By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
St. Joseph seems to be poised for economic growth, if some companies looking at the city decide to locate here and some existing businesses follow through with expansion plans.
St. Joseph Chamber of Commerce President Patt Lilly says the Chamber has kept busy speaking to business owners and managers about several projects.
“Always a lot of competition for these projects, but the fact that we’re getting a lot of looks certainly is encouraging,” Lilly tells host Barr Birr on the KFEQ Hotline. “And so, we’re hopeful that here in the next six months we can see some benefit to that effort and have some announcements.”
Lilly says the competition for economic development projects is fierce.
“One of the challenges you have in the world of economic development is when somebody wants to do a project, they need an available building, they need a green field site,” according to Lilly. “Well, certainly, with Eastowne Business Park, we have green field sites and with the support of the city’s capital improvement program, we’re having some mass grading done on the east side of Eastowne, which will open up more land for development.”
The Chamber is working with St. Joseph city officials as well as Buchanan County officials on erecting a shell building which can be ready for occupancy.
Lilly says the city has some prime space, ready to be developed.
“At the end of the day, most companies can be almost anywhere,” Lilly says. “And so, as you compete for these projects, you’re competing with other communities in most cases and the more you can do to better position yourself so that the company can make a good decision and that they can be successful in your community typically make the difference between winning and losing.”
Lilly says the Chamber might be able to make some announcements soon.