NW Florida Region receives $15 M in economic development grants

Federal grant money is being issued for economic development in Florida’s panhandle for specific technology and materials based industries. The Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development (WIRED) program represents $195 million from the U.S Department of Labor via the Employment and Training Administration and will be distributed to 13 regional economies. The grant is to fund regional partnerships aimed at expanding employment and advancement opportunities and catalyzing the creation of high-skill, high-wage opportunities in those regional economies. The Northwest Florida region is officially defined by the regional development firm Florida’s Great Northwest as the 16 county area stretching from Jefferson to Escambia Counties. This portion of Florida, locally known as Florida’s panhandle, received $15 million from the WIRED initiative. The program requires a 100 percent match from awardees, effectively doubling the grant’s value to $30 million.

The WIRED initiative for Northwest Florida includes:

¦ Entrepreneurship development designed to enable qualifying start-up companies to secure seed capital.

¦ Grants enabling job training for new and existing businesses in the target industries.

¦ Secondary education academy development for entrylevel employment in selected industries or accelerated college preparation in the subject areas of math and science.

¦ Outreach programs to educate and attract students of all ages into training programs to meet workforce demands.

¦ Strategic development component designed to ensure workforce development programs are developing skills necessary to meet current and future target industry needs.

Because the federal government administers the grants through the state, applicants must adhere to federal guidelines. Only certain industries are eligible for funding and jobs created must pay125 percent above the average annual wage. For example, according to the Agency for Workforce Innovation’s 2004 report, the

average annual wage in Santa Rosa County is pegged at just over $27,000. In order to qualify, created jobs must pay at least $34,000 a year and provide real healthcare, paid vacation, sick leave and retirement benefits.

The target industries as defined by the state are:

¦ Aerospace and defense

¦ Medical device manufacturing, biotechnology and health services where 70 percent of the company’s revenue is generated by sales outside of the Northwest Florida region.

¦ Information technology, software development and Electronics engineering.

¦ Construction materials manufacturing

¦ Distribution activities that support the target industries.

Regional companies being awarded grant funding are: Ceryph, Inc., ActiGraph, LLC., O&M Steel Fabricators, DayJet, GridSouth Networks, Trinity DNA Solutions, Aerospace & Flight Academy, Construction Academy, Computer Numeric Coding Instatute, Allied Health and Medical Device Instatute and Project C2. For more information, visit www.floridasgreatnorthwest. com.