With millions of dollars of competitive economic development dollars on the line, the Western New York Regional Economic Development Council has approved a five-year strategic plan it will submit to Albany next week.
The local council is one of ten formed statewide under an initiative launched by the Cuomo administration. This program has made available $200-million dollars in competitive funding for local economic growth projects. Only four of the ten regional councils will be awarded shares of this funding for use to develop "priority projects." Western New York's plan identifies a dozen projects, including initiatives in Buffalo's medical corridor, infrastructure improvements in Olean, and tourism and job training programs.
"The plan is really an excellent plan," said University at Buffalo president and council co-chair Dr. Satish Tripathi. "It really talks about job growth, it talks about smart development, it talks about entrepreneurship and growing the business and growing the number of jobs. This is an excellent plan. The plan really is not just for this phase of the funding that's available. This plan would be a guide for us for a long time, for at least four or five years."
Fellow co-chair Howard Zemsky says the regional plan and its projects result from an extensive process involving many people who studied more than one hundred proposals carefully.
"Did they have a significant economic, particularly on jobs and investment? Did they align with our strategies?" said Zemsky. "Our strategies and our themes broadly are smart growth, workforce development, entrepreneurship and business development, and from that we prioritized and selected."
The strategic plan, due in Albany by 4 p.m. next Monday, is available for review at http://nyworks.ny.gov/content/western-new-york.
