San Benito County is ready to get back in business.
Supervisors this week approved allocating $67,000 toward local economic development organizations and giving a tentative commitment to future, six-figure funding to one of those groups.
The board voted 5-0 in favor of a motion from Supervisor Jim Gillio after lengthy discussion involving county officials and business leaders at Tuesday’s meeting. The county will add $67,000 for the last four months in the fiscal year to the $35,000 currently allocated annually to the four organizations. The additional amount is coming from leftover funds in a budget for a county-hired lobbyist whose contract was terminated in January.
Supervisors agreed to allocate a total of $7,000 in additional funds to two Monterey Bay organizations, $15,000 to the San Benito County Chamber of Commerce and $45,000 to the EDC. The county already had allocated a total of $35,000 to all those groups for the entire fiscal year before Tuesday’s update.
The EDC, meanwhile, is in line to potentially receive $100,000 annually for each of the next five years as a tentative plan included in Gillio’s motion, which also relies on funding commitments from the cities of Hollister and San Juan Bautista. Supervisors largely supported the concept of supporting economic development, but Jaime De La Cruz and Peter Hernandez made it clear they wanted to see solidified objectives with the money and a potential out clause from the contract in the event the economy goes sour.
“At the end of the day, we have to have strong measurements,” Hernandez said.
De La Cruz recalled similar efforts more than a decade ago to fund a six-figure salary and benefits for former EDC Director Nancy Martin, whose tenure coincided with the Great Recession and left some, including De La Cruz, with a bad taste in their mouths.
“Somehow, the EDC has to give me that trust that it’s not going to happen what happened before,” he said.
But supervisors unanimously approved the Gillio motion with caveats, namely that the county would include tangible metrics for the EDC to pursue and for the early termination clause if needed. Supervisors agreed to pick up talks on the long-term plans with the funding during budget hearings for the 2019-20 fiscal year this summer.
The decision came after lengthy debate Tuesday. Aaron Johnston from Graniterock, the chairman of the EDC board, spoke for the organization. He emphasized how local nonprofit business groups have been working well together, particularly on avoiding overlap.
He presented a five-year plan for the EDC to the county board, which was receptive but cautious in some respects as well, especially after Martin’s tenure that ended seven years ago. The EDC expects a new director would re-shape and refine that five-year outlook, while measurements for the person’s success would be outlined by the organization.
“We’re going to have to be pretty loose in the first couple years in the metrics we use to reward and compensate the director,” Johnston acknowledged.
Supervisor Peter Hernandez latched onto that statement and told Johnston he’d like to see specific metrics from the outset.
“At the end of the day, we have to have strong measurements,” Hernandez said.
Johnston responded by giving examples of objectives the EDC can pursue right away such as tracking available non-leased industrial space, taking inventory of retail space that’s vacant, and doing an analysis of the the workforce commuting out of county.
