Group pulls counties together to sing Valley's praises to the world
It’s easier said than done for longtime rivals to put aside their differences and join forces for the larger good, but that’s exactly what the Rio South Texas Economic Council is attempting to do, all in the name of job creation.
Nonprofit Rio South was formed last year to get the economic interests of Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr and Willacy counties in sync as a way of raising all ships. It started when County Judge J.D. Salinas III and other Hidalgo County officials wanted to expand the Greater McAllen Alliance, an economic development group. Bill Martin, CEO of the Harlingen Economic Development Corporation, overheard a conversation to that effect and decided he wanted in. Today Martin is Rio South’s chairman as well as HEDC chief.
"We’re trying to broaden our horizons," he says. "We realized we actually will get farther by working together than we would working separately."
Rio South’s purpose is to market the Valley nationwide to large corporations that are searching for new sites, and to the consultants those corporations hire to scout sites for them. Population density is usually a deciding factor in where a company locates its operations, which means the Valley is often overlooked.
"We feel that sometimes, perhaps we get eliminated because none of our individual towns are large," Martin says. "But if you look at what’s going on in our region we’re at 2.3 million people, so we’re a large metropolitan area. In fact, our research indicates that we’re the 23rd largest metropolitan area in the United States and the third largest in Texas. We’re just trying to get on the radar screen of these site location consultants and major corporations that are looking for new locations."
Business Week magazine, meanwhile, ranks McAllen and Brownsville third and fourth, respectively, in its list of U.S. cities best poised for significant job growth in the first quarter of 2010.
Rio South’s plan is to reach out to automotive, aerospace, metal products, electronics, medical device and renewable energy companies via an international marketing campaign using direct mail, the Internet, trade shows and other means. MPC Studios of Harlingen was hired to execute the marketing plan, which was developed with help from marketing firms in Chico, Calif., and Cleveland, Ohio. The bill for the marketing blitz — about $200,000 — is being footed by the various economic groups involved with Rio South, Brownsville Economic Development Corporation being one of them.
Gilberto Salinas, BEDC’s vice president for marketing and public affairs, says his organization has made a multiyear financial commitment to help keep Rio South going — multiyear because such efforts don’t bear fruit overnight. He views Brownsville and McAllen as the two "bookends" of the Rio Grande Valley, which means Brownsville bears responsibility for helping drive Rio South forward, Salinas says.
He notes that Valley communities have always wanted the same thing economically, but have competed with each other to get it. Now those communities are sitting together at the same table as allies.
"That’s never really happened in the past," Salinas says. "Now we’re all moving in the same direction under the notion that whoever gets a project it’s good for everybody in the Rio Grande Valley. It’s taken a while for us to get that that mentality. We finally got there."
While making nice with old rivals might take some getting used to, it’s just how other parts of the country have landed auto plants, steel mills and other big providers of high-paying jobs. The governor’s office has authorized local incentives, such as tax abatements, in conjunction with any help the state might render in landing a major company, Salinas says, noting that tax incentives of one kind or another are something nearly every region offers to try and lure big employers.
"It’s a way of remaining competitive," he says. "It’s part of the game that we play. We, especially the Brownsville area, have been pretty competitive with other states. We can hold our own. That’s for sure."
Martin has worked for economic development groups in Kansas, Nebraska and North Carolina, and ran one in Washington state. He’s seen how to do it and how not to it. Rio South’s approach — targeting industries and then aggressively marketing to them — is exactly the right one, though everyone should be careful not to fall back into old habits, Martin says.
"This concept of working together is new, so I think the thing we need to avoid is any tendency to go back to old competitive ways," he says. "I think the other thing we need to avoid is expecting immediate results, because it’s going to take us a while to get our name on the map."
Maybe the tallest obstacle Rio South has to climb is the misconception that South Texas equals San Antonio, Martin adds.
"There’s a lot of Texas south of San Antonio," he says. "Our biggest challenge is just to get the word out about where we are and who we are and what we have to offer."
