Economic Development Week: A Regional Perspective

Join us for a special Economic Development Week edition of The Economic Current, where MasonEDC Executive Director Kevin Shutty takes the mic for a regional conversation with Thurston EDC’s Michael Cade and Joe Morrison of the Kitsap Economic Development Alliance. Together, they explore what economic development really looks like in practice—sharing insights from their communities, how industries and infrastructure are evolving, and why collaboration across county lines is more important than ever. The conversation offers a behind-the-scenes look at the work shaping our regional economy today, and what it takes to build strong, resilient communities moving forward. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome to a very special edition of the Mason EDC Economic Current. Those of you that have been listening, you're probably used to hearing Tiana's voice on these podcasts. But this week we have a very special episode for everyone to celebrate Economic Development Week. And so Tiana has turned the microphones over to me, Kevin Shuti. And I'm excited to be joined by two of my colleagues in the work of economic development in our region. I have Michael King with me from Thurston, EDC, and Joe Morrison from KitSAP Economic Development Alliance. And we're going to have a conversation today about their work and their communities and how that translates to a strong region and a strong state. So let's kick it off there. Let's start with Michael. Maybe Michael, tell us a little bit about Thurston County and your Economic Development Council.

SPEAKER_02 0:52

Yeah, great. Thank you. Honored to be here. It truly is an honor to have a conversation with the both of you. Well, I think that's when I think about economic development, I think about the partners and the leadership that I get to work with and work around. But thank you very much for the opportunity. And Tiana, thank you as well. Good morning, good afternoon. Michael Cade, I'm the executive director of the Thurston Economic Development Council. We are the lead economic development agency for Thurston County. We're just very similarly organized like most of the other economic development councils in the state. We're a 501 nonprofit. I'm governed by a board of directors of 27 individuals. And I have actually two boards, but we'll just kind of leave it at that. Our mission is to promote and increase economic investment opportunities throughout Thurston County. And while we do that, we want to build a vibrant, dynamic, and inclusive economy that our citizens and employees and community leaders can participate in and make sure that we're building wealth that they use to create that quality community. And we create a quality community. I'm not talking necessarily about dollars and cents in our pockets, but we're about the ability to attract and retain that new investment that we do things with. But again, our mission is to promote and increase economic development opportunities. We have three or four platforms that we'll talk about later. But that's a I think that's a pretty good start for me.

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Thank you. Wonderful. And our neighbor to the north, Joe Morrison. Tell us a little bit about KEDA.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Well, Keda is far smaller in scope than the Thurston EDC. We have six headcount and five full-time equivalents. We've been around 40 years. We are focused on the same things that the Thurston EDC is. I would say that we have been also focused on looking at the opportunities in our local economy and the challenges and identifying where we can be most impactful. So whether that's you know the intent of a developer to build a large-scale development that might include some housing and ADUs and some recreation facilities and to put some acres into conservation. You know, that's that's very clearly something we think is important, whether it's to maximize defense opportunity. We have a rather large defense economy in KitSap. Uh we're focused there. Uh, we have an Apex program that actually the Thurston EDC is the main center. And so we sort of uh are a sub-recipient of a Thurston EDC grant where we help local firms get government contracts. And we have uh two employees on that side of the team that are just great at helping folks get Navy contracts and things like that. So we're in the space of entrepreneurship, we're in the space of, you know, how do we make it easier to value our businesses locally and how do we improve our economy in the community?

SPEAKER_01 3:44

Excellent, excellent. One of the places that I wanted to start the conversation today is maybe a little bit more on the um theoretical side, get some of your perspectives on this question of what is economic development. Michael, I know you and I have had a version of that conversation over the past couple months. And, you know, there's always sort of this, you know, a kind of a misunderstanding maybe of what it is economic development practitioners do in their communities. And so, Joe, maybe we'll let you tee off on what economic development is to Joe Morrison.

SPEAKER_00 4:15

The way I describe economic development is that it's the facilitation of jobs and investment, right? So what do you do on your daily basis? You're trying to help grow jobs in your community, you're trying to help create investment within your community so that, as Michael said, you can grow that wealth. Now, there's a lot of different ways we do that, and there's a lot of things that key into that. Lots of folks sometimes ask, why aren't we in necessarily the individual housing space or focused on homelessness? And if we're not focused on those things, well, why are we focused on childcare? Well, we're focused on childcare because the amount of childcare you have and what you pay for it indicates who can work in your household. And whether you're a single earning household or a dual income household. And when you have a dual income household, your workforce is stronger. There's greater folks in the community that can be employed, and employers have a wider range of people to choose from, and you have enough workers in your community, and you also increase wealth. So for instance, Kita's in that space, but we're not in other social spaces. I think economic development is really focused on jobs and investment and growing wealth in a community.

