Mayor Sam Adams finally presented his economic development
strategy to council last week—and unsurprisingly it was
underwhelming. For six months, the mayor has been saying how terrible
it is that Portland hasn’t had such a strategy for a decade, but at
this stage the new plan seems to be more about politics and marketing
than actual job creation.
The plan aims to create 10,000 jobs in the greater Portland
area over the next five years. To put that in context: Last year,
39,550 people moved to the greater Portland area, while at the same
time, the greater Portland area lost 38,510 jobs. Other major cities
also lost jobs at a similar rate in the recession. But we’re expecting
unemployment as high as 17 to 18 percent next year, with job growth at
around 10 percent in the next five years, according to the folks from
the Portland Development Commission (PDC) who presented the mayor’s
strategy to council. Compare that to a city like Austin, with an
aggressive economic development strategy. Austin is expecting job
growth of 15 percent over the same period, and it’s clear that we’re
losing ground.
“We’re getting a lot of attention, and that’s great,” said Erin
Flynn, economic development director of PDC, introducing the plan.
“But we know that the quality of life we’ve created here does not
necessarily translate into job creation.
“The New York Times loves us. The Wall Street Journal ran a big article on us,” Flynn continued. “The coverage we’re getting
tends to focus on lifestyle, on quality of life, and on our quirky
bohemian character. We love that, but we also want people to know
that we’re a great place to do business, so we’re going to be launching
a campaign to that effect.”
Oh, goodie. A campaign! The plan aims to focus on four key sectors:
clean technology and sustainable industries, active wear, software, and
advanced manufacturing. But is it really enough to just cross our
fingers and make noise around the country about the few industries
we’ve already got? As “strategies” go, ours sounds a little “quirky and
bohemian.”
Speaking of bohemian, Mayor Adams said an implementation plan for
the strategy will kick off in the fall. In other words: We know we want
jobs! We think we know where those jobs are going to come from! But
we’ll get back to you in a few months on how, exactly, all of
this is going to work.
It seems Portland’s economic motivation and sense of urgency is all
used up for this year.
You want jobs but you don’t want the business friendly environment that attracts those jobs. Government jobs are dependent on tax revenue from the private sector. Bottom line, Portland needs to attract more private sector jobs. Texas is one of the most business friendly states in this country. I have a feeling a number of Portland businesses will be there shortly. Let’s face it, art galleryies on Hawthorne and farmer’s markets don’t produce the same tax revenue that comes from an intel.