You Can Help Grow Your Local Economy
Column by State Senator Dale Schultz

There’s an answer for how to lower our high taxes and provide more dollars to our schools and meet other community needs.  Throughout history, it’s the only answer.  Whether raising hundreds of millions of people out of dire poverty in China or India, or raising per capita incomes in states and regions of America, the answer is to create more wealth.  The alternative plan, to spread existing wealth around, has brought down once great nations.  We need to create more jobs and bake a bigger economic pie locally and nationally.

In Littleton Colorado, Chris Gibbons developed an approach to economic development called Economic Gardening.  Gibbons is right when he says that only entrepreneurs create jobs, not governments or economic developers.

Economic Gardening is working for Littleton and the communities and regions adopting it nationwide.  EG provides tools for communities to assist entrepreneurs, especially those with "second-stage companies”.  Second stage companies are vital to recovering from our current downturn and for our economic prosperity.  Most job growth in this nation and our region comes from 1st stage (0-9 employees) and 2nd stage (10-99 employees) with minimal growth or actual declines in larger companies.

Are you ready to be part of the answer by helping your community to improve its local economy?  Learn about Economic Gardening direct from Chris Gibbons at http://www.littletongov.org/bia/economicgardening/.  Find tools from the Edward Lowe Foundations at www.YourEconomy.org.

Most important, get involved locally.  Start with a contact to the economic development group for your county: Grant: Ron Brisbois 608.822.3501; Lafayette: Joanne Ehasz 608.776.8080; Iowa: Rick Terrien 608.930.2000; Richland: Meegan Thompson 608.647.4310; Sauk: Karna Hanna 608.355-2084; Green: Anna Schramke 608.328-9452; Juneau: Terry Whipple 608.427.2070; Columbia: Nancy Elsing 608.742-6161; Vernon: Sue Noble 608.637.5396.

It’s also important to celebrate our local entrepreneurs.  A new statewide award program, "Wisconsin Companies to Watch" creates a great opportunity to express gratitude to our local business owners for providing jobs and wealth in our community.  Learn about the program and how to nominate a company (or a company can self-nominate) at: http://www.wenportal.org/.