State Economic Development Executives (SEDE) Network

State Economic Development Bulletin – Issue 86, October 2025

Written by

aulaky@crec.net

in

Issue 86, October 2025

A Summary of Cutting-Edge Articles Affecting States

HEADLINES

SEDE News 🗞️

Economy 💰

Trade 📈

Industry Trends 💡

Workforce ⚒️

Business Expansions and Incentives 📊

SEDE News 🗞️

SEDE Hosted Meeting for Top Executives (SEDE) The State Economic Development Executives (SEDE) Network held its Fall meeting for state economic development executives and their deputies in New York City from October 14-15th. The meeting, hosted by Empire State Development Corporation, included discussions of current issues facing states and many opportunities for networking among the state economic development commissioners, secretaries and executive directors or their top deputies. Meeting notes will be available at stateeconomicdevelopment.org.

Call for Sponsorship Practices (SEDE) SEDE is interested in potentially creating strategic relationships with economic development sponsor partners. Sponsors may gain visibility with SEDE leaders, broaden their promotional reach, and be recognized in event materials, signage, and digital channels. SEDE wants to learn more about the sponsor relationships that exist in the economic development ecosystem. Please contact Bob Isaacson, Senior Vice President with the Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness, if you have experiences, best practices, or lessons you’d like to share!

SEDE Steering Committee Member Spotlight: Hope Knight, President, CEO, and Commissioner of Empire State Development

Hope Knight is the President, CEO and Commissioner of Empire State Development, New York State’s economic development agency. She was nominated to the position by Governor Kathy Hochul in October 2021 and confirmed by the New York State Senate in May 2022.

Hope has been instrumental in the creation of the state’s Office of Strategic Workforce Development, which will focus on improving New York’s workforce development programs and practices to better align with the needs and priorities of today’s employers. She has also focused efforts on supporting New York State’s small businesses, ensuring that they have the resources needed to grow and thrive, and growing the state’s Minority and Women-Owned Business community. Prior to her appointment, Commissioner Knight served as President & CEO of Greater Jamaica Development Corporation, one of the nation’s first community development corporations. Additionally, from 2015 to 2021 she was a Commissioner on the New York City Planning Commission. She holds a BA from Marymount Manhattan College and an MBA from the Graduate School of Business of the University of Chicago. The SEDE network would like to thank Commissioner Knight for hosting the Fall SEDE Network Meeting in NYC!

SEDE Members on the Move: Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation

We’re pleased to share recent leadership changes within the SEDE Network. Join us in celebrating these transitions and welcoming new leaders to our community!

Outgoing Leader: Missy Hughes, WEDC Secretary and CEO

Hughes led the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation for six years. As Secretary and CEO, Hughes helped secure over $8 billion in planned investments from companies, which helped create or retain over 45,000 jobs. Hughes has announced running for Wisconsin Governor election in 2026. A new Secretary has yet to be named.

Economy 💰

Commerce Invests $15.8M in First Awards for Disaster Supplemental Funding (EDA) The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) awarded $15.8 million in FY2025 Disaster Supplemental funding in 11 states and territories. These awards will support economic recovery efforts in several states that received major disaster declarations in 2023 and 2024, due to storms and other weather-related events. These awards are the first of many to come to support economic recovery from these disasters.

State Legislatures Make Bipartisan Breakthroughs on Policies that Promote Housing (Pew) In 2025, state legislatures enacted unprecedented reforms to improve the availability and affordability of housing, with lawmakers in Texas, Washington, and Montana leading the way with major successes. The momentum behind these new state laws reflects a growing national consensus around the strong connection between housing availability and affordability and the types of changes that can improve both. These changes include zoning reforms, focusing on affordable homeownership, parking reforms, and cutting processing times to reduce delays.

The Atlanta Fed’s Role in Understanding the Economic Impact of Natural Disasters (Atlanta Fed) Atlanta Fed researchers strengthened the Atlanta Fed’s ability to understand economic mobility and resilience conditions within communities through recent discoveries about Hurricane Michael’s impact on one Florida county. Hurricane Michael made landfall along the Florida Panhandle on October 10, 2018. Through data analyses of this urban/rural county, a tourist destination anchored by Panama City Beach, Atlanta Fed researchers gained insights into the outcome of residents’ decisions to move from the county after the storm. Results suggested that Bay County residents exposed to the storm were 3% more likely to move within the next year (2019), and 3.8% more likely to move within the next three years following Hurricane Michael.

