Economic Forecast - Biz Breakfast another success

By Matt Echelberry

Inquirer Reporter

[Matt Echelberry/media-credit] Galion-Crestline Cham­ber of Com­merce CEO and Pres­i­dent Joe Kleinknecht speaks dur­ing the event. Cham­ber Board Pres­i­dent Jen­nifer Kuns (cen­ter) and Board mem­ber Kim Polito look on.

On March 13, busi­ness lead­ers as well as the cur­rent city lead­ers and can­di­dates for the upcom­ing Spe­cial Elec­tion gath­ered for the annual Eco­nomic Devel­op­ment Update and Busi­ness Fore­cast Break­fast. Pre­sented by the Galion-Crestline Area Cham­ber of Com­merce, the event was held at Free Methodist Chris­t­ian Life Cen­ter to a big turnout.

Many rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the local busi­nesses spoke that morn­ing, includ­ing Dawn Ratliff from Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Geyer’s Super Mar­ket Pres­i­dent Rick Geyer, E-Crane Pres­i­dent Mark Osborn and A-1 Print­ing Pres­i­dent Dan Price.

Jeff McClain, state rep­re­sen­ta­tive for the 82nd Dis­trict, also attended the event. He gave an update on the bian­nual bud­get, which he said was “ambi­tious and earth-shaking.” McClain serves as Vice-Chair of the Finance Com­mit­tee, which will pass the bud­get by April 18 before it moves to the floor of the House and Senate.

He said there are three very divi­sive issues regard­ing the bud­get; the two he dis­cussed were school fund­ing and Med­ic­aid expan­sion. The finance for­mula for schools that the Gov­er­nor pro­posed is cur­rently being adjusted. Accord­ing to McClain, leg­is­la­tors are try­ing to reward the schools and teach­ers that are doing a good job. With Med­ic­aid, they are look­ing into what other states are doing. He said the changes will pri­mar­ily help with men­tal health and the uninsured.

[Photo cour­tesy of Dick Cope] State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Jeff McClain updates Break­fast goers on the state budget.

Changes with the sales tax has also been a prob­lem. The Governor’s inten­tion was to expand the tax base, but the com­mit­tee real­ized that it was not com­pletely thought through—McClain said it would have been a job killer. They are now work­ing through some seri­ous issues.

McClain also explained that a bill for turn­pike bonds will be passed soon, in which $1.5 bil­lion will be used for ODOT projects, to get them com­pleted sooner. Accord­ing to McClain, 90 per­cent of the funds must be spent within 75 miles of the turn­pike, which includes State Route 30.

“This is all designed to pro­tect busi­nesses. When busi­nesses do well, you hire peo­ple. When peo­ple get hired, their fam­i­lies do better…That’s really our focus,” McClain stated.

Lastly, he briefly dis­cussed a pilot project for opi­ate addic­tion reha­bil­i­ta­tion. The Gov­er­nor vetoed the orig­i­nal pro­posal last year, but a revised plan will be put back on the table. McClain said the pilot (if approved) is to hap­pen in our coun­ties, includ­ing Craw­ford. Viv­it­rol, a non-addictive injec­tion with no street value, will be used for the treatment.

Audi­ence mem­bers clapped loudly at that point.

After McClain’s updates, Craig Miley, owner of Craig Miley Realty & Auc­tion, addressed the audi­ence. He began with an obser­va­tion that there is a lack of moral oblig­a­tion in repay­ing debts in soci­ety today, cit­ing it as a pri­mary rea­son why the fore­clo­sure rate on homes is so high. He reported that 25 per­cent of Ohio home­own­ers are “under­wa­ter” on their mortgages.

Miley reported that the fore­clo­sure rate in this area start­ing to sta­bi­lize and inter­est rates are low. His busi­ness has con­tracted 18 list­ings since Feb­ru­ary. “It is a myth that there are too many vacant homes in Galion. We need list­ings now,” Miley said.

