Business View Civil and Municipal | May 2021

38 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL MAY 2021 they couldn’t refuse. One of the strengths that municipalities have in charting their own course for development is their ability to access capital. Several times the City has needed to act quickly to secure a property or an opportunity that presented, and the Peoples Trust Company has always been our go-to lender. We can walk down the street and get a commitment for a million dollars; that’s what it takes to be able to move swiftly and compete in the business world. The relationship with the bank is pivotal.” Another frequent topic of conversation in recent years has been the issue of workforce recruitment. Although Franklin County has an abundance of jobs available, that supply is met with a shortage of candidates who meet those needs. “We’ve got to get people to learn the basic skills to start to fill some of those opportunities,” says Smith. “With the way demographics are going, the aging population is growing all the time and grow, and attracting some of the new businesses and development projects identified in our Town Plan. We helped Mylan, one of the largest generics and specialty pharmaceutical companies in the world, expand and they added 100 jobs and $10 million to the tax base. We wanted a hotel downtown, so we recruited a nationally branded one. We also recently completed a combination housing/commercial project where, right on Main Street, there was a three-acre site with some blighted buildings. The City bought it and redeveloped 60 units of mixed-use housing on the back of the site. On the front of the site is a 25,000-square-foot office building that will host the Community College of Vermont and Northwestern Medical Center. in partnership with Vermont Technical College.” Left to their own devices, these projects and uses would have located outside the City, according to Cloud. “The City worked hard to bring them downtown,” he affirms. “We made them offers