All for one and one for all approach to guide new regional development agency, say mayors

Three of the four biggest municipalities on the Avalon took another step towards integrating their economic development efforts Wednesday in the hope of drawing more investment and talent to the region.

St. John’s Mayor Danny Breen and Paradise Mayor Dan Bobbett joined CBS Mayor Darrin Bent at the Manuels River Interpretation Centre to outline a deal to establish a shared economic development agency and to sign a Memorandum of Understanding committing them to finalize an operating plan for the new body and appoint a board of governors for it by the end of the year.

The agency is expected to employ several staff and operate in an office separate from the economic development departments of the three municipalities. It will be funded in its start up phase 70 per cent by St. John’s, 16.5 per cent by CBS and 13.5 per cent by Paradise. The partners are hoping higher levels of government will provide future funding.

Conspicuously absent from the deal is the City of Mount Pearl, which was a partner when the centres acquired ACOA funding two years ago to hire a consultant to examine the concept of a regional economic development agency. After considering the consultant’s report, Mount Pearl decided last year to withdraw from the scheme.

Bent said the new agency won’t stop CBS, or the other partners, from simultaneously pursuing their own development plans. CBS in particular is strongly focused on growing its business and commercial base to relieve some of the tax pressure on homeowners.

“This new agency will use the resources we already have in place as well as establish its own,” Bent said. “It will build its own organization from the bottom up and our hope is that it will expand into an agency that will be self-sufficient and be able to represent all three based on the needs that all three of us have. We’ll have representation on the board of governance to direct it in the way that we want it to go. So, when it comes to stepping on each other a little bit, there will always be some of that, because we’re doing that right now when we’re working individually and of course we’re all working to get the same prize. Working together we think we have a better chance of that prize.”

Both Bent and Breen said the arrangement won’t affect each municipality’s business tax regime. There will be no effort to offer a common business tax rate throughout the region.

While St. John’s will fund the lion’s share of the start up costs and will be the only municipality with its name incorporated into the name of the future agency, Mayor Bobbett indicated his town is not worried the capital city will dominate it.

“We’re going to have an equal say,” said Bobbett. “It will be equal representation. We are the three largest municipalities in this region and we’re going to work together as we always have, and this will be no different.”

Bobbett said the partners will combine to compete globally for business. 

“We’re looking at huge projects, we’re looking at things globally to attract businesses and firms to this region and to the greater Avalon area. That’s what it’s all about,” said the Paradise mayor.

Bent said of course each municipality will continue to work to improve its own business base.

“But when we go further abroad, when we get out of the Newfoundland and Canada spectrum, we become smaller as individual municipalities,” he said. “Together we are bigger… We’re looking for other investments to come here to help the region as a whole. When it comes to our own work that we’re doing nationally and locally, we’ll continue to do that. But when we get further abroad, we are smaller, and we need to improve our chances in landing some of the bigger fish out there that we know are looking to invest.”

Bent noted a number of other Atlantic regions, including the Halifax area and Moncton area already have such agencies working for their areas.

Mayor Breen said the new agency will focus initially on ocean industries, foreign investment immigration and supporting start-ups.

“Looking at areas like ocean sciences – if you look at the capacity that we have here in the ocean industries in Newfoundland and Labrador, with one of the largest amounts of GDP in the country to come from the ocean industries – that’s something that we can build on,” he said.

The timeline for the opening of the agency and its budget has yet to be determined.

“The basic premise if this is that when anything good happens in one municipality, whether it’s St. John’s, Paradise, or CBS, it’s good for everybody in the region,” Breen said. “We’ve spent a lot of time talking about how we can come together to put forward the region and the province as a great place to do business.”

Breen suggested Mount Pearl’s absence won’t hurt the three partners, or Mount Pearl.

“As I just said, everything that happens in the region is good for everybody in the region,” he argued. “It’s not like it was years ago. The boundaries are invisible here now, almost… So, if you attract a new company to one of the municipalities, people may live in any one of our communities, they may shop in any one of our communities. So, we need to keep that in mind, that we need to be able to compete nationally and we need to be able to compete globally, and the best way to do that is to work together with common goals in mind.”