Economic Development Strategy
Parkland County's Economic Development and Tourism Strategy has been developed to set the pace and direction of economic development and tourism activities in Parkland County over the next five years. The process used to develop this plan was highly facilitative, gathered feedback from multiple stakeholder groups, and was built on the principle that all activities must be realistic and achievable within existing resources. The findings in this report have been reviewed and validated by the Economic Development and Tourism Advisory Committee, and are intended to represent an aggregation of inputs and ideas provided by Parkland County project contributors.
Through this Strategic Plan, Parkland County is seeking to establish and communicate a vision for the municipality’s future that will inspire elected officials, policy makers and citizens, and enable them to make informed choices to guide growth and set priorities, while preserving the County’s competitiveness and livability.
The economic development vision for Parkland County’s future is “a diversified, quality economic foundation, sustaining a healthy environment where people, businesses and industry can thrive and grow.” The economic development function is intended to work proactively to leverage County business assets to stimulate economic flow in support of this vision. The primary mission of economic development activities is to strengthen and diversify the County’s economic foundation by growing value-added industry, accelerating development, supporting businesses and improving awareness.
The County’s Council, staff, Economic Development and Tourism Advisory Committee and other business and community leaders want to see the community continuing to be proactive and focused on achieving specific deliverables. Because Parkland’s office and its partnering organizations have done some great work in the past, there is a lot of enthusiasm about making progressive change in order for it to do even better. The following document provides Parkland with a structure for that change. Identified within are a number of recommendations that will bring focus to activities.
The following target sectors are recommended:
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Logistics & Distribution (immediate investment attraction opportunity)
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Lone Eagles (strong short and long-term investment opportunity)
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Advanced Manufacturing (concentrating on retention in the near-term)
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Eco-Industrial Park (longer-term opportunity)
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Tourism (relatively very weak sector strategy)
In addition, we recommend Parkland put very high priority on a number of economic development and tourism services delivery initiatives that are “foundations” which impact each of the above sectors.
For each sector and the “foundation” services delivery there are action plans that contain strategic objectives and individual initiatives. Associated with each is a priority setting and suggested timeline.
The report also includes a comparison of economic development and tourism services delivery in six similarly sized Alberta communities. The results of the comparison offer interesting insights into the characteristics of strong County economic development and tourism models. Recommendations are made on a wide range of characteristics.
The last section of the report deals with performance monitoring and metrics and offers recommendations on different ways to measure the effectiveness of the economic development and tourism initiative. It is important to look at both quantitative and qualitative factors. One quantitative method in particular, termed the “OEDA Factor” is an innovative but very practical measurement for the County’s investment attraction efforts.
With attention to these initiatives, Parkland will strengthen its economy and create an environment that will become the envy of Alberta.