The Road to Prosperity

Ozark and Nixa schools may be athletic rivals, but economic development officials see cooperation as necessary for the neighbors’ collective future – and a highway between the communities may be a point of contention in quickly achieving collaboration.

Strength together
On Dec. 4, an advisory board comprising administrators from both cities and representatives from their business communities heard a presentation by Austin, Texas-based consultancy group TIP Strategies Inc., which was hired this summer to guide a possible partnership by determining the overall environment for development.

Dori Grinder, executive director of the Ozark Chamber of Commerce, said an informal group of Ozark and Nixa city officials has been working for two years to explore a formal strategic partnership designed to manifest opportunities for economic development. The group, which comprises both city chambers, the cities of Ozark and Nixa, and Christian County, spent $68,000 to receive guidance from the consultancy.

“We know that together we are very strong. We have great demographics in terms of income and great schools, and we kept thinking, ‘There’s something to this,’” Grinder said.

At the Dec. 4 meeting, TIP Strategies CEO and President Tom Stellman said the firm was managing the potential cooperative in three phases: discovery, opportunities and implementation, with the final phase likely to be complete by May. He said the meeting, held in the Ozark Community Center, represented the end of the first phase and the beginning of the second phase.

The firm has held a series of focus group interviews with officials from Ozark and Nixa, as well as representatives of the Springfield Area Chamber of Commerce, Bass Pro Shops, Branson and Taney Counties, the Ozark and Nixa school districts, Mercy and CoxHealth. It also has conducted a survey of 3,100 residents through utility bills.

“One of the key reasons we did the survey was to understand occupations and skill sets, things that people living in this area bring to bear as it relates to bringing in new employment. One of the things that is driving it is having access to a skilled workforce,” Stellman said, adding that a strength of both communities is proximity to several health care providers and educators. “That is the No. 1 issue for most employers.”

As bedroom communities of Springfield, Stellman said many residents work away from home, and the gap between inbound and outbound commuters is widening. While in 2006 there were roughly 17,000 residents living in either Ozark or Nixa, by 2010, there were nearly 25,000, while inbound commuters remained stagnant at roughly 8,000, according to TIP Strategies research.

Stellman said the top employers of Ozark and Nixa commuters are health care systems, at more than 4,500 residents, with the retail industry landing at No. 2, drawing around 1,800 workers. Of those surveyed who disclosed their employers, Mercy was at the top, employing 118 residents.

Top employers in the communities were the schools, Stellman said, followed by the two Walmart stores, Diversified Plastics in Nixa and Lambert’s Cafe in Ozark.

With technology firms in the area such as Concurrent Manufacturing, and more specifically, health care focused technology firms such as HealthcareFirst and HealthMedX in Ozark, Stellman said he’s heard it mentioned the region could someday be known as “Silicon Holler.” He said local leaders should be leveraging their talent to draw similar businesses to the county.

Divided highway
According to the TIP report, widening State Highway 14 is key to a marriage of the two cities, and it would improve access to the Ozarks Technical Community College Richwood Valley Campus and attract private development.

However, one advisory board member said the consultants have picked the wrong corridor.

“The east-west corridor that is going to come in a lot sooner is CC,” said Curtis Jared, president and chief operating officer of development and property management firm Jared Enterprises.

Jared noted more development is occurring north of the communities.

“That’s where the synergy is at right now,” he said. “It is closer to Springfield, and you’ve got more rooftops there. Commercial [developers] are looking for rooftops. At 14, you don’t have the neighborhood density; you have farmland.

“Where they’d like it to grow and where it is going to grow are two different things.”

Conrad Griggs, business development officer of The Bank of Missouri and former Springfield City Council member, said talk of expanding Highway 14 dates back to his city government days in the 1990s. Community leaders had considered extending Highway FF to Highway 14, he said, to encourage business development as Springfield population centers moved south.

He said a partnership in Christian County would help shape regional growth during the next several decades.

“I think this needs to happen,” Griggs said, adding while Jared might be right about Highway CC being a more immediate priority, the partnership should also be planning for expansion of Highway 14. “I don’t know why they couldn’t do both.”

Marc Truby, executive director of the Nixa Area Chamber of Commerce, said both corridors are important to business development and a partnership is a way to facilitate all the moving parts.

“With the Highway 14 corridor, I think it is going to take so much legwork in the long run. You’re talking about a highway that is going to need a $30 million to $50 million allocation,” he said. “That’s major. That’s not just going to involve just the county or cities, that’s going to involve the state and state legislators.”

The Nixa and Ozark chambers spent $5,000 apiece to hire the consultant, while the cities of Ozark and Nixa took on the greatest cost, $24,000 each, and Christian County paid $10,000.

Grinder said a partnership is likely, and a possibility is a public-private model, such as the structure of the nonprofit Springfield Business Development Corp. that connects 10 counties via public and private investors, including the city of Springfield, Greene County, BKD LLP and CoxHealth.

She said the parties are under no stated deadlines, and the next meeting is expected to take place in mid-January.

“I always think about St. Louis,” Grinder said. “How did 270 get there? Somebody thought it was needed 50 years ago, and then it took 30 years to clear the land and find a space for it, but now it is there and look at all the towns that have grown around that.”