Why do I write about local politics and economic stimulus on a startup blog? As I see it, traditional economic development efforts and local “job creation” programs ignore and in many cases actually discourage startup activity. While almost all mid-sized metros boast about their readiness to be the next big American tech or life science hub, this is mostly lip service and actual investment (tax) dollars are spent chasing big name companies looking to relocate  not on programs to assist the individuals most likely to develop innovative new products or services.

The second reason I rant about ecodev is because cities often behave like floundering startups. Do these sound familiar:

• No validation of market conditions or understanding of the actual customer
• Convinced they have a unique offering that is vastly superior
• A hyper-inflated “sales” plan with an almost magical string of mega-customer wins
• Belief that with enough marketing (rebranding), no one will notice the pig behind the lipstick

Tampa (in particular Hillsborough County) is no different, so over the past two months I traded my flip flops for wingtips and made an effort to play nice, observe and maybe even assist.

This past Monday marked the last meeting of the Hillsborough County Economic Stimulus Task Force.

Although I volunteered early on to serve on the technical resource group, these spots were already reserved mostly for County staffers and other ecodev regulars. Below, I have cut and pasted the charter for the task force…

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The purpose of the Hillsborough County Economic Stimulus Task Force is to develop new incentives & tools for use to create new jobs and encourage business relocation & expansion.

Goals and Objectives:

1. Position the County to be a leader in job creation in the economic recovery.
2. Immediately stimulate new, existing and expanding business activities, including startups, within our target industries.
3. Establish a regulatory climate that incentivizes sustainable business and industry growth needed to be a leader in Florida, the US and the 21st century.
4. Send a message that the County is “open for business” and provide a competitive advantage as we recruit new businesses and support expansions of existing ones.

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It was very interesting to watch this process unfold and the posturing of the competing “community” organizations that currently have a stranglehold on development strategy and the associated dollars for economic expansion. Unlike many of our sister counties in central Florida, Hillsborough has chosen to put all of its economic development eggs in a very limited basket of 3rd party “community” organizations.  The county has actually outsourced  this repsonsibility to the Chamber, the Committee of 100 and the Tampa Bay Partnership and as far as I can tell, this has been done without any real metrics for success or accountability.

This has lead us down a path of big spending and an all-or-nothing attitude for economic gains. The model is (and will likely remain) heavily in favor of infrastructure improvements and expedited land permitting so that Tampa looks like the ideal spot to build that new call center or warehouse facility. These one tracked minds (pun intended) are made up of the region’s bigger companies and established business leaders. I have nothing against their success or their position in the community, just their outlook on growth. Someone a long time ago came up with an economic development model that was based on relocation of companies from high cost and usually cold areas to low cost and sunny Florida. I’m sure this model worked well in the 70′s, 80′s and even part of the 90′s, but times have changed and so must our strategies.

There is no lack of research on where the bulk of new high-wage job growth occurs, it is the emerging company. Both government (U.S. Census, S.B.A.) and private resources (Kauffman, Babson) track job creation and destruction by size and age of companies.  Yet, throughout the task force’s evaluation and recommendation process, small business creation barely received a mention. The focus of the anointed 3 remains on attracting an established business rather than fostering new growth and local talent.

The chairman of the task force wrapped up the final session by crafting an executive summary to be delivered to the full county commission on Wednesday May 20th. The summary is rightfully dark in its assessment of current economic conditions and begs for a sense of urgency and open mindedness on the part of the commissioners.  The chairman asks that the county draft a new strategy for economic development that challenges every existing policy, every program and every preconceived notion about jobs and business.  I just hope that if a new strategy is in the cards that the commissioners sharpen their expectations and expand their circle of advisers in an attempt to produce a more balanced and productive portfolio of economic development initiatives. There are plenty of other cities that have broadened their efforts to understand and accommodate new venture creation as a part of their economic landscape. Isn’t it time we do some of the same and scale back programs that are based on begging for hand-me-down jobs from other areas

I have several other observations to share on my experience with the task force, but I will save those for future rants.

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