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Southeast Crescent Regional Commission Awards Two Enterprise Innovation Institute Programs With $700K in Grants

The awards will advance the work of the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation and the Center for Economic Development Research.

(Originally produced on the Enterprise Innovation Institute news website, located here).

ATLANTA — The Southeast Crescent Regional Commission (SCRC) handed out 17 State Economic Infrastructure Development (SEID) grants in Georgia.

Two of those awards went to Georgia Tech programs: the Partnership for Inclusive Innovation (Partnership) and the Center for Economic Development Research (CEDR), both housed within the Enterprise Innovation Institute.

Cody Cocchi, the Partnership
for Inclusive Innovation’s
student engagement manager

A public-private collaborative, the Partnership supports access, growth, entrepreneurship, and innovation in Georgia and the Southeast via economic opportunity, community research, student engagement, and workforce development.

The Partnership’s Summer Internship program received $350,000 to serve 15 Georgia counties that the SCRC has identified as distressed.

“We want to be a catalyst for innovation not only across the state but across the Southeast as well. We do that by combining grantmaking with active programming across our four pillars,” said Cody M. Cocchi, the Partnership’s student engagement manager.

“During the 12-week summer internship, we partner with public-impact organizations that identify a challenge in their community and propose an innovative way to address it, with the help of interns from all over the nation who apply to work on those specific projects.”

Elaborating on the type of initiatives the SEID grant will fund in 2025, Cocchi cited a past project in Portal, Georgia, that focused on digital opportunity. Summer interns helped rural youth develop the technological knowledge and skill sets that would help prepare them for the digital economy. “That’s a pretty good example of empowering individuals within this community,” he said.

Betsy McGriff, a project manager
at CEDR and the lead on the
CEDRC™ project

CEDR was awarded $349,952 to assist Bulloch, Candler, Evans, Tattnall, Liberty, and Long counties in implementing its Certified Economic Development Ready Communities (CEDRC™) program, which helps communities plan for the regional impacts of a major economic development location.

CEDR provides local governments and economic development organizations with research, planning, and technical assistance.

The six counties specified in the SEID grant are within an hour’s drive of the $7.6 billion Hyundai Metaplant in Ellabell, which is expected to bring more than 14,000 jobs to Southeast Georgia.

“This grant will provide those counties with the full CEDRC™ program,” said Betsy McGriff, a project manager with CEDR and the lead on the CEDRC™ project. “The process entails forecast-based planning, including data-driven population projections, job counts, and potential housing needs, as well as model code and creative planning for community development.”

She noted that the communities are largely rural, with little significant residential or industrial development. “This grant offers them an excellent opportunity to identify the unique characteristics of their communities and engage in municipal planning that will harness new investment from increased population and business growth while preserving local character.”

The SCRC is a federal-state partnership created by the 2008 Farm Bill to promote economic development in the Southeast. This year, the agency awarded SEID grants totaling $19 million to fund 57 community projects in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. SEID grant criteria encompass equality, total regional population, total distressed population, and the square mileage of each state’s distressed area.

Of those funds, $5 million came from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL). As part of the Investing in America agenda, the BIL supports bottom-up economic growth to improve the quality of life for workers, families, and small businesses.

“We’ve been economic developers for six decades, but recently we’ve increased our focus on supporting Georgia’s communities through socioeconomic development, which provides resources and skills to people on a foundational level so they are better equipped to participate in the economy,” said Enterprise Innovation Institute Vice President David Bridges.

“Because these two SEID grants allow us to implement even more bottom-up, community-based solutions, they serve that important mission. We’re grateful that the amazing work of CEDR and the Partnership has been recognized with this support from the SCRC.”

EI2 Asks: A Primer on Placemaking

The Center for Economic Development Research (CEDR), a program of Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation Institute, provides communities with the data and guidance they need to make smart economic development decisions. Alan Durham is a senior research faculty manager and the International Economic Development Council’s (IEDC) economic development course director at CEDR, and below he outlines some basics of a crucial – and often overlooked – element of economic development: placemaking.

A photograph of a man, Alan Durham
Alan Durham, a senior research faculty manager and the International Economic Development Council’s (IEDC) economic development course director at CEDR.

What is placemaking?
I’m going to start by giving an example of what placemaking isn’t. So, after World War II and the birth of suburbia, development in the United States became very generic, very homogenized, very cookie-cutter, and that has continued through today. If you drive I-75 to Florida, every exit ramp looks exactly the same, with the same fast-food chains, drug stores, grocery stores, and it’s the same in Georgia or Florida, Mississippi or Colorado.

