ENERGIZE Clinton County

ENERGIZE Clinton County seeks to bring about a convergence of two critical economic issues: (1) Clinton County’s need to provide meaningful and sustainable employment opportunities to the area’s displaced workforce, and (2) Ohio’s need to spur Green economic development across the state.

The Wilmington Green Enterprise Zone will promote research and development, manufacturing, construction, and retail, as well as services that have a direct positive impact on increasing energy and material efficiency. In doing so, the Green Enterprise Zone will lay a foundation for a Green economic shift across the state of Ohio. The Green Enterprise Zone will also reward businesses that take measurable steps in increasing energy and material efficiency within their business practices.

We propose a three-sphere approach to development which seeks to achieve the primary goal of our long-term economic plan—to provide sustainable, meaningful, and long-term employment to the residents of Clinton County. This model will offer a testing ground for Green technologies, business models, and development strategies that will immediately provide jobs to the displaced workers. The sphere model addresses the urgent need for local jobs in a way that is integral to the larger project of attracting and accelerating Green research and technology throughout the state of Ohio.

(For more on Why Wilmington?)

The Three Spheres of Development

Rather than a strictly ‘phased’ roll-out of our economic policy, we have designed and are proposing a three-sphere strategy for developing a Green Enterprise Zone in Wilmington that enables us, first and foremost, to address the immediate needs of the community.  We chose this development model, rather than a linear model, to demonstrate the simultaneous nature of the plan’s spheres.

Sphere 1: Greening Our Community
Sphere 2: Building Green Partnerships
Sphere 3: Promoting Green Enterprises

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Sphere 1: Greening Our Community
To provide a stimulus to the Clinton County economy and employment opportunities, we propose an immediate investment in Greening Clinton County’s infrastructure. This investment will be focused on three infrastructural sectors, putting priority on projects which require Green Collar re-training for jobs that will be essential to re-development work across the state.

(1) Retrofitting Wilmington’s Commercial and Residential Buildings: We believe that the Clinton County workforce presents the opportunity to undertake the most ambitious Green Collar re-training program to date. Focusing on Green Collar re-training in Clinton County will create a critical mass of trained and qualified workers prepared for igniting a massive retrofitting effort across the state of Ohio.

We therefore propose that the re-development investment should go towards retrofitting commercial and residential buildings in Wilmington. The retrofitting process will rely entirely on known and accessible technologies, and it will build on existing skills in the workforce. Jobs created through this program will include: installation of high-performance windows, efficient heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems, geothermal heat­ing and cooling systems, efficient light­ing and day-lighting, building-integrated photovoltaic-powered energy, and efficient appliances.

(2) Building the Smart Grid: In order to take full advantage of the benefits of advanced energy technologies, we must first retrofit our electrical grid to create a more efficient system for distributing electricity. Building this system will require logistical and software engineers to develop the systems necessary for managing electricity flows. New power lines will also need to be manufactured and installed to handle the advanced distributions systems. Investment in Wilmington to build the capabilities for producing the equipment, systems and materials for smart grid construction would create Green Job opportunities and would take advantage of Wilmington’s central location to serve as a hub from which to build the smart grid throughout Southwest Ohio.

(3) Greening our Public Spaces: Building a Green Enterprise Zone has to include building a community which promotes energy efficiency and an appreciation for the environment. We believe that there are many immediate job opportunities in Clinton County that will meet the twin goals of improving our public spaces and providing a catalyst for broader Green Enterprise Zone development. New jobs can be created for projects that include: park development; establishing community and neighborhood gardens; downtown Wilmington re-development and beautification; expanding the Wilmington farmers’ market; establishing a Wilmington food cooperative; expanding our sidewalks and bike trails, and designating bike lanes, in order to make Wilmington walker- and biker-friendly.

President-elect Obama has made a clear commitment to using energy policy and an economic stimulus package to promote the creation of Green Collar jobs to retrofit America’s infrastructure for a Green economy. We believe that these new policies and funds will provide future opportunities for financing and tax incentives that will aid in the development of the Green Enterprise Zone. Due to the immediate need for job creation addressed in Sphere 1, we have identified the following direct funding sources and tax incentives which should be used to initiate the infrastructure retrofitting program while new sources of funding are pursued. These already existing funding sources and tax incentives include, but are not limited to:

Retrofitting Buildings
Direct funding is available through the Energy Independence and Security Act, state and federal low-income energy assistance programs, and matching grants for locally developed retrofitting programs.

Tax incentives are available through the Residential Energy Efficiency Tax Credit, Residential Solar and Fuel Cell Tax Credit, Business Energy Tax Credit, Energy Efficient Commercial Building Tax Deduction, Energy Efficient Mortgage federal loan program.

