Cloth Consolidation

Tucson, Arizona. Tucson business and community leaders announced today the creation of a new "supergroup" to foster greater collaboration of economic development, downtown redevelopment, tourism, and transportation, tentatively named "Greater Tucson Economic Partnership" (GTEP).

GTEP will encompass the existing Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities (TREO), Downtown Tucson Partnership (DTP), the Metropolitan Tucson Convention & Visitors Bureau (MTCVB), and the Regional Transportation Authority (RTA).

Interim Board President Larry Hecker said Tuesday that the resulting organization will be "world-class" as it coordinates the efforts of economic development, tourism, downtown development, and regional transportation planning into one partnership.

GTEP will consolidate the offices of the four organizations into one group that will lease space at the new Tucson Electric Power (TEP) headquarters to be built on the site of the Santa Rita Hotel on Broadway Blvd. in Downtown. Hecker said that while the lease has yet to be negotiated, it will likely be in the range of $28 per square foot. "To have a credible effort, you need top-quality space to really sell the community to angels, investors, and developers," said Hecker. The new TEP building will be "world-class", Hecker said.

TEP Vice-President Steve Lynn will be the interim president of GTEP, until the group can bring on a "world-class CEO hired after a national and even international search,” said Lynn. Current CEO’s Joe Snell, Glenn Lyons, Jonathan Walker, and Gary Hayes, respectively, will continue in their roles, heading divisions of the new GTEP as vice-presidents, and will see their salaries increase about 20% as a "signal that we value their continuing contributions in creating a world-class organization," said Lynn.

GTEP board members would be drawn from the respective organizations, although hoteliers from the MTCVB board, downtown businesses from the DTP board, and anyone running a legitimate business on the TREO board would likely not be retained.

"Larry has asked me to serve, and I’ve asked Larry to serve" on the new board, said Lynn.

Asked about the timing of creating the new group during a sustained downturn that has seen funding to three of the four groups threatened, Hecker indicated that the synergies of all four groups working together to attract the Creative Class would help the group save money. Pressed for details, Hecker said that all four groups could save on stationery expenses, for example, and all could reduce labor costs on the lower end of their workforce, from sales managers at MTCVB and maintenance staff at DTP, to engineers and planners at RTA. TREO will likely not see any staff reductions, "as they’ve already sacrificed enough," he said.

The first order of business will be to develop a community blueprint, which will cost approximately $600,000, said Hecker. "It will be a world-class blueprint," he said. "It will be even more significant than the $250,000 economic blueprint that TREO commissioned two years ago. We are ready to make things happen."

"This is public investment in the organizational infrastructure that is needed to build on the great successes we’ve seen since 2005. The community has come together like I’ve never seen before, passing the RTA, electing visionary leaders like Council Member Trasoff and Supervisor Elias, and building a griffin on Scott Avenue," said Hecker. "Now we can leverage the bonding capacity of RTA and the collective resources of all of these successful organizations into one world-class partnership."

Asked for comment on the formation of GTEP, Snell of TREO said, "at the end of the day, we’re seeing that Tucson is truly emerging as a strong competitor among third-tier markets." Lyons of DTP said, "it’s my sense that Tucson is ready for an organization like this." Walker of MTCVB was at Sullivan’s Steakhouse with staff and clients and could not be reached for comment. Gary Hayes at RTA did not return phone calls.

Mayor Bob Walkup, who sits on the RTA board, said, "this is going to be the key to getting us where we need to be. This is the first project of Rio Nuevo, and the first step towards regional cooperation". Paul Loomis, mayor of Oro Valley and a TREO board member, gushed, "this will create world-class synergies for our community".