Published: November 04, 2009 09:57 pm      

Cass joins nine-county economic effort

Officials hope effort will build on ties developing with Hoosier Heartland

Cass County has joined with eight other counties to form a regional economic development effort.

Skip Kuker, president of the Logansport-Cass County Economic Development Foundation, said MidWest Indiana Economic Development formed in recognition of the regional ties developing along the Hoosier Heartland Corridor.

Kuker said Logansport and Cass County already function with one regional group, the North Central Indiana Economic Development Partnership. He said the federal and state governments were recognizing regional economic efforts more and more.

“They like seeing regionalism,” he said. “And it might also offer us some grant opportunities.”

The regional group was officially launched last week at an event featuring Mayor Mike Fincher as a speaker.

More than 100 people gathered at Ivy Tech Community College’s Lafayette campus on Friday morning for the press conference. At the conference, Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman announced Benton, Carroll, Cass, Fountain, Montgomery, Pulaski, Tippecanoe, Warren and White Counties had all signed on to participate in the regional effort.

“MidWest Indiana will help these counties pool their resources to better sell the region to growing companies,” Skillman said. “As Indiana ramps up its emphasis on regional economic development, this group of nine counties is positioned to be a leader.”

Various speakers from each of the counties highlighted assets of the region. They mentioned manufacturing such as Subaru, Ball Corp. and Tyson Foods and tourism at sites like Lake Freeman, Lake Shafer, Indiana Beach and Purdue University.

The region’s location between Chicago and Indianapolis was also mentioned as a benefit, as well as the higher education opportunities in the area and a ready workforce with a resident employment base of 168,374 people. Agriculture was also noted as a strong point.

More than 330,000 people resided in the nine-county region in 2008, with 20 cities and towns having a population of more than 1,000 people.

“This isn’t the first time our region has worked together to accomplish something grand,” Fincher said, referring to the Hoosier Heartland Corridor. “The Hoosier Heartland Corridor’s completion in 2013 will be a tremendous boost for the economy and will make it faster and safer for business- goods and employees — to move throughout our region.”

Kuker said working on a regional basis serves as a marketing tool for a larger population base. As developments such as the Hoosier Heartland Corridor come to fruition, working as a region will become more logical.

“County boundaries get less and less important,” Kuker said. “People transport themselves across county lines more and more, and there is a larger base for employers to come in and utilize the natural transportation corridor coming right up into Logansport.”

• Jennifer Tangeman is a reporter for the Pharos-Tribune. She can be reached at 574-732-5148 or jennifer.tangeman@pharostribune.com.