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Economic Yearbook 2008
CENTRAL: Joining Forces
KISSIMMEE / OSCEOLA COUNTY
Plans for a deal with Nemours fell through in January when the children’s hospital chose a site at Lake Nona in Orange County instead. Osceola is still aggressively pursuing businesses attracted by its location and lower costs for land or warehouse space. It’s looking to add an industrial park near Narcoossee and Boggy Creek roads, as well as near Kissimmee Gateway Airport and at Interstate 4 by Celebration and ChampionsGate. The county has also put out feelers for a new convention center near I-4 and U.S. 192 that it will help pay for with tourist tax money if a resort builds at least 500 luxury hotel rooms.
LEADERS
» Since becoming county manager in February 2007, Michael Freilinger, former administrator of Polk County, Iowa, has brought new ideas to the county’s operations. For instance, he combined Osceola’s economic development and tourism operations, streamlining them to work together in cross-marketing.
» Brothers Ray and Dale Parsons operate Parsons Group, which is partnering with Schoolfield Properties to develop City Centre Kissimmee, a $24-million, eight-story property set to open in July in downtown Kissimmee. The project will include 31 condominiums, three restaurants, office and retail space and a 275-car parking garage co-financed by the Community Redevelopment Agency. The city is installing wide sidewalks and planning a $28-million park project two blocks away along the shores of Lake Tohopekaliga. “We’ve been developing in Kissimmee since the 1960s,” Ray
Parsons says. “We’ve always felt the potential is in the downtown lakefront.” Other 2008 projects for the Parsons Group: Broadway Marketplace, a $2-million retail center downtown; and the 12-acre Hoagland Industrial Center set to open in June near Kissimmee Municipal Airport.» Fifth-generation Central Floridian Russ Prather is transforming a longtime family property downtown from a bicycle shop into a pizza and wine restaurant, preserving the building’s Spanish-style architecture and brick porch. His brother-in-law, Chris Sutphen, will manage the business. “We’re from Kissimmee, and we really believe in the community,” says Prather, a pediatrician at the Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women & Babies. “It’s critical for a city to have a strong downtown.”
LAKE COUNTY
After hiring an Austin, Texas-based consultant to study the local economy, Lake is moving forward with a plan to diversify its tax base. One goal: Attract more companies in the healthcare/wellness, business services and “green” industries, along with former targets of manufacturing, distribution/warehousing, agritech and ecotourism. “We’re really in a transition phase from what was a bedroom community to the Orlando area,” says Dottie Keedy, the county’s director of economic growth and redevelopment.
LEADERS
» As immediate past president of the Chamber Alliance of Lake County, a new non-profit advocacy group for eight chambers of commerce and their 35,000 members, Robert Johnson has taken the lead in working with the county on its new comprehensive plan for growth. Johnson also serves on the board of myregion.org, a non-profit group that collaborates on growth issues for all of Central Florida. He works as vice president of Commerce Park Investments in Mount Dora.
» Bruce Duncan, president of Family Dynamics, formerly the Gregg Family Land Co., has been working with the state Department of Community Affairs and the town of Minneola to get approval for one of the county’s largest proposed developments. The Hills of Minneola would be as large as Orange County’s MetroWest and would include its own Florida’s Turnpike interchange.