Think about the old Dixie Highway before the Interstate system was built. That was a four-lane divided highway that everyone took to get to Florida, and there was a lot of character – you’d see, for example, local restaurants shaped like coffee pots. We call that roadside architecture. Think about Route 66 and all the crazy motels that looked like teepees. Some of the old Arby’s chain restaurants used to be shaped like cowboy hats. These things were interesting. They were unlike anywhere else. Our Interstate exits could be anywhere, and placemaking is about creating someplace unique.

What characteristics make a particular place appealing?
The heart of their history, and the heart of their character, is usually their historic downtown area, most of which were built in the 1890s through about 1920. That’s where you can find your local mom-and-pop restaurants, your local coffee shop, your pizza parlor that is not a chain. These places are unique, the architecture’s regionally unique – often tied to locally available materials – and your communities differ depending on who the local rich person was and what kind of buildings they wanted to build. You can look at different downtowns and feel like you’re actually somewhere, not just anywhere.

How is placemaking different from the common conception of economic development?
The traditional idea of economic development is business recruitment, retention, and expansion, and communities have been doing economic development through that lens for decades. But we have found that younger generations, especially millennials and Generation Z, don’t move to an area for a job. They move to an area because it’s where they want to live, and once they’re there, they look for a job.

We still do business recruitment, retention, and expansion, but we’re also starting to pay a lot more attention to placemaking to try to attract the younger generation of workers, and the key to attracting them is building a place where people want to live and businesses want to be. That’s my economic development focus: How can I help communities become extraordinary places that stand out from every other place in America? What unique assets make your community a special place that people want to live in?

What are some of the elements that younger generations prioritize?Number one is the built environment. Historic buildings have a lot more character than a strip mall, so I help communities redevelop their historic downtowns. A lot of those areas are sitting there vacant and boarded up, and people really want that unique coffee shop with wood floors and huge windows. It’s not the same as a Starbucks drive-through.

Number two, it has to be walkable. People are tired of sitting in traffic and filling up their tank with expensive gas. They want to be able to walk somewhere, to bike somewhere – to walk downtown and have dinner at a pizza parlor, walk next door to an ice cream shop, and then afterward have a beer and see a live band.

To facilitate this, town centers need to introduce more residential buildings in walking distance to commercial offerings. The idea of keeping restaurants and retail on the ground floor but converting some of the vacant upper space to residential lofts is coming back in favor, because if you live in downtown, you’re likely to patronize those businesses. Retail follows rooftops.

Do you ever encounter pushback to the principles of placemaking?
You sometimes run into opposition against apartments and rental units. In all fairness, a lot of communities already have too much rental and they need to explore ways to encourage home ownership, and that could be addressed with new development, but rental is always going to be a part of a community. You want to make sure it’s kept in balance.

The second concern tends to be traffic. The worry is, “You can’t put all these residents in your downtown because you’re going to clog up the street with traffic.” But that’s not the case, because if you live downtown, you’re going to walk a block away to get your lunch. So you’re actually reducing traffic by increasing density in and around your historic downtown and central business district.

The best way that I have found to counter some of these false narratives is to show people what other communities have done. “Look – this community is successful and thriving and exciting. They’re attracting young people. This is the workforce of tomorrow. They want to live in this location – and, look, traffic isn’t a problem here.” If you build a place for cars, you’re going to get cars. If you build a place for pedestrians, you’re going to get people on foot.

What types of questions should communities who want to increase their desirability be asking themselves?
Whenever you do new construction in a historic neighborhood, you have to have design guidelines in place to make sure that the new construction is compatible with and complements the existing historic buildings. I’ve seen communities build an apartment complex that looks nothing like any of their historic brick buildings. Instead of becoming a part of their downtown, it’s now an eyesore. They might have gotten the location correct, but instead of creating a place by picking up some of the elements of the historic buildings, they end up missing the mark and destroying the character of their downtown.

So design guidelines are extremely important, and communities need to ensure that developers are building an asset to their community that will continue to contribute to its character for the next 50 years.

What kind of guidance can CEDR offer those communities?
If half your downtown is vacant and boarded up, it’s hard to know where to start. CEDR can go into these historic central business districts and give a community a road map. We show them what they could be versus what they are today, and we can give them step-by-step instructions to help them get from point A to point B.

That involves everything from architectural design to financing building restoration, identifying parking needs, helping them activate festivals, and creating downtown park space to hold small concerts. Every historic downtown is unique, so we go in and work with the community to help them make sure their historic downtown is an asset that attracts people and businesses.

