Bringing Jobs to Our Valley

I read local Professor Robert Forrant's OpEd in Sunday's Lowell Sun, "Dark clouds for silver linings".♠

For me it started fairly slow, but the wrap-up was pretty much on target.

So, can we reverse the continuing decline of well-paying work and the attendant foreclosure crisis?  We had better.  But in our poisonous political climate and in a critical election year, we cannot expect bipartisan efforts to soberly discuss ways to stimulate the economy.  In the commonwealth, the Senate backed the start-up of three casinos and put a "job-creation dress" on their handiwork; sorry, these jobs don't enhance the state's future as an innovation-based economy.  Casinos won't produce the next significant wave of entrepreneurship needed to move the state forward.  Adding to "21," waiting for the hole card to be turned, or pulling a lever isn't going to get us out of this wretched mess.

We need discussions on how we can attach powerful jumper cables to the valley's job creation engine.  I've called for this before, but to no avail.  Maybe now things are troubling enough so that regional actors can see their way clear to organizing an emergency jobs summit? How about it higher-education leaders?  What say you local and regional economic-development planning agencies?  Major employers?  Any takers in the Legislature?  A focus could be consideration of the lessons learned from the recent "Innovative Cities Conference" held in Lowell, especially how cities boosted business incubators and attracted private-sector investment?  For what's possible check out Ann Arbor, Michigan (www.annarborusa.org).

There is good news to build on.  Infrastructure and other improvements are taking place in numerous Merrimack Valley communities thanks to federal stimulus dollars and a handful of firms have moved into or are expanding in the area.  But, the longer we wait to get together on the subject of job creation the worse things will get.  The market's magic hand isn't capable of pulling hundreds of thousands of badly needed new jobs out of Mr. Monopoly's top hat.  How many more fire stations need to close before we wake up and smell the smoke?

When I say "pretty much" it is because Professor Forrant talks about "our poisonous political climate and in a critical election year".  I am assuming, state wise, he is talking about Democrat on Democrat attacks and undermining, since there aren't enough Republicans in the Great and General Court to sustain a Governor's veto.  The thing is, if we are looking at job creation it is going to have to be a local thing, which I believe Professor Forrant points to.  We can't look to Washington.  We are going to have to do this ourselves.  We are going to have to decide if we are going to be the next Vermont or the next Texas, in terms of economic development path.

So, I say, tell me what I can do to help move Massachusetts forward.  You should also.

And Professor Forrant's EMail is rforrant @ external.umass.edu (Just take out the spaces before and after the "AT" sign.)

UPDATE:  And here are some additional thoughts, from Come to Lowell.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Remember, articles in The Sun go away after a while, to a different place.  I will not be updating their links unless I am bedridden and have read every book in the house.