Choose Worcester Faces A Choice | With funding drying up, booster agency has uncertain future
Photo/File
Alexander “Oley†Carpp, Choose Worcester's CEO.
Not yet 4 years old, Choose Worcester, the organization funded by investments from local corporations and charged with attracting business to the city, is in danger of running out of money and an effort to merge with the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce may be in jeopardy.
“We have a funding problem, and unless we can find a partner, my feelings are very pessimistic about Choose Worcester surviving much past March 2010,” said Sumner “Tony” Tilton, chairman of Choose Worcester’s board of directors.
Promising Start
Choose Worcester expected the $1.25 million it raised from local businesses to last between two and a half and three years. At that time, the organization “could make a case for state support,” Tilton said.
But a year and a half ago, Choose Worcester discovered that the only state money available to economic development organizations would be for regional efforts. Choose Worcester was created to attract business to Worcester itself, and “we resisted changing our charter just to pick up state money,” Tilton said.
Plans to merge Choose Worcester with the Worcester Business Development Corp. and the City of Worcester’s economic development office were considered.
Becoming part of the chamber, though, would give Choose Worcester “regional” status and ostensibly qualify it for state support, which typically amounted to $800,000 shared by eight regional economic development corporations. The arrangement would also partially support Choose Worcester through increased chamber dues.
The arrangement would have funded the gap between February 28 and Aug. 1. Then, the $800,000 in regional economic development funding was cut from the state budget.
Without the state funding, the partnership with the chamber is inadequate.
The situation has left Tilton wondering how seriously the state takes economic development.
“Maybe people don’t think it’s important,” he said. But without organized economic development efforts, Worcester is “just going to wither on the vine.”
“I’m not used to plan Bs, or plan Cs, and I’m certainly not used to failing to get something done,” Tilton said.
Alexander “Oley” Carpp, Choose Worcester’s CEO, acknowledged recently that all the organization’s funding, mostly in the form of three-year pledges from local businesses, was secured before he was hired in the summer of 2007. Yet, “we haven’t been back out looking for funds,” he said.
If Choose Worcester were to restart its fundraising efforts now, “I expect to find that these are different times, and we’re going to look at what our sustainability is going forward.”
Carpp’s three-year contract with the nonprofit organization expires Aug. 1, 2010. In 2008, Carpp made $192,079 in salary, bonuses and deferred compensation, according to IRS records. He said he’s had no discussion with the Choose Worcester board of directors about whether his contract will be renewed. It’s been assumed that at the end of three years, there would be “a combination of public and private funds involved” in supporting Choose Worcester, he said.
“We’re looking at models and all different ideas right now,” Carpp said.
And what makes sense is a “strategic partnership,” according to David Forsberg, a member of Choose Worcester’s board of directors and president of the Worcester Business Development Corp.
“There is an emerging funding issue in terms of sustainability,” Forsberg said. As a result, the Choose Worcester board is considering “how to form a strategic partnership to create a little more energy in the organization, to create a second wind. They can’t be doing capital campaigns every two years; there has to be a sustainable structure and mission.”
Parsing out Choose Worcester’s success since Carpp was selected as its first CEO is difficult, although the organization claims to have brought eight companies and 450 jobs to the city.
Often, Choose Worcester works closely with Mass-Development, the City of Worcester and other government and economic development organizations, which makes it difficult to quantify how much the organization has to do with either bringing business to the city from elsewhere or convincing business to stay in the city rather than move away.
“What our job is is strictly business attraction, so when it comes to companies coming from outside the city, we talk to them and try to get everyone at the table together.
We’re not really involved with closing the deal,” Carpp said.
WBJ Web Partners
Most Recent
Most Recent
0 Comments