What trends is CEDR noticing in Georgia?
One of the things that we have seen post COVID-19 is people who can work remotely are moving out of inner cities, and they’re not stopping at the suburbs. They’re going to exurbs and small towns, where property is cheaper and crime is less – and the communities that have already done an excellent job bringing back life into their historic downtowns are going to be the winners here. Placemaking helps set these communities aside as somewhere special with unique characteristics that are going to draw residents.

CEDR is hosting its annual Basic Economic Development Course (BEDC) August 26-29 in Atlanta. Can you give us a brief overview of that program?The BEDC is the longest running basic economic development course in the nation; this is the 57th year that it’s been offered by Georgia Tech. They partner with IEDC, the International Economic Development Council, to put on this four-day course, which covers a wide variety of economic development subjects, from real estate redevelopment to business recruitment. We do marketing and promotion. We do ethics in finance. The people who take the course are usually new to the economic development industry, and the BEDC gives them a very deep and thorough overview of what to expect in their economic development careers.

Every year I’ve taught it, the BEDC has been about placemaking, creating a place where people want to live and businesses want to be. Right now, too many people live where they do because they have to, not because they want to. Smaller communities should look around and figure out what makes them special, because they need to capitalize on their unique assets if they’re going to be a population winner in the future.

Register for the 57th annual BEDC here.

Increasing Expertise: Leigh Hopkins Earns Certified Economic Developer Credential

Senior Project Manager Leigh Hopkins earns her Certified Economic Developer credential

Leigh Hopkins, CEDR senior project manager

Economic developers around the state, many with years of experience and expertise themselves, often hire the Enterprise Innovation Institute’s Center for Economic Development Research (CEDR) for assistance with workforce development, strategic planning, fiscal and economic impact analyses, and more. Now, when CEDR gets a call, the program will have one more resource to offer. Leigh Hopkins, senior project manager at CEDR, is a newly minted Certified Economic Developer (CEcD). It’s a national designation that’s been years in the making, and marks Hopkins as an authority in the field of economic development.

The credential wasn’t always her goal. “I’m a city planner by trade and education,” Hopkins said.

She completed a master’s degree in city and regional planning from Georgia Tech in 2005, then worked for the city of Atlanta as well as the private sector before coming back to her alma mater in 2008. After joining CEDR, she got her certification from the American Institute of Certified Planners.

“I’ve held that certification ever since 2010, because it’s the industry credential for the planning profession, and I was hired here to work on projects with a planning component,” she said. “Over time, my job has morphed from planning, which can sometimes be idealistic, into economic development where the rubber meets the road in terms of helping communities implement their plans, but economic development wasn’t my area of expertise at first.”

As her role changed to include economic development-type work — strategic plans for communities and workforce development, primarily — she was encouraged to pursue the CEcD designation. It’s a journey that can take years and involves core classes central to the economic development field, at least four years of work experience, and a three-part comprehensive exam.

“When I started working at Georgia Tech, we had two senior managers who had their CEcD certifications,” Hopkins said. “They were mentors and encouraged us to participate in professional development courses. Georgia Tech is one of the host sites for courses offered by the International Economic Development Council, the accrediting body for the CEcD. I was encouraged to take their classes.”

To receive the certification, candidates must complete four required courses: Basic Economic Development, Business Retention and Expansion, Economic Development Credit Analysis, and Real Estate Development and Reuse. In addition, candidates choose two courses from a list of electives that include finance, marketing, small business development, and neighborhood development strategies. Hopkins selected economic development strategic planning and workforce development as her electives, since they are the areas she works in most often.

Her current boss, CEDR Director Alfie Meek, Ph.D., also supported her in getting the designation. “Our primary clients are the local economic developers around the state, many of whom have the CEcD certification themselves,” Meek said.  “As the ‘experts’ who are hired to provide advice and thought leadership to these communities, it gives us instant credibility and rapport with our clients if we have put in the hard work to achieve that same level of professional credential.”

Hopkins agrees that it’s hard work. In fact, only about one-third of those who take the exam pass it. She has some tips for people who are considering it.

    • Study the books. Much of the test is straight from those.
    • Take a prep course or two.
    • Practice writing the essays.
    • Learn the terminology.
    • Get a mentor or study buddy.

“Passing the exam shows that you have arrived in this field,” Hopkins said. “There are also good networking opportunities and good opportunities for professional development within the field.” And while the credential is significant to her, it’s more meaningful in the context of her job.

“It was important to have someone on our staff to get the certification, to add credibility to what we do and how we interact with our clients,” Hopkins said. “I think it gives our clients peace of mind. They feel that they’re in good hands with somebody who is accredited and well-versed in the economic development field.”