32 counties seek economic cooperation
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What do the populations of 32 counties in four states that form the headwaters of the Ohio River have in common?
It turns out a lot.
Twenty-five years after the collapse of the steel industry put the entire region into an economic slump, the residents have adopted a commitment that the regional economy has to be industrially diverse and welcoming to entrepreneurs.
This is one of the lessons the organization called Power of 32 learned through a six-month exercise of meeting with a total of 3,300 residents in all 32 counties and asking them what they thought the strengths and weaknesses were for the region and what they want to see in the future.
"We've learned the value of diversifying our economy, and people feel really strongly that that has to be maintained," said Selena Schmidt, the executive director of Power of 32, a regional economic development initiative.
She said policy experts and public officials had been preaching the value of diversification for a long time, but that "to know that is the actual real experience on the ground makes a real difference."
The difference is that government officials will know that they have the support of the population when making tough economic choices to diversify the economy.
What also came out of the meetings is that one of the problems facing the region at large is that there are so many governmental bodies: four states, 32 counties, 230 school districts, 62 cities, 20 municipalities, 342 boroughs, 463 townships, 63 villages, 32 towns and eight special taxing districts (all in Allegany County, Md.). That's a total of 1,256 elected governments -- without including the more than 700 appointed government authorities such as water and sewer authorities.
Ms. Schmidt said that while some people wanted to merge governments, others liked the access they had to the governments that are close to their lives.
First Published May 18, 2011 12:00 am
