8 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 4, ISSUE 6 financial support programs through the creation of a downtown TIF district. They also collaborate with the Small Business Development Center and local bankers to provide training, networking, and financing options for entrepreneurs, ensuring a supportive environment for small business growth, as Jones recounts, “We do have some tools here to help small businesses, through the TIF program, and then also through some financing options. If someone is seeking financing, we know which financing institute specializes in certain things. For example, a local bank here is a preferred SBA lender. We also have access to a revolving loan fund program through our local regional planning commission.” Supporting economic development through infrastructure is also key, as Buerck reports, “We have to provide the infrastructure so they can provide the jobs. You can’t have one without the other.” Currently, the city is investing over $30 million into a new sewer plant, as well as a $3.5 million for road expansion which will allow for further business development along the City’s main commercial corridor in the form of an extension to Progress Drive. Additionally, the community just added two new fire stations, an $8.5 million technical school for Ranken, has jointly contracted with Perry County on a $30 million Joint-Justice Center and is working with MODOT on a $284 million investment will to build a brand new bridge across the Mississippi River, which sees 7000 vehicles per day and connects the cities of Chester Illinois, and Perryville. if that wasn’t enough, the city is also set to construct a new 6,500-foot-long and 100-foot-wide airport runway, replacing what is currently the longest runway in the region between St. Louis and Memphis. The city’s aviation proud history includes hosting the headquarters of Sabreliner Corporation, known for producing the world’s first twin-engine corporate jet. Today, Perryville’s investment in infrastructure attracts businesses like WestStar Aviation, which has serviced high-profile clients such as Taylor Swift, Troy Aikman, and SpaceX jets, and Helicopter Transport Services, a company who help maintain helicopters used for fighting forest fires out West.“The investments that the board is willing to make into our infrastructure creates the environment where businesses can do what they do on top of it,” Buerck asserts. On the subject of housing he acknowledges, “You know, Shakespeare said, ‘What is the city but it’s people’, and people are our limiting factor. We’ve had more jobs than people for many years.”
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