RIDGWAY – The North Central Pennsylvania Regional Planning and Development Commission’s Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) committee heard progress updates on the continued buildout of their economic development tracking system during Wednesday’s quarterly meeting.

The hybrid meeting featured a presentation from ATLAS Community Studios (ATLAS) detailing their progress on the North Central Data Dashboard, which is a visual economic development evaluation tool. The dashboard provides data on population; employment and wages; education; housing; critical infrastructure, such as transportation and water; and broadband and internet access across the six-county region, which are all aspects of the North Central Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy and Resiliency Plan 2022-26.

ATLAS consultants Kate Green and Megan Tebbe told the committee they are currently adding greater detail to the dashboard that would reflect overall project progress. Activity measures are being used to track the progress on the strategic priorities identified in the North Central CEDS and Resiliency Plan. Green said the dashboard will serve as a tool that will show a projects’ return on investment and could also be used to leverage different resources for projects.

The guiding principles of the North Central CEDS and Resiliency Plan focus on strengthening employment and education opportunities that would provide stable family-wage jobs; invest in entrepreneurship and home-grown business development to build a sustainable, diverse economy; preserve and invest in the region’s natural and cultural assets to strengthen economic potential; create and/or improve reliable, consistent access to critical infrastructure in the six-county region; and provide sufficient availability of right-sized, right-priced housing in each county.

The data dashboard gauges the efficacy and impact of projects created through the North Central CEDS and Resiliency Plan by region and county level and can also be used to compare data across the six-county region. The dashboard can be found at https://tinyurl.com/k7nkt6cx.

The committee also heard progress updates from North Central staff. Jennifer Hibbard, who serves as Loan Program Director, gave the committee an update on the Microloan Development Project. Hibbard said the program is designed to support small businesses and entrepreneurs to foster local job creation and create economic diversification. The program was developed using a Regional Access to Capital study that was used to identify any gaps and needs in the financial market that negatively affect businesses and entrepreneurs to accessing capital.

The study showed a very specific recommendation for North Central to reboot the microlending program albeit with revised financing strategies. The new program would be responsive to the unique financing needs of very small businesses with 10 employees or less that are seeking capital up to $50,000.

Hibbard said the commission plans to unveil the reboot of the microlending program within the next six months to a year.

Ed Matts, who serves as Director of Information Systems at North Central, provided the committee with an update on broadband. He said the state released $284 million to vendors to perform buildouts of the broadband network in the state as a precursor to BEAD funding, which will be released later this year. In the region, Verizon was granted $38 million for projects that are to be completed over the next two years.

The meeting opened with unanimous approval of the May 15 meeting minutes and the appointment of Brian Reed of Cameron County and Brenda Langdon of Potter County to the committee.

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The North Central Pennsylvania Regional Planning and Development Commission is a premier regional development organization that serves the public and private sector through a wide range of economic, community, infrastructure, human services, and technology programs for Cameron, Clearfield, Elk, Jefferson, McKean, and Potter Counties.