At tonight's Town of Coeyman's Board Meeting, RCS CBA Vice Chair Aaron Flach appealed to the Board to work with the Village on the creation of a joint comprehensive plan.
"I'm here today on behalf the business community to encourage the Town to follow through on this planning process. We desire the Town to devote the human and fiscal resources needed to bring such a plan to fruition. In the end we hope the outcome will provide a road map for well thought out economic development for the community," Flach said.
Discussion of a joint plan started in January when the Town and Village announced a meeting to discuss economic development. Little has been said by either municipality about a joint plan since.
"I realize the Town and Village currently have separate plans. The Town's is a decade old and I understand you are working to update it. However, we firmly believe the Town and Village must work in unison to make any plan successful because you share many resources," said Flach.
In addition to joint planning, Aaron encouraged the Board to consider hiring an economic development coordinator.
"We understand your Town Board responsibilities are part-time and you have other jobs. The same is true for the group of professionals running the Business Association. What we need is an experienced person whose job is to leverage local, state and federal resources and promote our wonderful Town and Village to potential businesses that will create jobs and build our tax base in a way that's in keeping with the comprehensive plan," Flach said.
Town Board Members Tom Dolan and Dan Baker enthusiastically agreed to participate in future discussions. RCS CBA invites Town and Village Board members to attend the next meeting of its Economic Development Advisory Committee Meeting on Monday, May 20 at 3:30 pm in Village Hall.