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Happy Economic Development Week, everyone! This week, May 9-15, is nationally recognized by the International Economic Development Council as an opportunity for promoting local programs that create jobs, advance career development opportunities, and improve communities’ quality of life everywhere.
I am greatly pleased to share during this week that our region’s great partnerships and regional collaboration has put us on track for the best year ever for our region’s economic growth. The Greater San Marcos Partnership (GSMP) is about to close on its eighth company expansion or relocation this fiscal year. More details will be shared soon, but I want to take this moment to reflect on what this number of announcements means.
If you are a familiar reader of this column, you already know that fiscal year 2020 (ended September 30, 2020) was a tremendously successful year for our region. Even with the challenges that the pandemic presented, GSMP facilitated the relocation or expansion of seven companies, bringing a conservative estimate of 550-plus new jobs.
This year, just eight months into fiscal year 2021, we have already surpassed the record set last year for the number of announcements in a single year. Many more major announcements are anticipated due to the large number of prospects in the current pipeline, representing the best year of growth for our region, ever.
Speaking of those prospects, the prospect pipeline has exploded in this fiscal year, as it currently represents more than $20 billion in prospective capital investment for our region. For reference, it is three times larger than FY20’s record-breaking pipeline and nearly ten times more than the record that stood before it. It represents thousands of potential jobs for the residents in our footprint and it continues to grow just about every day.
None of this, of course, is by accident or coincidence. Our region came together to build a consensus-driven, community-built plan known as Vision 2025 to be our communal economic development strategy. We are seeing incredible response from relocating and expanding businesses from following this strategy, which has been why GSMP has seen the success it has been seeing this year.
This week during economic development week, we’ve taken time on to highlight several key communities in Hays and Caldwell counties (Buda, Dripping Springs, Kyle, Lockhart, Luling, San Marcos) through a series of videos we have been sharing on social media. You can find those videos on our YouTube page (Greater San Marcos Partnership), LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook (@GreaterSMTX). I strongly encourage you to see these short videos to learn what our communities have to offer and why companies are choosing our region again and again.
This is an extremely exciting time to be in the Texas Innovation Corridor and our shared success is reason to celebrate Economic Development Week. If you would like to know more about Economic Development Week, or how you can participate with GSMP’s work, please reach out to me at [email protected] or on Twitter @JasonGiulietti. I look forward to speaking with you.
