Charles Todd has a long and distinguished history in Columbia. Among other things, he founded the laundry cleaning company which today is Crown Linen Service and established Toddhall Retreat & Conference Center.
For the past two years, Todd has been an active member of Columbia's Heritage & Preservation Commission. He helped that group erect a columbarium in historic Warderman Cemetery and provide for burial of indigents with both his personal time and money. This week, it will be announced that Todd has donated $20,000 to the City of Columbia to spur renovation of the historic Miller-Fiege Home.
Members of the Heritage & Preservation Commission are now asking the Columbia City Council to name Charles Todd the first ever Commissioner Emeritas, in recognition of his long and sustained service.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Making a List, Checking It Twice...
One of the basic tenets of economic gardening--any well-planned economic development program, in fact--is that growth should arise from nurturing of enterprises already growing in the local environment. Columbia is well-positioned for such growth not just because of its many small firms but because of some of its larger companies, as well.Inc. Magazine recently released its tally of the 5000 fastest-growing companies; two are in Columbia (Illinois, including Chicago and its suburbs, only has 224): MAVERICK Technologies and Traube Tent Company.
The Inc. 5005000 (as the tally is called) is ranked according to percentage revenue growth from 2005 through 2008. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by the first week of 2005, and therefore able to show four full calendar years of sales. Additionally, they have to be U.S.-based, privately held, for profit, and independent--not subsidiaries or divisions of other companies--as of December 31, 2008. Full-time and part-time employees are included in the head count; independent contractors and temporary employees are excluded.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Other Communities, Other Visions
Local leaders in many parts of the country are finding creative new ways to spur economic activity in their cities and counties:
In California, the City of Santa Clarita began hosting stakeholder meetings for business leaders as the economy turned sour and more businesses began looking for help from government. The mayor's economic development summit helped leaders from the chamber of commerce and the industrial association meet each other. The City’s strategy also included a luncheon for commercial brokers that was held to target rising vacancies and to share resources for attracting new tenants. The meetings were perceived as valuable, offering more ways that the City and the business community could proactively come together to address the downturn, and efforts eventually resulted in the City bringing Advanced Bionics Biomedical Company and its 350 jobs to town.
The City of Lake Forest, Illinois provides local businesses with a checklist of all events in the city so that owners and managers can synchronize their business goals, promotions, marketing and sales with opportunities available in the community. The City's Economic Development Department calls this service "Lake Forest’s Marketing Machine."
In Tennessee, Unicoi County officials are planning a sustainable tourism initiative with its goal to create new businesses that would support tourism. The county will use a $50,000 GEMS of Appalachia Grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission and matching funds from the Joint Economic Development Board and the Conservation Fund to sponsor educational workshops early next year for business owners and entrepreneurs in Unicoi County, the Town of Erwin, and the Town of Unicoi. According to Mayor Greg Lynch, the program is targeted to people "who are close to retirement, maybe wanting to start a bed-and-breakfast, something to sustain them for the rest of their lives, or young people wanting to start up their own guide business, [for example] to be river guides..." The county also is considering culinary tourism focusing on Appalachian Mountain cuisine.
In California, the City of Santa Clarita began hosting stakeholder meetings for business leaders as the economy turned sour and more businesses began looking for help from government. The mayor's economic development summit helped leaders from the chamber of commerce and the industrial association meet each other. The City’s strategy also included a luncheon for commercial brokers that was held to target rising vacancies and to share resources for attracting new tenants. The meetings were perceived as valuable, offering more ways that the City and the business community could proactively come together to address the downturn, and efforts eventually resulted in the City bringing Advanced Bionics Biomedical Company and its 350 jobs to town.
The City of Lake Forest, Illinois provides local businesses with a checklist of all events in the city so that owners and managers can synchronize their business goals, promotions, marketing and sales with opportunities available in the community. The City's Economic Development Department calls this service "Lake Forest’s Marketing Machine."
In Tennessee, Unicoi County officials are planning a sustainable tourism initiative with its goal to create new businesses that would support tourism. The county will use a $50,000 GEMS of Appalachia Grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission and matching funds from the Joint Economic Development Board and the Conservation Fund to sponsor educational workshops early next year for business owners and entrepreneurs in Unicoi County, the Town of Erwin, and the Town of Unicoi. According to Mayor Greg Lynch, the program is targeted to people "who are close to retirement, maybe wanting to start a bed-and-breakfast, something to sustain them for the rest of their lives, or young people wanting to start up their own guide business, [for example] to be river guides..." The county also is considering culinary tourism focusing on Appalachian Mountain cuisine.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
For States and Cities, the Downturn May Continue
Most economists now believe that the national recession is drawing to a close, but the impacts of the downturn will continue to be seen in budgets for state and local governments for at least the next year.While stimulus funding has allowed state and local governments to avoid laying off teachers, prison guards, police officers and firefighters, revenues are expected to remain depressed, even as the national economy improves. The depressed value of housing will continue to mean lower revenue from sales taxes and property taxes. Continued high unemployment will mean reduced income-tax receipts, higher expenditures for unemployment claims and more demand for public assistance. Federal stimulus aid is declining, and many cities and states have already used up their emergency reserves.
