Sept. 28, 2004: What’s “Cool”
About Oswego County
Finding out about what’s “cool”
about Oswego County is the topic of a public issues forum to be
co-hosted by the Workforce Development Board of Oswego County (WDB),
Operation Oswego County (OOC), and SUNY Oswego.
The forum will be held in the Forum Restaurant
in Hewitt Union on the SUNY Oswego campus, Thursday, Oct. 28 from
7:45 to 10 a.m. There is no registration fee, but reservations are
required.
The featured speaker will be Rebecca Ryan,
president of Next Generation Consulting, Inc. (NGC). Ryan will discuss
and present the findings of a recent study to determine what Oswego
County can do to attract and retain young professionals. NGC has
hosted a series of focus groups and interviews throughout the county
over the past few months. Ryan will present a “handprint”
of the county, which profiles how the area scored in the seven indexes
that are considered important to young professional: vitality, earning,
learning, social capital, cost of lifestyle, after hours, and around
town.
The forum is part of a strategic planning
initiative that the WDB began in February 2004 with an economic
and workforce summit, featuring Ed Barlow, a nationally known futurist.
A series of follow-up meetings helped the WDB to identify key industry
clusters for future growth in the county, as well as the human resource
challenges for these industries. This information was summarized
in a recently completed state of the workforce report. The strategic
planning initiative will culminate with the publication of a five-year
strategic plan expected this winter.
“For Oswego County to attract the next
generation of knowledge workers and innovation economy entrepreneurs,
it must place as much emphasis on its quality of life as its economic
incentives,” stated Ryan. “Oswego County has many of
the amenities- a gorgeous climate, access to university research
and culture, and a system of parks and trails- that strongly resonate
with young professionals looking for a “cool” community.
Hosts for the program include Nancy Bellow,
director of SUNY Oswego’s Center for Business and Community
Development, and L. Michael Treadwell, CEcD, executive director
of Operation Oswego County, the county’s designated economic
development agency.
“Before this project began, we only
had anecdotal or speculative information about the challenge in
attracting and retaining young, talented professionals to Oswego
County in order to meet the human resource needs of current and
future employers. With an increasingly competitive market for drawing
this target demographic to our area, Oswego County must take a proactive
approach and define the unique regional characteristics that make
it attractive so that it will appeal to this group of people,”
Treadwell said.
To make a reservation or for more information
about the forum, call SUNY Oswego’s Center for Business and
Community Development at 315-312-3492.
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