Execute Growing Opportunities report recommendations related to economic development

Economic Development
Description

There is a distinct correlation between economic development and workforce development efforts. The Growing Opportunity report seeks to better align these efforts in order to increase the City's opportunity for success.
Why and What it Achieves

The Growing Opportunity report seeks to further align economic and workforce development efforts, thus bridging the gap between job creation/businesses and training/individuals. This is carried our through a series of outreach programs beginning with our personal business visitation program and continuing with our GO HIRE, ACE and Made In Charlottesville initiative.  
Status

During FY17, the OED continued to focus on aligning economic and workforce development efforts with the following program results:

GO HIRE -  provides wage subsidy and incumbent worker training by serving 12 city businesses in the past fiscal year. The average wage of the 37 employees served  was $17 per hour.

ACE - provides micro grants to help increase revenue and capacity of city based businesses. In the recently past fiscal year 21 businesses were served with $25,000 in grant funds.

VJIP Match - a commonwealth of Virginia program that helps fast growing companies that are a part of the economic base. The city provides a local match to these efforts to further assist business development. In FY17, 47 jobs were created with an average wage of $34 per hour and a total of $3.35M in local payroll.

In addition, the Office of Economic Development has offered three GO training programs that provided in-demand workforce training to 18 City residents. OED staff hosted three major hiring events/job fairs that assisted nearly 100 local employers in their efforts to hire job seekers. In addition, to the job fairs/hiring events hosted by the Office of Economic Development, staff also regularly participates in the weekly job fairs held at the Virginia Workforce Center. The Downtown Job Center provided transportation assistance to 102 City residents through the GO Ride program allowing residents to be able to ride the bus to look for work and also to get to work once they obtain employment.