Coachella Valley Region Economic Development Strategy

Chapter Two: Plan Development

As a core component of the stakeholder engagement effort for the Countywide EDSP, the EDSP consultant team facilitated a series of workshop-style meetings (three meetings spaced over five months) with key public and private stakeholers specific to the Coachella Valley. In order to allow for continuity of the stakeholder discussions over the course of the project, the invited stakeholders were asked to commit to attending all three Coachella Valley meetings. The meetings progressed through the following sequence of objectives: Meeting 1 (January 2025) – Orientation to the CV Strategy process; scoping of stakeholders’ priorities for economic development programming in the Coachella Valley; identification of strength-weakness-opportunity-threat (SWOT) factors for the Valley. Meeting 2 (April 2025) – Review of (and stakeholder comment on) preliminary target industry analysis completed for the CV Strategy process; facilitated stakeholder exercise to develop an economic development vision statement for the Valley and to broadly outline stakeholders’ definitions of “success” for CV Strategy implementation. Meeting 3 (June 2025) – Stakeholder confirmation of final set of targeted industry clusters; review of preliminary framework/outline of CV Strategy; review and discussion of strategy categories.

Economic Development Summit Process Structure:

A series of 3 workshop-style meetings in the Coachella Valley. Participation focused on invited public/private stakeholders (asked to commit to attending all three meetings). Forum to review background studies and draft strategy documents; opportunity for key stakeholders to provide direct input on economic development priorities, SWOT factors, target industries, and the CV Strategy vision statement / action plan.

Purpose:

Participation Level: 66 total participants Outcomes:

Coachella Valley SWOT summary; final lists of target industries for the Valley; vision statement / success criteria.

Number of Participating Stakeholders by Date Coachella Valley Economic Development Summit Meetings Round 1 (January 2025) Round 2 (April 2025) Round 3 (June 2025) Total 21 15 30 66

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