‘Green Day’ pep talk: Commerce Secretary predicts strong recovery in Wilkes-Barre visit

WILKES-BARRE — As Luzerne County enters the state’s “green phase” of coronavirus recovery today, one of the nation’s leading voices on business development predicts a robust rebound for the region and the country.

“Due to the high quality of life, the diversity of your population, and affordable housing, this area has been an attractive place for foreign direct investment,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross told area business leaders during a roundtable discussion at the Westmoreland Club on Thursday afternoon.

“It is essential that we safely and carefully reopen before there is any further economic damage,” Ross said.

Secretary Ross visited the Diamond City to meet with members of the Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce and other local leaders.

Ross began with a stop at the outdoor patio of Rodano’s restaurant on public square as custiomers enjoyed al fresco dining around him, followed by lunch, remarks and roundtable discussion at the Westmoreland Club.

Ross expressed interest in how local businesses, including restaurants, were preparing for the move to green, as well as in programs created by the chamber, Wilkes-Barre City, Luzerne County and other organizations to assist in restarting the region’s economy.

“The Chamber’s ‘Respond, Return, and Re-Imagine’ recovery plan shows how important it is to have an organization like yours connecting local companies to national assets to help them through this crisis,” Ross said.

Safe reopening stressed

Paramount to the reopening of the economy is a plan for the health and safety of the region’s workforce, consumers and community, according to chamber officials.

“Recovery speed has a lot to do with public health and safety, confidence with consumers, and our labor force,” said chamber President and CEO Wico van Genderen. “It is the prime impetus behind the Luzerne County Ready Pledge program, a proactive joint program between the county and our local businesses.”

The pledge helps to ensure that CDC, OSHA and the governor’s health/safety protocols are in place for workers and consumers “to help restore a level of confidence as we re-engage in our daily routines,” van Genderen said.

Secretary Ross joined Frank Rodano, in the outdoor courtyard at Rodano’s Restaurant on Public Square, to commend the eatery and the local business community’s sustainability efforts as downtown businesses reopen under the green phase.

“This was exciting, and the secretary was a delightful man,” Rodano said following a discussion with Ross in which Ross shared some anecdotes about how New York City, which he had recently visited, has been doing, with the travel, tourism and hopsitality sectors seeing business increasing once again.

“It just reassures my confidence that we’re heading in the right direction,” Rodano said. “People need to be safe of course, but at the same time we need to keep the economy moving.”

Encouraging investment

Mayor George Brown, whose efforts have included overseeing loan programs for small businesses during the outbreak, said he hoped Ross would appreciate the ways in which Wilkes-Barre has been battling the pandemic, and how it has been transformed economically in recent years.

“We’re not an old coal mining town anymore. We’re a city of entrepreneurs and we’re looking for people to invest in the City of Wilkes-Barre,” Brown said. “I’m hoping the message he will take back to the Trump Administration is that this is a city they should be investing in.”

It’s a message Ross embraced.

“Prior to COVID, both the Wilkes-Barre region and Pennsylvania were exporting powerhouses,: he said.

“While Pennsylvania ranked an impressive 10th among our 50 states for exports, at $42.7 billion last year, the Wilkes-Barre region alone exported $1.73 billion worth of manufactured goods.”

With the majority of Pennsylvania’s exports heading to Canada and Mexico, that bodes well for the future, Ross said, given that the new United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement is set to take effect on July 1.

Speaking more broadly, Ross noted that the Department of Labor reported Thursday that workers filed 1.5 million new unemployment claims last week and 20.5 million people received benefits, “signs that while the pace of layoffs remains high, they are stabilizing.”

“New applications for benefits edged lower by 58,000 last week and fell by 62,000 the week before, indicating a substantial swing in the right direction,” he said.

“Even better news is that on Tuesday, the Census Bureau reported that U.S. retail sales rose by a record 17.7 percent in May, far higher than the 8 percent economists had projected in a survey by Dow Jones. The previous monthly high was in October 2001, the month after 9/11, when retail sales rose by 6.1 percent,” he noted.

“The good news is that consumer spending should continue increasing over the coming months because Americans have $400 billion more in their bank accounts today than they did prior to the pandemic,” Ross added. “As enterprises reopen, that money is being reinvested back into local economies, and furloughed workers will be rehired.”

“Once the all-clear sounds on the coronavirus, there will be an incredible pent-up demand in the travel and hospitality sector. Our airports will be filled with Americans anxious to visit families and take vacations. Business travelers will head to long-delayed meetings and conventions. Our restaurants and retail establishments will reopen,” Ross added.

“We are all eager for the end of this pandemic.”

He also saw much to admire in the way local agencies are approaching recovery.

“I applaud the commitment of the Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce as they work to connect local companies to national assets to help them through this crisis,” Ross said. “As we continue to safely and carefully reopen our communities, it is encouraging to see the unemployment rate fall and retail sales rise, proving the true resilience of Pennsylvanians and all Americans.”

Themes, invitees

Van Genderen echoed that theme.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has created devastating unemployment numbers,’ van Genderen said. “These numbers represent real people who have lost their jobs. We need to get them back to family sustaining jobs for a real rebound to take place in the region. We are working with the county, the state, PA CareerLink, and The Institute, in collaboration with the U.S., Economic Development Administration to look at aligning jobs, skill-sets and critical needs to ensure we are in front of a labor force recovery for our area.”

As part of the roundtable talk were ongoing discussions with the Commerce Department about the development of local initiatives, including NEPA Works, Project EVOLVE, and Project PIVOT, which are focused on assisting businesses with adjusting to the post COVID-19 economy, identifying critical workforce needs, aligning industry needs to workforce skill-sets, providing training, up-skills, and certifications, and accelerating the process of bringing displaced workers back into the labor force.

Invited to the roundtable were:

• U.S. Rep. Dan Meuser, R-Dallas

• Wilkes-Barre Mayor George Brown

• Carl Witkowski, COO, Berkshire Hathaway GUARD Insurance Companies

• Angelo DeCesaris, Chairman, Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce

• Wico van Genderen, President and CEO, Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce

• Elizabeth Graham, COO, Riggs Asset Management

• Scott Lynett, President and CEO, PDQ Printing

• Bill Sordoni, President, Sordoni Construction

• Carol Keup, CEO, Valley Distribution and Storage

• Tara Mugford Wilson, President, Power Engineering Corporation

• Bill Frommel, Partner, CPA, Kronick Kalada Berdy & Co.

• Steve Clemente, Partner, CPA, Snyder & Clemente Accountants and Consultants

• Phil Amend, Vice President, One Source HR Solutions

• Teri Ooms, Executive Director, The Institute of Public Policy and Economic Development at Wilkes University

• Ken Okrepkie, Regional Manager, Ben Franklin Technology Partner

• Mike Murray, Publisher, Times Leader Media Group

• C. David Pedri, Luzerne County Manager

• Lindsay Griffin, Vice President and COO, Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce

• Joseph Boylan, Executive Director, Wilkes-Barre Connect

• Ben Eaton, Director, Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Commerce.