Consolidate School Admin to Generate $1 Billion for Higher Education

Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber President Tom Humphries generated a buzz in the room on Thursday when he told a group of about 150 government and business development officials that the state of Ohio could save more than $1 billion a year by consolidating K-12 school administration on a county level throughout the state.

The Regional Chamber is pushing a smaller scale effort in three counties in Mahoning Valley and, if successful, would use the savings (estimated at $20 million a year) to pay for valley residents to go on to college or to get a technical degree. Read more about the chamber's effort here.

Humphries spoke on a panel during a program sponsored by the Fund for Our Economic Future that explored how  the Dashboard of Economic Indicators can guide our region's economic development efforts.

Humphries said that the time is right for making fundamental change to the way we do business in Northeast Ohio.

Chris Warren, chief of regional development for the City of Cleveland, and Twinsburg Mayor Katherine Procop agreed that revenue sharing throughout the region could boost the overall economic health of individual communities and Northeast Ohio. The region's elected officials, led by the Northeast Ohio Mayors and City  Managers Association, is taking a serious look at implementing regional revenue sharing. You can learn more about their efforts at RevenueStudy.org.

Thomas Waltermire, CEO of Team NEO, highlighted that while there is a need to create more jobs in the region, it may be more important that the region focus on filling the jobs that are available. He noted that companies in the region, and those that want to move to the region, are finding it hard to find employees with the appropriate skills.