Measuring the Economic Impact of Entrepreneurship in the East Central Florida Region

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The National Entrepreneur Center (NEC) stands as a transformative force in shaping Orlando’s entrepreneurial landscape. The NEC helps propel aspiring and established entrepreneurs towards success by offering an array of assistance services and resources vital for business formation and growth. Since its inception, the NEC’s partners have helped to empower over 300,000 entrepreneurs and facilitated over $320 million in business loans. It has also attracted attention from both national and international governments seeking to replicate this successful model. In 2023, the NEC partnered with the ECFRPC to undertake an economic valuation analysis of the region’s entrepreneurship system with the objective of quantifying the collective impact of the seven technical providers within the NEC.

In this webinar, Luis and Belinda will explain how the NEC helps foster small businesses. They will also note the regional economic impacts of the robust entrepreneurial landscape that the NEC has helped shape. These presenters will use REMI PI+ to help quantify these impacts.

 

Presenters:

Luis Nieves-Ruiz
Director of Economic Development
East Central Florida Regional Planning Council

Originally from Puerto Rico, Luis serves as Director of Economic Development for the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council, a council of governments located in Orlando, FL. Through his 21+-year career, he has made significant contributions to the fields of economic development, regional food systems, and community revitalization. This includes using the REMI PI+ model to estimate the economic impact of a variety of investments and activities including tourism, sea level rise, and early learning education, among others. Because of his many career accomplishments, Luis was inducted as a Fellow of the American Institute of Certified Planners in 2022. That same year, he was also awarded the Professional of the Year Award by the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Metro Orlando and Prospera.

Belinda Kirkegard
President
National Entrepreneur Center

Belinda Ortiz Kirkegard is the President of the National Entrepreneur Center. Prior to joining the NEC team, Belinda worked the last 13 years for the City of Kissimmee as its Economic Development Director, working with a leadership team that believed in building an incredible quality of life for residents and businesses alike. Her professional experience also includes the Central Florida Hotel & Lodging Association, Orange County’s Business Development Office, as well as having worked for a couple of Central Florida elected officials.

She is a nationally certified Economic Development Finance Professional and has a Master’s degree in Public Administration. Belinda currently serves on a few community boards, and is the Treasurer for the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority, which oversees the Orlando International Airport, which has a $600 million annual operating budget and $3 billion for capital improvements.

Unforeseen Events, Natural Disasters, and Insurance Rates

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Recent unforeseen disasters, like the East Palestine train derailment, the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse, and general increases in extreme weather in certain regions of the United States have created discussion about infrastructure resilience and recovery. Supply chain disruptions often have severe long-term economic impacts at the regional and national level, and it is important to conduct resilience analysis to understand the economic impacts of these disruptions and how they could be mitigated. In addition to affecting broad economic factors like employment, GDP, and wage level, these destructive events also hurt individuals due to increased insurance rates, which may incentivize these people to migrate or decrease spending.

Join us for a webinar as we explore the connection between unforeseen events, including supply chain disruptions and natural disasters, and insurance rates. Using REMI PI+, we will discuss how some regions are impacted more than others, and we will also explain which demographics are most hurt by these trends. We will also discuss why doing resilience analysis is crucial to ensuring regions are prepared for supply chain disasters, and fully understanding the crippling effects of disruptions of varying length

Wild Pig and Foreign Animal Disease Outbreaks: Understanding Spread, Mitigation, and Economic Impacts

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This webinar was presented by Lirong Liu, Ph.D. and Steven Shwiff, Ph.D. from Texas A&M University Commerce, and Stephanie Shwiff, Ph.D. from the United States Department of Agriculture.

This presentation will explore results related to a study examining the relative economic impact of ASF and CSF in swine and FMD in swine and cattle on the U.S. economy. An epidemiological disease spread model was used to predict the potential spread of these diseases. Spread results were then analyzed using REMI PI+ to estimate the relative economic impacts on the U.S. domestic economy and exports. Outbreaks started in locations with the highest risk of introduction tended to be small, frequently only infecting a few animals due to the disconnect between introduction risk and the presence of the livestock industry.

