Commentary: Collaboration Drives Economic Growth in the Valley
By Guy Coviello
President and CEO of the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber
It was 3½ years ago when we decided we were no longer going to thump our chest as THE self-proclaimed leader of economic development in the Mahoning Valley.
Economic development, after all, is not any organization’s responsibility. It is a community’s responsibility.
During our 2021 annual meeting we asked many people to stand. They were representatives of the Western Reserve Port Authority, Eastgate Regional Council of Governments, Valley Economic Development Partners, Youngstown Business Incubator, Brite Energy Innovators, The Youngstown Foundation and the chamber-founded Eastern Ohio Military Affairs Commission.
We told everyone in attendance: “THIS is your economic development team.”
Someone smarter than me about this stuff once told me – and I wholeheartedly believe – that economic development is the ultimate team sport. Over the past year, our team has become stronger.
That’s because the Mahoning County commissioners joined the team when they approved Valley Vision, a joint economic development strategic plan created with the help of Ernst & Young. Trumbull County commissioners joined a month later.
Then we added Lake to River Economic Development, the seventh and final JobsOhio partner that we spun off from the Regional Chamber. More recently we added Goodwill Industries, which has a history of working with JobsOhio, and which will be a formidable teammate helping us move thousands of marginalized individuals off the sidelines and into jobs.
Because of this team, the Valley is growing. According to the United Nations, the Youngstown/Warren metropolitan statistical area grew in population in 2023. The U.N. projects our population to grow every year through 2030.
Because of this team, and even though we have grown jobs at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station, for the first time in many, many years, a private, for-profit, corporate-tax-paying company is now the largest employer in Trumbull County. Ultium Cells has surpassed YARS by more than 100 employees.
The timing of this lookback is important. It comes on the heels of an intense election cycle. Now it’s time to move as quickly as possible from politics to policy, and we’ll do that by strengthening this economic development team even more.
We will partner closer than ever with our state elected delegation, with whom we have already forged a strong working relationship to develop economic policies favorable to the Mahoning Valley. All of our election night winners – state Sens. Al Cutrona and Sandra O’Brien, as well as state Reps. Monica Robb Blasdale, Tex Fischer, Lauren McNally, Dave Thomas and Nick Santucci – form a cohesive, bipartisan delegation dedicated to helping us move forward.
We will partner closer than ever with our new county commissioners – Tony Bernard and Rick Hernandez in Trumbull County and Geno DiFabio in Mahoning County – who we are confident will blend in nicely with their incumbent, bipartisan counterparts to continue supporting Valley Vision.
The Regional Chamber will do its part.
Along with our partners, like Eastgate, we will continue to make talent expansion our top priority by growing the population through our retain, return and receive three-pronged approach. We will continue to make increasing housing inventory our No. 2 priority.
We will announce multiple programs to cultivate the next generation of corporate leaders to overcome challenges presented by a wave of retiring, baby boomer CEOs throughout the Valley.
We will help the Youngstown State University export assistance office pursue trade opportunities with Vietnam and Iceland, facilitated by the chambers of commerce in those countries, to grow our economy.
We will use our newly created Business Advisory Council of The Fed to make sure real-time economic conditions in the Mahoning and Shenango valleys are given weight when creating monetary policy.
No doubt, this has been a tumultuous election cycle, which some of us would say is necessary to engage in healthy discourse about all ideas. Now that it’s over, rest assured, because of the partnerships and collaborations we have formed over the past several years, we are poised to forge ahead, expanding economic prosperity and improving our quality of life.
Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
