Governor announces rural funds, council

Who better to understand how to boost an area than those who live and work there, Gov. Jan Brewer said Wednesday in signing an executive order to establish a rural business advisory council for economic development.

She also announced that $2 million will be made available to the rural areas to help with infrastructure, marketing and other efforts to compete for jobs.

Brewer said she chose Yuma as the stage for the announcement, well aware that the area's battered job market had suffered two more severe shocks last week.

“Yuma has had some serious economic downturns. I wanted to share a good news message with the community.”

Between the phased closure over the coming months of Russell Coil, a commercial air conditioner manufacturing plant, and Dole Fresh Vegetable's decision to not operate its packaged salad plant in Yuma this winter, the Yuma area will see a loss of hundreds of jobs, adding to its unemployment rate already in excess of 20 percent.

“Lord knows we need a lifeline and hopefully this is it,” observed Julie Engel, president and CEO of Greater Yuma Economic Development Corp.

The new advisory council will be comprised of one business representative from each of the rural counties in addition to each Native American tribe, Brewer said, adding that she wants the council in place by late October.

In establishing the council, the governor stressed the need for leadership in the private sector to turn around the state's economy.

“I want leaders who can think outside the box and be an integral part of economic development. Each area has specific and individual issues to deal with. We need leaders who can bring us that information, and I want them to come up with solutions.”

As for the $2 million she's making available, Brewer said the money is coming from discretionary stimulus funding, money she would like to see the council itself decide where it would do the most good.

For example, perhaps Yuma County could use some of that money to help attract the new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, along with contractors involved in working on the new aircraft. Another community might need to strengthen its utility service so it can meet the needs of new industry.

“I'm looking forward to successes,” Brewer said. And those successes in turn can be taken to the Legislature to encourage more investment in rural economic development in the future.

After all, she noted, what is good for Yuma and other rural communities is good for the entire state.

State Attorney General Terry Goddard, who is running against Brewer for the governor seat, criticized the plan.

In a statement from Phoenix, Goddard said, “On the one hand, Jan Brewer criticizes the federal government for giving stimulus money to states, then gleefully accepts it with the other hand, taking credit as if it were something she’d come up with on her own ... On day one of her administration, Brewer should have come up with her plan to address Arizona’s jobs crisis. Instead, she waited 20 months to announce the formation of another committee. This is another sad example of Brewer’s failure to get the job done.

“Just last week, we learned that Yuma will suffer the loss of another 800 jobs. These jobs, which belonged to hard-working Arizonans, are now headed to California and Alabama. Yuma and all of Arizona is losing jobs and Jan Brewer has done nothing but make the situation worse. She doesn’t understand that Arizona is facing a jobs crisis.”

Brewer said the new rural business advisory council is the next step in her ongoing efforts since taking office to turn the state's economy around by encouraging the private sector. Previous steps have included a moratorium on new regulatory rules and the planned reinvention of the Arizona Department of Commerce into the Arizona Commerce Authority with a clear focus on business development that is less subject to the political process and in collaboration with the private sector.

“I don't believe government creates jobs. Businesses do.

“The government's job is to get out of the way and cut the green and red tape,” Brewer said, referring to environmental and other regulations that she says stifle business.