LVEDC President and CEO Don Cunningham speaks at the LVEDC Annual Meeting March 21, 2023 at the ArtsQuest Center in Bethlehem.
Editor's note: The following is a copy of the prepared remarks Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation President and CEO Don Cunningham delivered March 21 at the nonprofit's annual meeting at the ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks in Bethlehem.
Thank you, Governor Shapiro, for those remarks – and for being here.
It’s taken 25 years for a governor to speak at an LVEDC Annual Meeting, but it was well worth the wait.
Thank you for your focus on economic development. Your commitment to innovation and growth. And your energy, vision, and leadership.
We’ve quietly been doing our part here.
The Lehigh Valley economic renaissance to a 21st Century economy started as those blast furnaces behind us fell silent. It continues today.
Last year – once again – we were in the Top 10 in the United States for regions of our size in new development projects. This time, placing second – second in the U.S. in 2022 for regions of 200,000 to 1 million in population. Greenville, S.C., had two more projects.
What’s most impressive – and most important – is that those 46 projects were in nearly every sector of our economy – from life sciences to technology to health care to advanced manufacturing and lots in between. Our strength is a balanced economy.
We’ve been ringing up the wins. 2022 continued that streak.
Here’s a short video that summarizes last year – much quicker than I could.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwQK_c8vUJQ
It’s always great to place high in rankings. But what matters more is how you get there.
2022 marked the return of manufacturing as the largest sector of our economy.
$8.4 billion in economic output coming from more than 750 manufacturers – and job growth 5 times faster than typical U.S. regions.
From this location, steelworkers made the steel that built the skylines of our cities, and the armaments that helped to win two world wars.
It’s hard to beat the poetry of that. Today, we make a little bit of everything.
My dad was one of those steelworkers, as was his grandfather before him.
Long retired, he still jokes when he’s on Long Beach Island in New Jersey – the only place I ever vacationed as a kid – that if it wasn’t for him, you couldn’t be on LBI.
Now, I don’t know if Bethlehem Steel made the steel for that causeway bridge but – if it didn’t – please don’t tell my Old Man.
I’ve heard the same pride in Crayola workers, and those of Mack Trucks, B. Braun, OraSure, FreshPet, and Martin Guitar.
It matters not if you’re making steel, trucks, medical devices, beer, or baked goods. There’s pride in production.
America still makes things – at least here in the Lehigh Valley. It’s 18 percent of our economic output. It’s 12 percent in the U.S.
In an era of rapid change and innovation it’s good to have a stake in the ground. The Lehigh Valley has been making things for our country since the 1700s. The products have evolved but our role remains.
The pandemic increased that demand.
The tenuousness of supply chains across oceans and continents – dependent on ports and trucks and ships – was exposed. Governments and companies have a new focus on producing in the U.S. and closer to large population centers – and they’re investing in it
America remains the world’s largest consumer economy. And one-third of consumers live on the East Coast, a day’s drive from here.
Hence, one of our most consistent interests is from companies – both domestic and international - looking to access them with their products.
Our secret sauce remains the same.
A large and well-trained workforce, good infrastructure with access to market, and available land and buildings.
More than workforce, building availability is our biggest challenge.
In case you’ve just returned from 7 years on the Space Station, industrial buildings are not very popular. They’re called warehouses regardless of what takes place in them, which includes manufacturing.
Concerns about mammoth buildings – far off the beaten path, pushing trucks onto rural roads – are justified and a balance is necessary. But the bottom line is that distribution centers, industrial flex buildings and even warehouses are a critical part of a manufacturing economy.
Most manufacturers inhabit industrial buildings for both production and distribution. Once products are made, they need to be held and then distributed.
Together, industrial production and distribution employ about 75,000 workers – making the combined sector the Lehigh Valley’s largest employer, just ahead of health care. The market minimum wage for non-skilled workers is $20 per hour or more – with health care benefits. Skilled manufacturing workers earn $30 to $40 and beyond.
The jobs are not glamorous, but neither were those in slate, cement, and textiles.
The pandemic showed us that the Lehigh Valley workforce is on the front lines. Remote work is not an option for 77 percent of them, well above the national average.
If you make things, move things, sell things, or take care of people you have to show up. That’s most of our workforce.
2022 taught us that remote work is here to stay.
And, like much in life, it brings both opportunity and challenges – a very real one for those who own office buildings. Conversations have started about when to convert and repurpose offices for housing, as professional workers now spend less time in an office and the demand for new housing grows.
It will continue as remote work is helping to attract new, young talent to the region.
The Lehigh Valley is growing and changing. It’s getting younger and more diverse.
We will hear from a panel of those young people in just a moment.
Our colleges and universities produce more than 10,000 graduates a year – and more and more are staying or returning. The Lehigh Valley has the fastest percentage growth of young people of any Pennsylvania market.
This is one of the drivers in LVEDC’s strategic focus to target growth in the life sciences, bio-med, and technology sectors, along with advanced manufacturing and creative services. The region has history in these sectors and good existing clusters.
The critical ingredient is talent.
Do you have the right workers with the right skills for the jobs that are needed?
If you do, employers will stay and grow and come to your market. If you don’t, they’ll go elsewhere.
This is one constant that doesn’t change with time.
The strength of a place remains its people and quality of life.
That’s why so much of our economic development work today is in talent supply and linking employers to education -- and families and students to career information.
Our test as a community is to meet the challenges created by a rapidly changing world and the unease it creates. To take advantage of the new while honoring our time-worn traditions.
That’s long been the strength of the Lehigh Valley.
We evolve while staying the same.
We still make things here.
We understand that economic development is about opportunity for all – from the recent immigrant with just a high school diploma to the Ph.D. in biochemistry.
We’ve long been an underdog – always surprising people – and we like it that way. We’re a suburb of nowhere, our own authentic place.
And we leave things a little better than we find them.
We did that again in 2022. Let’s watch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPoVttKI52s