Some Americans Are Starting to Feel the Impact of the Government Shutdown (The N.Y. Times) Impacts of the federal government shutdown are starting to be felt by certain populations beyond federal employees, hinting at problems that could deepen. For example, in some Native American communities, key medical services, such as diabetes monitoring and telehealth sessions, have been curtailed or canceled. Veterans no longer have access to career counseling or regional benefits offices. In addition, many of the country’s fruit and vegetable farmers face hurdles in planning for next year’s crops because there is so much uncertainty about what federal assistance they can expect. Construction projects may also face delays if permits cannot be issued. Tracking these impacts will be important as the shutdown continues.

EDA Discontinues 3 Programs, Including the University Centers Program (SSTI) The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) is discontinuing funding for the University Center, Trade Adjustment Assistance to Firms, and STEM Talent Challenge programs. The reason cited was budget constraints. This change will have no impact on current awards; they must be closed out, and project activities must end once funds are spent. The University Center program had 70 UCs operating across the country. University Centers were focused on leveraging university assets to build regional economic ecosystems that support innovation and high-growth entrepreneurship across the country.

Trade 📈

Highest Tariffs Since 1930s Redraw the International Trade Map (Bloomberg Businessweek) The new contours of global commerce are starting to emerge as governments redraw trade alliances and changes occur due to the highest US tariffs since the 1930s. Smaller economies are also adapting to a world where US consumers and companies are more expensive to reach; for example, a group of 14 countries that includes New Zealand, Singapore, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates has formed a partnership to boost trade and investment. Trade relationships will continue to shift, along with more bilaterial trade agreements between countries.

Industry Trends 💡

AI Places: How to Benchmark and Boost Your Region’s AI Competitiveness (Lightcast) While AI demand is rising across industries worldwide, the future of work isn’t happening somewhere in the cloud, but in real communities. Looking through a regional lens shows us where talent, training, and companies come together. For workforce development agencies and local policymakers, this means knowing how to prioritize AI-readiness interventions. Demand can be driven by universities, by the private sector, or by both. AI competitiveness depends not only on the amount of talent in a region but on knowing who the anchor institutions are and how ecosystems are connected. Regions that can map their key players are better placed to foster partnerships, strengthen pipelines, and align employers and educators.

The Future of Life Sciences: Harmonizing Quality and Manufacturing (Forbes) Life sciences are standing on the edge of their most consequential decade. Scientific discovery is advancing at breakneck speed, all promising to transform how we treat and prevent disease. Yet, the systems that must bring these breakthroughs to patients remain constrained by old divides. The most critical of these is the separation between quality and manufacturing: while quality safeguards compliance and patient safety, manufacturing drives efficiency and scale. The technology to bridge quality and manufacturing is available now. For example, AI can predict deviations and prevent recalls before they occur, while digital twins simulate manufacturing and quality outcomes in parallel. Leaders should consider interoperability, redefine accountability measures, and adopt an ecosystem mindset to create new standards of excellence.

Workforce ⚒️

NSF Invests $30M in EPSCoR for Workforce Development in Energy, Semiconductors, and More (NSF) The U.S. National Science Foundation is investing approximately $30 million in institutions across Montana, Idaho and Louisiana to establish NSF EPSCoR Centers of Research Excellence in Science and Technology (NSF EPSCoR CREST Centers). These centers aim to expand STEM knowledge, enhance research productivity and attract more students from those regions into STEM fields. Montana Technological University will establish a research hub on energy systems, Boise State University will launch the Center for Advancing Workforce Experience through Semiconductors, Outreach, and Mentoring, and Louisiana will establish a center focused on nanomotor research with workforce development.

Who Rides Out the Storm? Post-College Transition and its Role in Socioeconomic Earnings Gaps (NBER) Despite a large earnings premium for bachelor’s degree completion in general, graduates from low-income families earn substantially less than graduates from high-income families. While prior research has documented the role of college quality and major choice in explaining these gaps, this research examines a different margin: the first (post-college) job transition. The transition from college to the labor market can be challenging to navigate, and students with financial, informational, or other disadvantages during the job search may be more likely to “undermatch” to their first job.

Manufacturing Day 2025: A Skilled Workforce Should be the Nation’s First Priority (IndustryWeek) An estimated 3.8 million manufacturing jobs will need to be filled over the next decade due to an overall shortfall in recruits and a mismatch between the skills manufacturers need and the skillsets of available workers. In honor of Manufacturing Day 2025, it is important to acknowledge the need to provide pathways for more youth to obtain the technical skills needed for today’s job market. U.S. educational pathways favor college degrees over technical training, resulting in fewer engineers and apprentices compared to global competitors like Germany and China. Expanding apprenticeships and technical certifications and publicizing reshoring success stories can attract more youth to manufacturing careers and improve workforce quality. Likewise, certificate and license training pays off, and greater funding should go towards technical training opportunities.

