Brownsville Should Pursue Joe Max Higgins As BEDC President Immediately!

60 Minutes' Bill Whitaker, left, and economic developer Joe Max Higgins

From the editor:  This story appeared on 60 Minutes December 4 and should be must viewing for everyone on the City Commission, the GBIC and the BEDC.  Simply go to CBS archives to see the original report.

An impoverished tri-county area in central Mississippi had lost several large employers and about 12,000 low-skilled jobs since the last recession. Unemployment stood at 20%.

The three counties joined forces, along with local businesses, formed a partnership and hired Joe Max Higgins away from the city of Paragould, Arkansas at a salary of $250,000 and loudly proclaim that he's been worth every penny.

Higgins has brought $6 billion worth of advanced industry to the three county area, including the most high-tech steel mill in the U.S. and a helicopter factory.  6,000 highly skilled jobs with many salaries of over $100,000 annually have replaced the lower skilled jobs lost.

Higgins has not done this by traveling to Colombian and all over the world, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayer money, but simply proven that his area was the BEST place to locate industry.  

Higgins Flying Whitaker Over Region
in a Helicopter

On a tour of a potential factory site, Higgins had researched the shoe size of every executive on the tour and, when it became necessary to walk through a little surface water, he broke out galoshes for everyone in their exact size. 

As Higgins pointed out, no one in his area knew how to build helicopters or monitor a high tech, mostly robotic steel mill, but he got the companies in the same room with local colleges to give workers the EXACT skills needed.

Do you think Brownsville and Cameron County could use this man or do you think we need more high-priced studies from Carlos Marin or taxpayer paid trips to exotic places by the BEDC's Jason Hilts?