RCEDA’s new center moving forward

Ravalli Republic May 25, 2009 by John Cramer

Four gold shovels will break ground Tuesday on the Ravalli Entrepreneurship Center, but the project’s foundation was laid more than a decade ago.

In the 1990s, the Bitterroot Valley’s population skyrocketed and community leaders envisioned a local economy that was less dependent on agriculture and logging and more invested in technology, information and consumer services.

Come Tuesday, the Ravalli County Economic Development Authority will break ground on the REC, a $3.2 million facility designed to usher in a new era of economic development, employment and education.
Construction started last month and the 10,000-square-feet building’s foundation has been completed and a parking lot roughed in.

But the project’s official start is slated for 4 p.m. Tuesday at a ceremony that includes hors d’oeuvres, refreshments and speeches. The facility is at 274 Old Corvallis Road next to Ravalli County Council on Aging.
It’s a moment that many people have long anticipated.

“It’s really exciting,” said Julie Foster, executive director of the Economic Development Authority. ”It’s a sense of accomplishment and pride in something positive that involves so many people who don’t always think the same but who worked together.”
The REC will be an incubator that offers laboratories and office space to promote small, local start-up technology businesses.

The county’s growing biotechnology and research industry already employs hundreds of workers at GlaxoSmithKline and Rocky Mountain Laboratories.

The REC, which is scheduled to open its doors on Oct. 14, is being built along Old Corvallis Road on four acres donated by the Council on Aging, which is next door.

The project is designed and being built largely by local firms, including general contractor Quality Construction, which has offices in Hamilton and Missoula.

The REC will provide technical assistance, business coaching, mentoring, advisory boards, networking opportunities, access to capital programs, market information and office space to new entrepreneurs and existing businesses.

The Economic Development Authority projects the REC will create 253 jobs from the start up and encourage more than $11 million in private investment over the next 10 years. [MORE > link to Ravalli Republic article]