By Christine Graf
When Jim Siplon was hired as president and CEO of Economic Development Corporation (EDC) of Warren County in early 2021, the country was in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“When I stepped into the job, I thought it was about attracting and supporting business,” said Siplon. “That’s kind of the traditional view of economic development. But, COVID helped clarify that there are a lot of dynamics going on in the greater economy and the greater population.”
During the pandemic, the EDC began working to bring high-speed broadband internet service to rural communities throughout the region.
“It’s not something I would have predicted we would get involved in, but we discovered it to be a huge, glaring need during COVID,” he said. “We had school kids that needed to stay connected. We had people with health care issues that were attempting to access health care but couldn’t hold a tele-health session. We had businesses that were trying to operate remotely. The ability for everyone to be able to connect became almost a universal need.”
Although a considerable amount of money had already been spent to bring broadband internet to rural areas, pockets within Warren Country remained unserved.
In order to address what was considered an urgent need, the EDC established an informal group to tackle the issue. The makeup of the group–one that continues to meet weekly–varies from week to week. It typically includes elected officials, members of community organizations, and representatives from broadband companies.
“The group does not issue funds or make public decisions. It acts as a catalyst for problem solving around all of this,” said Siplon. “It is made up of anybody who has domain knowledge or questions they are trying to resolve on how best to proceed on broadband.”
Informally known as the North Country Broadband Alliance, the unchartered group is open to those outside of Warren County. Weekly meetings are regularly attended by individuals from six different Adirondack counties.
“To me, that’s a model for how this entire field (of economic development) is evolving,” said Siplon. “These are things that are best done collaboratively rather than competitively. We all need more housing. We all need better access to broadband. If we are out there trying to compete county by county or municipality by municipality for access to funds and resources that are needed, that creates a binary of winners and losers. What I would like to do is raise the whole region up.”
Thanks in part to the work of the alliance, Siplon reports that the vast majority of those living in Warren County now have access to reliable broadband.
“In 2020, roughly two out of three people in the county had access to a modern broadband standard. Today, it’s nearly 94 percent. There are still some pockets of work that we continue to address, but increasingly, what we are trying to do is help our neighbors as well as ourselves. Because to get to those last six percent, it’s probably more effective for us to partner with our neighbors who have greater needs than us. That’s because the eligibility for some of the remaining funds is based on the populations that are unserved.”
According to Siplon, working on the broadband issue proved to be an eye-opening experience for him.
“It helped me to understand what I consider to be the new dynamic of economic development. It used to be that economic development was about chasing companies because companies provided employment and tax base which communities needed in order to continue to sustain, but economic development is largely about our ability to attract, sustain, and grow people. It took me a while to understand this.”
One of the major issues facing the field of economic development, particularly in Warren County, is related to the shrinking and aging workforce. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the median age in the United States reached a record high of 38.9 in 2022. In Warren County, the median age is 49.
Without an influx of new residents, the median age will continue to increase, something that will impact businesses and the local economy.
“If our housing stock and our ability to receive new residents doesn’t grow, our population stays static or goes down, and we will essentially age in place year over year,” said Siplon. “All of our businesses will suffer.”
As an example, he mentioned AngioDynamics. The company’s recent consolidation was attributed in part to the aging workforce.
“Their workforce was aging in place, and there was not an adequate workforce coming behind it that they could count on to support their manufacturing operations. This was not an issue of whether they wanted to continue here. It was a resource issue of whether or not they had the resources to do that,” said Siplon. “We have to figure out how to be able to build the infrastructure that’s needed to attract a new wave of residents.”