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Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership and South Bend-Elkhart Regional Development Authority will each receive $50 million from the state for projects and programs to retain and attract workers. All 17 region applicants received grants.

“It’s a great day for Northeast Indiana,” Michael Galbraith, the regional authority’s administrator, said after the Dec. 14 announcement of the Indiana Regional Economic Acceleration and Development Initiative (READI) grants. I “look forward to more transformational projects throughout the 11 counties in Northeast Indiana.”

Now the group, which presented over $323 million worth of projects in its READI application, “Growing with Vision,” must meet with the Indiana Economic Development Corp. to decide how the funding flow works and which of the projects and programs will be at the top of the list.

Indiana Gov. Eric J. Holcomb made the announcement while chairing a joint public meeting of the board of directors of the IEDC and the Indiana Economic Development Foundation Inc. at Butler University. Formal recommendations for funding from the READI program were made to the IEDC board of directors.

“We are really ready for this fourth-quarter IEDC board meeting,” Holcomb joked as the meeting commenced.

The $500 million in READI grants by 17 regions represents $1.5 billion in projects that attracted $15 billion in investment. The regions’ projects had to rely on no more than 20% in state funds, with the other 80% coming from private or local sources. Funds to all 17 regions were given in the amounts of $5 million (1 recipient), $15 million (3), $20 million (4), $30 million (4) and $50 million (5).

The Northeast Indiana region continues to draw investment through state funding. In 2016, it was one of three regions to receive $42 million from the Regional Cities Initiative grant. Its Road to One Million Plan, named for the region’s efforts to grow from fewer than 800,000 to 1 million residents over a 10-year span, outlined a short-term goal of 38 regional development projects in all 11 counties totaling $400 million in quality of place investments, and more than 70 projects and $1.5 billion in public and private investment over a decade.

The READI citizen review committee looked at over 800 individual projects submitted by the 17 regions that each had a limited amount of time to present its plan for workforce housing and other projects for talent retention and attraction with public-private investment.

The Northeast Indiana Regional Development Authority’s READI application includes 130 projects totaling over $2 billion in investment in the 11 counties that the partnership represents — Adams, Allen, DeKalb, Huntington, Kosciusko, LaGrange, Noble, Steuben, Wabash, Wells and Whitley.

Some of the proposed projects are recreational, such as the proposed Poka-Bache Trail Connector, costing nearly $9 million, to link 81 miles between Pokagon State Park in Angola to Oubache State Park in Bluffton. Others, like the Invest DeKalb, totaling nearly $3.81 million, touch on multiple areas. The DeKalb County project includes downtown redevelopment of approximately 45,000 square feet of new build construction for retail, office and residential space. Meanwhile, Whitley County’s Churubusco Civic Center project, estimated at $395,400, would transform the 13,800-square-foot former PNC Bank building to space that would include classrooms to conduct entrepreneurship classes and other adult education opportunities.

South Bend-Elkhart’s plan, covering Elkhart, Marshall and St. Joseph counties, seeks to leverage the $50 READI grant into $461 million of total investment. With 32% of its jobs in the manufacturing sector it worries about the potential impacts of automation. With a population of over 526,000, it looks to skill up its workforce and create internship programs, attract monitories, and fulfill quality-of-place projects that include revitalizing a shopping area in Mishawaka.

Brad Chambers, Indiana Secretary of Commerce, said “READI is bold (and) going to be nationally recognized.”

“There were some unprecedented relationships developed,” Holcomb said of the READI process.

With the state’s strong revenue forecast, “We’re going to continue to lean forward and encourage that momentum,” he said.

With $644 million extra in revenue and another forecast to come Dec. 16, Holcomb was happy that the money could be invested into the state.

READI review committee member Jason Blume, executive director of Trine innovation 1 in Steuben County, said the process gave him a greater appreciation for what Indiana communities have to offer.

“I thought it was very insightful being myself a Northeast Indiana native and a lifetime Hoosier, I just thought it was very enlightening and exciting to get a statewide perspective from everybody.”

Specifically, he noted the collaboration that exists in Northeast Indiana among public and private groups as well as municipalities and counties that “we are so accustomed to collaboration that we don’t realize how for other areas it is a new concept.”

For more on Northeast Indiana’s plan, go to www.neindiana.com/growingwithvision to see a video, photos, presentation materials and more.
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