Smart Grid Development
Direct funding is available through the Smart Grid Investment Matching Grant Program established in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act.

Green Collar Job Re-training
In November 2008, the U.S. Department of Labor allocated Wilmington a $3.8 million National Emergency Grant for job re-training. Congressman Mike Turner referred to this grant as a “down payment” on future federal assistance. This grant money, along with future grants, could provide the funding for immediately initiating a Green Collar job re-training program in Wilmington.

Sphere 2: Building Green Partnerships
We believe that designating Wilmington as a Green Enterprise Zone will create many opportunities for pursuing public-private partnerships to spur innovation and create incentives for Green businesses to operate within the Green Enterprise Zone. We have identified three key public-private partnerships which should be pursued in early stages of development to accelerate the development process:

(1) Research Partnerships: To create an environment promoting the research and development of Green technologies, we propose that the state of Ohio establish an advanced energy research center in Wilmington that will take advantage of the town’s centralized location to provide collaborative facilities and resources for southwest Ohio’s six regional research universities to pursue research related to advanced energy production and distribution. Such a partnership would be encouraged by designating government and private grant money for research conducted at the research center. By bringing together teams of Ohio’s top advanced energy researchers, the Green Enterprise Zone will provide a stream of expert engineers and scientists to attract companies focused on innovation and technological development.

(2) Renewable Energy Partnerships: Ohio Governor Ted Strickland’s Energy, Jobs and Progress plan has called for energy companies in Ohio to obtain 25% of their energy from advanced energy sources. We propose a public-private partnership with local energy provider Dayton Power & Light to develop a business park in Wilmington powered by advanced energy technologies. Such a business park would serve as a testing ground and model for these technologies; would allow DP&L to work towards fulfillment of its advanced energy quota; and would provide an incentive to companies by guaranteeing significant energy savings.

(3) Financing Partnerships: A key component of the Green Enterprise Zone’s success in jump-starting Green economic development across the state will be the success of entrepreneurs and start-up companies. To facilitate this entrepreneurial development during the early stages of the Green Enterprise Zone development, we propose that the state seek a financial partner to establish a state backed venture fund that will provide seed money to innovative businesses, especially those developing new technologies, and early stage financing for businesses seeking to increase the productive scale of successful technologies.

Sphere 3: Promoting Green Enterprise
By leveraging Wilmington’s assets, and with new assets gained through the development of Sphere 1 and Sphere 2, we believe that Wilmington will be primed to become a hub for Green enterprises in Ohio. Yet there are three policy components which must be developed to successfully establish a Green Enterprise Zone.

(1) Establishing a system for classifying Green enterprises: In order to establish an enterprise zone that specifically promotes Green businesses, we must first develop a clear definition of what constitutes a Green business. Not only is such a definition essential to developing effective incentive packages to promote the desired Green businesses, but it more importantly provides a clear set of criteria for businesses to adapt their practices to take advantage of Green incentives. We believe that this definition should not be limited to traditionally defined Green businesses that sell goods and services that have a direct positive impact on the environment. We believe that the definition should be broadened and should offer incentives to all businesses that take steps to reduce the amount of waste and emissions produced in the supplies and inputs they use to produce the goods and services they sell. We suggest a tiered categorization system which provides different levels of incentives based on the fulfillment of industry specific benchmarks for each segment of the production chain.

(2) Offering Incentives for Going Green: To provide economic incentives to attract Green business to the Green Enterprise Zone, the state, county, and local governments must design tax incentives that will maximize the competitiveness of business operating in the Green Enterprise Zone. We recommended establishing a tiered incentive system which rewards companies based on their classification as one of the following:

Class 1 (Highest incentive level): Firms whose activity is to produce environmental goods and services (the traditional “Environmental Goods and Service’s sector)
Class 2: Firms which have taken active and identifiable steps to change their products and/or process to take sustainability agenda into account.
Class 3 (Lowest incentive level): All other firms which have taken some steps to improve process efficiency or change their brand type.

We also encourage local and state officials to pursue new and innovative incentive packages to encourage Green business practices such as developing programs that allow businesses to pay for commercial retrofitting with the savings produced.

(3) Marketing the Green Enterprise Zone: One of the most effective ways of rewarding businesses that operate in the Green Enterprise Zone will be increasing their brand value through an aggressive national campaign marketing the Wilmington Green Enterprise Zone. The compelling nature of Wilmington’s story and the groundbreaking nature of the establishing the country’s first Green Enterprise Zone should be maximized to attract businesses and increase their value.