The overall economic impacts primarily reflected the results of import bans placed on U.S. products by other countries, which turned out to be consequential, inducing between three and four billion dollars in loss in gross domestic product (GDP) in the first year. The worst-case scenarios involved more than a fourth of the domestic cattle population in the case of FMD and almost the whole domestic swine population for the three diseases affecting swine. In the year of disease spread, the loss in GDP was estimated at $65 billion if both cattle and swine were involved, despite a government infusion of $7.5 billion for the euthanasia and disposal of slaughtered animals and cleaning and disinfecting of facilities.

Investing in Transportation Resilience: A Case Study of DFW Airport

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This webinar was presented by Robert Horton, Vice President of Environmental Affairs at DFW International Airport,  Peter Evangelakis, Ph.D., Senior Vice President of Economics & Consulting at REMI, and Igor Linkov, Ph.D., Adjunct Professor at the University of Florida and Risk and Decision Science Focus Area Lead with the US Army Engineer Research and Development Center. This presentation was hosted from 2:00-3:00 pm EST on Wednesday, February 21st.

The Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport is a crucial pillar of its regional economy. It hosts a diverse ecosystem of tens of thousands of direct jobs, and its significant indirect and induced impacts ripple throughout the Dallas Metro area. Disruptions are common for DFW as well as for other airports, and building resilience (defined as the ability to recover from disruption) is a key priority, but it may require significant investments. The presenters will explain the importance of airport resilience investments in strengthening the supply chain and transportation networks, present resilience and the economic model, and highlight the results of disruption scenarios affecting DFW.

Based on an analysis using the REMI TranSight model with the SEI module, the presenters will first quantify and discuss DFW’s large economic footprint based on a variety of economic and socioeconomic indicators, including output, Gross Regional Product, personal income, population, and employment, which is further broken down by sector, race/ethnicity, and educational attainment. The results show that even relatively short disruptions to the airport have outsized negative economic effects on the airport that cascade throughout the region, emphasizing the need to take proactive measures to minimize both their frequency and duration.

Economic Impact Analysis of Connect SoCal

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The Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) is the country’s largest Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) and includes six counties in Southern California, spanning over 38k square miles. SCAG serves 18.7 million residents, accounting for 48 percent of California’s population. With a GDP of $1.6 trillion, the SCAG region was the 15 largest economy in the world in 2021. The SCAG region’s size and its social, economic, and political diversity raise planning challenges but also position the region as a leader in economic and policy innovation. In the Fall of 2023, SCAG released the 2024 Connect SoCal Plan, SCAG’s quadrennial Regional Transportation Plan and Sustainable Communities Strategy. Connect SoCal outlines the region’s long-range transportation plan and strategies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

In this webinar, Gigi Moreno, Ph.D., SCAG’s Senior Economist, will share recent economic indicators for the SCAG region and SCAG’s regional economic outlook for 2024. While the SCAG region’s economy reflects the U.S. economy, Dr. Moreno will highlight distinct features of the SCAG economy and highlight how regional economic differences can shape local economic trends and inform regional planning. In this webinar, Dr. Moreno will also delve into SCAG’s economic impact analysis of Connect SoCal, which includes an economic impact analysis using the REMI TranSight model, an estimate of the economic benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and an analysis of the economic impacts of a more inclusive and equitable labor market.

Gigi Moreno, Ph.D.
Senior Economist
Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG)

Dr. Gigi Moreno is a Senior Economist with the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG). She has worked as an applied economist in various roles, including economic consulting, healthcare consulting, academia, and the public sector. At SCAG, Dr. Moreno focuses on policy strategies for inclusive economic growth and is responsible for SCAG’s long-range employment projections, integral to the agency’s regional land use plan and environmental compliance strategy. Prior to joining SCAG, Dr. Moreno taught environmental economic and industrial organization at Cal State University, Long Beach. Dr. Moreno has published numerous peer-reviewed papers in health economics, agricultural and environmental economics, cannabis economics, and climate change policy. In addition to a B.A. in economics from Carleton College, Dr. Moreno has a Ph.D. in Agricultural & Natural Resource Economics from UC Berkeley and a certificate in Geospatial Science from UCLA.