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EDC Minutes September 17, 2019 Page4of7 ----------------------------- compare to others across the world, and show us what we need to do to keep moving forward. She said if we end up in she believes the final seven they will send a team to the area and dig deeper into the Intelligent Community with us. Discussion ensued about who is going to attend the broadband conference in October at Grandview and the benefits of doing the assessment as the Brainerd Lakes area and not as a solo City. Chair Lindholm said the EDC will look at this again in November after the conference and determine if they need to do anything with this topic. 7. Pequot Lakes Incentive Program Nancy Malecha informed the EDC that a chart of potential incentives from the City of Brainerd is in their packet. She stated that at the last EDC meeting it was discussed to potentially put something similar together for the City of Pequot Lakes. Chair Lindholm asked it this is something that the EDC would create and send a proposal to the Council for discussion. Ms. Malecha said yes and to possibly bring in the Planning Commission as well if they are talking about waving permit fees. Discussion ensued about incentives being a part of the Small Cities Development Program Grant. Shelia Haverkamp explained that the City of Brainerd has a geographic designated area that they wanted to encourage economic development in so they asked what they could do to add enhanced incentives to encourage private sector investment in that area. She stated that over the years the Pequot Lakes Economic Development Committee wanted the city to start contemplating something like this for the downtown area. Ms. Haverkamp discussed possible areas to offer incentives that would benefit the City, creating incentives that are acceptable to ail community leaders and marketing these incentives. She talked about Pequot Lakes possible having the Small Cities Development Program grants as a financial incentive to encourage people to apply for projects to get the incentives. Ms. Haverkamp discussed having Bruce Buxton coming to an EDC meeting to discuss the City of Brainerd's incentive program since he was a key individual in putting together the Brainerd incentive plan. Commissioner Lelwica suggested possibly having finro separate incentive programs; one for housing and another for business development. Ms. Malecha reminded the EDC that we're in the midst of the workforce housing task force that was presented to them a few months ago and that they should have more information to them by the end of this year. She suggested waiting until you get that information or commingling the finro together somehow. Commissioner Lelwica stated that the EDC could potentially have the workings of an incentive program talked about and then maybe those could be married together. Discussion ensued about potential geographic areas, the downtown area or Grow Zone, and gaining the support from the community to implement the incentive plan. Chair Lindholm asked Ms. Haverkamp to invite Bruce Buxton and suggested that him, Commissioner Lelwica and Ms. Haverkamp get together to