HVEDC’S NEW BOARD MEMBER

Over the past two decades, Tim Weidemann has worked closely with local governments, nonprofits and individual businesses in the Hudson Valley and beyond to create stronger, more prosperous communities and to deliver efficient, effective and equitable public services. He will continue his good work with the Hudson Valley Economic Development Corporation (HVEDC) in Poughkeepsie.

After receiving a bachelor’s degree from SUNY New Paltz and a master’s degree from Carnegie Mellon University, Weidemann was recruited into Deloitte Consulting’s Change, Leadership and Learning practice, where he managed several large-scale change-management efforts for statewide human services agencies and conducted new research on human capital challenges facing the public sector.

In 2006, Weidemann left Deloitte to return to the Hudson Valley, where he continued building his consulting practice, first by establishing a new municipal restructuring service line at Fairweather Consulting, and then by establishing his own firm Rondout Consulting, which helps mission-driven organizations build management capacity in order to maximize their effectiveness.

Weidemann put his consulting practice on hold in 2016 to join former Ulster County Executive Mike Hein’s economic development team as senior economic developer. He was promoted to assistant county executive and, following the election of former County Executive Pat Ryan, was promoted to director of innovation, where he led the county’s Covid-19 data and constituent services operations. In 2021, Ryan tapped him to run the newly created Department of Economic Development, where Weidemann spearheaded and negotiated a public/private partnership to redevelop the former IBM campus in the town of Ulster, now known as iPark 87. Weidemann also successfully recruited Cresco Labs, a

multistate cannabis operator and licensed medical cannabis organization to purchase the former Schrade site in the town of Wawarsing.

In addition to these major brownfield redevelopment projects Weidemann led grant applications for the county resulting in more than $25 million in new funding, helped to establish new programs to support entrepreneurship and innovation in partnership with the Hudson Valley Venture Hub at SUNY New Paltz, and operated the county’s first re-granting program to support small businesses recovering from the impacts of Covid-19.

Following Ryan’s election to Congress, Weidemann serves as special advisor for economic development in New York’s 18th Congressional District and continues to engage in regional efforts to promote sustainable and equitable economic growth.