SPEAKER_02 5:25

I don't know if I have anything to add to that, Kevin. That was very well said. I think when we look at we break our work down. So I do this every month for our board of directors. What is what do we do? You know, what is the return on investment that they so gladly put into our budget and our investors and our contractors? So what do we do? We have to be responsive about understanding and communicating kind of the value of community and economic development. Joe is absolutely what space do we play in? And so each community, I think that's really why I like my job, is that each community is a little bit different from each other. We're all kindred spirits and we all share this kind of the same notion of the platform. But as we kind of go about economic development or community, we have to make sure there's a strong value that we build that strong community. Economic development is something that my one of my earliest mentors told me about. What is the value? Because I didn't know what I was doing when he hired me. I didn't be surprised he hired me. What is it that we do? He says, Michael, we build communities and we can't do everything for everybody, but we take on very strategic issues that have long-term impacts in the community, such as we develop an agriculture park. So we're not only focused on growing the agriculture environment and those producers and those farmers and those processors, but also the workforce that comes along with it. And Joe mentioned childcare. We are very concerned about childcare. If you don't have childcare, you are not going to have employees to do those things that they can't to make a better life for themselves. This kind of goes back to the old saw is that we end up with a community that we don't want, or we end up with a community that we work towards.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

So Mason County has long been economically at least and culturally synonymous with timber and shellfish growing. And those are some of our anchor industries here in Mason County. If I said, Michael, what are your anchor industries in Thurston County? What would you say?

SPEAKER_02 7:18

I'd give you the kind of the quick rundown of kind of what our major clusters are, major economic environments are, and certainly warehouse distribution has seen an expansive growth in Thurston County, certainly along the I-5 corridor, and it's an extension of that whole trade market that occurs between Everett and Vancouver. And so we have seen a quite a bit of expansion of that environment. Healthcare is a significant is the largest private sector within the Thurston County economy. And it you know, if you add one doctor into that environment, you actually add 13 jobs downstream. So we really focus on supporting the healthcare industry. The other thing is professional services. You know, we were lucky we had the state government there. That was kind of a catalyst to do things. But when we look at what state government does and services, we re-recruit into that industry, we recruit into that sector that you are providing these professional services that the state government, another joint base, Lewis McCord, needs to take advantage of. And so we lean into it. Agriculture, I'd mention agriculture as a pretty significant piece of our world. And I actually kind of embarrassed about it, but I wasn't a I wasn't a believer. You know, 10 years ago, 15 years ago, I said, no, we're not doing agriculture, ain't gonna do it. Um but when you start looking at it, peel back that layer of what it is, and you realize shellfish related to Mason County, Pacific County, Grace Harbor in uh Kidsap as well. So when you look at agriculture and you look at the things there and the the production and the lines of uh chain, it's it's a big deal. So those are the major drivers. The other thing that we have found, and it really isn't show up in a lot of the data bits that you'd find at any layer of government, really is the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Thurston County has 15,425 businesses. The majority of those are small, 10 employees or less. And so we spent a lot of time looking at that entrepreneurial ecosystem, spent a lot of time making sure that we're growing, but we're also retaining and transitioning those businesses that are looking for exit rehumps to make sure that they stay. Because if we lose those small businesses, we have a big significance. So those are kind of our major drivers right now.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

About Kitsap. What's driving your economy, Joe?

SPEAKER_00 9:32

Yeah, that's an easy answer. There are 40,000 employees who work at Naval Base Kitsap alone. About 15,000, 16,000 of them are military, meaning most of them are civilians or working for contractors. And so that is overwhelmingly the largest industry cluster in Kitsap. We have some spin-off clusters related to it. We have a small maritime boat building cluster with great firms like Safe Boats and Inventech Marine. Kita just worked with the Washington Department of Commerce and Inventech Marine to get a $200,000 Evergreen Manufacturing Growth Grant. And that helped fuel and fund their 60,000 square foot facility, which is the largest, newest manufacturing facility in Kidsap. We're really excited about it. We also have a pretty strong healthcare sector. We were talking earlier about Silverdale and the new hospital that's in Silverdale St. Michael Medical Center. And it just opened a new 74-bed tower last year, and that's on top of opening in 2020 with a half a billion dollar construction cost. We are the center of healthcare, not just for the kids at the peninsula, but oftentimes also for the surrounding areas of the Olympic peninsula. People need to get into Silverdale to do that. So I'd say healthcare, maritime, and of course our big driver is defense.

SPEAKER_01 11:00

Let's maybe stick on defense for a couple of seconds. The Navy has some really exciting investments that are going to be happening over the next five, 10 plus years in Bremerton. And we've been watching that quite a bit here in Mason County as well. What can you tell us about PSYOP? What is PSYOP?

