BDC WORK* Exterior repair* New heating and air-conditioning systems* Interior renovation* Remodeling of conference and industrial training areasSource: Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce
Work started Thursday on the biggest-ever revamp to Chattanooga’s small-business incubator, and the city’s chief job-growth group is beefing up efforts to help startup and existing firms.
“We’ll put together more programs to offer to young businesses … and existing industry,” said Tom Edd Wilson, the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce’s chief executive.
The Business Development Center on Cherokee Boulevard will be a key focus of the Chamber’s new strategic plan that “calls on us to spend more time, money and effort” on small firms, he said.
In the past, only startups located in the incubator had access to its seminars, help with business plans, accounting setup services and counselors.
The BDC, when a $4.74 million upgrade is complete in May, will house programs for small businesses throughout the county, Wilson said.
Adam Green of BDC tenant Green Real Estate Partners said he recently moved from Tampa, Fla., and he likes the city’s jobs focus.
“It makes people want to come here and work,” said the medical real estate developer.
Hamilton County Mayor Claude Ramsey termed the BDC “a place of opportunity.”
“It’s another piece in the economic development puzzle,” he said about the center where companies receive reduced rents.
Mayor Ron Littlefield said scores of businesses “graduate” from the BDC each year as they go out on their own.
Littlefield recalled when 3M Co. owned the 90-year-old building, housing about 400 workers decades ago. After that company moved out, officials hit on the idea of starting in 1988 what has become one of the country’s largest small-business incubators.
Wilson said the BDC houses about 55 companies employing 400 people. He said around 20 companies graduate each year.
The 125,000-square-foot structure will receive a major refurbishing. Hamilton County has $3 million available in funding with the U.S. Economic Development Administration supplying $1.5 million and Housing and Urban Development chipping in $1.37 million more.
J.Ed. Marston, the Chamber’s vice president of marketing, said project bids came in lower than anticipated and some of the county share may not be needed depending on contingencies.