By Kirk Ross
Staff Writer
CARRBORO — As Carrboro leaders ponder the town’s participation in a new Orange County economic-development collaboration, they’re underlining support for a focus on growing local businesses.
At their retreat last weekend at the Orange Water and Sewer Authority headquarters, the Carrboro Board of Aldermen reviewed its own economic-development efforts, including an update on the replacement for the town’s economic and community development director James Harris, who retired at the first of this month.
Town Manager Steve Stewart told the board he had narrowed down a pool of about 70 applicants and would begin face-to-face interviews with a small group of candidates next week.
Stewart said he was looking for an individual to take on the priorities of the board, particularly the focus on supporting and growing locally owned businesses.
Board member Dan Coleman said while the hiring process continues, the town’s elected leaders’ commitment to local ought to be clear to whomever Stewart names to the job.
Coleman said that at the retreat, the board reached a consensus on the need to follow through on three priorities: building on the town’s revolving loan program, the launch of a Think Local First campaign and attracting more “green jobs†to Carrboro.
He said the town will try to bolster the funds in its loan program by pursuing state and federal grants, including Community Development Block Grants. Right now, Coleman said, the town has enough in the revolving loan fund to assist in the start-up or expansion of two or three businesses. One strategy to expand that number would be to try to target a grant proposal.
“There’s the belief that if we had a project attached to a grant, there might be federal support available,†Coleman said.
The Think Local First campaign, a top priority of the town’s recent Local Living Economy Task Force, aims to build more business-to-business ties and encourage greater use of local products and services by consumers and businesses.
Mayor Mark Chilton said that though there’s been disagreement over specifics, thinking local is a long-running policy in Carrboro.
He said the retreat provided a contrast to a recent meeting he attended of county, business and municipal leaders on a proposed economic-development collaboration.
“As a board, we’re still fundamentally committed to focus on local business and promote local ownership as a strategy for recycling the most dollars into the community,†he said.
Chilton said it’s been apparent from the outset that the county and other members of the group looking at a new strategy want to focus on recruiting from outside the county.
The recent hiring of Gary Shope, a former vice president at the Research Triangle Foundation with international recruiting credentials, as the county’s interim economic-development director shows the distinction, Chilton said.
“In talks with our neighbors, it’s clear that they would really like for us to join forces and cooperate in pursuing some strategies. But fundamentally it’s a group of strategies that run contrary to what we want to do in Carrboro.â€