SPEAKER_00 11:17

Yeah, sure. PSYOP is the shipyard infrastructure optimization program. It's an effort on the national level to upgrade the facilities of our nation's four public shipyards. Uh here in KitSap, that means it'll be upgrading um Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility, Bremerton, which is 134 years old. And so you can just think of it this way: there's an industrial plant that's 134 years old that has never really been comprehensively looked at and upgraded. So this isn't a once-in-a-lifetime upgrade. It's kind of like a once in a hundred years upgrade. As part of that upgrade, they need to build a dry dock that is capable of servicing the Ford class aircraft carrier. And that is the new generation of aircraft carrier that the U.S. Navy has. And so this is an investment that will be in the billions of dollars that comes to KitSAP. And I look at it as Keda's job to work to capture as much of that as we can for our local economy, right? And it and it won't be easy. There's going to be a lot of national players, a lot of rather large construction firms not headquartered here, sending folks in. And it's a it's a remarkable investment that can benefit, you know, not just our restaurants and our local businesses, but that can help sort of increase the industrial capacity and the long-term job capacity of Kitsap. And so that's squarely, I would say, where Keith is focused on doing our number one job.

SPEAKER_01 12:52

That's excellent. That's a really exciting project for you and our region. Now, I want to maybe zoom in a little bit on your own experiences in economic development and how you ended up in this line of work. Michael, maybe give us a little bit of background on your economic development origin story and what's sort of driven your growth in the profession.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

That's a great question. Fortunately, I'm kind of snickering myself. This is my second job since college. So, you know, I kind of found something that I enjoy and I'm stuck with it. I started in 1991 uh working for the at that time, the Snowhomish Economic Development Council, Snowmish County Economic Development Council. Um, and I was hired as the local business development manager. And my boss didn't talk to me for like three weeks. And I finally went to him and said, Wait, wait, what's the deal? You hired me, you're not talking to me because that's it's not my job to talk to you. My job is for you to make sure that you are confident and comfortable in designing a work program that benefits this community. So here's some things you should work on. Oh my word. Okay, perfect. And so when I worked there, I worked at the Snowmish Group for 12 years and then ultimately became the vice president. But my first week on the job, I didn't really realize this was my job, but the Everett Craft Warehouse or Craft Mill announced that they were closing. And then, so that was on a Friday. On a Wednesday of the next week, we were hit by one of the hundred-year floods in the Snowmish River. And the Seattle Snowmish Mill essentially was inundated with floodwaters, and their entire inventory went down into down the river and out into the bay. And they lost the entire inventory and they had to shut down. And then three weeks later, the food processing plant in Stanwood burnt down. And so my mom said, You're either really bad luck, or you got to get busy. And so what we what I did was I started working with those partners that were coalesced around to deal with the employment and the environment and also the economy. And it gave me just a master's class in understanding how you actually do economic development in a very stressful environment. We worked with a workforce development council at the time, the PICs, the county, the cities, employment security, um, department of trade, the folks in the uh plumber industry and corporate world at Warehouser and some of the other folks. And so I started my world doing that work. And I was lucky enough, John, my boss that was lucky enough to mentor me to understand how do you take those very dramatic environments that you just dealt with over the last nine months and translate that into building a vibrant, inclusive local economy. So started working in the rural communities and a lot of things in Snowhomish, and then ultimately ended up doing work around the aerospace and the biomedical manufacturing space. I was really given an opportunity to do some really good work and really, really, really appreciated and uh enjoyed working for John and then Deborah Knutson was took the role thereafter. I think that was your question about how to get started in that. But what I found was even though I was afforded other opportunities to go elsewhere, what I found was that I really dug it. I really enjoyed the work that I was doing. And not only that, but every day was a little bit different. And if you think about it, every hour is a little bit different. And I had an opportunity to work with individuals and communicate with individuals that were truly making a difference in the community. And I I really gravitated towards it. I I just soaked it up. I loved it. I was a county executive at that time. Bob Drewell was his name. He ultimately ran the Puget Sound Regional Council, he was executive director, and he it was so gracious. It's so the notion of extending grace to individuals and encouraging that you can, as an economic developer, make a difference. And then he'd take your work and then he'd talk about it publicly, and you'd you'd sit there and think, wow, he just speaks to like 300 people that talked about the work I was doing. He didn't do that work, I did it. And I realized it really wasn't about me, right? It was about the community and the individuals that I worked with, and those individuals that we worked for. And how do we serve individuals and what do we owe those people? And that's where how we started economy, and that's why I stuck to it. People talk to say, well, it's the only second job. You must not be employable. Yeah, probably there's a little bit of that. But I just every day is I still have that same verb. I have that same idea that how do we work for each other and serve each other? This is fantastic work.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

If Michael Cade is unemployable, Joe. We should we should probably start rethinking things. But that's a good way to maybe tee it up for you. What was what was your early entry into economic development work and what are some of those foundational projects maybe that you worked on?