GE Aerospace Invests $30M in Workforce Program to Grow Manufacturing Talent (WCPO Cincinnati) Over the next five years, GE Aerospace will invest $30 million into its new workforce program across the nation. The company said it’s hoping to increase the number of highly skilled manufacturing workers by 10,000 beginning next year. GE Aerospace is partnering with educational programs across the country to assist with this effort. This includes efforts in Cincinnati, as Cincinnati State Technical and Community College will receive $250,000 from GE Aerospace. That money will fund two new aviation maintenance technician instructors to help expand the program capacity from 185 students to 350.

Business Expansions and Incentives 📊

The Evolving Landscape of State Incentives (Smart Incentives) The C2ER State Incentives Database recently completed its annual update and has shared some interesting trends and findings. Although the total number of incentive programs continues to increase, the pace of program creation has slowed. While 2025 showed an increase in new programs, the broader trend suggests that states are rolling out fewer new incentives than in the 1990s and 2000s. Several new programs in 2024 and 2025 are focused on boosting childcare resources, including the Nebraska School Readiness Tax Credit and Child Care Nonrefundable Tax Credit, Utah Child Care Business Tax Credit and Alabama Childcare Facility Tax Credit. C2ER expects states will continue to “prioritize workforce initiatives and programs like childcare or housing to support a robust workforce.”

Connecting Evidence to Policy: Takeaways from the NCSL Tax Incentive Roundtable (Smart Incentives) The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) recently hosted the annual Roundtable on Evaluating Economic Development Tax Incentives in Helena, Montana. NCSL. The meeting, supported by The Pew Charitable Trusts, brought together economists, auditors, analysts, researchers, economic developers and consultants who all share an interest in improving our understanding of how tax incentives work and illuminating their impact on state budgets and economies. A significant underlying theme this year was the need to ensure incentive evaluations remain relevant and actionable for policymakers. While evaluators are successfully generating more and better evidence – clearly identifying incentives that work and those that don’t – many are encountering difficulty engaging with decision-makers. This disconnect prevents the evidence from being fully incorporated into policy and program deliberations.

Stellantis Makes Largest U.S. Investment in Company History, Promising 5,000 Jobs (STLA) Stellantis is making the single-largest investment the company has ever made (even as Chrysler), announcing plans to drop $13 billion into the U.S. market. The investment will affect each of its manufacturing facilities in the United States, with the largest sums to be distributed among four states — Michigan, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana. The investment is also planned to result in more than 5,000 jobs and lead to a 50% increase in yearly vehicle production and five new vehicles. New vehicles are expected to launch by 2027.

Colorado Approves Millions for Semiconductor Manufacturer’s Expansion (Colorado Springs Gazette) A service provider in the semiconductor industry, which operates a packaging facility in Colorado Springs, has been approved for millions in tax incentives from the state if it expands its U.S. operations in Colorado. The Colorado Economic Development Commission approved more than $1.1 million in performance-based job growth tax incentives and $1 million in CHIPS refundable tax credits for an unnamed company. The parent company has nearly 2,000 employees across the world, including more than 100 currently in Colorado. Colorado legislators in 2023 created the CHIPS Zone Program to maximize incentives available for semiconductor companies in the state. Municipalities, counties and groups of both can apply to designate a geographical area within their boundaries as a CHIPS Zone, allowing them access to various state income tax credits.

The State Economic Development Executives (SEDE) Network engages in regular events throughout the year. State Economic Development.org lists these activities and offers an interactive forum for discussion among peers. The SEDE Steering Committee includes: Sandra Watson (AZ), Chair; Clint O’Neal (AR); Kurt Foreman (DE); Quentin Messer (MI), Kevin McKinnon (MN); Michelle Hataway (MO); Thomas Burns (NV) Hope Knight (NY); Christopher Chung (NC); Andrew Deye (OH); Sophorn Cheang (OR); Ashely Teasdel (SC), Adriana Cruz (TX).

Allison Ulaky of the Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness (CREC) led the development of this Bulletin; for questions on the content in this Bulletin or for information on the SEDE Network contact Bob Isaacson, CREC Senior Vice President.

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