Gladewater’s latest economic development dynamo hit the ground running this month — Anna Conlan’s first goal is to let the community’s existing momentum drive its ongoing progress.
“My vision, honestly, is to help Gladewater develop a path forward with what Gladewater wants it to be,” the new Gladewater Economic Development Corporation director said last week. “Gladewater is going to grow one way or the other. Being able to choose that vision for growth with the community in mind, and our values, will propel Gladewater into its next era of economic development and tourism.”
Conlan says she’s still getting the lay of the land in terms of active and developing projects. She’s pleased to see many things already in the pipeline and focused on the community’s existing inventory.
“Gladewater is tee’d up right now for really interesting expansion into commercial business,” she said, “while at the same time holding dear its current retention and development of existing business, retention of its history, and tourism.
“I was very excited to be part of the growth that’s coming the next five years. Watching East Texas as a whole, I want to be a part of helping propel Gladewater on their path of expansion to benefit the community.”
An East Texas native, Conlan graduated from Gilmer High School in 1994 before heading on to Southwest Texas State University. “From there I went into hospitality then into convention sales and tourism,” she said. “That lapped over with economic development.”
Conlan previously worked for the City of Frisco as national sales director before becoming Director of Operations for Performance Management Institute and GrantWorks.
“I did grant administration and performance management training for local municipalities and state government organizations,” she explained. “For the performance management portion, I was managing state-funded and federally-funded dollars to help municipalities train staff and stay within compliance in how they use and allocate those funds.” Duties across three-and-a-half years also included training employees on risk management, logic modeling and general staff competency.
Conlan and her husband, Patrick, moved back to Gilmer during the COVID-19 pandemic with their two sons, Austin (a high school freshman) and William (a junior studying Engineering at Texas A&M).
Taking the reins at GEDCO, Conlan says retention and development of existing businesses is a top priority.
“Combined with new job creation, new job development by promoting education,” she said, “which gives the children in our community a pathway to employment during the growth I anticipate all of East Texas is going to have.”
There’s an ongoing focus to develop local jobs in manufacturing and other sectors. A new retail project is developing, and there’s a dialogue in progress with a mid-size company in transportation — notably, GEDCO principles and other city leaders have to stay mum about projects in development so as not to derail negotiations.
That said, “We are getting geared up to help facilitate the expansion of the road,” Conlan noted, with further development of the Toll 49 project expect to drive more traffic to and through Gladewater.
“We’ll be working with the city to change some of the zoning around that with the possibility of industry coming in along the road,” said outgoing interim director Scott Owens.
“In partnership with TxDOT,” Conlan said, “That will spur commercial developments.”
The EDC continues working with the buyers of the old Gladewater High School property on a variety of developments at the site. Likewise, the organization recently received its finalized Hotel Feasibility Study (see separate story in today’s issue) and will soon be entertaining RFPs from potential developers.
At the same time, “The economic development corporation is actively partnering with Texas Workforce Commission and Gladewater ISD to enrich our CTE and trade programs, partnering with our local industry to develop career paths are seamless between high school and transitioning into the workforce with the support the EDC, TWC, ISD,” Conlan said, “As well as our partnership with Kilgore College for young adults who want to go into a degree program.”
She’s also keen to see more Gladewater entrepreneurs take advantage of GEDCO’s Grow Gladewater outreach.
“The EDC has put together a grant program that our local businesses can apply for to help with expanding their business — repairs on building and maintenance that they can apply for directly through the EDC in order to help them grow and retain employees.”
Conlan will also be taking charge of plans for a coming Town Hall-style meeting that will encompass the GEDCO board, city council members, chamber of commerce representatives and the full slate of business owners, developers, financiers and community members interest in Gladewater’s growth and the strategy to achieve.
“This promotes partnership and transparency across city government,” Conlan said. “We will be going out and pursuing site selectors, opportunities for existing businesses to expand and new businesses to develop… to encourage all of this inclusively.
“The new vision is definitely to create substantial job growth with jobs that include healthcare and benefits while using our sustainable labor force and growing Gladewater in such a way that we’ll keep our smalltown community feel while providing a better quality of life for our citizens and developing a path forward with a purpose that’s Gladewater’s vision.”