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Connecticut has been obsessed this year with questions about economic development. How much public money should be spent to help private businesses create jobs? Which investments make the most sense with limited resources? Many towns are dealing with these questions on the local level. WNPR’s Harriet Jones reports on a successful entrepreneur in Groton – who needs help from the town to create more jobs.
The machines on the shopfloor at Tylaska Marine Hardware are busy creating snap shackles that the company’s owner, Tim Tylaska invented when he was in graduate school.
"I had designed a mechanism to release loads for pulling hangliders behind towboats."
Essentially he had solved a problem that no-one else in the marine industry had been able to figure out – how to release lines under load.
"I spent a couple of days and I came up with some differential equations that described the sliding surfaces of this mechanism, and came up with an exact equation. I built one and sure enough, regardless of the loading you could release the shackle independent of the load.”
His business took off.
"Everyone wanted them for their boat, so I built more and more and that’s kind of how it evolved, and now we’re on every one of the Americas Cup sailing yachts, and most of the big races throughout the world.”
But the problem was where to house this growing business – at first Tylaska went with the classic entrepreneur’s solution.
"I originally started in my basement, then I moved to the garage.”
When he outgrew those he moved to small industrial unit, but again found there was no room to get bigger.
"I was trying to find another location nearby that allowed incubator type businesses to expand, and there was nothing. And so I eventually decided to build my own building.”
Not only did he build his own unit on a quiet rural road in Groton, but because of the need that he’d discovered, he built 19 more units. He finished his mini business park in 2005, and all of the units quickly filled up with other small businesses.
"They make windshield wiper blades there, we’ve got a carpenter up here, we have a machine shop, this place we have an engineer who was laid off from Pfizer……”
But in amongst the plain metal sheds is another type of structure.
"That large building there you see is my public water supply….”
Tylaska’s business park has no water supply or sewer service from the town. He’s managing the entire site on well water and septic systems. In order to expand his business park to 52 units, as he did in 2008, he had to build a larger capacity well, and run it as a publicly regulated water supply. He says that’s put a full stop to his growth here.
"I’ve had to turn away a lot of businesses that wanted to be here, but without water and sewer I’m not allowed to do it. Some of them wanted to start a beer brewery, I’ve had printing, other companies that need to have a nice flow rate of water. With my limited resources here I couldn’t allow that.”
The town’s water supply stops about a mile away from Tylaska’s development and the neighboring industrial units along Flanders Road. There has been talk of expanding supply here for more than 20 years – but nothing has happened. In 2006, after the nearby submarine base was threatened with closure, the town commissioned a study to show the best places for economic diversification. Flanders Road was named the number one priority. But it will cost as much as $20 million to extend utility services. Groton’s Mayor, Jim Streeter.
"With the economic situation that our community as well as the state and everybody else is facing it finally went on the back burner for a while.”
He says for a town like Groton, $20 million, even with projected state and federal help, is a big nut to crack.
"Any amount over $750,000 – if we have to borrow over $750,000 – then it has to go to a referendum, so it has to go to the citizens and they have to approve it. Our citizens are very cost conscious right now.”
Streeter says his job is to sell that big upfront payment as an investment in new jobs that may come to the town as a result.
"We’re trying to keep a level tax base, but unless we have new economic development in the area, it’s not going to happen.”
Bill Johnson is the town council’s liaison to the economic development commission. He says the fact that this will have to go to a referendum is a significant obstacle.
"Unfortunately this part of Flanders Road doesn’t get a lot of traffic, so people don’t really know how much is going on up here. But I think if you can show the amount of jobs that these businessmen have created already and how much room there is to grow, I think they’ll realize this is probably something we should be doing.”
"We’re losing opportunities essentially as we speak.”
Local attorney Richard Dixon represents a neighboring landowner who’s keen to see development here. He says Groton has gotten used to relying on its large employers like Electric Boat and Pfizer.
"We’ve had great benefits in Groton of having some very good industry that has carried the tax base. Because of the changing climate internationally, those places are not as secure.”
He says the 100 jobs that have been created at Tim Tylaska’s business park are proof that economic development can be viewed through another lens.
"The small businesses that develop, they’re the real base, and there’s the security to our communities. The large firms come and go – they didn’t used to, but they do now – so that’s why it’s so important we deal with this now.”
Whether the citizens of Groton will agree is another question.
For WNPR, I'm Harriet Jones.
