Rural Washington Economy Continues To Lag

According to the Association of Washington Business and state Representative Joel Kretz, the rural economy to not keeping up with the growth enjoyed in the I-5 corridor for the past two years.  As Kretz put it, there is very little to be excited about.  Kretz told the Washington Ag Network policies from both Olympia and Washington DC discourage growth outside of Western Washington.

‘You know, we’ve got a lot of policies and agencies and regulations that make it extremely hard when you’re outside the bottle of the big companies in Seattle.  We have not done a very good job of making a good business climate for any place other than the I-5 corridor.”

Kretz working with the AWB to encourage growth those portions of the state hammered by high unemployment rates. He said Washington’s economy is not one dimensional.

“The aerospace industry, we kept hearing how iconic that was in the Northwest.  Well, it is, but  we’ve got iconic industries around the state that we’ve done an extremely poor job or supporting them and making them healthy, and staying out of their way.”

Kretz said AWB plans to hold a rural economic development conference this summer, and lawmakers plan to create a rural caucus, which he says will help ensure the issues of rural Washington are addressed.

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