SPEAKER_00 17:40

Well, just want to say I I think it's great to to listen to Michael because I refer to him outside of this podcast studio as the godfather of economic development. Which is which is a mixed which receives mixed reviews perhaps sometimes. But, you know, in terms of the principles that he espouses when he's talking about his origin story, you know, it doesn't get better than that. And most of what we do is good, right? Like overwhelmingly, 90 to 95% of everything we're doing is good for the community, good for incomes, and and we're the good guys and good girls in our day jobs. So totally agree with that. My beginning was different in every way. I got a business degree, went back home to my hometown of Anchorage, Alaska, and they had received federal money, which was kind of funny. It the story goes something like this: there was a Republican governor at the time, which there usually is, and the Republican governor's like, no, I'm not taking that money, Obama. And the municipality of Anchorage said, we are absolutely taking your $12.7 million, Obama. And we built a venture fund with it to invest in local businesses. And so I spent six years on and off doing that. And it was a really interesting, one-of-a-kind job. And so we ended up building a bunch of subfunds, and those subfunds would go out and invest in companies at all different life cycles, at the entrepreneurial growth stages. And then some of them, some of them would flame out and implode dramatically, and some of them would eventually return a little bit of capital. And I remain really interested in in communities like Mason County, in communities like Adams County, how do you capture entrepreneurial opportunity, right? Because it's it's kind of an easy conversation to have in Seattle. It's an easier conversation to have in Spokane. It's kind of an easier conversation even to have an Olympia, but it's not easy in the rest of America. So how do you do it? Because that's where uh long-term opportunity um comes from. You know, one of KitSApp's great stories is one guy uh and and a couple co-founders got together and they started a company and they started building boats for uh the U.S. Coast Guard, which needed a small-scale, small format offshore patrol vessel. That company today is Safe Boats. It's an international boat manufacturer. And then one of them went and started the other one called InvinTech Marine. So we have uh a growing maritime cluster thanks to entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship. Uh and I I remain transfixed by that question. Um, we're lucky in our community to have some strong entrepreneurial support players like Elena Imbok at Matchstick Labs. Over the last four years, we've run um micro business accelerators um out of that uh wonderful organization where they're focused on kind of the care and feeding of Kitsap's entrepreneurial ecosystem. So anyway, that's that's how I got started. And I was down here. Uh, I moved down here and and did the Alaska job for a while. And then my predecessor retired and I applied for the job and I got it, and I'm just the luckiest guy ever.

SPEAKER_02 21:01

I and I throw you a bouquet of stuff. We're lucky for it. Truly blessed. Did fantastic work. I really like the notion of how you create that entrepreneurial spirit. And you've done a great job.

SPEAKER_00 21:13

Really have speechless, Michael. Speechless.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Michael Cade, everybody.

SPEAKER_00 21:19

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:20

Who has forgotten more about economic development than most people have our will ever know, right?

SPEAKER_00 21:26

Yeah. Michael sets a really great example for all of us in economic development in the state of Washington. And it's not I'll I'll toot our own horn a little bit. It's easy to be an economic developer in the state of Washington. We don't I understand that incentives aren't everything to everybody, and I think that might even be the right answer for Washington, but we don't have a lot of incentives. We don't have a lot of tools in the toolbox. And at the end of the day, businesses care about their profit and loss, bottom line, and and how they can uh be a growing concern and a going concern. Uh and and create enterprise value and and and grow well. And I think that we will probably use this as an opportunity to transition to, you know, what are some of the challenges we face in face in Washington? We just funded, and we're thankful at the state level, we just funded a $300,000 economic development study that can give us a strategy for our state. You know, just the defense sector, we spent a quarter million dollars on a couple of years ago. And I think we're being vastly out invested by neighboring states in economic development, vastly underfocused. And I don't think we are doing an adequate job of appreciating our local employers and our local businesses in the private sector. And it's not really about taxes. It's really, I mean, yeah, but it's not about taxes. It's really about placing a priority and understanding that these are the people that create jobs and grow wealth in your community. So anyway, there there's there's a there's an opportunity to to hit that tennis ball back, Kevin.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

Well so you know I I think that's a great uh segue into the to the next topic, which is Washington's competitiveness both nationally and globally. And so you know we have been a leader um nationally and internationally in aerospace in tech. You know you look at some of the you know large large really significant companies who have started here, you know, Amazon, Microsoft, Boeing. But it feels like it feels like outside of that central Puget Sound I5 corridor, that maybe the economy and its competitiveness here is lacking a little bit. Michael, maybe what are some of your thoughts on what Washington can do as everybody's thinking this economic development week about our own place in the national and international economy. What does Washington need to do to reestablish itself as a as a competitor nationally and a leader internationally?

