Business View Civil & Municipal | July 2022

119 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 3, ISSUE 7 poised to take advantage of the new job growth and other residual benefits, such as attracting more interest in residential development and welcoming new residents to the county. “Wythe County is going to need help accommodating their workforce needs,” Sweet predicts. “Same with the Town of Blacksburg— they running out of capacity. If 1,000 people wanted to move to Blacksburg tomorrow, then few of them would have the opportunity to do that. There are so many jobs being created not only in Pulaski County, but through the Corporate Research Center at Virginia Tech, at Radford University, in Wythe County with Blue Star, that it’s going to take the region to help support the demands for workforce and housing. We’re readying Pulaski County, not just for what’s happening here, but for what the entire region is doing.” Meditating on how some southwestern communities were more vulnerable to the pandemic’s economic consequences than others, Sweet decries Pulaski County is like a “fertile oasis” and what one might call “recession- resistant,” citing their heavy participation in high-demand and core-critical advanced manufacturing as an insurance policy against most post-COVID-19 austerity. “Our leadership has that very strategic, forward- thinking mindset, which can only further stabilize and sustain the industry pipeline to this county,” Sweet insists. “The Volvos of the world and their vast supply chain are going to be very busy replacing the trucks that are reaching the end of their life cycle. Between the market needing new trucks and the diesel to electric conversion opportunities, we really think we’re going to be a community that continues to thrive and doesn’t go into survival mode. In addition, we have two major universities and a community college that are not only our talent pipelines, but are robust employment centers as well.” PULASK I COUNTY , V I RGINI A