ERC fellows demonstrate value of relationships in economic development

Key Takeaways

Mick Thornton has spent the past year tracking housing in San Juan County, Utah and developing a strategic plan to increase the county’s workforce housing supply. The project seems straightforward on paper, but the on-the-ground reality is far from straightforward. San Juan County is more than 8,000 square miles — the size of New Jersey, dotted with mountains, national monuments, detours and more.

In a geographically large county like San Juan, it is especially difficult to know and connect relevant stakeholders. In Thornton’s case, that means long travel times. He could be going to the remote Navajo Nation, the county seat of Monticello or all the way out to the state capital, Salt Lake City. Monticello sits five hours from Salt Lake City, or three hours from some of the Navajo and Ute communities. 

“Sometimes in a week I’ll start in Monticello, head up to Salt Lake City for a Tuesday meeting with the Governor’s Office for Economic Opportunity, then head back down to Monticello,” he said. “Then on Thursday, I’ll attend a community meeting in Navajo Nation where 70% of the time it’s in Navajo and then I have a couple hours in the car home.” 

Long travel times are a small price to pay for progress. Making a concerted effort to engage with all stakeholders in San Juan has allowed Thornton to gather data for the housing study that truly reflects needs and perspectives of multiple communities. 

Traditional economic development schools of thought do not typically recognize relationships as assets that a community can use to further their economic development agenda. But effectively engaging fractured or distant networks across a region can transform how economic development practitioners operate in their environment. 

More than 1,500 miles away from Thornton, in the swamp and bayou north of New Orleans, Deeneaus Polk navigates his way among the silos of St. Tammany and the surrounding parishes. 

St. Tammany Parish is a rapidly growing suburb of New Orleans. Adding 25,000 residents over the past decade has prompted officials to look for development support beyond its traditional boundaries to neighboring Washington and St. Helena parishes.   

This is where Polk has found that relationships are his greatest currency in the economic development world. 

“Consistently bringing the community together where members can be engaged has been essential to my work so far in St. Tammany Parish,” he said. “Building strong relationships through trust is key for the community driving resources, rather than following top-down models of traditional development where the community may have little say.” 

Meanwhile Jessica Stern, economic development director for Taos County, N.M., got her start in economic development through arts and culture management, showing her the potential for the arts to be a cornerstone in local economic development. 

Thornton, Polk and Jessica Stern are Economic Recovery Corps fellows, part of a capacity-building initiative from the U.S. Economic Development Administration. Through 26-month fellowships, ERC places 65 economic development professionals with counties and other host organizations in economically distressed areas of the country. These ERC fellows live and work in these communities to implement innovative projects that strengthen and grow local economies. Under the International Economic Development Council’s leadership, NACo is an ERC partner, focusing on expanding economic opportunity for county residents nationwide. 

As an ERC host organization, Taos County aligned with Stern’s vision and teamed her with their ERC Fellow Contessa Trujillo to begin work on a cultural and outdoor asset-mapping project. This analysis will provide valuable insights on how to best steward the natural environment and cultural assets in local economic development. 

The asset map will not only provide analysis of the community’s physical assets but also document less intangible cultural and natural treasures. Working together, the county and ERC fellow are safeguarding what makes Taos County unique as growth and development occur.   

“Breaking down silos is really just building relationships,” Stern said. “As a field, we need to embrace imagination and new thinking. We need to see beyond the nuts and bolts of traditional deal-making and move in a direction that considers the downwind impacts of economic development on a community as a whole. This is really about building strong relationships and understanding the connectivity of all our work.”