Monroe BDC report: economy ‘extremely strong’

By Danielle Portteus
Monroe News staff reporter
 

Posted Mar 29, 2018 at 2:00 PM

The Monroe Business Development Corp. held its annual investors meeting this week.

Monroe County’s economy continues to see improvement and that momentum will propel the community toward a successful 2018, business leaders say.

“The local economy is extremely strong,” said H. Douglas Chaffin, president of Monroe Bank & Trust and chairman of the Monroe County Business Development Corp. board. “Unemployment is down.”

Chaffin addressed about 40 investors during the BDC’s annual investors meeting at Tenneco on Wednesday.

One of the biggest challenges still facing the county is a lack of skilled workers, Chaffin said.

“We have talked often about the need for talented, skilled workers,” he said.

Tim Lake, BDC president, told investors about the highlights during 2017, including new business attraction.

“One of the areas we work on heavily is business attraction,” Lake said. “We are trying to lure new businesses into Monroe County on a regular basis.”

Attraction is done regionally through partnerships such as working with the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce and the Regional Growth Partnership in Toledo.

Last year, the BDC had 11 requests for property in Monroe County and, in the first three months of 2018, already has received eight requests.

“We have seen an influx since December for companies looking at sites in the county,” Lake said.

He said last year he worked with three companies, an engineering firm, a hotel and an automotive supplier, to bring $10 million in capital investment into the county with more than 300 new jobs.

The BDC also works on retention and growth with existing companies. Last year, it worked with 16 local companies to connect them to additional resources in the community to help with areas such as training.

Lake updated investors on the Monroe County Link Plan and said the goal is to have several action steps in the plan completed by year-end.

Monroe County is seeing economic growth, but it takes time, he said.

“Monroe is growing slowly but surely,” he said.

Of the local labor markets, manufacturing is still the largest at 20 percent based on 2016 data, Lake said, followed by business and professional service and finance, insurance and real estate.

“2018 looks to be a great year,” Lake said.

Mark Christiaanse, director of regional product management at Tenneco, also spoke. He talked about the company’s clean air initiatives, which are being driven by federal guidelines.

He talked about the company’s products and its success growing the business in China.

“Our global presence makes us strong,” he said.