Site Selection Magazine has named Toledo No. 1 for new business investment among metropolitan areas with populations between 200,000 and 1 million, a ranking Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz said the city has never before secured.
Toledo tied with Savannah, Ga., for the top spot in the magazine’s Governor’s Cup 2020 awards.
The mayor announced the economic development news Monday morning at the Glass City Metropark pavilion in East Toledo.
“Site Selection Magazine is the absolute gold standard when it comes to economic development rankings,” Mr. Kapszukiewicz said. “It is the Bible that businesses look at when they decide where to spend their money and where to invest.”
He was joined by Dean Monske, president and CEO of the Regional Growth Partnership, and Jonathan Bridges, managing director of automotive, steel, and white goods for JobsOhio.
Mr. Kapszukiewicz said there is about $2.2 billion worth of projects either underway or recently completed that are expected to create about 3,500 new jobs and 1,079 new residential units.
He highlighted a $25 million investment by Amazon, Inc., at the former Southwyck Shopping Center property that will create 410 jobs and redevelop a 58-acre site; a $23 million investment by Stellantis, formerly Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, for the sale and redevelopment of the former Textileather and MedCorp properties site; a $75 million investment by General Motors at its Toledo Transmission Plant in North Toledo, and Libbey Glass LLC’s announcement that it will invest nearly $30 million over the next four years.
“To do these things in any environment would be impressive. To do them in the middle of a once every hundred-year pandemic is truly a credit to the partnerships that are represented in this room today,” the mayor said.
Mr. Monske said the recognition from Site Selection is a big deal, and though Toledo wasn’t competing with large cities such as Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles, it did beat out other cities twice its size to secure the top spot.
“This recognition for us at the Regional Growth Partnership is incredibly important because it allows us to tell the story, to market the region, and in turn attract even more investment and more new jobs,” Mr. Monske said.
City officials during Monday’s news conference played a video message from Gov. Mike DeWine congratulating Toledo on its award.
Ohio on Monday was also ranked No. 1 in Site Selection Magazine’s Governor’s Cup 2020 state economic and business attraction rankings for bringing more new corporate facility projects per capita than any other state in the nation. The state also ranked No. 2 among the nation for total projects overall.
“With 2020, we didn't know what the economic development impact would be in our state, around the country,” Lt. Gov. Jon Husted said during Monday’s coronavirus briefing with the governor. “We stayed aggressive with our partner JobsOhio and really tried to focus on continuing to do deals.”
Mr. Husted noted medium-sized cities and rural communities also closed development deals in 2020.
Site Selection named Findlay the No. 1 overall micropolitan for the seventh year in a row, which is a category for metro areas with populations between 10,000 and 50,000. Fremont tied with Wooster, Ohio, for seventh place on that list.
The Lucas County Board of Commissioners in a statement Monday said Toledo’s ranking shows the success of partnerships in workforce development, as well as the caliber of the county’s workforce.
“This honor is in large part the result of the hard work we have done to prepare job seekers through our workforce system,” said Tina Skeldon Wozniak, commission president. “The Lucas County Workforce Development Board and the department of planning and development have helped job seekers hone the skills necessary to find and keep good-paying jobs in the area.”
First Published March 1, 2021, 3:28 p.m.