SPEAKER_02 24:14

That's the big question, right? I mean that's a that's the bang on question. Let's get it done. Let's figure it out. So I have my opinions and so I've you know done quite a bit of thinking and research about what is it that creates a vibrant state's economy. In Washington State I believe that economic development is done at the bottom level, bottom up. If organizations like ours um are left out of the conversation there is a missing component. And I don't think the state does that. I don't think commerce does that. So this is this is not a criticism. It's just a notion this is how I'm approaching it approaching that question. And then the other thing is the notion that um I strongly believe in three basic tenets of economic development uh talent, technology and tolerance, but also the notion that those things a lot of times come out of education. So I'm a big supporter of K through 20 and even pre-K through 20 and what does that do to set the pace for entrepreneurs and innovators? Joe used an example of two individuals that started kind of what they probably thought was a, hey, let's do a cool boat making thing and we'll make some boats. International change the course of direction for marine manufacturing that's what we need to allow. I don't have the kind of the recipe that allows it, but it has to do with ensuring that they're funded, those entrepreneurs are funded and they have space and capacity and support to do that work. And then the other thing um so it's that starts at the bottom up and then it works I believe on the entrepreneurial ecosystem that we're we're all talking about and dancing around. And the other thing is making sure that our large companies have the ability to continue to innovate. You know I I grew up in Redmond, Washington and right down the street from the what is now the Microsoft campus. It was an old chicken farm as Mr. Morelli hit my Spanish teacher it was his old chicken farm that now Microsoft is. And I think about kind of what that environment changed over when we graduated from high school in the early 80s to what it is now in the generation of wealth and the generation of products and innovation ideas is phenomenal. We have to continue to allow that to happen. It's not a tax thing, but we have to create an environment for those people to do the work that they need to do and want to do. There's smart people doing things. There was a chart that the University of Washington put out about 10 years ago and showed the ecosystem of the University of Washington, what spun out of the UW and it was amazing. It literally touched 200 companies that we all consider as mainstays of Washington state's economy. We need to get back to thinking that way is that you have one individual you have the the Kita which is generating a significant amount of resources and capacity around Joe just talked about the the the naval but also the boatbuilding and what what happens of it, what because of it, what becomes of it. So let's make sure that I have an ability to look at that what happens there and to ensure that I'm focusing energy that way and not being competitive with each other. Just don't get out of this competitive game. Let's think about it in terms of kind of how the economy operates or more importantly doesn't operate. So as Washington State kind of goes in I'm kind of dancing around the topic here I'm sorry if there's a lot of things spin in my head. But as as Washington State gets into it, they need to think about kind of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, make sure we build from the bottom up those smart people that do smart things and sometimes dumb things that create cool things. Got to allow it to happen. We have to have that strategy around um we have to have the strategy around allowing those uh established companies to innovate and expand and change. I was thinking about Phillips ATL you know one of the things I worked on at Snowmish was kind of their their thing, you know, imaging thing um and how they innovated that in North Seattle and became a major employer. Well that wasn't they didn't set it up they just had an opportunity. And then the last thing is uh resources let's make sure that we're focused on we have the resources the resources are individuals smarty people smart pants um but also the energy and the capacity and other other technology to do those things. So I think that if you combine them together you might come up with something really good. But they have to work with people that the three of us that are sitting around the table the four of us that are sitting around the table so I'll let Joe fill in the blanks or go any direction. Thank you. That was a great question by the way.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

Yeah I'll I'll continue to um kind of talk more at the macro level about Washington. So I'm stealing this from um Ashley Matthews who is last year's mayor of Bainbridge Island. She's a councilwoman on Bainbridge Island these days she points out that uh in 2014 Washington was ranked sixth in tax competitiveness. We are now 45th and we're the 40 we're 48th out of 50 states in terms of cost of doing the business. This has dropped from 39th in 2025 28th a decade ago. So there there are some things that we start to need to look at uh as a state and are we um in in addition to the economic side, just the dollars and cents side of how much it costs to do business here, we also need to look at like are we making it easy to do business here? Are we welcoming business and investment in our communities? When we run a process where government interfaces with local businesses and people who want to open doors and create value in the community, are we helping them or are we saying things like you don't understand how to go through our process? The right answer is we're here to help you succeed in our community.

SPEAKER_02 29:59

I'm sorry you start on something is it's about a year and a couple years ago one of the things that we do, we all do is we support significant projects at at the local political level and land use decisions and other permitting issue. So I was uh supporting of a major development that was still ongoing the issue still ongoing in Olympia and I was walking into the I was I was walking in the public hearing right so I'm walking in the building and my my phone rings and I said oh it's my dad yeah I got to talk to my dad I you know he's since passed and truly miss him he's a phenomenal business person in the Puget Sound region. But he said, hey what you up to and I said well dad I I gotta go. I I I can't I can't talk right now I gotta uh he goes oh what do you what do you do and you know he likes to talk and I said well I head into a public hearing he goes well I hope you have a good attorney and and he stopped and I said stop I hope I do too but the point that I took from it was that what Joe was talking about is we have to make space and we have to make room for those ideas. I didn't have an attorney it was that's not what it was about dad but we have to make space for exactly what Joe's talking make sure those companies have the ability to get supported and expand and innovate and continue to employ and continue to drive investment into Washington State. Otherwise we will continue the slow climb and sometimes not so climb down the ladder in competitiveness.

SPEAKER_01 31:20

So is that message to policymakers maybe not so much get out of the way of entrepreneurship and economic growth or is it to walk alongside entrepreneurs and communities and and help help support that way?

