Eleven Regional Projects Win Top Honors at Team Northeast Ohio Economic Development Plus Awards

7/1/2011 8

For additional information, contact:

Jenny Febbo
216.363.5426 (o)
440.258.8805 (c)
jfebbo@teamneo.org


ELEVEN REGIONAL PROJECTS WIN TOP HONORS
AT TEAM NORTHEAST OHIO ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT PLUS AWARDS
Business attraction organization recognizes outstanding contributions to region’s economy



AKRON and CLEVELAND, Ohio, July 1, 2011 — Team Northeast (NEO) recognized communities and organizations for 2010 economic development initiatives that created or retained jobs, attracted investments and developed opportunities for Northeast Ohio. Winners in 10 categories were announced at the organization’s Fifth Annual Economic Development Plus Awards Dinner, presented last night by PNC. The event, which was held at the John S. Knight Center in Akron, Ohio, drew a crowd of nearly 600 business and community leaders, economic developers, politicians and chamber of commerce representatives from the 16 counties of Northeast Ohio.

“This unique event honors Northeast Ohio’s local economic development community
for their creative and innovative efforts to advance our region’s economy,” said Tom Waltermire, CEO, Team NEO. “We recognized 62 organizations for executing projects that represent almost 9,000 new jobs, 1,700 retained jobs and $1.4 billion in capital investment.”

A panel of judges selected twenty-six finalists from which the following winners were chosen:

Asset Creation

  • Global Cardiovascular Innovation Center, Cleveland Clinic Innovations  and Fairfax Renaissance Development Corp. for the creation of the $19 million, 50,000 square-foot Global Cardiovascular Innovation Center Incubator.

Business Attraction

  • Team Lorain County, Lorain County Growth Partnership, and the City of Lorain for convincing Heidelberg Distributing to consolidate their operations in Lorain County.

Business Expansion/Retention

  • Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber, City of Youngstown, City of Girard and the Office of Congressman Tim Ryan for landing the 1-million-square foot V&M Star expansion.

Foreign Investment

  • Case Western Reserve University, University Hospitals Case Medical Center and BioEnterprise for the establishment of the Global Advanced Imaging Innovation Center.

Fostering Entrepreneurship

  • Case Western Reserve University for the Coulter-Case Translational Research Partnership, which is bridging the gap between biomedical engineers and physicians.

Minority Business Development

  • Akron Urban League, Kent State University and Akron SCORE for working together on the Partnership for the Minority Business Accelerator program or PMBA.

New Economic Development Practice

  • Employment Connection for creating a new workforce development system focused on helping local employers find qualified candidates to fill current job openings in real time.

Public-Private Partnership

  • City of Cleveland and the Greater Cleveland Partnership for the Flats East Bank, a $500 million redevelopment project.

Regionalism & Cross-Border Collaboration (tie)

  • Concord Township and the City of Painesville for forming a Joint Economic Development District.
  • Lake Erie Energy Development Corp. or LEEDCo, for its regional approach to wind energy in Northeast Ohio.

Workforce Development

  • Ohio State University Agricultural Technical Institute for developing a Regional Food Processing Training Consortium

 

For more information about each of the winning projects, see the attached fact sheet.

In addition, former United State Senator George V. Voinovich was honored at the event with the annual H. Peter Burg Regional Vision Award. The award is Team NEO’s highest honor, and commemorates the late chairman and CEO of FirstEnergy Corporation, a regional leader who was the founding chairman of Team NEO. Senator Voinovich was recognized for his steadfast commitment to economic development and his many years of service to Northeast Ohio.

The 2011 Economic Development Plus Awards were presented by PNC. Additional sponsors include: Ben Venue Laboratories, FirstEnergy, the Sherwin-Williams Company, Diebold, Human Arc, Roetzel & Andress and Squire Sanders.

Team NEO advances Northeast Ohio’s economy by attracting businesses worldwide to the 16-county Cleveland Plus region. The organization is a joint venture of the region's largest metro chambers of commerce. Since 2007, the organization has attracted 47 new company expansions or relocations, 3,800 new jobs and more than $151M in annual payroll to Northeast Ohio, leading to a total annual regional payroll benefit of $257M.


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