New leaders offer fresh approach to LI development issues
Linda Armyn, left, and John Nader, are members of the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council. Credit: Linda Rosier
More than a decade ago, New York State established a new strategy to award economic development money to key construction projects, companies and initiatives. State officials established 10 Regional Economic Development Councils to solicit and analyze submissions, recommend the best, and vie for top prize amounts.
Some referred to the contest as the state's version of the Hunger Games. Each year, it culminated in an enormous awards ceremony, complete with nail-biting anticipation, where the regions would learn who won big, often more than $100 million each. In this awards show, no one lost; some just got less. According to the state, $7.5 billion has been awarded since 2011, when the REDCs were born.
Now, Long Island's council is on the brink of a significant shift. For the first time in 11 years, it has new leadership — with Farmingdale State College president John S. Nader and Bethpage Federal Credit Union senior vice president Linda Armyn taking the helm.
And both are bringing a welcome, fresh approach to what's become a bit of a tired process.
Especially in its early years, the then-innovative REDC contest generated much excitement, competition and buzz — and plenty of interesting and innovative economic development ideas. Often, Long Island took a top prize, allowing then co-chairs Kevin Law and Stuart Rabinowitz to ascend the Albany stage to applause.
This year, under Gov. Kathy Hochul, the pomp disappeared, as grants were offered on a rolling basis. Long Island received less — $40 million total, placing it eighth among the 10 regions. Law noted in January that some applications "did not warrant public dollar investments." Meanwhile, there have been valid, broader questions about how to better analyze whether funds were well-spent.
It's no wonder Armyn and Nader want to change things up.
For Armyn, that means instituting better guidance for applicants and focusing on where downtown redevelopment, which brings its own pot of money every year, can be most successful. But it also means spotlighting her "hot button" issue that until recently might not have seemed directly related to spurring economic development or job growth, but certainly is: child care.
"We need to prioritize child care as much as we prioritize other things," Armyn said in a recent interview. "Elevating child care in people's minds so it's more than just a babysitting problem is really important."
Armyn correctly points out that attention to and money for child care must not mean simply adding a day care facility to an office building — though that would be nice. It's about developing work environments where those with children feel comfortable, creating more options for them, focusing on child care workers, and linking it all to a subject at the top of Nader's to-do list: workforce development.
It's no surprise that a college president's eyes are trained on nurturing Long Island workers. But his thinking goes beyond schools like Farmingdale.
"We really need to better coordinate the workforce training and career education programs in the region," Nader said. "We need to make sure young people are prepared to capitalize on the opportunities here."
In the early REDC days, many projects that rightly received funding promised new infrastructure or a lab or office space — to physically show how the money was used. While Long Island will never lose sight of those brick-and-mortar needs, Armyn and Nader seem ready to take the council for a deeper dive into less tangible, but just as prizeworthy, interests — whether or not there's a Hunger Games win to prove it.
Columnist Randi F. Marshall's opinions are her own.
Randi Marshall is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
