Macomb County Executive Mark Hackel and his able team of assistants have
focused intently, from day one, on marketing the county as a great place to
live and do business.
After decades of Macomb suffering from an
image as a southeast Michigan outback, a
factory town, a sleepy bedroom community, Hackel seeks to make Macomb a major player in the regional
economy.
“Make Macomb Your Home” is the slogan the Hackel administration devised to
change the county’s image. Over the past year, optimism crept in from every
corner of the business community after the darkness of Michigan’s lost decade.
Macomb
gained from a considerable increase in jobs and capital investments by General
Motors, Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler. In addition, Hackel’s plans for a Blue
Economy, making Macomb
a playground for water enthusiasts – from beach bums to kayakers to fishermen –
holds much promise.
Overall, the economic development plan is to make Macomb more cultural and cosmopolitan – a
cool place to be. Maybe we can land a children’s museum or the arena that will
eventually serve as the new home for the Red Wings. Perhaps a casino is in the
mix. Whatever it takes to attract people here.
But it seems we’ve still got a long way to go.
The Macomb Daily recently completed its “Best of the Best” survey of our
readers, giving them the opportunity to choose their favorite places for
dining, entertainment, shopping and more.
For me, this unscientific survey represented, in some ways, the lack of
sophistication that still holds us back when the upper middle class – or
foreign entities — choose a place to live or establish a business in the
region.
It may not seem like much, but in the survey category of best seafood
restaurant, Red Lobster finished second. I have nothing against Red Lobster,
but for a county with 31 miles of lakeshore, surely we can do better than a
cookie-cutter restaurant chain.
In the categories of best Sunday brunch, best buffet and best American
(non-ethnic) restaurant, the second-place finisher was Big Boy. Seriously? Big
Boy is the Macomb
County standard of
excellence?
Is it any wonder why various lists of the top 10 or top 20 restaurants in
the Metro Detroit area typically ignore Macomb County altogether?
Next, consider the Macomb
County event that
attracts more media attention than any other – the Jobbie Nooner. This annual
sleazy escapade in drunkenness and nudity received perhaps more news coverage
than ever before on Friday.
Some in the media have willingly latched onto the event label, “The Mardis
Gras of the North.” All we have to do is build a French Quarter on Gull Island
and that fantasy may come true.
Do we really want to be known as the place
where fat, shirtless, bald guys, each with a constant beer in their hand,
engage in chants that encourage college girls to expose their breasts?
Is this our cultural event of the year?
In his first 18 months in office, Hackel’s biggest gaffe has to be his
infamous August 2011 comment that favorably compared the Jobbie Nooner to Oakland County’s Arts, Beats & Eats festival.
None of this may seem consequential, but it certainly is when the
administration is trying to attract people with money to spend and businesses
to build.
The ripples spread far and wide.
In addition, largely unnoticed in recent days is the news that the county’s
economic momentum hit a strong counter-current in May when the Macomb unemployment rate jumped to 9.8
percent.
Previously, we had gone from 10.7 percent in January, to 10.1 percent in
February, to 9.5 percent in March, to 8.6 percent in April. That’s an
incredibly impressive run. So, is May a fluke, a blip on the screen? We have to
wait and see.
At a recent public event, Hackel said that he recently learned that the
county is producing 1,100 jobs a month. That sounded extraordinary. But it wasn’t
true. Not by a long shot.
The latest figures from the state bureau of Labor Market Information shows
that the county has actually gained less than 4,000 jobs since the start of
2012.
It’s dispiriting that Hackel is relying upon faulty information.
What’s more, the administration’s emphasis on the county’s defense corridor
as a job-creation zone seemed promising last year. But with substantial cuts
planned for the Defense Department budget in Washington, opportunities may fade fast.
And then there’s this: A report recently released by an arm of the Southeast
Michigan Council of Governments and the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce
inadvertently pointed out where the county has a lot of catching up to do.
The task force that issued the study – a cross-section of heavy hitters in
the Metro Detroit business and labor communities – found that Macomb, the state’s third-largest county, is
not engaged in the globalization of the world economy. Compared to neighboring Oakland County,
in particular, the county is in no position to attract foreign firms or engage
in Michigan’s
$51 billion annual export market.
Of the 1,240 foreign firms operating in the 10-county southeast Michigan region, Macomb
is home to only about 50.
Other than Sterling Heights, with 18 foreign
companies, Macomb
has largely failed to attract employers from around the world. Our four large,
growing communities – Clinton, Shelby, Macomb and Chesterfield
townships – have barely made a showing in the competition for foreign investment.
We have a lot to offer. We could have a lot more. But when those prospective
employers from Japan or Germany or Canada come calling, I doubt they
will be impressed by our Big Boy restaurants.

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