Elyria's new approach to economic development

Sometimes you can't do it on your own. That's the conclusion Elyria city officials have arrived at when it comes to bringing a grocery store to the city's south side. "We weren't having much success, quite frankly, on our own looking for that," Mayor Kevin Brubaker said last week. Brubaker has rightly prioritized finding a grocer to replace the Aldi that was once located next to Rural King in Carlisle Township, just outside the city limits. Aldi closed the store last year after opening a new location off Chestnut Ridge Road. The departure left south-side residents without easy access to fresh food. It was especially problematic for those who lack access to reliable transportation and made worse when the Family Dollar on Oberlin Elyria Road also closed last year. The city's new answer to filling that void is to outsource recruitment of new retail stores and restaurants to Alabama-based Retail Strategies LLC. City Council voted unanimously last week to approve a three-year contract with the company, which specializes in that sort of economic development. The company will be paid $50,000 per year, with the funds coming from Issue 6, a 0.25-percent income tax that voters first approved in 2016 and that is up for renewal this year. Among the goals for use of that money was economic development. At a Council committee meeting two weeks ago, Brubaker said his administration contacted the company after reading a story in The Chronicle-Telegram about a deal Lorain made with it last year. The difference between the two is that Lorain is paying Retail Strategies $22,500 to teach various local officials, including from the Lorain Port Authority, how to bring in specific kinds of retail to the International City, which has struggled to get a grocery store or pharmacy to open in south Lorain. Brubaker said he didn't think that was the right tactic for Elyria right now. "My comment was kind (of) 'We don't have time to teach,'" Brubaker said last week. "Our teams will learn as we're going through this process, but just to bring somebody in to teach somebody how to do it — I'm two years behind if I do that." It will be interesting to see which of the two cities' approaches works better. In Elyria, Retail Strategies plans to look at data, including from cellphone providers, to get a sense of who's coming and going from Elyria for their shopping needs. The goal, Ryan Culp, the company's vice president for business development, said, is to prevent "retail leakage" of residents spending money outside the city. (He also said that his company had a proven track record of bringing retail development. On average, he said, it had brought in $105,000 in new tax revenue annually for its client communities.) Culp told Council that Retail Strategies would draft a comprehensive strategy for the city within six months. Although he ultimately voted in favor of the contract, Councilman Brad Armstrong, I-5th Ward, who represents Elyria's south side, questioned whether a citywide strategy was the best approach to getting a grocery store for his constituents. It's a reasonable concern, but the city can do more than one thing at once. Culp argued that any retail development in the city would create momentum for additional retail. We hope he's right, not just for the south side, but for the rest of Elyria, because, as Brubaker acknowledged, the city's efforts at retail development haven't been working. Still, the city has had some economic development successes. For example, a senior care center and senior housing project is being developed off state Route 57. Two other projects, if they happen, also could be a boon for the city's economic fortunes. One is the redevelopment of the Midway Mall, which the Lorain County Port Authority purchased in 2023 with a nearly $14 million loan from the county commissioners. The Port Authority has agreed to sell the mall to developer ICP of Cleveland for $17 million, but the deal has not been finalized. The other is a proposed e-sports facility in downtown Elyria, which was announced to great fanfare in 2022 under then-Mayor Frank Whitfield. That project remains a work in progress. Broadly speaking, voters tend to expect mayors and other elected officials to deliver when it comes to economic development, which brings jobs and tax revenue to the city. Time will tell whether Brubaker and Council made the right call outsourcing at least some of those efforts.