Sonoma County BEST: A New Economic Development Partnership Announced for Sonoma County

The Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce has served as the catalyst to create Sonoma County BEST, which stands for “Building Economic Success Together.” The program was unveiled March 18, 2011 at the Santa Rosa Junior College campus where the capital campaign progress to-date was announced. BEST is a $3.25 million dollar five-year private/public partnership for job creation and economic development projected to create 4,100 jobs. This program is being launched in response to the significant economic and community challenges we are facing in Sonoma County as a result of the recession. The program is expected to add $268 million dollars in payroll, $182 million dollars in disposable personal income, and $37 million dollars in State and Local tax revenue over five years.

Economic development programs that have successfully created jobs were studied by the Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce. BEST was designed using an approach proven effective in other communities. The program includes strategic initiatives built around job retention and creation, building a better business climate, and improving the job skills of our work force. What is unique about this program is that it combines private and public sector resources and creates an active economic development program with “jobs” as the deliverable.

The Leadership Team formed to launch this program includes: Henry Trione, Retired Businessman; Randy DeCaminada, PG&E; Shirlee Zane, Sonoma County Supervisor; Robert Agrella, Santa Rosa Junior College; Brett Martinez, Redwood Credit Union; Judy Coffey, Kaiser Permanente; Rolf Nelson, Exchange Bank; Ty Pforsich, Moss Adams; Marcus Benedetti, Clover-Stornetta Farms; Brad Bollinger, North Bay Business Journal; and Juan Estrada, Environment Control.

A capital campaign is underway to fund the program implementation and will continue through July 2011. The execution phase of this program will begin in July 2011 and continue for 5-years.

BEST’s Honorary Chairman Henry Trione commented, “This Program is a Bold New Approach to economic development in Sonoma County. It combines and unifies the private and public sector efforts toward economic vitality for our community. I believe this is a powerful approach to directly address the significant challenges we are facing in our community as a result of the recession.”