Action 4: Enhance Company Attraction Efforts
Create a Public-Private Business Attraction Center
Public-sector economic development agencies such as the RIEDC can administer business assistance programs and provide follow-through, but local business leaders are best at attracting new businesses to a jurisdiction. Peer-to-peer interactions in the business community reveal opportunities and potential, and open doors. Other jurisdictions such as North Carolina harness the good will and knowledge of local businesses to build their economy. It is time for Rhode Island to do the same.
The responsibility for marketing Rhode Island as an appealing destination to out-of-state companies should be housed in a new private-public partnership, or Attraction Center, that combines the expertise of the public sector with the contacts and up-to-date industry knowledge of the private sector. An Attraction Center completely focused on bringing new jobs to Rhode Island would complement the RIEDC’s strong client-service capabilities and allow the RIEDC to focus its energy on job retention, entrepreneurship and business starts, company expansion, and workforce development.
To succeed, the Attraction Center must be a statewide organization with a strong "qualitative" and "quantitative" commitment from both the private sector and the state. It should be governed by a board of directors that represents both private-sector expertise and the RIEDC Board of Directors, and be funded equally by the private sector and a new appropriation from the General Assembly. Given proper resources, the Attraction Center will:
- Execute attraction strategies that cannot be performed by a public agency with a state appropriation
- Leverage business community involvement and investment
- Have staffing flexibility
- Benefit from continued access to top elected officials through an integrated relationship with the RIEDC
Fortuitously, the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce’s knowledge-based economy study revealed a strong interest on behalf of the private sector to participate in Rhode Island’s attraction initiatives. The moment is right for the RIEDC and many other public and private entities to establish a statewide, collaborative Attraction Center.