Frontenac Economic Development Rejigs After Losing Out At Budget

Jeff Green | Feb 21, 2024

Frontenac County's small economic development department was expecting to be larger by the time the February meeting of the county's Economic Development Advisory Committee (EDAC) rolled around.

After spending two years developing a Destination Development Plan and receiving approval to develop a full scale tourism website, the final piece in a carefully constructed puzzle was hiring a third member of the department to create the capacity to focus on developing a cohesive tourism enhancement and marketing capacity for the county.

But that would have led to a 1% increase in the county taxes in 2024, and when the budget was approved in early December, Council decided to limit the tax increase and not proceed with the new position.

So what was to become of the Destination Development Plan, and the new website.

The answer came last week at the committee, when Richard Allen, Manager for Economic Development, briefed the committee on a business plan update for his department.

He said that, with input from Debbi Miller, who is the other member of his team, and Joe Gallivan, who directs the department, they had a good look at how to maximise the impact of the department over the next five years.

“We had to make adjustments to our business plan,” he said, "We considered Council's strategic plan, the county’s economic development charter, things that we have momentum on, and our strengths.”

He mentioned 'Open Farms' which is put on each September in partnership with the City of Kingston and South Frontenac, trails, which he said have begun to have the impact that was envisioned as the K&P Trail was being built out through South and Central Frontenac, and the partnerships that have been fostered with the staff teams at the local townships as well as Frontenac Business Services. Ultimately we want to make sure that we have an impact on a few projects that we can make an impact in, based on the foundations that we've laid, rather than try to achieve all of the things that we've defined as economic development for Frontenac County ... What we want to do is focus our time and attention on what we know we can make a difference on right now, with the resources that we have right now.”

He then pointed to the new focus points for the department.

The first thing he talked about was “reignite” the Frontenac Ambassador Program. The second was to bring forward a countywide Community Improvement Plan, and said “it would have the same impact as a new person, maybe, in terms of doing the investment attraction piece.”

He said the township based Community Improvement Plans, which have provided grants for existing business and storefronts for upgrades, is different from the regional plan, which will be more oriented to investment attraction.

The third item was to follow the directive from Council to take a leadership and coordinating role in physician recruitment. He said he will bring a report to the committee in late March about what those efforts will look like.

'Open Farms' which he had already flagged as a strength, is another priority for the department.

Then he talked about the tourism piece.

“We are going to continue with tourism but we are only going to focus our efforts, and marketing efforts on trails. That's because we have already invested so much in trails, and we just do not have the capacity to do the whole gamut right now, so we will start here.”

At this point, committee member Mike Hage, who works in the tourism sector in North Frontenac, took the opportunity to express his surprise at the change in direction for the department.

'Let me understand this,” he said, “within the past couple of years we've been saying we want to encourage tourism, to expose this hidden gem of Frontenac to the outside of Ontario and Canada and the world. Council approved all the initiatives, and then staff decided, because there were no resources, to cancel all tourism focus and work on something else..

“Is this what I understand as a headline?”

Allen said that while Council approved the tourism initiatives, “we see supporting businesses and investment attraction, we don't see tourism or visitor attraction laid out as significantly.”

Hage then asked why, given a lack of resources, physician recruitment which he said “has little chance of success” had been prioritised over tourism.

Frontenac Islands Mayor Judy Greenwood-Speers, who is a member of County Council as well as the EDAC, said that the fact that destination development was approved by Council and yet the money for the human resources to carry it out was not approved, “is something that I thought was inconsistent, and you know that because I was the only one that voted in favour of investing ... I understand that you can't get something for nothing.”

Warden Frances Smith, who also sits on the committee, said “I just want to add that you have to remember that the lower tier does some economic development as well, and their focus is definitely on tourism, and they work with the county, and they are working on tourism. I think we are not in bad situation, but unfortunately the economic times were not there for us to spend that money right now.”

Mayor Speers and South Frontenac Mayor Ron Vandewal, who chairs the committee, both made reference to how difficult the physician recruitment goal will be to accomplish, with Vandewal saying that in a conversation he had with an MPP, “I was told not to spend any money on physician recruitment, that it is a waste of time and money.”

Nonetheless, no one on council proposed pulling physician recruitment from the department's business plan.

Allen then concluded that looking forward, the department will be looking at an update to the county economic development charter and developing an integrated collaborative strategy.

He also said that both he, and Debbi Miller, will begin spending a day a month at each of the township offices, in order to rekindle some of the relationships that have been weakened over the last few years, mainly because of the pandemic.

The proposed changes were approved by the committee, with at least one dissenting vote, and are being considered at a meeting of Frontenac County Council this week (Wednesday February 21).