Utah Alliance

I’m reminded of the value of my membership in the Utah Alliance for Economic Development every time I attend a quarterly meeting.  I always come away with ideas or practices that broaden my understanding of economic development.   Often new ideas and practices come from presentations, but just as often I learn from casual conversations with government, private industry and economic development peers.  I have made great professional friendships that support what I do for Millard County and rural Utah all year long.

Linda Gillmor – Millard County

Salt Lake City is third on Forbes’ list of the Best Big Cities for Jobs, the magazine announced.

No. 1 is Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, Texas, followed by Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, Texas. Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas, was No. 4, followed by San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, Calif. at No. 5.
For the big-city list, the magazine ranked 65 metro areas that each have more than 450,000 jobs.

Salt Lake City is placed highly in several of the business magazine’s other rankings measuring the job market, business environment, quality of life and other factors.
For more information about Salt Lake City’s rankings by Forbes, go to here.

The Salt Lake Tribune 

Dear EDCUtah Partners,
It's hard to believe that Economic Development Corporation of Utah is celebrating its silver anniversary. I reflect on the vision our founders had in 1987 when EDCUtah was created and realize that, thanks to your unfailing support, Utah's economy is the envy of the nation.Over the years, many other states have tried unsuccessfully to duplicate our model of economic development. The secret to our success is the level of collaboration that exists in Utah, which we have been able to leverage through our unique public-private partnership. To mark this occasion, we will be unveiling a special 25 Year Anniversary logo. I want you to be first to see this new branding as we incorporate it into our various marketing platforms. I encourage you to use this new logo in your own materials to let your stakeholders know of your membership in EDCUtah. Please, click on the logo below for more 25-Year Anniversary information and to download the new logos. It is your contribution and support that enables us to continue the work we started 25 years ago, and to fulfill our mission of serving as a catalyst for quality job growth and increased capital investment in Utah.

In celebration of our anniversary, I want to share some data about our recent successes. Over the past ten years:• EDCUtah has worked on nearly 1,000 corporate recruitment projects and successfully won 198.• These nearly 200 project wins have resulted in the creation and retention of 41,425 direct jobs.• Using a conservative wage estimate, these 41,425 jobs have resulted in payroll of more than $6B.• EDCUtah wins have also resulted in nearly 20M square feet of real estate absorbed -- the equivalent of nearly two Salt Lake City Central Business Districts.• Capital investment from EDCUtah wins has totaled just short of $8B.Thanks to many different factors, Utah is seen as a beacon of strength and security. Many different businesses have taken notice, and more continue to grace our office on a daily basis. Current project loads at EDCUtah are the highest they have ever been -- 50% greater than this time last year. Clearly, there couldn't be a more exciting time to be involved in economic development in Utah. As we embark on the next 25 years, I want to personally thank you, the 272 businesses and governments that make what we do possible. Your commitment to our mission continues to amaze and humble me. I know that with your continued support, we can continue to accomplish great things.

Thank you for staying the course. 

Best wishes,    

Jeff EdwardsEDCUtah President  & CEO

We want to give Bob Farrington and his crew a great big THANK YOU for hosting the Spring Utah Alliance Meeting. The newly remodeled Gallivan Plaza which included the building where we met, was a fabulous venue for our meeting. We had over 100 sign up for this meeting and everyone that attended went away with new ideas to implement into their own economic development strategies.

If we could choose one word that described the meeting it would be: Partnerships.

We started out the meeting hearing from Derek Miller, Governor Herbert's chief of staff, and Lincoln Shurtz from the League of Utah Cities and Towns. They presented on the past legislative session and some of the successes and issues debated during that time. Both of the presentations reiterated the need for working together with state, local and private entities.

Bob Farrington then talked about the new City Creek project and how Salt Lake City will leverage the new development to foster further growth in other areas of the city. 

Helen Langan and Phil Jordan discussed the Salt Lake Arts and Cultural initiative. Once again, it was clear that cultural arts in Salt Lake City would not happen without the partnership of the city, Salt Lake County, and private investors. Each one of these entities has a part to play in making this huge project a reality.

Bill Knowles, Robin Hutcheson and Sharen Hauri discussed the new Sugarhouse Street Car. This project is a partnership between Salt Lake City, South Salt Lake City, and Utah Transit Authority. What was once a "wouldn't that be nice" project is becoming a reality with an official groundbreaking for the new Street Car line on April 26. The first phase will go from Central Pointe Station into Sugarhouse.

It has been nice to finally see the weather finally change in Utah, as warmer days are definitely ahead of us now.   It is also certainly nice to see Utah experience a change in the economic outlook for the state.  It is anticipated that in 2012 should realize an estimated 2.8% employment growth or over 30,000 more jobs are to occur in the economy this year.  This is great news to come from where we were!

Additional good news is to see the state’s unemployment rate drop below 6% to approximately 5.7% in the recent month.  In comparison, the national unemployment rate was 8.3% for January 2012.  Interest rates are still low, average annual pay for Utah employment has ticked up and all in all the future appears a little brighter for the State of Utah.

The economy is ‘grinding back’ and it is predicted that the Utah economy will outpace the national economy this year.  The economy is ‘lifting up’ and private businesses have a little more hope for building their businesses this year.  We can only hope that economically we continue to grind though again to some type of improved norm.  That hopefully will mean continued business expansion and job growth, more housing permits and an improved business and consumer sentiment.

Utah’s population is forecasted to continue to grow at 1.5% that means over 53,000 more people will be living in Utah this year.  This could help home prices stabilize and continue to support the expected 5% growth in retail during 2012.

Now for economic development, we need both the business and consumer confidences to return in our favor.  There are numerous businesses and many consumers that are holding cash, waiting on the side lines for this economic cloud to burn off.  Cash is always king and there appears to be many businesses wanting to expand plants and operations but hesitate as they wait for that change in the economic outlook.  There is more discussion and want to ‘in-source manufacturing’ and help the US economy get back to the pre recessionary periods.  Utah continues to have great export volume and appears to be in a good place to right now as we continue to receive accolade after accolade as Utah positions itself to become even better.