Happy New Year, friends of NEI!
It’s been a little over a year since my family and I made the move to Northeast Indiana. It’s been a year full of change, transition, challenges, new initiatives, hefty goals, and, most of all, assurance that I made the right choice in making NEI my family’s new home.
Looking back, there is much to be proud of and many things to celebrate as we move into the new year.
In 2022, we released the organization’s new 3-year strategic plan with an updated mission statement for NEI, bringing a more clear focus to the need to drive business investment and strengthen the region’s global competitiveness and economic resiliency.
The first steps in driving business investment in NEI and fulfilling that mission involve a long and competitive prospecting and due diligence process.
It was this effort that led the NEI team to chart our best year ever for leads and new projects issues to our communities and local economic development partners.
Whether a company chooses NEI involves a significant level of due diligence, evaluation of existing assets, and collaboration among many parties—public and private, local and state. This is why we work tirelessly to attract leads and projects, and it is critical that we continue to strengthen the region’s global competitiveness.
Last year, we restructured the Regional Opportunity Council (ROC)—a unique leadership body of the Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership that exists to identify and tackle issues that will have a lasting impact on the economic viability of the region.
The ROC’s reorganization aimed to focus on issues and opportunities to strengthen our region’s Built Environment, our position in the New Economy and Innovation capacity, and our Workforce Competency and Competitiveness. These councils have been very busy identifying more than a dozen projects, initiatives and policy opportunities for growth.
Many of these discussions call for further investments. It is no secret that sustained public and private investments are a key driver of long-term productivity and economic growth.
In 2022, under the leadership of Governor Eric J. Holcomb, Indiana launched the Regional Economic Acceleration and Development Initiative (READI). Our team worked diligently in support of the Northeast Indiana Regional Development Authorityand partners to distribute our region’s $50 million allocation of READI funds.
Furthermore, we supported efforts by the Northeast Indiana Strategic Development Commission (SDC) to develop a 5-year regional strategic investment plan—seeking an additional $75 million to promote talent attraction and retention, workforce training and housing.
Looking to 2023
We’re looking forward to more positive change and progress in 2023 as we reposition ourselves, our brand and our name.
Moving forward, we are NEI.
We are developing a stronger brand platform that will allow us to more efficiently identify target audiences, with the proper approach to let the facts tell the story of the region for us through digital assets. More to come on this in 2023—please stay tuned!
It has been a busy year and many thanks and recognition goes to our 140+ investors and partners. Much of this would have been impossible without your support, both in time and treasure. Our region is recognized as a model by many across the state and in turn, we recognize we owe our many thanks to the strength and dedication to the regionalism of our local civic and business leadership.
