Commissioners get briefed on economic development

ALAMOGORDO – Otero County Economic Development Council President Mike Espiritu provided county commissioners with an update of the economic development for the County at their Sept. 8 meeting.

The Otero County Economic Development Council (OCEDC) is the premier economic development council bringing business to Alamogordo and Otero County. Their mission is to attract, retain and grow businesses and jobs in regions of Otero.

Espiritu said they attract businesses through marketing and sales and also help established businesses grow through specific resources.

“We have areas of specific focus when we target companies and they are: Aerospace defense, robotics and unmanned systems. We’re also involved with business retention expansion where businesses already established in our county can grow by linking them to resources,” he said. “We work a lot with workforce development in our community. In fact, it is the number one priority for businesses to consider expansion or relocation by finding a critical workforce.”

Espiritu said OCEDC is also involved with Alamogordo Public School and New Mexico State University-Alamogordo along with Holloman Air Force Base and White Sands Missile Range.

“Holloman Air Force Base and White Sands Missile Range are important economic assets in our region that affect us tremendously,” he said. “Holloman Air Force Base has an economic impact of over $3 million a day to our county. We support their efforts and we’re often supporting their needs.”

Aside from business development, OCEDC is also involved with state legislation.

“We work with our lawmakers. We’re currently working on broadband development in rural areas in our state,” Espiritu said. “I recently testified about liquor licensing in our state to the Rural Economic Development Committee in Roswell.”

On Dec. 2, OCEDC will host a job fair at the Sgt. Willie Estrada Memorial Civic Center, 800 E. First St., in partnership with NMSU-A and Workforce Solutions.

“Hopefully employers will hire people on the spot,” Espiritu said.

Espiritu also discussed the benefits of Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) funds and how they help attract businesses to the area.

“There’s a 150,000 economic development councils around the country and we’re all competing for a small piece of that pie,” he said. “Just a few years we didn’t have LEDA but now we’ve been able to bring businesses to New Mexico.”

Commissioner Janet White said she believes LEDA may be ineffective and could balance out the state budget by eliminating it.

“There are fiscal conservatives that believe that New Mexico can balance its budget and one of those ways is to eliminate LEDA, that’s $50 million,” White said. “These fiscal conservatives say LEDA is corporate welfare and is ineffective.”

Espiritu disagreed with White and said that if it wasn’t for LEDA we would not have some of the businesses we have today in the community.

“The reason I disagree is because LEDA funds goes back into the community. We leverage our funds first because we don’t have a big pool of resources. The companies that we brought here are a part of the LEDA funds. They have been part of the difference,” he said. “The result is not only do the companies spend a lot of money for the state but it goes back to the community. In order to invest money you need something to pave the way. I think it’s important to have programs in place to help businesses be successful and creating jobs. We’re finally getting there and I’d hate to see that go away.”

To learn more about OCEDC visit their website at http://ocedc.com/