He also com­mended Annie Carter for her tes­ti­mony in front of the House Com­mit­tee on Gov­ern­ment Finance. He said he agreed that the gov­ern­ment makes it too easy for peo­ple to stay home, and encour­aged peo­ple to demand more from elected officials.

As it hap­pened, Annie Carter, pres­i­dent of Carter Machine Com­pany, also spoke. Refer­ring to her tes­ti­mony, she said that like many employ­ers, Carter Machine strug­gles to hire and main­tain qual­ity employ­ees. How­ever, accord­ing to her Craw­ford County has a high unem­ploy­ment rate. She added that the gov­ern­ment has made it “an option to work, not a necessity.”

“Despite what any­body says, there are jobs here. We need will­ing work­ers,” Carter stated.

Dr. Kathy Jen­ney, super­in­ten­dent of Galion City Schools, shared the One-to-One Tech­nol­ogy Pro­gram with the audi­ence. “Share” is used lit­er­ally: A student-made video was shown that demon­strated how tech­nol­ogy is being used in the class­room by both stu­dents and teach­ers. The video is on the school web­site (www.galionschools.org).

Jen­ney explained that all devices being used for the pro­gram were pur­chased through grant funds that could not be used for gen­eral oper­a­tions. Also, she briefly men­tioned the income tax levy that will be on the May bal­lot. “The Board decided to ask for the levy because the dis­trict relies mostly on state fund­ing, with 70 per­cent from the state and a 30 per­cent local share…We want to main­tain local control.”

Jerry Morasko, pres­i­dent and CEO of Avita Health Sys­tems, said the health­care indus­try is strug­gling across the state, but Avita has been doing well. Cur­rently the largest employer in the county, Morasko said Avita con­tin­ues to grow—the com­pany added 10 addi­tional ser­vice providers last year, with three more ready to join this summer.

Avita is set to focus on the patient expe­ri­ence now by expand­ing and enhanc­ing pro­grams over­all, com­pet­ing in this mar­ket and main­tain­ing local con­trol. “We want to make Avita all it can be for the patients,” Morasko concluded.

Todd Bai­ley, direc­tor of busi­ness devel­op­ment for Med­Flight, explained to the audi­ence that Med­Flight looked at sev­eral coun­ties for locat­ing a new base, but decided on Galion because of Morasko and the impres­sive work of Avita Health Systems.

He recounted a story about a seven-year-old Galion boy who had an acci­dent last win­ter. He fell two sto­ries and should not have sur­vived, but Galion Hos­pi­tal staff “did a phe­nom­e­nal job in keep­ing him alive.”

Med­Flight then trans­ported him to Nation­wide Children’s Hos­pi­tal in Colum­bus. “The patient sur­vived because of the com­mit­ment of the entire team. It’s an A to Z process,” he com­mented. Bai­ley invites any­one inter­ested in a tour of the base to stop by and meet the crew, who are on standby 24–7.

Dave Williamson, exec­u­tive direc­tor of the Craw­ford Edu­ca­tion and Eco­nomic Devel­op­ment Part­ner­ship, spoke briefly as well. He said the com­bin­ing of the Galion and Crest­line Cham­bers is a great thing and a pow­er­ful state­ment. He felt the orga­ni­za­tion will achieve more.

Williamson said other local orga­ni­za­tions, such as United Way, are con­sol­i­dat­ing as well. “Align­ment is key…We’re rethink­ing how we work together,” he commented.

He briefly updated the crowd on what Craw­ford: 20/20 Vision is doing, explain­ing that its numer­ous ini­tia­tives have seeped into well­ness, work­force par­tic­i­pa­tion and trans­porta­tion (in addi­tion to its four core areas of busi­ness suc­cess, work­force prepa­ra­tion, qual­ity of life and pub­lic safety).

This April, Vision update meet­ings are to be held, sim­i­lar to the meet­ings from 2010. Fur­ther details to be announced.

Posted by Matt Echelberry on Mar 18 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.