When Gov. Pat McCrory tapped Sharon Decker as the new state secretary of commerce last month, several made much of her career with Duke Energy and time spent in Charlotte during the city’s boom years. “But what I learned to be commerce secretary, I learned in rural North Carolina,” Sec. Decker said last week during the N.C. Main Street Conference in Salisbury. She said the lessons that best prepared her to head the state department came while raising four children, running small businesses and restoring several historic downtown buildings in Rutherfordton.
Sec. Decker pledged a new emphasis on small business from Gov. McCrory’s administration. With a goal to bring a “more holistic approach to commerce and economic development,” Sec. Decker said she will use a community development model at the department that includes five tenets: arts, culture and tourism; equal access to health care for all; quality public education; economic development, including job and business recruitment and tax reform; and quality of life and environment.
In 2006, the last time N.C. Main Street held its annual conference in Salisbury, Sec. Decker and her husband, Bob, received an award for adaptive reuse of an old city firehouse, which they turned into an upscale bed and breakfast. Sec. Decker joked that while her husband was in Salisbury accepting the award, she was cooking breakfast and changing sheets for guests at the inn. She used the story as an example of the dedication and hard work required of small business owners and downtown entrepreneurs. The long hours, challenges of restoring and maintaining quirky old buildings and “sucking sound” of cash exiting bank accounts are experiences shared by people devoted to downtown revitalization, Sec. Decker said. “You have invested in the very heart of a community to try to make a difference and create a sense of place,” she said.
At a meeting of the Wilkes County Chamber last week, Sec. Decker said, “We can’t forget that as we try to grow this economy, we can’t sacrifice the quality of life in our communities.” She said that despite North Carolina’s urban centers like Charlotte and Raleigh and its large corporate headquarters, “we really are still a state that is made up of small towns like North Wilkesboro and Wilkesboro. Even towns the size of Boone are considered small towns by most standards.”
She said North Carolina is still dependent on small businesses, small manufacturers and agribusiness. “We are a state where hard work and hospitality are really a core of who we are and our ability to adapt has enabled North Carolina to compete globally on many levels.” Sec. Decker said the N.C. Dept. of Commerce is dedicated to increasing exports. “I’m interested in hearing from you about the products you have that you are ready and willing to export around the world. We think there is a lot at the state level that we can do to help you with that.”
Sec. Decker said the film industry is growing rapidly in the state, with an estimated $360 million spent by production companies in North Carolina last year that surpassed a record $220 million the year before and directly benefited many small businesses. It also created nearly 20,000 job opportunities.
She said tourism, which already provides about 40,000 jobs (including nearly 500 in Wilkes), is another huge area of opportunity for economic development. “Events like MerleFest. Wow, congratulations to you for what you’ve done to identify what you had to make it great.”