Progressive Development for Richmond and its Businesses

By Eduardo Martinez

Team Richmond's platform for moving us economically. I have also been in conversation with people who have interest in making our port a center for import and distribution.

For one thing, an improving quality of life in Richmond matters to businesses. The amenities that make a city a good place to live also make it a good place to do business: good schools, good transportation, low crime, clean well-lit streets. The employees new and growing business hire eat, shop, get their hair and dry cleaning done in Richmond. The market for goods and services expands, spawning opportunities for additional service businesses. Those businesses and their employees provide desirable amenities, and thrive as well. Richmond keeps getting better. New Strategies

At this stage in Richmond's economic development efforts, we need some new strategies. We need to target and win micro, small and mid-size businesses eager to grow in the Bay Area. To fill this niche, we need to hone our approach. Doing so will help complete the transformation of our city from one that focused exclusively on Chevron and the large developers, to one that builds on the diversity of our population and the wide array of retail, service, office, professional and light-industrial businesses our community can support.

Economic Development Website

Redesign an attractive city website for economic development that provides one-stop shopping for businesses looking to relocate in the Bay Area. Our current online presence includes links that go nowhere and outdated information. Prospective businesses want to find out what this city offers easily, and they want to connect easily with an informed and helpful city business development contact. Commercial real estate and relocation specialists want to know what Richmond offers when they provide their clients options. When we do an excellent job of marketing the space, workers, and amenities we offer, we beat out other cities which aggressively market themselves. Our success winning LBNL shows us that. Support Local Businesses

Support existing local businesses. Run promotion and advertising campaigns, enhance signage, and grant funds for storefront improvements, city street banners, attractive street plantings and lighting. Actively promote business owners' success stories. The stories of our minority-owned businesses and cooperatives especially reflect Richmond's neighborhoods and vibrancy. By tracking and publicizing awards and accolades city businesses receive (Catahoula Coffee, Nutiva) we control our image and transform it to one of optimism and success, an image that reflects the positive feelings people in Richmond have about our community. A recent Contra Costa Times article about the growth of food businesses in Richmond (Blue Apron, 400 jobs; Whole Foods Distribution Center, 30 jobs) did this. We could use KCRT in combination with our talented city youth artists, muralists, and musicians to encourage more stories promoting our small businesses. Grow Local Expertise

Identify and grow local expertise that will play a useful role within the county, area, state, and national organizations concerned with the needs and interests of businesses that are growing in the Bay Area today, including software, clean tech and green businesses, food industry, healthcare, arts and entertainments industry, and artisan crafts. Regular, structured communication between local business leaders, non-profits and the city, state and regional economic development groups is an important way to get input from people on the ground to keep up with changes in the economic landscape of the Bay Area. Working closely on a local level with each of our main commercial areas and with the Chamber of Commerce is important to surface the different needs and desires of our community. Bringing these voices together with people in the broader economic development community will expand our horizons to reach those people with vision who can make use of what we have to offer. A small business consortium that reports quarterly to the City Council could be a useful tool to surface problems and solutions.

Adult Education Programs

Performance assessments that target programs in adult education, to support job-training skills suitable to a broad range of skilled office jobs, are an absolute priority to enhance our population's offerings of skills development that can grow beyond jobs in construction and STEM-related employment. Additional training programs for other targeted job opportunities for new businesses and existing businesses should be constantly in the pipeline for our Adult Education classes and other sponsored training programs.

Promote Service Businesses

Support and promote existing service businesses that will be used by the people who work in Richmond: restaurants, dry cleaners, hardware stores, pet food stores, nail salons. We need to make very sure that everyone who works in Richmond knows how they can also shop, eat, play and run their errands here in Richmond. Large businesses and government services in Richmond need to be reminded to shop local, and any and all efforts to encourage local procurement need to be actively encouraged. Promote and Cultivate Cooperative Businesses

Continue to promote and expand cooperative businesses. We currently have two catering co-ops, a solar installation cooperative, a housing cooperative, an arts collective, and two credit unions. We also have a bike co-op and urban agriculture co-ops in-the-making. In addition, we have the Richmond Worker Cooperative Revolving Loan Fund which provides small loans as start-up funds for qualifying cooperative development. Cooperatives create jobs, economic prosperity and workplace democracy. We need to expand opportunities for cooperative development in Richmond through potential policies such as providing additional points for cooperative businesses (with a large number of Richmond worker/owners) when selecting vendors and contractors for the City. Cultural Diversity

Build on the cultural diversity of Richmond. Richmond has a solid Latino community. The Cinco de Mayo festival is already a major regional event. We have the potential for building an important East Bay Latino shopping district by working with the 23rd Street Merchants Association. Our Juneteenth festival and our Native American PowWow, that also draw wide attention, provide for similar opportunities to develop business that both contribute to and serve cultural identities. There may also be similar possibilities by working with our Arab, Laotian, Tibetan and other communities.

A Business-Friendly Environment

In 2013 the City of Richmond published an advertising piece in the San Francisco Business Times. This marketing piece promoted the business-friendly environment we have here: revolving loans; target employment benefit areas, various tax credits. Local small and medium-sized businesses that have successfully and happily located in Richmond were highlighted and their stories told by the business owners. This was certainly a start.

But much more needs to be done to change the image of Richmond and to win the battle for economic development in this very competitive Bay Area market. We need continuously and effectively to focus on what Richmond offers: opportunities for infill development in our core commercial business streets; new and enhanced mixed use light-industrial areas; the many advantages of our shoreline for transit, tourism, recreation, and our ready and willing workforce. Richmond works for business.

How to maintain forward momentum at a rapid pace is a question all the members of Team Richmond will take a very active role in. Our General Plan supports this, and we intend to be part of the implementation strategy . Whether the answer is hiring consultants, resourcing an expanded city department under the City Manager's office, requesting specific reports and analyses through its commissions and staff is a worthy conversation to be having with our community now. Our solutions, if well-articulated and built to solidly serve the interests of our residents, will be an important component of our future quality of life: Better. Safer. Healthier. Richmond Working. New businesses in Richmond

Ekso Bionics in Point Richmond, a hi-tech medical robotic company, just featured as leading robotics coming in Healthcare Robotics Magazine.
Tissue Banks International in the Marina Bay area (see the Marin IJ article)
Assemble Restaurant at Craneway Pavillion
La Revolucion in the Hilltop area
Chicken and Waffles Restaurant (soon-to-be) downtown on Macdonald
Magick Lantern in Point Richmond
Lots of small innovative Latino businesses on 23rd St., setting an example for other areas of the city
Grocery Outlet on San Pablo Ave.
Planet Fitness on San Pablo Ave.
SunPower in the Ford Building, our largest new business over the last 8 years--300 employees.
Cooperatives--a new innovative economic strategy--examples are Liberty Ship Café and Fusion Latina, both in the catering business