After making a major change this summer in the structure of Brunswick County’s efforts to lure jobs and industry, officials also chose a new leader for those efforts.

Michael DiTullo, formerly head of the Rockland County, New York, economic development corporation, started Nov. 2 as the new director of the recently formed Brunswick County Economic Development Department, earning a salary of $100,000.

By Dec. 8, DiTullo had delivered a report to the newly formed Brunswick County Economic Development Advisory Commission at the panel’s first meeting, outlining specific efforts to bring in new jobs and businesses and support existing employers in the county.

One of the new potential employers DiTullo mentioned and the only to be specifically named, MicroSolv Technology Corp., broke ground this month on a facility at Leland Industrial Park. Describing a different unnamed potential Brunswick employer, DiTullo said the county is working with the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina and the state regarding an incentive offer that, if accepted, could deliver 300 to 400 manufacturing jobs and multi-million dollar capital investment. That company would occupy an existing, vacated industrial building in northern Brunswick, the report said.

Of the 50 appointments and meetings DiTullo has participated in during his first month, six of those contacts were developers or builders, he told the committee.

“I’ve mentioned to other people that I approach economic development from a real estate-centric perspective. Every single economic development transaction, just about, is a real estate transaction,” DiTullo explained. “Working with commercial builders, developers is sort of like a transmission belt that can generate business activity.”

DiTullo said he also visited some of the county’s existing businesses.

In June, the Brunswick County Board of Commissioners voted to create the county department rather than continuing to provide some funding and support to separate legal entities that did the job. The change came after questions surfaced about how those entities, the Brunswick County Economic Development Commission and Brunswick County Economic Development Corp., had used county funds from 2009 to 2014.

County manager Ann Hardy led the new county department briefly in an interim capacity, taking over for the retiring Jim Bradshaw, who had served as the executive director of the Brunswick County Economic Development Commission.

Under the new system, the 16-member advisory commission, which has six voting members, will meet at 8:30 a.m. the second Tuesday of each month. The Jan. 12 meeting will be held at the Leland campus of Brunswick Community College.

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