Mission Statement: The LEDC is to foster a diverse and entrepreneurial-based sense of place and economic climate that sustains growth in private jobs and investment, developing the city of Lansing into a top tier urban capital city in the Midwest.
Problem Statement: There are two, overarching problems. One, because of Lansing and the region's long history of dependence on what were very stable, unionized institutions like Michigan State University, state government and General Motors, the city and region have taken a very laisze faire attitude toward economic development. Until very recently, the public in general, the smallish private sector and local governments have taken little ownership or interest in innovative or aggressive economic development efforts and, thus, possess little understanding of economic development. This "safe and stable" economic climate of the past has also greatly stunted a sense of entrepreneurialism in our city and region and, in fact, to our generational culture, leading to a relatively small private sector and, consequently, a tax base largely and dangerously dependent on a residential sector servicing huge public sector institutional needs.
Two, in addition, the tri-county region (Ingham, Clinton and Eaton counties), over the last fifty years, has experienced little to no overall growth in terms of population which is leading to a still unrecognized, but inevitable non-sustainable region. As an example, within this tri-county bubble of non-growth, townships surrounding Lansing and other smaller cities have grown rapidly with people and business, nearly all of which was not new growth of wealth, but existing wealth fleeing only a few miles from a city into a township. The result has been: Declining cities, a declining sense of cosmopolitan flair that has damaged a regional portrait of entrepreneurialism, youth and sophistication, re-segregated communities and schools, and duplicative, expensive infrastructure. Government infrastructure and services have been duplicated and doubled in a strangling ring around cities, yet these services serve no new wealth or population. Thus, the overall tax base is simply stretched further and thinner to serve the same population of people and business who demand the rights to the same services that already existed in the city they left behind. Ironically, the lack of commitment to city growth has assured future, unsustainable growth in the townships and overall tri-county region.
These two factors have created a financially unsustainable bubble for our entire tri-county region. And the bill will arrive. The time is now for open, honest and truthful dialogue about this overall issue. But it is still a wholly unpopular discussion and one that experiences the wrath of the many when mentioned publicly or privately. If one dares discuss these issues, one is quickly dismissed as being "anti-regional", "anti-township", a "trouble-maker" or "unrealistic" because "You can't change the ways things are. Those are the rules."
Vision Statement: There is great hope for our city and region! Our collective assets, if reconfigured and understood differently, can be seen as great opportunities. State government does not need to be seen as a bureaucracy, but as a dynamic and ultra-exciting place of mega-power and billions of dollars of annual decision making made by policy wonks and the ambitious. Michigan State University is not just a land grant university, but should be seen as an international portal, one of the great universities in the world, rotating 40,000 of the best and brightest of the globe in and out of our region annually, a place of limitless ideas, inventions and commercialization of product. Even General Motors, with its two brand new, world class car assembly plants right here in the city of Lansing, must be seen as the great innovator in global car and parts manufacturing. We should be seen as the pinnacle of technically advanced, environmentally friendly, future car manufacturing.
But we must add to these assets a new urban environment, a new city. Beyond providing better and smarter basic services, safety and infrastructure, we must create a city that embraces and facilitates entrepreneurialism and higher education, that is fiercely pro-business, that relentlessly puts our affordable or historic buildings back on the tax rolls for investment by entrepreneurial businesses of all varieties but especially in high tech and bio tech fields, that invests in a beautiful and vibrant sense of place in its downtown and along its riverfront, that invites tall and visible corporate presences for all to see on our skyline, that repairs a sense of beauty and safety to its many neighborhood and commercial corridors, and a city that commits to additional housing of a more diverse variety that meets the demands of young professionals, students and empty nesters.
Ironically, by aggressively and fiercely focusing on taking a good city and making it great, the entire region will truly benefit and experience real and sustainable growth. The LEDC can and should be the leader of this effort.
