Dayton to spend $100,000 to help establish city as aerospace hub

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By Joanne Huist Smith, Staff Writer Updated 9:37 PM Wednesday, November 25, 2009

DAYTON — The city’s Office of Economic Development, over two years, will spend $100,000 to refine and implement a strategy to establish Dayton as an Aerospace Hub of Innovation.

The Dayton City Commission, on Wednesday, Nov. 25, voted to approve a two-year contract with the Dayton Development Coalition to assist the city with that effort.

“This is something I have been working on for a long time,” City Commissioner Matt Joseph said. “It’s about our future.”

The goal of the contract, according to city records, is to develop a city-centered plan to capture growth at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, including creating a list of businesses to target during attraction efforts.

The coalition also will work to build relationships between the City Commission and city staff with key WPAFB personnel and monitor Base Realignment and Closure developments there.

Payments suspended

In other business, the City Commission favored a recommendation from City Manager Tim Riordan to suspend payments into the city’s executive savings plan for one year. Since 2005, the city has made just over $1 million in cash payouts from the plan to 17 employees who retired, quit or were fired.

Riordan asked the City Commission to halt the deposit of about $100,000 into the trust while an independent group reviews whether the plan, started in 1979, is cost effective.

Under the plan, designed to attract and retain quality directors and managers, the city contributes an incentive equal to 4.6 percent of every executive’s salary annually.

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