By Nicholas J. Vehr
Guest columnist

More than 1,000 members of the International Economic Development Council (IEDC) will meet in Cincinnati beginning Sunday afternoon. At a time when economic development issues seem to dominate local news, this conference offers a national, even global, perspective on regional development.

Who is IEDC? Our guests are members of the Nation's largest economic development professional association. From states, counties, cities, utilities and port authorities to site location consultants, technology development organizations and neighborhood development corporations, these professionals are here to network and learn.

Why are they here? This is IEDC's annual conference. The membership comes here to learn all they can from each other. Importantly, they come to learn how the local community addresses some of the same complex and challenging issues they deal with each day in their own communities.

They're also here because The Partnership for Greater Cincinnati, the regional economic development initiative supported by the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce, the City of Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky Tri-ED and TechSolve Inc., along with other economic development organizations from throughout our 13-county, three-state region known as Cincinnati USA, collaborated, cooperated, then, convinced IEDC to select us as host.

What will they learn? IEDC members will experience a region that uniquely blends many of the best attributes of more renowned markets from throughout America. Interestingly, this is a perception of our home that often eludes us as we focus on our most visible civic and social challenges, but it's not being overlooked by others:

The Partnership for Greater Cincinnati's current phase (1999-2003) will see 1,000-plus new or expanded business investment projects; our international business community will nearly double to almost 300 firms; and 50,000-plus new jobs will have been created despite the lagging economy of recent years.

For 2002, we're one of Site Selection magazine's top 10 U.S. metro areas for "New and Expanded Facilities" and "Investment," and one of Expansion Management magazine's top 15 U.S. markets for European investment.

These things don't just happen. A region like ours can outpace our competition only when leadership, collaboration and action are the rule, not the exception.

Of course, our region's collective attention has been focused on several high profile and successful corporate retention and expansion projects in recent weeks and months. We are certain that many of our economic development peers from other regions appreciate local anxiety while recognizing long term value for retaining industry leaders such as Kroger, Fifth Third Bank and Convergys.

Lesser notice has been paid to a significant shift in our local economic landscape to a greater reliance on high-skilled, more highly paid knowledge workers. P&G's recent decisions to outsource thousands of professional services jobs to Hewlett Packard and IBM is a trend that is unavoidable and growing. The relocation to Cincinnati of two high-tech headquarter operations, dunnhumby and think3, starting with more than 150 combined executive-level jobs among them, reinforces this shift.

The challenging issues of out-migration, the health of the urban core, a structural reduction of manufacturing jobs, race relations, the quality of urban public school systems, and much more, will be topics of many discussions at this conference, not because we face these issues alone, but because virtually every community in America faces them as well.

Hosting IEDC 2003 shines a light on Cincinnati USA and presents an opportunity to not only examine complicated issues, but to celebrate real progress and great success. Our economy is growing faster than the national economy. Our downtown is healthier than the downtowns of the vast majority of our guests. Our work force is more educated and more dedicated than in most other American cities. Our many multinational companies make the world even smaller for us than many of our competitors.

Our region has achieved more success than many realize, with great opportunities still ahead. Leadership, collaboration and action are the keys to continued progress. These attributes unify our regional economic development strengths and resources and leverage our regional assets enabling us to compete effectively in the global economy.

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Nicholas J. Vehr is vice president for economic development of the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce.