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Goodyear's planned headquarters in Akron, other capital projects statewide earn accolades
By Paula Schleis
Beacon Journal
Published on Tuesday, Mar 04, 2008
That giant sucking sound you hear is the vacuum cleaning up the sawdust from corporate capital projects throughout Ohio, including Akron and Wayne County.
For the second year in a row, Ohio has counted more new or expanded business enterprises than any other state in the nation.
That was enough to earn it the Governor's Cup, an award by Site Selection magazine, which annually tracks investment by private companies in plants and jobs.
At a community level, Akron tied for second in the country among midsize metropolitan areas, and Wayne County was named the country's third top ''micropolitan'' region.
In its March cover story, the magazine said one of the most ''meaningful'' of the 399 projects Ohio completed or announced in 2007 was the retention of Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.'s Akron headquarters.
''These days, in this global economy, even iconic companies that have long been established in a particular state have the ability and flexibility to move quickly out of state,'' Ohio Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher told the magazine.
''Goodyear came to us and indicated that a number of states had come to them to convince them to leave Ohio, because they wanted to expand their headquarters. We partnered with them, the city of Akron, the county, the port authority and a private developer to close an $890 million project that retained about 3,000 jobs and will create far more jobs in the future.''
Akron has not ranked in the publication's list for many years, so this year's high placement has folks at the Greater Akron Chamber cheering.
Chamber President Dan Colantone said collaboration between the private sector and government has led to several companies reaffirming their commitment to Akron.
FirstEnergy Corp. and Sterling Inc. are also among those with multimillion-dollar expansions announced in 2007, Colantone said.
Rick Rebadow, vice president of economic development for the Greater Akron Chamber, said the rankings came out just in time for a series of trips to meet with site selectors in Chicago, San Diego, New York and Canada.
''This is really going to (show) that what we're doing in Akron is good and positive and creating a buzz,'' Rebadow said.
No doubt Akron's success contributed to Ohio's victory.
The magazine concluded that Ohio's second consecutive Governor's Cup is ''proof positive that manufacturing-intensive states can diversify their economies and retool their labor supplies'' enough to win a corporate facilities race.
Ohio also won the Governor's Cup in 2003, and three times in a row in the early 1990s.
Fisher acknowledged that not every Ohio industry is in growth mode, and many jobs have left the state.
But he's confident that projects in the economic development pipeline will soon reverse that trend.
''The many economic development successes we are having do not reflect themselves immediately in job numbers and statistics, because when we do create new jobs, they are produced usually over a period of 18 to 36 months,'' he said.
Wayne County saw 17 plant expansions and projects in 2007, representing a $66 million investment that helped to create or retain 809 jobs at an average hourly wage of $15.39.
That was impressive enough to make it the nation's third top micropolitan area, and first in the Midwest. A micropolitan region is one whose urban core (in this case, Wooster) has fewer than 50,000 people.
''Wayne County has consistently shown an ability to outperform the vast majority of micropolitan areas in the U.S. by targeting the right companies, helping existing industry grow and serving as an effective tool for job retention and expansion,'' said Ron Starner, general manager of Conway Data Inc. and Site Selection.
Wayne County companies or institutions that completed or announced investment projects in 2007 were American Augers Inc., Bekaert, Bosch Rexroth, Collier Well Equipment, Johnson Brothers Rubber Co., Morton Salt, OARDC, PFI-Orrville, Preferred Airparts, Quality Castings, Santmyer Oil Co., Speed France, Stonecraft, Technigraphics, J.M. Smucker Co., Walnut Creek Foods and the Westerman Cos.
Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com.
That giant sucking sound you hear is the vacuum cleaning up the sawdust from corporate capital projects throughout Ohio, including Akron and Wayne County.
Get the full article here.
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