5. SWOC Analysis

A strengths, weakness, opportunities, and challenges or SWOC analysis was conducted with the CEDS Stakeholder Committee. The information gained through this process allows for a thorough assessment of the economic needs of the region and the assets available to meet those needs. The goals, objectives, and actions formed to encourage economic growth were created with information gathered and analyzed through this process.

6. Strategic Direction/Action Plan

Strategies

The following economic development strategies are focused on TCOG as a region, as a community, as an organization, as a business, as a household, the strategies are recommended from Economic Disaster Mitigation Plan report 2020- 2022 by Hawes Hill Consultants.

Goals, Objectives & Activities

The following Goals & Objectives are recommendations from the Business Disaster Mitigation Plan 2022.

7. Evaluation Framework

The Texoma Council of Governments will report CEDS performance measures through the GPRA process, and will provide these figures on the TCOG Community & Economic Development Program website, www.texomaedd.org.

• Number of Jobs Created and/or Retained in the Region
• Total employment in initial year
• Total employment in subsequent years
• Number of jobs retained as a Result of Federal Investments
• Number of Jobs Retained as a Result of Select State and Local Investment

Amount of Investment in the Region:

• EDA sponsored investments
• Significant state and local investments

Business Formation and Expansion in the Region:

• Total formations or expansion in initial year
• Total formation or expansion in subsequent years

Workforce Development in the Region:

• Number of people receiving job training in the region
• Number of people receiving training on economic development, soft infrastructure, or hard infrastructure at TCOG workshops
• Number of requests for assistance with data collection, data analysis, or data development in the region.

Changes in the Economic Environment of the Region
Changes to taxes & fees, new incentive programs, etc.

7. Economic Resilience

Business and Pandemic

The pandemic created by COVID-19 struck the United States and the entire world in a manner unseen since the Spanish Flu in 1918. The economic fallout of the pandemic remains to be fully measured, in part because eradication of the virus is still underway. Generally, the impacts across local economies were widespread:

• Businesses closed to the public, including the majority of retailers, dining establishments and entertainment venues. Some adapted to survive. Others never recovered. Across the United States roughly 74 percent of small businesses reported negative impacts from the pandemic.
• Available labor was erratic as non -essential workers stayed home to remain healthy while others that became sick from the coronavirus or were potentially contaminated were required to quarantine.
• Orders of goods were cancelled as demand plummeted or companies cut purchases to preserve revenue. As a nation, Gross Domestic Product decreased 3.5 percent in 2020.
• Employees were furloughed or dismissed and the unemployment rate skyrocketed. Approximately 9.4 million Americans lost jobs in 2020.

Locally, the Texoma region consisting of Cooke County, Fannin County and Grayson County was certainly impacted. Full details are not yet clear, but it appears that local impacts may have been slightly less severe than in other areas of the country. As an example, unemployment in the region spiked from 4.4 percent in March 2020 to 10.3 percent by April. However, by April of 2021, unemployment rates had subsided to 4.8 percent.

Regardless of the severity, the pandemic served as a “wake up call” as communities across the country realized that their economies are vulnerable to “economic shocks”. Also, unlike natural disasters, there is no local emergency response system in place for those moments when economic disaster strikes.

To locally address these concerns, the Texoma Council of Governments developed a Business Disaster Mitigation Plan. The purpose of the plan is to better prepare the region for economic shocks from events such as a natural disaster, a pandemic, or completely unforeseen circumstances. The plan is intended to strengthen the regional economy to better withstand economic impacts and also to allow the region to respond aggressively when an economic disaster strikes.

To do so, the report assesses typical conditions in the region, establishes a worst-case scenario, and crafts recommendations that will allow the region to withstand and respond to the economic impacts of events.

Keys to Economic Disaster Mitigation

An economic shock can occur as a result of any one or more of many types of events ranging from a global pandemic or the fiscal crisis of the Great Recession to a local flood. The region’s ability to absorb the resulting economic shock and prevent it from becoming an economic disaster comes down to its ability to strengthen resilience and response.

RESILIENCE represents characteristics that make the region less susceptible to economic shocks. In the case of a natural disaster, building codes are put into place so that in the event of a tornado, the impact is minimized as much as possible. The same concepts of resilience can be applied to the local economy.

RESPONSE represents efforts throughout the region to prepare for a potential economic shock and to adapt and act to address impacts. Emergency response is expected during physical events. It is equally essential to mitigating economic shock.

Elements of Local Resilience and Response

Both resilience and response rely on characteristics of the People, the Business Environment, the Built Environment and Economic Infrastructure. Traits of all four elements
contribute to the region’s ability to avoid, withstand and recover from economic shock.

DATA SOURCES:
American Progress.org, Early Childhood Report 2020
Data Axle USA May 2021
Childcarecenter.us
Childrenatrisk.org
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation County Health Rankings and Roadmaps 2013-2019
TCOG Business Disaster Mitigation Plan 2020-2022
TCOG 2022-2024 Community Needs Assessment
Texas Department of Transportation 2021
Texas State Water Development Board
Texoma Regional Coordinated Human Services Transportation Plan 2022-2026
US Census, County Profiles
US Census, 2020 American Community Survey (ACS) 1-Year Estimates
US Census, American Community Survey, 5-Year Estimate, 2015-2019
US Census, American Community Survey 2019
US Census Data, 2020
Workforce Solutions Texoma Q1 2021
TCOG CEDS Strategy Committee 21/22