City: What would you do differently from the Johnson
administration when it comes to economic development?
Norwood: I would look
to build greater synergies between economic development and community
development. I would create a city development department where those functions
are merged. Housing and neighborhood commercial development go hand in hand;
they should not be separated. I would look to have more effort going into
business incubators to help develop small businesses. Small businesses are the
job creators and the engine of our local economy.
The city’s
economic development department takes a lot of heat for being more about
regulation than development. We’ve heard several times that it can think of
lots of reasons not to do something.
Do you believe those criticisms are fair? If so, what would you do about them?
I
think it’s absolutely critical that we understand that in this city, business
interests are already operating at a disadvantage. We have to make sure that
our governmental processes, our investment tools, are really designed to help
overcome that disadvantage and help become more development friendly and more
development ready.
I
worked very hard to assist in the rewriting of our zoning ordinance to make
sure that our zoning code was more development friendly. I believe that all our
regulatory processes could do with a similar review and, where appropriate,
with a retooling.
Would you
support city tax incentives to spur business development?
I
do support city tax incentives to spur business development. I’m just very
clear that those incentives have to and should be tied to the actual retention
or creation of a job.
Would you
spend city money on preparing development-ready sites, dealing with
environmental problems to get them ready?
Yes.
What, if
anything, should be changed in the relationship between the various
economic-development bodies throughout Monroe County?
I
believe that the Greater Rochester Enterprise should be the main outreach
organization for business contact and business promotion. I’m absolutely a
believer that there should be a specific cooperation agreement between the
city, the county, and GRE so there are no longer gaps through which business
investors can fall when they’re trying to grow jobs in our local community.
What would you
do to provide jobs for the unemployed?
I
think that there is a great opportunity for us to do a better job of
job-matching for people who are underemployed than we are currently doing. I
believe that a great way to do that is through this program of economic
circulation that I’ve been pushing; we should be looking to make sure that
local public works projects are opportunities for us to create local jobs for
local people.
I
believe that by pushing the unbundling of city contracts to make it easier for
more small businesses to bid on city contracts we will help create job
opportunities. I think that we really need to embrace the opportunity of our
not-for-profit employers. Whether they’re large employers like the University
of Rochester or the Strong Museum, or whether they are small employers like the
Baden Street Settlement, our not-for-profit sector remains vibrant and remains
a place where we can create jobs for semi-skilled or for underemployed persons.
Look at this great expansion of the Strong Museum; there is an opportunity
where we can grow jobs through creating a tourism destination economy.
We
need to be partnered with the hospitality industry. I think there are
opportunities where it comes to new technologies. Fuel cell technology is very
exciting. How do we as a local community embrace this form of manufacturing
technology to grow jobs? It’s not going to be one magic bullet that does it,
but if we can embrace what’s going on with our non-profit community, if we can
grow jobs through new technology, and if we can use the public works
contracting dollar, we can create opportunities for people that do not
currently exist.
This article appears in Aug 10-16, 2005.
