Weekly REDEW: This Region is Delicious!

I opened my inbox this morning to find the sort of e-mail I get all too infrequently — an offer for free delicious popcorn snacks from Kitsap County’s own Popcorn Chef. What a way to start the day! As a pregnant lady and the organizer of the Prosperity Partnership’s December 3rd Specialty Foods Industry Cluster Tour, I spend a lot of time these days thinking about food. Fortunately for me, the Puget Sound is full of companies making all kinds of amazing goodies…

Weekly B-MOW: Getting to Know Pierce County

That’s right, it’s time for the third installment of our new weekly feature: Best Meeting of the Week. Each week, we’ll highlight one of our adventures in the world of economic development, sharing the most interesting, exciting or unique things that the Prosperity crew is doing. This week’s B-MOW? A fabulous “familiarization” tour of Pierce County…

In Case You Missed It, Proof that Our Region Is Really Cool in Energy Efficiency

If you’ve never been on one of the Prosperity Partnership’s quarterly Industry Cluster Tours, you’re missing out. Imagine this: you and 46 peers from across the region, riding around on a cushy charter bus, being guided through some of region’s leading businesses as VIPs, getting a sweet meal, networking, and learning about the economic development opportunities and challenges facing one of the Puget Sound’s important industries. Sound like fun? Well, if you’re a wonky sort or are generally interested in promoting our region’s growth and development, it is.

What’s Red, White, and Blue—and Green All Over?

You probably already know that military and defense industry activities play a vital role in our economy and our economic development, but you might not know just exactly how important they are. Allow us to reduce the guesswork: According to a recently released WEDC-funded BERK study, military and defense contracting activities supported approximately 191,000 total jobs and $12.2 billion in total output in Washington for FY 2009—nearly 7% of all state jobs and 4% of the state’s overall gross domestic product (GDP). That’s a whole lot of green!

Not Just for Billionaires and Lance Bass Anymore — The Era of Space Tourism About to Begin??

This Wednesday Boeing announced that it will help the non-astronaut community boldly go where few men have gone before… No, not a Lilith Fair concert… outer space. Not to explore strange new worlds, or to seek out new life and new civilizations, but to tap into the apparently under-served market for space tourism by taking visitors to low Earth orbit (LEO).

Ich bin ein manufacturer

Okay, I’ll admit that I took Spanish in high school, so that probably doesn’t make any sense. But you know what does seem to be making a lot of sense these days? Germany’s focus on manufacturing—and on manufacturing for export, in particular.

“Don’t Eat Your Seed Corn”

The weeklong Farnborough International Airshow—one of the world’s largest aviation/aerospace events and trade shows—wrapped up this weekend in England. In total, some $47 billion worth of deals were signed during the event.

As you may have heard, there were no Washington state or county officials on hand during the show. While in years past Washington has sent substantial delegations and facilitated meetings and events at the show, this year’s budget constraints kept our leaders and economic development organizations at home. (I should note that Washington did have a booth organized and staffed by Washington’s trade representative for Europe.)

The WTO and the Tanker

Last week’s WTO ruling that Airbus has for decades received billions in illegal subsidies from European governments was a major victory for Boeing, for American workers, and for Washington State. But, its impact on the ongoing Air Force aerial refueling tanker contract saga remains uncertain.

Show Me the Money

In tough economic times government and community leaders understandably look to their economic development organizations (EDOs—officially called ADOs in Washington, but mostly referred to as EDCs and EDBs) for a vision and strategy to boost employment and turns things around—and they expect to see results.

The Puget Sound Region is privileged to have a robust network of highly effective economic development organizations. Even in the midst of recession and now a sluggish recovery, we’ve seen new recruitment announcements, redoubled business retention efforts, and a host of exciting new cluster development programs.

But, after years of lean times and budget cuts, lately we’ve started to hear some question: Are we asking our economic developers to do too much with too little?