Coastal Mississippi has the assets and the common ground. The next decade is ours to shape.
Imagine a major advanced manufacturer calling the Coast and finding one place that can answer, one ready site, and a single, clear reason to choose us. That single call could help diversify an economy still heavily dependent on gaming and government. That is the moment we have an opportunity to decide now to create.
Coastal Mississippi has spent two decades proving it can rebuild. The next test is whether it can decide what it wants to become and then go after it together. We are at a crossroads.
The Masters Leadership class of the Gulf Coast Business Council has completed the Coastal Mississippi Regional Priorities Alignment Framework and presented it at the October general membership meeting. The framework identifies shared outcomes organized under five themes: workforce, education, and the economy; infrastructure and site-readiness; housing, communities, and quality of place; resilience and natural resources; and leadership, collaboration, and accountability.
The Masters program delivered and few will disagree with those shared outcomes. That was by design. The goal was to show where the region’s existing plans already point in the same direction. It’s common ground and a compass pointing us forward together.
Now we raise the bar together by building an aspirational regional plan that gets us all on the same page and aligns the people who can move land, money, and companies. It will define a future when a prospect hears one pitch about our Coast and not three. The next decade will be defined by the choices we make together in this moment.
The next steps are what this region has needed for years. It’s time for the tough conversations that turn shared outcomes into decisions that are aspirational, and something people can actually see and be inspired by. It’s a compelling, living regional blueprint that picks priorities instead of merely listing them. It sequences and fully funds them.
It’s a Coastal Mississippi Economic Development Partnership (name it what you want to) that puts the three counties, the ports, the airports, the military installations, the colleges and universities, and the private sector at one table. Its job is to pursue the big opportunities none of the three counties can land alone. Local economic development teams keep doing what they do well. The regional structure multiplies them.
A megasite that is opened. It’s large, pre-certified, shovel-ready, and has infrastructure in place so the region can compete for the transformational projects that require more than any single county can offer. And the remaining BP money targets these high-ROI projects.
There is one voice to companies that don’t care about county lines. When a prospect calls, it gets Coastal Mississippi, not a directory! And a national and international marketing effort promotes our Coast as the powerful region it is, treating its ports, connectivity, workforce, lifestyle, and blue economy assets as a regional platform rather than a collection of local strengths. A site selector sees a single page showing a pre-certified megasite with power, water, and a workforce pipeline already attached, plus the phone number of one person who can speak for the region.
These are the differences between shared outcomes and a plan—a plan that forces choices.
The Business Council-created Coast Forward Committee now has that assignment. It has the tiger by the tail. The rubber is hitting the road.
Jamie Miller, president and CEO of the Gulf Coast Business Council, is moving to Mississippi Power as senior director of economic, workforce, and community development. This is a big moment for Mississippi Power and its CEO, Pedro Cherry. Cherry has spent years leading economic development efforts across the South and has chosen to align Jamie’s new role around the future of Coastal Mississippi as a region. Jamie will stay involved in the Business Council through the transition and will continue to co-chair the Coast Forward Committee with Dave Dennis. Dave and I have worked together for years, through the Governor’s Commission after Hurricane Katrina and in the early formation of the Business Council. He knows how hard it can be to keep a regional effort focused on the whole.
At the Business Council, Jamie has shown he can bring people together. That skill served the organization well as the executive committee worked through what role it will play in bringing our region together.
The next test is turning this energy into decisions. Creating alignment around an aspirational plan means doing the real work of making tough choices together. Jamie, Dave, their blue-ribbon committee, and the growing number of others involved in this game-changing effort now carry the assignment.
This time, the committee has a document built from the region’s own plans and a private-sector survey. A compelling case for action now exists. Leaders can treat the shared outcomes as the starting point for the decisions that shape the next decade.
Those shared outcomes will become real when mayors, supervisors, economic development organizations, ports, airports, tourism leaders, site selectors, legislators, the Mississippi Development Authority, the Governor, the Speaker, and the Lieutenant Governor pick up that one plan that evolved from them and they see the same priorities.
Local economic development teams should keep doing what they do well in their own counties. A regional framework does not replace that work. I have never suggested anything other than that. A regional approach on the big stuff multiplies their efforts by targeting projects none of the three counties can land alone and by giving the remaining BP money a clearer target.
The Business Council has done the important work of starting the alignment process. The really hard work is just beginning. We cannot fail at this. Our kids and our kids’ kids need us to get this right. It is time to put a shovel in the dirt. This is a critical moment for Coastal Mississippi.
Regions that wrote a single regional plan and spoke with one voice on the big opportunities have landed game-changing advanced manufacturing and other companies that diversify their economies. Huntsville has lived this. I spent time there. I’ve seen it firsthand—the research park, the companies clustered around the federal anchor, the workforce that stayed and grew, and the big-time habit of presenting as one place.
Now…Why not us?! Coastal Mississippi has the assets: ports, airports, interstates, Stennis, a strong workforce, location, and so much more. The Committee’s job is to close the gap between those assets and the habit of treating them as separate local strengths.
Most of the people I hear from are ready for this. They see our potential busting at the seams. The next decade is ours to shape. It is time to put a shovel in the dirt, and to invite every mayor, supervisor, and business leader who wants the region to win to pick up a shovel with us.
Let’s go build something BIG.
The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the views of SuperTalk Mississippi Media.
Read more of Ricky Mathews’ columns on the future of Coastal Mississippi.