to expire. Those issues included updating the county commission, the size of the EDC budget and the salary of the EDC president.
The contract calls for the EDC to be responsive to the Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) by giving monthly oral and written updates to the BOCC, which will improve communications. The EDC is asking for $110,000, beginning in Fiscal Year (FY) 2011, as opposed to $157,000 wanted by the old EDC, and the $60,000 salary of the EDC president will be less, Meek said. Meek did not say what the upper limit of the president’s salary would be, but assured fellow commissioners that the EDC “would not go over budget, with regard to the executive director.”
For FY 2010, the EDC is asking for $60,000, because an audit found some unspent public money in the EDC’s coffers after the contract expired with the county. That $50,000 will instead remain in the Occupational License Fee fund, which funds the county-EDC economic engine.
During public discussion, Lecanto resident Christopher Lloyd questioned the price tag of the new contract. “Obviously, I am not subject to taxation under the Occupational License Fee mandate but I am cognizant of the – 6,902 in 2009 -predominantly small businesses who are liable for this tax,” Lloyd said. He also called on the BOCC to wait until after it had seen a full breakdown of the $60,000 EDC budget before making any decision to approve or disapprove the contract.
“If the $60,000 presents purely cost recovery – shared resources, shared assets – fine; that’s what I would expect it to show,”Lloyd said. He added that the actual cost, according to his calculations, made the cost of the contract $142,000, plus the cost of belonging to the Tampa Bay Parntership, which could cost from $25,000 or $50,000 more.
In response, Meek and CEO and chamber president Josh Wooten said that many things under the contract will be what they called “revenue neutral.” They include donating office space for the SBDC. “In addition to that,” Wooten said, “we are housing Workforce Connection in our office. And the shared receptionist is going to work for all of these organizations.”
The chamber went through the list of things that the EDC board needed to be picked up, “and I think we nailed it,” Wooten said. Wooten added that there was a conscious effort to only ask for $60,000 as a minimum amount “just to keep the doors open.”
Meek said the EDC gets funding from many sources, to include Workforce Connection and EDC membership fees. Meek added that the EDC membership has dropped in recent years, but the EDC is hopeful the chamber will be able to help increase that membership.
After voting to approve the contract, all commissioners expressed their optimism for the success of the venture.
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