Watch Doug Von Gausig, League of Arizona Cities and Towns President and Mayor of the Town of Clarkdale, talk about AZ Cities @ Work and the vital services cities and towns in Arizona provide to their communities each and every day.
By Casey Rooney, Economic Development Director
The city of Cottonwood Business Assistance Center (BAC) has been successfully servicing the needs of local businesses for over 2 years. The BAC is a partnership between the city of Cottonwood, the Northern Arizona Council of Governments, Yavapai College and local businesses. The city Economic Development and IT Departments are located at the BAC. The Cottonwood Economic Development Council (CEDC) also calls the BAC their home office. The CEDC is a private, public economic development partnership.
The BAC provides business consulting services. A typical person might enter our doors looking for information regarding opening a new business. We will sit down with this person(s) and discuss their concept. Their business concept will often times lead us to work with our customer to develop their business plan. Sometimes, training needs are identified. Regular training classes are conducted in subjects such as QuickBooks, excel, Photoshop, and general business development. You could consider the BAC as a business connection service where we connect the business with the resources they need to move forward. Between all of our partners we have access to an amazing amount of creative business consulting talent.
In addition to mentoring businesses, we provide office space on a short to medium timeframe. A budding business can come in, occupy an office, and use our technology such as computers, Wi-Fi and printers for business purposes at little or no cost for an hour or an entire day. We have several business housed in our facility for 6-12 months. We charge a modest fee to longer-term occupiers of office space. We have incubated and graduated several business. These businesses leave our facility and move into the commercial office market where they pay market rate for their new space. Our facility is designed to help startups with every advantage they need to start and be successful. The process works!
The city of Cottonwood took the lead, working with the Unites States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Verde Valley Regional Economic Organization to develop a revolving loan fund to help support our BAC clients. One business recently borrowed $150,000 and another deal is about to close for $50,000. Between these 2 BAC client businesses we are creating approximately 35 jobs. That’s economic development!
The BAC can also be categorized as a virtual incubator. Home based businesses use our very professionally appointed board rooms to conduct business. Rather than meet clients at home they can use the BAC for important and strategic face-to-face meetings.
We presently house four full-time businesses in the BAC. One of our businesses is actually two businesses in one office with the same owner. Jamie Fulmer is the CEO of Fire Mountain Wines and Blue Stone Strategy Group. Jamie will be opening a wine tasting room shortly in Old Town Cottonwood. His Blue Stone Strategy Group is a business consulting company where the primary clients are tribes located throughout the United States and Canada. His consulting company employs approximately 20 high level business consultants. His story is a success story.
The wine industry is an emerging industry in Arizona and Cottonwood is the economic center of activity in the Verde Valley. The Verde Valley Wine Consortium (VVWC) is a trade association for the local wine producers, tasting rooms, etc. VVWC is headquartered at the Business Assistance Center.
All of the companies that graduated out of the BAC and all the present companies located at the BAC continue to be successful. That is a pretty good batting average.
Maricopa in Motion on My Fox Phoenix with Cory McCloskey! Just another example of AZCities@Work. Visit www.maricopa-az.gov for more info.
Check out Maricopa in Motion on Fox10 this morning!
http://www.myfoxphoenix.com/category/235505/corys-corner.
Just another example of your Arizona Cities @ Work.
Learn what’s being done to bring Arizona’s cities and towns together to better serve their residents.
By Todd Henderson, Utilities Management Assistant
In May 2009, the town of Marana implemented Cartegraph software, an asset management system that gives staff the ability to track the condition and value of assets and create a proactive work management and inventory control system. This system gives the town the ability to create an enterprise-wide asset management tool that increases efficiency and transparency.
The Utilities Department began implementing Cartegraph by creating a work management system while Public Works simultaneously started collecting and rating town assets. One year later, the roles were switched; Utilities collected all of its assets and Public Works created a work order system. Both departments kept track of every asset’s maintenance history by attaching work orders to the relevant assets in the system.
Four years later, the town is realizing significant savings by virtue of proactive maintenance schedules versus reactive response. An example includes the Pavement Preservation Program adopted by the Town Council that was created from the numbers generated by Cartegraph’s pavement rating system. This program assists the town in identifying and scheduling treatments that preserve roads years past their normal lifespan and saving the town millions of dollars.
A fully implemented asset management system that tracks labor, equipment and materials saves municipalities money and provides efficiency, transparency and accountability to residents. This type of progress and innovation is reflected in the town’s strategic plan and is one of the driving forces behind Marana’s success.