SPEAKER_02 31:36

I believe it's walk alongside I was asked that similar question at a conference last summer that put on by WIDA one of the state legislators there and she asked me the question I said stop squeezing business. Just stop it knock it off just you can't do that anymore. You have to walk along and support it. If you don't agree with them then just say it and then we will figure it out.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

Let's let's put some sunshine into the room too yeah Washington has been great at entrepreneurial development right wa Washington you know for for a long time was probably underinvested in terms of venture capital and other sources of like private equity funding for all the companies that were here and all the companies that were growing and that potential still exists but there is some exhaustion and there are some policies that aren't necessarily helping fuel that growth. And this is one of the few places in the nation where you know it has captured the tech entrepreneurship um rocket ship you know from an economic development perspective it's a mistake to say to 50 states across the nation, oh, okay, you're all going to be technology centers. But Washington state is actually a technology center. The greater Seattle area is actually a technology center. So it's really important that you do things like prioritize your qualifying small business tax law to allow for greater upside for investment into entrepreneurial companies and you don't shut that down because you've been really successful at the easy to focus on you know where government is maybe not being as supportive or helpful for entrepreneurs, but let's maybe shift the focus to the actual entrepreneur that maybe that that you've helped along the way.

SPEAKER_01 33:21

What's some advice you've given that you think entrepreneurs should keep in mind as they go down that path I always think of it as a wood shepper and that people are walking into it and they don't know what they're walking into and they might not necessarily do it for that.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

Yeah you know I think I focus more on a systems level these days, Kevin there's a lot of care and feeding that entrepreneurs need. And I think that one of the most interesting things that we don't do as economic developers is we might create the program like the micro business accelerator that we have, but we don't create the program that checks in with them three times a year afterward that provides aftercare so they can continue to get technical assistance. Or at least I don't and I need to but I also need more money to go do things like that. So anyway that's that's my answer. Entrepreneurship is the hardest thing it is one of the most valuable things uh and it is by and large often painful.

SPEAKER_02 34:18

Melody is a good answer.

SPEAKER_01 34:20

So keeping again in the theme of economic development week hopefully maybe there are some young people or maybe not so young people who are listening to this who think maybe there's a there's a career for me in economic development to either one of you what's a piece of advice that you would give to somebody who's thinking about embarking on this uh this career journey that you both have been on?

SPEAKER_02 34:42

I'll jump in. So I was an English literature major and a geography major I was going to be an English teacher. That's got into student teaching I realized these kids are going to be up and so I need to do something else. When I was hired in Stoholmish what I found was that it's the ability I felt one of the keys to my longevity here if I was going to make a go of this one of my things that I wanted to focus on was the ability to communicate with each other and communicate with leadership but also communicate at an ex-leadership meaning above the leadership level at the state level and at the federal level but also how do I communicate resources and opportunities and service to the private sector business. And so when I talk to folks about my career, they say, well I'd like to do what you do and I said I want to encourage you to do it. They said one of the things that I should focus on is I would focus on your ability to communicate and how do you kind of distill issues down. And if that's something that you want to spend time doing and don't be afraid to do that. But also think about those non-traditional economic development partners, right? And I think about the work that we do as individuals, whether it's on a school board or a church board or a United Way board, those are economic development partners. They may not know it, but as a young entrepreneur and a real economic developer, seek out ways that you communicate their mission about how it builds that environment that you want to live in. And so we spend in my office we spend a crazy amount of time talking about those non-traditional partners and making sure that we create space. This is not an exclusive environment and it really is up to us as economic developers to make sure that we're making a space at the table for an individual that has an idea and how they want to build communities, that they have a seat at that table. And it's not just figuratively, but it is literally come to the table and talk to the board of directors or at a at a team roundtable meeting or each other. But find those those entry points that you want to communicate and then we'll we'll work with you. So it's kind of start, right? Start the process. There's a lot of love there and I'm not afraid of that word is that we need to share kind of that love with each other about how do you kind of start economic development.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

That's an interest interesting question, Kevin. And I think I have some questions for you after this. I agree with Michael that interpersonal skills are probably going to be a competitive advantage for the under 30 crowd maybe I think that technology has really driven some interaction warp in terms of how human beings interact with each other. So if you're under 30 and you're great at interpersonal communications, you're that's going to take you really far in your career for a long time. The other thing that I would say is I I I'm gonna go back by the way it's kind of a new thing that people want to be economic developers. Yeah. Right? Yeah. And there's been I I think it's a good plug for the Washington Economic Development Association, which is a place where you can start to look at different economic development jobs and kind of get involved, come to the conferences, go to the community, start to network, and I think you'll find something for yourself there. And here's the good news you do good things, right? You're not foreclosing on a loan. You're not kicking a tenant out of their apartment building or anything like that. You know, you're generally working to do good things with your eight plus hours a day that you put into the job. So so that's the good news. Kevin, it occurs to me that we didn't get to hear you talk about Mason County's economy. And I'd love to hear a little bit about it because well as a as a Kitsapian we have an interest in Mason County's economy because it's really closely tied to us. And actually it's really closely tied to Thursday County's economy too. So what's what's your economy like Kevin?

