Antranette Forbes, Economic Development Director, City of Saint Cloud
Antranette Forbes, economic development director of the City of St. Cloud, joined a conversation with Invest: to discuss what drives economic development in the city, from supporting small businesses to leveraging funds for community development, including affordable housing. “We want to help the community understand that economic development is all-encompassing and there is no one way to get to that destination,” she says.
What have been the city’s key takeaways over the past year?
We started quantifying our performance as a part of our strategic plan. Part of our KPIs is to meet quarterly with the city administration to see where we are in terms of these indicators in economic development. This includes everything from the creation of events to the number of businesses recruited and jobs retained, along with grants given out and tax value. We not only monitor that, but we’re very transparent about it, and that includes a dashboard on our website that shows where our goals are for each department and how they are ranking.
I also see more commercial and industrial development on the horizon that I hope matches the pace of our residential development. We’re shifting our focus to diversify our industry mix a bit more, as well. As a credit to our success, WalletHub has ranked us as one of the top 100 best small cities to start a business two years in a row.
What is the overall economic development strategy for St. Cloud?
We have taken inventory of our existing businesses to find out their composition, their industry, and what they need in support. We noticed a huge prevalence of retail and service-oriented businesses, which are the backbone of any community. So, we’ve created a plethora of technical and financial resources to help these businesses grow. Financial resources include small business grants for initiatives like downtown marketing. We also offer one-on-one counseling through our community partners at the University of Central Florida and Veterans Entrepreneurship Initiative to not just help entrepreneurs start a business but to scale up as well. From what we’ve seen, these resources have led to exponential growth, with 700 new businesses coming online in the past four years.
We’ve also invested in infrastructure. In downtown, we’ve done upgrades to water and sewer lines, along with landscaping and streetscaping improvements. We’ve also recently opened a new skatepark. Our seaplane base has also been redesigned, which is a major ecotourism economic driver. Overall, we’ve been strategic with economic growth while maintaining the integrity of historical St. Cloud. We want to help the community understand that economic development is all-encompassing and there is no one way to get to that destination.
How has the city infused D.E.I. initiatives into its strategy?
Our office has been reaching out to community partners, and this external collaboration has been key to moving the needle on many initiatives. For example, we partner with the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, which has been instrumental in connecting us with the business community. Part of our sponsorship with them is for the chamber to host one signature event in St. Cloud. This event was called “Hola St. Cloud” and served as a business community expo that had over 3,000 attendees. The event was so successful that it won a state award and is now an annual event.
We’re also working with the state to help get businesses certified as minority business enterprises. Our partnership with the Veteran’s Entrepreneurship Initiative has also been a vital one, as St. Cloud’s moniker is “The Soldier City” and we are proud to recruit more veterans into an entrepreneurship track that can scale up. We try to be intentional and laser focused when we engage in DEI initiatives that attach quantifiable results for the community.
How is St. Cloud approaching the issue of affordable housing?
Under Housing and Urban Development (HUD), there is a fund set up for entitlement cities that must go to low-income residents and areas. As an entitlement city, St. Cloud receives Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) to enable this work, along with support from the State Housing Initiatives Partnership (SHIP). We also partnered with the county to help the city with housing renovation and down payment assistance. Additionally, our partnership with Habitat for Humanity has initiated a roofing program for low-income residents who qualify. St. Cloud is very strategic about taking care of the community in terms of business and residence. That means recognizing parts of our cities that need more assistance and having excellent partners to collaborate in supporting them.
In what ways is the city partnering with schools?
We work with our schools in the city and region, including K-12 and vocational schools. Our partnership with Osceola Technical College includes having a seat on their institutional advisory committee to meet with business owners and school administrators. We come together to strategize the skill sets needed for a competitive workforce and how the curriculum can meet that need.
What are the city’s overall economic development goals?
St. Cloud strives to maintain its historic background, which includes a designated historic district downtown. For businesses relocating there, they must recognize a need to keep the integrity of that historic and hometown feel that makes this place unique. Because even though we’re a burgeoning city, you still feel like you’re part of a tight-knit community, and we are extremely passionate about maintaining that integrity. Developers meet with the historic preservation board and we are always happy to walk them through that process with our designated liaison. By doing so, we can handhold developers through this process so they can open a business that still pays homage to our history.
How is the city tracking economic development?
We track tax assessed value from year to year, new businesses in the city, and the commercial development happening in terms of square footage and valuation. We also keep data on the number of registered certified businesses and disadvantaged businesses in the city. Keeping tabs on the grants we have administered and the amount of money received by those businesses allows us to understand the amount of jobs created by the grant.
What is the city’s approach to innovation as it relates to economic opportunity?
When we look at commercial development, we are keen to incorporate technological advances in the scope of that work. We’re doing wayfinding signage downtown and are looking at more electronic portions that can give us more flexibility in changing messaging while keeping static frames. On the seaplane base, we not only have an opportunity as a landscape site, but also create more economic drivers that can be tied to, including training facilities. As we train the new generation of workforce, we want to put them in a better position, and that won’t always be found at a four-year college. We’re seeing more certificates to train in specific fields and interact with more entrepreneurship opportunities.
