At its annual meeting June 3, the Bridgeport Regional Business Council unveiled to an audience of 250 of its members a new quarterly publication titled “The QR: Quarterly Review of Economic Development.”
Subtitled, “What Gets Measured, Gets Managed,” the publication will now be produced quarterly by the 900-member regional business membership association. It will serve as an inventory of “bricks and mortar” development projects that are either underway, about to get underway or are planned within the municipalities of Bridgeport, Fairfield, Stratford, Trumbull, Monroe, Easton and Shelton.
“Our first issue inventories 30 projects in our region that will have a very significant impact on jobs growth and retention in the region as well as tax base growth,” said BRBC President and CEO Paul Timpanelli.
The inventory includes brief project descriptions, location information, project contact and a project stratus review.
The publication is the work of the council’s Economic Development Working Committee, which is described as a special committee of the BRBC board of directors.
“Our committee views this publication in three ways,” said Paul Antinozzi, committee co-chairman and principal of Antinozzi Associates, a Bridgeport architectural firm. “First, we will distribute it widely and it is intended to educate our audiences as to real development projects that are taking place and will have dramatic impact.
“Second, it is meant to dispel the notion that ”˜nothing is happening in our region,”™ which is held by far too many people,” he said. “And, finally, it will be used as a tool for the Business Council board and our committee to determine whether there might be a role to play for the business community to help move a stalled project forward more expeditiously.”
“Our second issue will concentrate on providing data for each regional project relative to jobs retained, jobs grown, capital investment and tax generation,” said Ken Oppedisano, committee co-chairman and president and CEO of Stratford-based Main Enterprises, a nearly century-old machine and mechanical-services provider. “This data will help us in determining how well we are doing with organic jobs growth in our region.”
The first issue describes 12Â projects in Bridgeport, three in Fairfield, three in Monroe, two in Shelton, five in Stratford and five in Trumbull.
The list includes projects that are completely private, such as a 300,000-square-foot office and research and development facility in Trumbull being developed by R.D. Scinto Inc., and Victoria Drive in Monroe, which will be a 160,000-square-foot retail center. Completely public projects are also on the list, such as the to-be-built Harding High School on the former GE site in Bridgeport, as well as public/private efforts like the soon-to-be-developed Downtown North project in Bridgeport.
Said Timpanelli, “As we began to work on the inventory a few months ago, it even became quickly apparent to us that the abundance of project activity in our region was really quite impressive, and we are convinced that this new tool will be very useful over the long-term improving our region”™s perception of itself regarding what is going on here.”
A complete list of the projects will appear in the June 16 edition of the Fairfield County Business Journal.
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