SPEAKER_01 38:56

Well how the tables have turned no so our economy I kind of mentioned it earlier you know we have these sort of historic industries here timber and shellfish you know being top among those back into the early days of of Mason County and those have taken on their own sort of innovations and and have made changes over time. Some of that is is technological innovation automation has changed a lot of the way both of those industries look and work. Some of those have been regulatory changes. So obviously the timber industry uh you know has has dealt with its fair share of regulatory changes over the years. And so you know we're we're kind of at this point where we we love and want to continue to support and grow those those industries but you know we're also a little bit more prospective. And so healthcare also is a is a um industry here that we're focused on. Michael I liked your earlier comments about hiring one provider has a downstream impact of 13 other jobs. My wife is a a nurse practitioner here in Mason County and you know it's the it's a critical role that we have in in our community. I would also say that Joe kind of in relation to some of the activity around the Navy we've certainly been looking at how we can attract and support defense related jobs here, not just in North Mason County where you know you're bordering the shipyard you know with you, but also down here at the Port of Shelton where there's already active defense contractors. There's manufacturers at the Port of Shelton who do work for Boeing, who do work for the United States Navy. And so building on that and when we look at we look at the relationship that we have with the the Pugettown Naval Shipyard too, I always go back to 2024 Mason Transit, over 21,000 trips in 2024 in their worker driver program to the shipyard. That's a significant amount of workers who are coming from Mason County into Kitsap to do that that defense work. And so you know those are the areas where we're we're focusing and then I'm also really excited to to say that we're kind of along Michael's path with AG, you know, we're we're starting to lean into some of our agriculture work here. We were just awarded under $375,000 from USDA to support farmers and producers as well as our local farmers markets here in Mason County. And so that'll be a fun three year project for us to embark on. We're doing some of that work in partnership with Thurston EDC, who has a lot of experience in in looking at you know just business planning for market operators and producers. And you know the the Tenino Ag Industrial Park is a shining example of what a lot of long-term planning can produce in a community and in an ag economy. And so we're kicking that work off now and I think that's going to be a big part of what we do over the next couple of years.

SPEAKER_00 41:44

Thank you. You're a great partner Kevin we're we've worked on a a project or two together we have one coming out I think in the next month or two about the potential for sewer infrastructure growth along the Highway 3 corridor and I didn't say this earlier but you know first the people who care about borders is almost nobody right it's it's elected officials for the most part. You know I I uh let me think about this I shop at Costco in both Gig Harbor and Costco in Silverdale. And my dog's veterinarians are in Gig Harbor and my wine purchases are in Belfare at Mosquito Fleet Winery. Like I'm not thinking about where I spend my capital generally speaking okay I might buy the car down in Port Orchard, right? Because that's that's big tax. But we just don't think about this, right? We just live our lives in our neighborhood and surrounding communities. And so KitSAP and Mason's economies are really intertwined. And you talked about the worker driver program. I remember I come down to Shelton a couple times a year and like I always see a bus that runs every day that is full of people who work at the shipyard. And I also recognize that in Belfair there are more affordable homes that can put people into housing that is wonderful and comfortable and gives them the opportunity for home ownership at a at an affordable price point that is still part of my community. So anyway I look at this upcoming Navy investment we talked about Psyup a little bit billions of dollars flowing into our community I would really like to see growth along the Highway three corridor and I would like to see it across both of our jurisdictions, right? Because that's that's the opportunity. The opportunity is not, you know, we're gonna we're gonna improve one retail store that's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is there could be a half million new square feet of industrial space across both Mason County and Kitsap County that employs, I don't know, 600 more people and creates millions of dollars in tax revenues for jurisdictions.

SPEAKER_01 43:55

I think that's such a good point, Joe. I you know I was on I think I believe it was the director's panel at Expo last December. And we're kind of doing the similar discussion as this. You know, sort of where are we, current state in our economy? What do we need to do to be competitive? And one of the things that I I mentioned there that I think is just so appropriate, given the fact that the three of us are sitting down and having this conversation is that in my opinion, the era of go-it-alone economic development is over. Like it's done. And so the only way that we're going to see the kind of success that we need for Mason County is with support from Kidsap and Thurston. And I think I hope that when we work with you all, you feel the same way about our presence and support, making your community stronger. And those regional investments are going to become more and more attractive to funders, both at the state and federal level. Certainly, our workforce development, you know, region has five counties in it. We don't overlap with Kits apps, but there's a lot of I mean, look at Olympic College.

SPEAKER_00 45:00

But your community college is part of our system.

