At the August meeting of the Kosciusko County Redevelopment Commission, commissioners, discussed the Van Buren TIF proposed budget, received an update from KEDCo and discussed their fact-finding trip a bit more.

County Attorney Chad Miner was present to help the commission through the legal side of the proposed TIF budget for the Van Buren/Maple Leaf TIF near Leesburg. The commission has been formulating the budget for several months, and they nearly have a draft ready that would go before the Kosciusko County Council for approval.

“This is a fairly good generic plan,” noted KEDCo President George Robertson. “You could use this for more than just Maple Leaf.”

The plan was designed to be relatively generic, allowing for a variety of uses of TIF funds. Funds could be used for infrastructure improvements or purchasing equipment, for example.

Miner stated he needed to do a little more research as to whether or not the Van Buren TIF qualifies as a Legacy TIF, meaning whether or not it was officially adopted before 1995 However, he is comfortable adopting the plan the the commission has worked up.

“We could go ahead and adopt the plan as is,” Miner said. “If we need to make changes later on, we can do that.”

Commissioner Henry DeJulia said he would have a final draft ready for the next meeting. Once approved, the budget plan would be submitted to the Kosciusko County Council.

Moving on. “What I want to chat about today is the biggest challenge we face,” Robertson told the commission.

“Since January to June, we’ve added 3000 more employed people in this county,” he said. “That’s good news.”

However, this poses a certain problem for KEDCo and local industries. “It’s getting harder and harder to find good workers,” Robertson said. “The challenge that my board gave me two weeks ago was that we needed to recruit workers.”

To remedy the situation, Robertson plans to run a “Bring Them Home Kosciusko” campaign. He says he executed a similar program working in Louisiana.

Basically the idea is to reach out to young professionals and families, originally from the area but who’ve moved away to pursue other opportunities, and get them to bring their skills back to Kosciusko County.

To do this, Robertson’s campaign would stress the safety, schools, employment and continued education opportunities. KEDCo would combine this information with local job openings, then advertise it.

“We got 200 families to move back in a year,” said Robertson of his campaign in Louisiana. “If you get them to move back, it gives the whole economy a shot in the arm.”

Robertson wants to keep local industries staffed and happy, but he also stressed wanting to make sure there’s attraction for new prospects. To do this, he thinks the county should have “shovel-ready sites” to accommodate business who might want to open a facility in Kosciusko County. Robertson noted several such sites along US 30, which he thought were good for the county.

After Robertson’s presentation, the commission revisited their fact-finding trip to Lafayette. Commissioner Max Courtney suggested looking into the possibility for a river front district for the county (DeJulia noted the success of the river front district developed in Syracuse). He also wanted the commission to look into using TIF funds for projects such as fiber optics.