The Council of State Governments projects that for the next two fiscal years, the states face a combined budget shortfall of $350 billion.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
IDOT Awards Columbia $70,000 for Pedestrian Safety
The City of Columbia will receive $70,000 from the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) to install fixed speed feedback signs on Main St. near Immaculate Conception School and Parkview Elementary School. The award was part of $13.1 million in Safe Routes to School grants announced yesterday by Governor Pat Quinn.171 projects were funded in almost 90 communities across Illinois, including Columbia, ranging from sidewalk repair to safety training for students to equipment for police and crossing guards. The federally-funded program is designed to enable and encourage children to walk and bike to school.
“This grant request and the School Safety Plan that led up to it were a true community partnership,” Columbia Mayor Kevin Hutchinson observed. Both elements of the application process were assembled by a steering committee that included city and school district officials along with representatives from the Monroe County YMCA, Helmets First! and other groups.
The Illinois Safe Routes To School (SRTS) program applies to schools serving grades Kindergarten through 8th. SRTS encourages a holistic approach to make it safer and more practical for children to walk to school, using the Five E’s: engineering, encouragement, education, enforcement and encouragement. IDOT Secretary Gary Hannig indicated that competition for funding was especially keen this year, with the agency receiving almost 200 applications adding up to $27.9 million in requests.
“This innovative program reaches out to our youth, instilling in them the healthy habits of physical activity,” said Governor Quinn. “With Illinois ranked fourth in the nation for childhood obesity rates, providing children with a safe and secure means of walking to school is an important tool to improve the health of our children.”
Safe Routes to School is a program of the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Highway Administration. The program is designed to:
- Enable and encourage children, including those with disabilities, to walk and bicycle to school;
- Make bicycling and walking to school a safer and more appealing transportation option, encouraging a healthy and active lifestyle from an early age; and
- Facilitate projects and activities that will improve safety and reduce traffic, fuel consumption, and air pollution in the vicinity of primary and middle schools.
Monday, August 3, 2009
...But Local Cities Still Feel the Pinch
While there are signs that the economy is starting to strengthen at the national level, Metro East communities continue to suffer from the effects of the downturn.
Sales tax receipts--which contribute a large portion of revenues to the balance sheets of all cities--continue to be weak across the board:
Sales tax receipts--which contribute a large portion of revenues to the balance sheets of all cities--continue to be weak across the board:
- In Belleville, sales tax receipts are down 7.64 percent, about $112,857, over the first quarter;
- Despite cutting $2 million from the city budget in the past year, O'Fallon is operating about $117,000 over budget after one quarter of the current fiscal year;
- Edwardsville's sales tax receipts are down about 6 percent.
Metro East cities are coping with the continuing revenue pinch via a variety of strategies:
- Collinsville leaders sliced $1.4 million worth of road projects out of the budget to make up for lost income;
- While July sales taxes were $20,356 lower in O'Fallon than last year--$518,940 versus $498,584--the City had budgeted an 8 percent reduction in sales tax.
Indicators Suggest National Economy May Be Poised For Growth...
The current recession--appraised by most economists now as the worst since World War II--is showing signs of easing. Three articles over the past few days in national business sources suggest that better economic times may be just ahead.
A front-page story in Saturday's edition of the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. gross domestic product contracted at a 1% annual rate last quarter, its slowest pace in a year, but a marked improvement from the first-quarter contraction of 6.4% and the fourth quarter's 5.4% pullback. "Consumer spending stabilized early this year," it was reported, "but businesses kept cutting back sharply on payrolls, inventories and new-equipment spending."
The Chicago Tribune on Saturday reported that economists, who were expecting GDP to be down at about a 1.5 percent rate in the second quarter, were largely heartened by the data. The report reflected much smaller decreases in business investments, a smaller drop in inventories and exports, as well as an upturn in government expenditures as the federal stimulus measures took hold. The GDP news, the article adds, "comes on the heels of a number of reports suggesting that the long-troubled housing market decline is bottoming and that manufacturing is also stabilizing." But the labor market remains troubled and, with the unemployment rate expected to keep rising until at least the end of the year, "many people will not feel a recovery."
In Bloomberg News this morning: "Manufacturing in the U.S. probably shrank in July at the slowest pace in 11 months as the recession eased and factories moved closer to stabilization, economists said ahead of a private report." The Institute for Supply Management's factory gauge increased to 46.5, from 44.8 in June, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey. Other reports indicate manufacturing, which accounts for about 12 percent of the world's largest economy, is improving.
A front-page story in Saturday's edition of the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. gross domestic product contracted at a 1% annual rate last quarter, its slowest pace in a year, but a marked improvement from the first-quarter contraction of 6.4% and the fourth quarter's 5.4% pullback. "Consumer spending stabilized early this year," it was reported, "but businesses kept cutting back sharply on payrolls, inventories and new-equipment spending."
The Chicago Tribune on Saturday reported that economists, who were expecting GDP to be down at about a 1.5 percent rate in the second quarter, were largely heartened by the data. The report reflected much smaller decreases in business investments, a smaller drop in inventories and exports, as well as an upturn in government expenditures as the federal stimulus measures took hold. The GDP news, the article adds, "comes on the heels of a number of reports suggesting that the long-troubled housing market decline is bottoming and that manufacturing is also stabilizing." But the labor market remains troubled and, with the unemployment rate expected to keep rising until at least the end of the year, "many people will not feel a recovery."
In Bloomberg News this morning: "Manufacturing in the U.S. probably shrank in July at the slowest pace in 11 months as the recession eased and factories moved closer to stabilization, economists said ahead of a private report." The Institute for Supply Management's factory gauge increased to 46.5, from 44.8 in June, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey. Other reports indicate manufacturing, which accounts for about 12 percent of the world's largest economy, is improving.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)