It was only a few years ago, the Tucson region was riding the crest of the wave when it came to economic development. The region’s fledgling economic development organization Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities (TREO) was ranked tops among its peers in similar-sized regions for the percentage of business activity deals it closed for relocations, retentions and expansions.

Then the world as we knew it changed.

Money was in short supply. The economic recession set in. Businesses and industries were no longer looking to grow. If anything they were getting smaller and going leaner to do whatever it would take to survive.

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TREO is still here and still doing its job but it has refocused as well. It’s still a public-private partnership, But it’s smaller. That will happen when an organization goes from pursuing around 60 possible leads a month to just two, as happened earlier this year. 

But there are positive signs now. Consider what TREO did just in the month of August:

• 22 leads were generated. Just two of the leads came from the Arizona Department of Commerce, which at one time accounted for the vast majority of lead referrals.

• 14 of those 22 leads came from businesses in targeted industries producing high-wage jobs, including solar, aerospace and bioscience manufacturing firms.

• 17 firms requested more specific information about the Tucson region. Of those, 41 percent are in the alternative energy industry, 29 percent were call centers, 18 percent are in aerospace, 6 percent are in biosciences and all other industries make up the remaining 6 percent.

• More than 2,000 jobs are represented by the 17 firms requesting information. Three quarters of those would be call center jobs, which while not high-paying, could help put people to work. Alternative energy firms tend to be smaller and more entrepreneurial but, carefully nurtured, they could blossom into something significant.

• $50 million is what aerospace firms alone are proposing to spend in capital investments in Tucson.

Like everyone else, TREO has been challenged. Arizona’s budget issues have hurt economic development efforts statewide, though California’s well-publicized problems have made that state vulnerable and TREO and its counterparts in Phoenix, Flagstaff and Yuma are coordinatiing efforts to go after business looking to move.

With all of the publicity of federal stimulus money, relocators are looking for their share for businesses. But Tucson isn’t in the position to offer a lot of incentives.

Two weeks ago, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics ranked Tucson right along with Detroit for having lost 7.5 percent of its jobs between July 2008 and July 2009. The only metro area that lost more jobs was Phoenix, which lost 7.8 percent Economists suggest the economy is on the threshhold of recovery. In some instances they say it has already started, If you haven’t noticed, there’s a reason. The experts are also saying this recovery will be unlike any other ever  experienced.

The recession has changed all of us. The task at hand is to regain confidence. Jobs will do that.

Now in its fifth year, TREO is doing its part to keep the Tucson region on the leading edge of the recovery.