City staff outlines timeline, focus areas for Bendeconomic development strategic plan

City of Bend staff told members of the Community Advisory Board (CAB) on Wednesday that the city will pursue its first formal economic development strategic plan, with a timeline that targets council adoption on Dec. 3, 2025.

The plan is intended to set a 10-year vision and five-year implementation priorities for business growth, workforce supports and place-making, Cyrus, business advocate for the City of Bend, said during a presentation and Q&A. "When you boil it down, it's essentially a work plan that will occur over the next several months through December of this calendar year that hopefully gets us to the adoption of our first economic development strategic plan," Cyrus said.

City staff framed the effort around three core pillars: business (recruiting, retaining and growing employers), people (housing, workforce and services) and place (public amenities and sustainable infrastructure). The work plan calls for additional research, a three-stage focus-group sequence and broad stakeholder outreach that staff said will include about 100 stakeholder interviews by July or early August.

Jonathan Taylor, urban renewal project manager, and Cyrus said Bend will align the plan with the Bend Urban Renewal Investment Strategy and use the urban renewal toolkit as an implementation lever. Cyrus told CAB that the city intends to use the strategic plan to recommend roles and structures for the city and external partners. "The final plan aims to set a vision for sustainable and equitable economic development in Bend through 02/1935, providing key focus areas, strategies and actions that achieve that vision, and facilitates implementation by recommending priority strategies and actions for the next 5 years," Cyrus said.

Staff said BDAB (Bend Economic Development Advisory Board) has been appointed by council to advise the effort and that CAB will be asked to identify additional citizen advisory bodies and community partners to join focus groups. Staff described an aggressive schedule: finalize the focus-group membership on April 21, issue invitations the next day, hold the first focus group on June 10 and present a draft plan for public review in late summer and fall ahead of the December adoption target.

Council-level choices already shaping the project include procurement and service-provider structure. Cyrus said the city historically used a sole-source agreement with EDCO for economic development services and has been encouraged by council and procurement staff to move to a competitive request-for-proposals process for contracted services beginning in calendar 2026.

Board members raised several concerns and suggestions during the discussion: reaching small businesses that do not attend chamber events ("If there was a way for when people apply for business licenses to get a reminder ... here's a survey," said John, a bar owner who identified himself during the public comment), ensuring housing is central to the plan and engaging public works and engineering staff to address infrastructure impediments in the core area. One CAB member said they had "a little bit of concern with staff's ability to do this" given current vacancies and workloads; staff said the city is recruiting for two positions (an economic development officer and a development navigator) that they expect will contribute to the project and relieve current capacity constraints.

Staff also flagged coordination with higher-education institutions and regional partners during research and engagement. Cyrus and Jonathan named several organizations and potential industry participants they intend to reach, including the chamber of commerce, Cultivate Bend and regional employers such as Epic Aircraft; they also said they will coordinate with Oregon State University and other local colleges for academic expertise.

CAB members asked staff to make outreach methods inclusive of nontraditional business owners and to consider on-call design resources and financial outreach (vendors and lenders) that can help applicants execute improvements or development plans once priorities are selected.

The meeting opened with a procedural motion to approve meeting minutes as stated; a second was recorded and members voted "aye." The minute-approval motion passed on voice vote.

Next steps: staff will finalize focus-group membership and invitations, pursue the 100 stakeholder interviews, refine the draft plan through summer stakeholder engagement and return to CAB and BDAB with drafts for recommendation before the council adoption timeline.