Blog

COVID-19: A Lakeland Business Update

Over the past few business days, LEDC staff has been calling our 135 member companies getting updates on how their businesses are being affected by COVID-19. This isn’t a health care update, but more of a current state of union with regards to our member businesses.

What is the LEDC’s Vision?

The primary role of the Lakeland Economic Development Council (LEDC) is to create jobs, with an emphasis on high-skill, high-wage jobs and increase Lakeland’s tax base. But, if you asked me what I really wanted to accomplish over my last 33 years with the LEDC, it would be to create a city where our children would want to stay…

Lakeland Rated #6 Safest Place to Live in The US

Lakeland had 13,312 property crimes reported in 2017, according to FBI data, which makes the property crime rate for the metro area just 1,960.1 per 100,000 people.

Building a Citizen-Centered City

Starting in 2005, the LEDC and its High Skill Investors began traveling to cities around the country to learn best practices. These trips have led to many ideas we have brought back to Lakeland.

Incentives…Our Track Record

We believe the City of Lakeland should increase its investment in creating high-skill, high-wage jobs in our community in 2018. Intuitively, high-skill, high-wage jobs can be defined as…

Catapult 3.0: The Resurrection

Nine weeks ago, we received devastating news regarding our plans to renovate the former Cash Feed building on Lake Mirror. Our dream of turning the former…

Incentives

An economic development incentive can be strictly defined as “cash or near-cash assistance provided on a discretionary basis to attract or retain business operations. In practice, however, it is a broadly used term denoting an array of benefits designed to promote...

Catapult Parking

Catapult was started in late 2013 as an 501c3 educational entrepreneur center in the basement of the Bank of America Building in downtown Lakeland. Due to its initial success and the obvious need to move beyond its initial experimental stage, local private donors...

Lakeland Electric

In 2011, Tampa Electric (TECO) executives asked the LEDC to set up a meeting with Lakeland’s city manager and mayor. TECO was interested in talking to city officials regarding the potential purchase of Lakeland Electric. A number of meetings between TECO and city...

Broadband With a Broad Brush

What does broadband have to do with economic development? Companies across the country are making relocation and expansion decisions based on a long list of criteria such as real estate, incentives, talent, etc. Is broadband on the list? If so, where, and how...