SPEAKER_01 45:03

And so and so we have a lot of this sort of cross-pollination of investment and opportunity happening between our communities. And I think that's I think that's the thing that really is motivating and exciting about what the future looks like. And even amidst all the economic uncertainty that's out there, a lot of it driven by things that are outside of our control, the one thing that we can control is how we work together to create opportunity in our in our communities and our region. And so I think that's the thing that I'm just most inspired by this economic development week is being able to work with organizations like both of yours.

SPEAKER_02 45:38

Heartily agree. I think there's it's a it really is the notion of the leadership that is moving an agenda for economic development in Washington State now. There is a sense of purpose that we need to work with each other and we will work with each other. I hate to be that guy who's like, well, when I first started doing economic development 20 years ago, well, I am that guy who was 20 years ago. It was competitive. I mean, it was absolutely competitive. You know, we just no, we're not going up to Skagit. We're not driving down to Seattle. We're going to be here. And it is nice to know that we have leaders in lead organizations that are leaders that are supporting the notion that the economy truly flows throughout. And it really is about taking care of one each other. So thank you for that comment. I heartily agree. And that's the way of the future. And I we're all in. We are supportive of the work that you do and Joe does. And it's just nice to have leaders like you folks at the table. It really is. Good stuff.

SPEAKER_01 46:38

Well, we just have a couple of minutes left. And so I want to give each of you an opportunity to plug something, KETA, something Thurston EDC, and tell people how they can find out more about the work that you're doing in your communities.

SPEAKER_02 46:52

Something Thurston. So there's a couple things, you know, keep going back to the entrepreneurial ecosystem. You know, this is a rough year and a half for us. We had a very, very robust entrepreneurial ecosystem that was somewhat dismantled through a variety of funding sources that were no longer available to us. However, we've rebuilt it and it is moving forward pretty strongly. I'm very excited about it. The entrepreneurial ecosystem that we have is very robust. It's becoming robust again. We just rolled out a program that you all know about as well. And partners thank you of pushing that out is scale up. It's it's funded through Washington State Department of Commerce, where it just happened to be the leverage tool for it. So that's something for entrepreneurs and businesses to take advantage of to grow their business. And the other thing that we've coupled that with is the Washington Center for Women in Business. It's a program that we've been pushing since 2013, I think when we launched. And it really is the notion how do we work with entrepreneurs? Either on a mentorship level, coaching level, a technical assistance level, but also to enable them to create product that they have the background and the support to make sure that they're successful. And it's some of the numbers are crazy numbers, you know, launched out of Thurston through that program, launched 150 businesses in the last year and a half. Most of those are still moving forward. And they're not all just women-owned, even though it's the nameplate. So that ecosystem is coming back, coming strong. There's some programs that we're involved with, South Peace Sound Community College was a small business foundry. We fund these companies. And so we're working on that. It's moving forward. That was part of the expo last year. And then the last thing, there's two things, is the makerspace. And that by itself, while we created it as something for entrepreneurs to take advantage to test out product and do things. We didn't think it would be as entrepreneurial supportive as we as to launch businesses. They themselves, their clients, I think there were 42 businesses that got launched out of it last year. That's phenomenal. People are going in there and saying, maybe how do I make this thing? And we wrap around the services to help them create a business plan. And then I think the last thing was the ACPAR. You know, it just creates tears in my eyes the notion that we have more than quadrupled the amount of acreage that is under uh new business plans that are operating at a high level and creating a profit for not only their operators, their owners, but also the employees that work there. It's just phenomenal. That is a multi-county effort. So those are the things that we're working on. And I really am proud of those things.

SPEAKER_01 49:34

And where can we find more information on Thurston EDC?

SPEAKER_02 49:37

That was the question, wasn't it? Yeah, it was uh our you can find us at our website. All of our programs are listed under thirstandedc.com.

SPEAKER_01 49:44

Excellent.

SPEAKER_00 49:45

I'll I'll give our URL, kitsaped a dot org. And over the course of the next six months through August, we're going to be doing a lot of infrastructure work and industrial capacity work. Uh that includes our joint sewer study that's coming out, which just talks about hey, if you put in more sewer capacity along the Highway 3 corridor, what does that look like for job growth? That's coming up. And then we will also be facilitating discussions on the present state of infrastructure near and around Puget Sound Industrial Center, Bremerton, and the port. And so having some conversations around that. And then in August, we will have our third, fourth industrial readiness summit because we've been focused on this upcoming naval investment for a number of years and trying to get as ready as we possibly can for it, trying to position our local businesses to capture as much of it as they can and trying to use that investment to further our economy. In September, we have tentatively planned the great Matchstick Labs.co, I think, uh, will open for an accelerator weekend, a micro business accelerator weekend. Side note, we've had Mason County firms participate in that before, and we look forward to welcoming them back. You can find all that online. So that's what we're up to. Excellent.

SPEAKER_01 51:07

Michael, Joe, thank you for your time and partnership uh and for joining us today on our podcast to celebrate Economic Development Week. Thank you both.

SPEAKER_02 51:16

Thank you. Thank you.