Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, April 9, 1993 TAG: 9304090164
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DANIEL HOWES and DWAYNE YANCEY STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT PLAN PROPOSED
WHEN THE ECONOMY turns sluggish and local governments can't agree, business leaders intervene to come up with a regional game plan. That's happened in other places; now there's a move to make it happen in the Roanoke Valley.
A group of business leaders, concerned with what they see as the Roanoke Valley's tepid economic growth and lack of direction, is proposing a solution:
They want politicians and civic groups to join in crafting a single plan for economic development.
The Roanoke Valley Business Council - a loose collection of the valley's largest employers - is scheduled to meet April 16 to consider an embryonic proposal that could lead to a grand strategy for creating jobs.
"Somebody's got to start it," said Thomas Robertson, president of Carilion Health System and chairman of the business group. "I view the Business Council as a catalyst, [which], if necessary, could provide some money."
Although the group has not met to discuss the proposal, the idea is being widely - if quietly - discussed by leaders across the valley:
At least some local government officials have been approached, and have tentatively agreed to back the project. Roanoke County Administrator Elmer Hodge says he's all for the effort, although he doesn't know much about it. "I think they are just in the formulative stages," he said. Nevertheless, some specifics are taking shape.
Roanoke Vice Mayor Beverly Fitzpatrick Jr., who's slated to lose his job as the former Dominion Bankshares Corp.'s head of economic development in June, is being mentioned as a likely candidate to head the effort. Fitzpatrick will confirm only that he has discussed the idea with Robertson.
An urban studies professor at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte has been told to expect a call "from someone in Roanoke" asking him to come to the valley to lead a session on "regional vision."
Each locality now has its own economic development strategy. So, too, do several nongovernmental groups, including the Roanoke Valley Economic Development Partnership and chambers of commerce. But there's never been a concerted effort to develop a single plan for the entire Roanoke Valley - until now.
"We're talking about the Business Council taking a leading role in developing an economic development strategy with the [Roanoke Valley Chamber of Commerce] and the regions supporting it," said a business source involved in the planning who insisted he not be identified.
A key question: Who will support the plan, given the competing interests of various localities and development groups?
Some business sources, who spoke only if they were not identified, suggest that the idea is tantamount to a vote of no-confidence in the political leadership of the Roanoke Valley. They see each jurisdiction as pursuing its own pet projects to the exclusion of others - witness the city's Hotel Roanoke project and the county's Explore Park.
The sources also suggest that the Business Council plan may be a clear recognition by some business leaders of a need for increased business participation in public policy making.
Robertson, though, said the idea "certainly is not a vote of no confidence" in the valley's political leadership. "I think there is a feeling in the business community that we need to be involved in a process like this."
Still, Robertson - who headed the successful campaign to raise $5 million within two months for the Hotel Roanoke project - is concerned that the plan will be perceived as a power play by "Big Business."
It needs to be a "collaborative effort" with "no need in pride of ownership," he said.
More importantly, perhaps, is the recollection of some that it was the Business Council, then headed by Dominion Chairman Warner Dalhouse, that commissioned a study that supported consolidation of Roanoke and Roanoke County. The study was later discredited because it was rife with errors.
Robertson said his insistence on widespread support - instead of going it alone - is not intended to insulate the Business Council from any possible backlash.
Instead, the proposal closely mirrors what is happening in many other cities across the United States, especially slow-growth cities grappling with the loss of their traditional employers.
Drafting economic development strategies that cut across jurisdictional lines has become the vogue in many communities. The National Civic League - the Denver-based group that hands out the All-America City award that both Roanoke and Roanoke County have won in the past - even has developed a formal program for helping communities draft such regional plans.
Bill McCoy, who heads the Institute for Urban Studies at UNC-Charlotte, said many of the communities drafting regional economic development plans share traits with the Roanoke Valley:
They were built around one industry - in Roanoke's case, the railroad. That major employer has moved its headquarters, and with it much of the civic leadership that once set the community's direction.
The community also is divided among several governments, which frequently are at odds on what their economic priorities should be.
What's needed in those cases, McCoy said, is for some neutral party to take the lead and bring the different interest groups in the community together. Typically, that's a new generation of business leaders working under the aegis of the local Chamber of Commerce or other business group. In this case, that would be Robertson and the Business Council.
In many places where neighboring localities have banded together to draft regional economic development plans, they've called on outside consultants to do the work. As head of the urban institute at UNC-Charlotte, McCoy has participated in several such efforts - including one now under way to draft a single economic development plan for the 13 counties surrounding Charlotte - and that's apparently why he's being sought to lead a session on "regional vision" in the Roanoke Valley.
The key, McCoy said, is making sure each interest group - whether competing governments, the business community, ethnic groups or neighborhood leaders - is involved.
"These things work best when there's a crisis," McCoy said. "The major drawback to a vision is you have to get everyone to agree it's the right thing to do."