Source: indianachamber.com /Â
STATEWIDE — The Indiana Chamber of Commerce launched a fresh economic playbook called “Indiana Prosperity 2035.” This plan is the third version of a long-term project, but officials claim it’s more than an upgrade to the previous plan. Instead, they view it as a new objective to advance Indiana’s economy.
State leaders are worried about long-term stability, particularly in small business development.
Indiana Prosperity 2035 has six pillars and 31 goals. The plan aims to improve education and workforce skills, expand pre-K programs, enhance the state’s business climate, improve infrastructure, promote quality of place investments, and address health and welfare ratings.
“Achieving the goals in this plan will benefit all Hoosiers,” said Indiana Chamber of Commerce Chairman Paul Perkins. “The new playbook was developed through 18 months of work with a volunteer task force of 40 researchers, issue and policy experts, business leaders, and coalition partners.”
The Indiana Prosperity 2035 plan addresses various significant issues and possibilities for Indiana. However, it also recognizes crucial requirements and inadequacies in the state’s approach to encouraging assertive actions and consistent progress.
“The Indiana Prosperity 2035 is our third economic visioning plan,” President and CEO, Indiana Chamber. Kevin Brinegar. “We started [on the plan] about the turn of the century when the State of Indiana had no economic playbook at that time. We ranked in the bottom ten states in many important [categories] like business climate, tax structure, regulatory structure, and metrics. So the Indiana Chamber decided to take on this responsibility and put forth the first plan, which was Economic Vision 2010, followed by the current plan that we’re finishing up Indiana Vision 2025. We’ve used it for our guidepost.”
Larry Gigerich, the Task Force Chairman, expressed enthusiasm at the level of engagement and support that the 42 task force members provided for the new plan.
“Especially when you think about Indiana and under the chamber’s leadership, all of the progress that we’ve made in the past 20 years to see private sector, philanthropic, higher education, and government officials all recognizing that there’s a lot more work to do and we need to continue to be aggressive and innovate as we move forward,” he said. “One of the things that struck a note with me as we went through this process was the ground we’ve lost in entrepreneurial development and small business formation.”
Gigerich added that it’s important that Indiana excel in this area because it’s unlikely the state will get big corporations to relocate here.
The Indiana Chamber Foundation’s primary investors include Duke Energy, the Garatoni-Smith Family Foundation, Indiana American Water, Indiana Michigan Power, and NIPSCO
