In addition to
hearing from Margaret Spellings, the new president of the University of North Carolina system, attendees at Friday’s Wilmington Chamber of Commerce 149th annual meeting learned about chamber achievements in 2015 and goals for 2016.
After officially taking the gavel as the Wilmington Chamber of Commerce’s chairman for 2016, Mitch Lamm delivered a summary of chamber achievements, initiatives and policy positions. Lamm is senior vice president, commercial banking, at First Citizens Bank.
Speaking to an audience of about 200 at the Wilmington Convention Center, Lamm described what he termed the “renaissance” underway in Wilmington, with the opening of Cape Fear Community College’s Humanities and Fine Arts Center, the advent of Port City Marina and its adjacent green space, the construction of two new hotels near the convention center, the rise of mixed-use development Sawmill Park, production at Vertex Railcar Corp., the redesign of River Road and start of River Lights development, as well as the development underway at The Pointe at Barclay.
Lamm also touched on the extension of water and sewer service along the U.S. 421 corridor – for which the chamber has advocated, plans for a career technical high school and a proposal to relocate the railroad track serving the Port of Wilmington from downtown Wilmington to a route in Brunswick County.
“These are only a few of the projects transforming our community,” he said.
The chamber still has concerns about some aspects of plans for the area, Lamm added.
“We believe parts of the county Comprehensive Plan are still troublesome from an economic development perspective,” he said. “Currently, the plan includes new aquifer and exceptional resource maps that are intended to be educational, but will likely only serve to frustrate and deter future investment ... we need to ensure that the adopted Comprehensive Plan is in line with the commissioners’ stated focus on economic development and the continued prosperity of our region.”
The county’s plan needs to align with long-term plans of adjoining jurisdictions such as the city of Wilmington and Pender County, according to Lamm.
“We have asked the city and county to collaborate on long-range plans and transparent regulations which benefit economic prosperity while protecting our quality of life,” he said.
The chairman pointed to Charleston, South Carolina, as a good example of a city where robust economic growth is balanced against quality of place and protection of the environment. A chamber delegation visited the city last September to see and hear how the Charleston area has managed its multi-pronged growth while remaining a popular tourist destination.
“One of the most impressive things I found about Charleston is the cohesive regional approach to economic development,” Lamm said. “County boundaries are little more than a line on the map. In Charleston there is also an alignment between leaders and policy development, bringing together city planners, economic development recruiters, environmentalists, elected officials, preservationists and the general public. They work in concert, and you can’t argue with the results.”
The chamber is now planning a similar visit to Richmond, Virginia, Lamm said.
Lamm’s remarks also noted chamber achievements in 2015 such as the publication of its first Economic Development Scorecard and formation of a strategic partnership with Business Alliance for a Sound Economy (BASE).
The chamber’s year in review document distributed at the meeting outlined major points of the organization’s policy agenda for the past year. At the state level, highlights included opposing the state’s proposed sales tax redistribution plan and supporting North Carolina’s continued film incentives.
Locally, the chamber is pushing for revisions to the county’s Special Use Permit language and for a “realistic and sustainable” incentive policy for both the city of Wilmington and New Hanover County. It also plans to work for “sustainable funding sources” to improve the area’s economic development infrastructure.
