Community leaders face hard facts on attracting industry to Wilkes Co.
By KIP BURKE

As a step toward bringing in new jobs to Wilkes County, economic development experts talked to a full house of community leaders last week, and got down to the nuts and bolts of how local leaders can help attract jobs to Wilkes County and fill those jobs with qualified, educated workers.

Some 80 Wilkes County leaders in business, industry, retailing, hospitality, education, and government gathered at the Wilkes Senior Center at the invitation of the Washington Wilkes Chamber of Commerce.

The main speaker was John Perryman, Georgia Power's project manager for community and economic development. He explained the gritty truth about how companies pick a community to which they can bring their business or industry - and jobs.

"It's not about us, it's about them. You can do everything you can do to make your community ready for an industry to look at," he said, "but it all may be for nothing, because the selection is driven by what they need."

Companies narrow their selection to a region, then do research looking for reasons to eliminate cities from contention. They use the internet to do the initial search, and can use any negative information they find to knock a location off the list of possibles.

"They're not looking for what's great about your area," he said, "they're looking for the worst aspects so they can eliminate you."

He passed out a sheet of negative information that he found about Wilkes County from various sources on the Internet. The county's stagnant population growth rate and high poverty rate make employers wonder if they'll find enough qualified workers in the area, he said. The county's high personal bankruptcy rate combined with a high property crime rate make potential employers wonder if the employees they do hire will be honest.

The report does say that the area that Wilkes County draws employees from is large, however, and could produce qualified workers.

"I'm here to call your baby ugly," Perryman said. To let Wilkes County leaders see the county from an outsider's viewpoint, he showed a presentation of things that turn off potential employers. They ranged from a shabby old bar across from an industrial property that's now on the market, to the aged-in-the-sun sign marking the WashingtonWilkes Industrial Park.

"All these little things add up for a prospect," he said. "They say you don't care enough, and they mark you off the list."

The purpose of the "ugly baby" presentation, he said, was "to get you to see what you don't see anymore, to look at your county with new eyes and think about how a potential employer might see the area."

That stirred a spirited discussion among participants, facilitated by Donna Hardy, about ways to address problem properties with property owners, and to fix other areas that were within the reach of civic clubs and other groups.

Plans were made on the spot for further meetings to take action on several items.

Hardy started the meeting off by announcing that the Chamber of Commerce was partnering with the Wilkes County Family Connection to bring leadership training to some 25 young leaders in Wilkes County. "We have a commitment to leadership training," she said, "and we're partnering with Family Connection to identify and train a group of 18to-35-year-old people in Wilkes County to be tomorrow's leaders."

Several of the leaders spoke up during the discussion of the work ethic and work habits of Wilkes County's work force, and what could be done to teach people how to properly apply for a job, and how to actually work once they get a job. "We need this," said one manager. "We need this bad. I had a girl come apply for a job in her pajamas."

Dr. Jerry Barrow, Athens Tech's Economic Development Director, brought a positive note to the evening with a new tool to help Wilkes County workers get jobs.

He told the assembled leaders that Governor Sonny Perdue had just announced Georgia's Work Ready program, a plan designed to improve the training and marketability of Georgia's workforce.

The program, Barrow said, will allow Wilkes County workers - and the county's entire work force - to have the work skills to be certified "work ready."

The program's implementation steps are coming, he said, and he expected to be working closely with the Wilkes County Adult Learning Center and the Washington-Wilkes Chamber of Commerce to bring the Work Ready designation to Wilkes workers.

Barrow also threw down the challenge for Wilkes County to take the steps needed to turn around its work force. "This is an impressive turnout tonight. But the real test is who comes to the next meeting, and the next. This will take work, and for a long time to come."

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