The Mid-Hudson Regional Economic Development Council might be guided by judges”™ mixed reviews from last year”™s chase for state funding as it selects priority projects this summer for which it will seek a top share of $220 million in capital grants and employer tax credits from Albany.
Ten regional councils across the state will vie for those funds to assist job-creating projects that advance the goals of strategic plans prepared last year by the respective councils in the first year of Gov. Andrew Cuomo”™s regional development initiative. This year”™s pot of $150 million in capital and $70 million in Excelsior Jobs Program tax credits from the Empire State Development Corp. will be augmented by $530 million available from 21 grant and loan programs at a dozen state agencies, Cuomo announced last month.
Applications for priority projects to be reviewed by the Mid-Hudson council were due by June 29. More businesses, nonprofits and municipalities scrambled to submit proposals for hundreds of additional projects in the seven-county region by the July 16 deadline to file the state”™s Consolidated Funding Application.
Those applications also will be reviewed and ranked by the Mid-Hudson council before they are sent to Albany. The application process was streamlined last year for the first round of regionally focused development funding.
The 21-member Mid-Hudson council last year failed to win one of the state”™s top awards to regions judged to have the best strategic plans. Those awards, which went to the Western New York, Central New York, North Country and Long Island regions, ranged from $100.3 million to $103.7 million. Mid-Hudson was awarded $67 million for 61 projects, including 17 projects in Westchester County. Only one of the region”™s top three priority projects, a biotechnology incubator at New York Medical College in Valhalla, received any funding.
Scoring projects last November, a five-judge panel found several elements to single out for praise in the Mid-Hudson council”™s plan, including its “potential to drive strong economic growth and create robust and vital communities.” Yet judges found more weaknesses in the plan in areas that weighed heavily in the scoring.
Judges noted that four of the region”™s six priority projects did not address job creation. And the limited number of priority projects did not “readily align” with the plan”™s goals and strategies. Nor did the plan fully explain how private employers throughout the region would benefit from the priority projects. And the plan did not include specific time frames to implement those projects.
Along with the biotech incubator, the council proposed as immediate development priorities a cloud computing center at Marist College in Poughkeepsie and a high-risk assessment clinic for autistic children in Sullivan County.
Judges also noted that the plan was not clear on sources and amounts of leveraged funding for the projects. It also was not clear to judges whether the council was requesting state funding for each of the priority projects.
The council”™s plan for measuring performance and progress in achieving strategic goals was “very comprehensive” but might be too complex to implement without resources specifically dedicated to that, judges said.
Dennis Murray, co-chairman of the Mid-Hudson Regional Council and president of Marist College, referred questions about this year”™s project selection process to Aimee Vargas, mid-Hudson regional director of Empire State Development Corp. Vargas could not be reached for comment at press time.
