TO: Mayor and Commissioners
FROM: Jeffrey L. Oris, CEcD, Assistant City Manager
THROUGH: Terrence R. Moore, ICMA-CM
DATE: April 7, 2026
Title
ORGANIZATIONAL AND OPERATIONAL STRUCTURE FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT SYNERGY.
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Recommended Action:
Recommendation
The Commission is asked receive presentations from consultants to be engaged for economic development planning and marketing. Kevin Crowder of Business Flare, LLC will be in attendance to discuss the scope of work they will undertake to prepare an Economic Development Positioning and Targeting Plan and Craig Agranoff of GRIP.D Marketing will participate remotely to discuss his firm's scope of work for preparation of and Economic Development Execution and Marketing Infrastructure program.
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Background:
The December 1, 2025 City Commission Workshop focused on Economic Development. During this meeting, the City Commission provided some direction as to the types of businesses they would like to see the City focus their efforts to attract and indicated that the City needs to market itself to such businesses. Staff was directed to investigate and bring back additional information.
To this end, staff presented at the Commission Workshop meeting of February 3, 2026, a path forward to include the preparation of an economic development plan to show through data and other information, targeted industries for the City to seek to attract based on the City's assets and demographics, and a separate study to implement the plan through appropriate marketing to targeted industries.
Staff reached out to a number of firms that do such work and the best proposals received were from Business Flare, LLC for an Economic Development Positioning and Targeting Plan and GRIP.D Marketing for an Execution and Marketing Infrastructure strategy.
Attached to this item are the Scope of Work each firm will be undertaking.
City Attorney Review:
N/A
Funding Source/Financial Impact:
The funding for both resulting agreements wil...
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