Port authority hires firm to lead director search

A board member said the firm has a demonstrated ability to fill executive positions in the economic development and aviation fields.

By ED RUNYAN

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

VIENNA — Western Reserve Port Authority approved hiring a Chicago company to find an economic development director for the authority.

The port authority, which oversees the operation of the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, voted 7-0 Wednesday to hire Heidrick & Struggles at a cost of around $100,000 to find someone for the position.

The executive search firm is headquartered in Chicago and has offices on six continents.

Scott Lewis, vice president of Edward J. Lewis Inc. and an authority board member, said Heidrick & Struggles has a demonstrated ability to find individuals to fill executive positions within the economic development and aviation fields around the world.

Lewis pointed to a list of scores of positions the company has helped fill, such as the vice president of economic development for the city of Greensboro, N.C., and senior vice president of economic development for the Jacksonville, Fla., Economic Development Council.

“We’re quite fortunate that they [Heidrick & Struggles] decided to do this,” Lewis said of working with the authority. The fees Heidrick & Struggles will earn for this job are on the lower end of the earnings range for the company, he added.

The company will be able to locate the kind of person who will have the contacts in, for instance, the aluminum extrusion industry, so that they can help expand that industry locally, Lewis added.

Heidrick & Struggles will screen candidates and provide an authority committee with three to five candidates to interview and choose from, officials say. The process is expected to take about three months.

U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Niles, D-17th, and others have pushed the idea of creating a Mahoning and Trumbull county economic development office to take advantage of the authority’s statutory authority to make loans through bond financing to help companies locate and expand here.

Money to pay Heidrick & Struggles and the salary of the economic development director will come from the $375,000 per year for three years pledged by Mahoning and Trumbull county commissioners, city councils in Youngstown, Warren and Niles, Howland Township trustees, and the Western Reserve Building Trades Council.

In other business, the authority will ask the partners that worked with it on a recent failed economic development proposal to help reimburse the authority for about $3,400 in legal fees.

Atty. Dan Keating handled the legal work of a proposal to have the authority purchase land on Elm Road in Warren near Larchmont Avenue from Warren City Schools and then resell it to the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association. AHEPA planned to build an assisted-living center on the site of the former McKinley Elementary School.

But the project fell through when AHEPA failed to receive a needed grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Keating said.

The authority will ask the Warren Redevelopment and Planning Corp., Warren City Schools, Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber and city of Warren to help reimburse the costs.

runyan@vindy.com