The city of Glendale’s economic development efforts have initiated exciting new projects for its citizens to look forward to. Specifically, St. Joseph’s Westgate Medical Center is under construction in near the Loop 101 and Glendale Avenue. The $44 million Dignity Health facility is scheduled to open in early 2014 with phase one including a 60,000 square-foot hospital on 35 acres with an emergency room, 24 inpatient beds, two operating rooms and diagnostic services.
The city also welcomes ZyTech Building Systems, a Canadian company that chose Glendale for its first US headquarters after working with GPEC and the Arizona Commerce Authority. ZyTech, located at 8205 N. 67th Avenue, is a provider of roof trusses, floor systems, wall systems and lumber packages to home-builders and contractors for track housing, custom homes, multi-family, commercial and large span projects.
In addition, North Glendale is home to the new Arrowhead Cadillac which is currently under construction at 83rd Avenue and Bell Road. The 55,000- square-foot luxury car dealership is a $16 million investment by the Van Tuyl Group, Inc., which provides management consulting services to the largest group of privately held dealerships in the United States.
The city’s economic development continues to better the community and the environment for its residents and local businesses.
Tempe is the first city in the state to launch a centralized customer relations center to address questions/issues from community members, called Tempe 3-1-1. It is one of several ongoing efforts to improve technology in order to serve the Tempe community better.
Tempe 311 provides fast and easy ways for community members to connect with their city, making life easier and providing greater value and service. Community members can connect with Tempe 311 via phone (480-350-4311), Web, email and mobile app. The city receives an average of about 1,600 calls a week. What’s great about the program is that it’s the only resource residents need to remember – no need for phone directories and no getting bounced around to find the right place.
In addition, Tempe 311 makes city operations more efficient by helping the city to provide more responsive, efficient, cost-effective service by streamlining the process from the initial call to the resolution in the field.
The Payson Community Garden is a great example of an innovative idea from a local government at work for its residents. Started as a way to help citizens learn about water conservation while growing their own food, the Payson garden is now more than 4 acres large and rents up to 165 plots. The town of Payson partners with both private nurseries as well as the University of Arizona extension to offer a complete set of instruction courses for beginner gardeners.
The town asks that each plot donate 20 percent of their yield to the local food banks. Last year, more than 50 percent of the yield was donated to the local food banks.
For more information, please visit:
http://www.paysonroundup.com/search/vertical/news.story/?q=community%20garden
By R. J. Zeder, Chandler Transportation & Development Director
Chandler recently held its popular Family Bike Ride led by Mayor Jay Tibshraeny and several members of our City Council.
The annual event provides families with a great opportunity to get a little exercise and celebrate bicycling for recreation and as a way to replace automobile trips for commuting to work, school and other short trips.
For a number of years now, Chandler has been investing in infrastructure improvements that accommodate or encourage bicycling and has been recognized as a Bicycle Friendly Community by the League of American Bicyclists.
We recently constructed bike/pedestrian crossing signals at several arterial streets along our Paseo Trail in southeast Chandler and along our Western Canal Shared-Use Path in north Chandler. We also completed in November a major street reconstruction project near our mall at Chandler Boulevard and Price Road that added bike lanes beneath the Loop 101 Price Freeway.
In addition, construction has begun on a bike/pedestrian bridge that will cross the Price Freeway at Galveston Street, north of Chandler Blvd. This bridge will link bicycle paths on collector streets on both sides of the freeway, allowing for more access to parks, schools, employment and shopping centers. The project is administered and managed by the Arizona Department of Transportation and funded by a federal Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) grant.
Bicyclists also are taking advantage of Chandler’s Park & Ride lot adjacent to Tumbleweed Park. Bike riders can connect to an Express Bus which leaves from the lot each weekday morning and travel to downtown Phoenix or catch the LINK bus which runs every day and travels along Arizona Avenue/Country Club Drive to connect to light rail. Riders can utilize the bike lockers at the lot or the bike racks on the bus.
Chandler also is involved in regional efforts to improve conditions for bicycling. City transit planners are participating in a Maricopa Association of Government’s Bicycle Counts project that will collect bicycle counts at a number of locations throughout the valley to better understand how bike routes and facilities are performing, what patterns exist, why trips are made and whether safety improvements are needed.
With the support of its citizens, Chandler will continue to develop the city’s bicycle system while striving to provide maximum safety, convenience, and comfort for bicyclists of all ages.