Boone Economic Development Corp. celebrates successes at annual meeting

Molly Whitehead, the EDC’s executive director, outlined how recent success in attracting new businesses, and the announcement by others of expansions here, meant good economic news for Boone County. She was followed by speaker Gerry Dick, president of Grow Indiana Media Ventures, LLC, who shared other good news from across the state.

Whitehead said the county in 2015 the county landed $38.3 million in capital investment, with the potential to produce 381 new jobs. In the last two years Boone County has landed $151.8 million in capital investment that is projected to produce up to 410 new jobs, she said.

A key part of the EDC’s activities is the encouragement of small businesses and entrepreneurs, Whitehead said. Small businesses account for about 90 percent of Boone’s economy. “We cannot survive without them,” she said.

Assistance, such as a micro-loan program, targeted at those small businesses are not merely to launch them toward success, Whitehead said. “When they become the next Amazon of the world, we want them to remember where they are from, so they will remain here.”

Boone County’s location gives it a prime edge in attracting leading-edge life sciences, agrosciences, logistics, automotive and other companies, Dick said. The future impact of the CSX Select Rail site in Lebanon can’t be under-estimated, he said.

Recent announcements by companies moving to Boone demonstrate that edge, he said.

Daimler Trucks North America will invest $12.35 million and hire up to 45 people for a distribution center in Anson that Dick said will ship about 7,000 new parts a day to customers within a 350-mile radius.

“I think it is reflective of what is happening around Indiana,” Dick said, as the state continues to successfully compete for significant business projects.

“Who would have thought a few years ago a Silicon Valley-based company would be a regional headquarters in Indianapolis?” Dick said.

“Subaru just up the road continues to do great things,” he said. “Even through the recession, they continued to expand.” The company is investing $140 million and plans to add 1,200 jobs at its Lafayette factory, so it can build 100,000 more vehicles a year. About 3,800 people are employed at the plant which builds Subaru Outback SUVs and Legacy sedans. Production of Impreza sedans is expected to begin by the end of this year.

Parts for those vehicles will be shipped from a massive distribution center Subaru built on Monument Drive in Lebanon.

“The IT space is really on fire, particularly in central Indiana,” Dick said. In Boone, those include DK Pierce, in Zionsville, which specializes in healthcare reimbursement; MOBI Wireless Management, a cloud-based software provider; and Telamon Corp., which is moving into a new building in Anson.

Indiana’s challenges include boosting the knowledge of an under-educated work force.

“Too few Hoosiers have college degrees,” Dick said. “There is a skills gap ... especially in technology.”

The Vincennes University Gene Haas Training and Education Center training center, 321 N. Mount Zion Road, Lebanon, is an example of steps being taken throughout Indiana to expand education for Hoosiers, he said.

“It is a big deal in training young people to go into careers,” Dick said.

Whitehead said that talent attraction and retention are among the EDC’s tasks, “to accurately reflect that talent in Boone County comes in all shapes and forms.”

The Lebanon Community School Corp. and the EDC have joined in an Education Workforce Innovation Network program that has the objective of creating what Whitehead called “a plan for K-12 students to have a pathway” to specific jobs.