NACo Cheatham County Prosperity Summit was a success!

Our first try at the Cheatham County Prosperity Summit was in February and the icy weather forced us to reschedule until May 28th.  Storms, rain and a power outage the afternoon before did not deter us from our mission and the day of the summit was a perfect, warm spring day in beautiful Kingston Springs.

The Cheatham County Prosperity Summit was hosted by Cheatham County in conjunction with the National Association of Counties (NACo) and WealthWorks, with support from the Ford Foundation.  Cheatham County was selected through a competitive application process to host the summit, which introduced Cheatham County to the WealthWorks framework, helped build strategies to strengthen regional relationships and identified ways to deepen and sustain economic development activities.  The full-day event convened over 50 business and community leaders from Cheatham County, our state and regional partners, national experts and NACo staff to discuss asset-based economic development and to generate creative solutions that will strengthen the local economy.  Since Cheatham County recently completed a strategic tourism inventory and plan, tourism and small business development was the main focus of the summit.  Not only did we learn from the process, but we also applied our knowledge to develop next steps to encourage more people to visit Cheatham County and to grow our local businesses.CheathamCountyTourismLOGO_CMYK

About Daryl Phillips, CEcD

I am a professional economic developer. I presently work for communities and companies in developing and implementing workforce and economic development solutions as CEO of Phillips Economic Development Solutions (Phi EDS). Prior to September 2017, I was the economic development professional who served a community team of elected officials, business people, community leaders and dedicated stakeholders for economic development in Cheatham County, Tennessee (pop. 39,880) and its four towns. During my five-year tenure, I served the team as Cheatham County grew over 1,700 jobs, turned around population declines at the start of this decade into healthy population growth, increased tourism expenditures 20.3% and local tax revenue from tourism 25.4%, grew sales tax revenue 36%, focused on developing the local workforce and was recognized by SmartAsset as having the 9th highest Incoming Investment Index of all the 95 counties in Tennessee. I am a member of International Economic Development Council, Southern Economic Development Council, Tennessee Economic Development Council and International Council of Shopping Centers. I have earned the designation of Certified Economic Developer (CEcD) from International Economic Development Council (IEDC), the Economic Development Finance Professional (EDFP) certification from National Development Council and hold a Master of Business Administration from Tennessee Technological University.
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