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​We’d like to recognize the Menifee VFW Post 1956  for becoming a Topaz annual sponsor. We appreciate their continued support of the EDC and the region. Our annual sponsors help support our site visits, FAM tours, and more. If you’d like to learn more about becoming a sponsor, please email or call Connie at cstopher@edcswca.com or 951-557-8040.

​We had a very productive September board meeting. Members collaborated in groups to brainstorm the mission and vision of the organization. Thank you to everyone who came and participated. We are so excited to move forward together and the organization's future.​

​This month, we hosted a site two visits for a Taiwanese clean energy company called “Project Sun.” The site visits were a great success, and we received very positive feedback from the company. We want to thank all our partners for making it all happen.

The company was so impressed by the support they’ve received and their visit to the region that they invited Connie to Taiwan. Connie will be flying to Taiwan in November to meet and speak with other companies interested in doing business in the US. This is a great honor and an opportunity to attract more foreign direct investment into the region.

​Our Executive Director, Connie Stopher, CEcD, attended the International Economic Development Council's Annual Conference in Dallas. Connie represented the region as a guest speaker at the event.

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​We hosted our first TechSouthwest meeting back from our summer break. We had an exciting meeting discussing our upcoming Manufacturing Idea Exchange. We invite all our manufacturing and education partners to participate in this event on October 12th. Registration is open. Our next TechSouthwest meeting will be held on October 10th at 3:30 at the Temecula Valley Entrepreneur Exchange (TVE2) Building.

​We wrapped up the month by attending the City of Wildomar’s State of the City on September 28th. It was great to hear Mayor Joseph Morabito's address about all the exciting things going on in the City of Wildomar.

​​On October 12th, we will partner with the City of Menifee for our third Mayor’s Idea Exchange of the year. This month's idea exchange will focus on creating a student-to-manufacturing internship pipeline in the region. Registration is open for the event. Please reach out to Connie if you’d like to participate as a sponsor.

​We are looking forward to next month, where we will be attending the City of Menifee’s State of the City and birthday celebration at the new MSJC Stadium on October 19th.

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​We are continuing to prepare for our second annual regional FAM tour on November 6th-7th, . “FAM tours” are known as familiarization tours where we invite site selectors from across the country from the industries we are interested in and show them everything we have to offer in this region. Last year was a great success; we are using all the feedback to improve this year.

If you are interested in sponsoring this year's FAM Tour please contact Connie at cstopher@edcswca.com.

​​Our October board meeting will take place next Thursday, October 5th, at 9 a.m. Our guest presenter this month will be RCTC Deputy Executive Director Aaron Hake. He will be discussing relevant topics that impact the communities and businesses in the region, so I hope we will see you all there. If you are not a current member and would like to attend as a guest, please sign up here.

​​We had our first Board Meeting back since our July break. We had the honor of having both Vice Chancellor Rodolfo Torres and Associate Vice Chancellor Rosibel Ochoa from the University of California Riverside in attendance as guest speakers. Our partnership with UCR has been a tremendous help in our foreign business recruitment efforts. We look forward to partnering more with UCR in the future.

​This month, the EDC attended the Temecula State of the City, where we heard from the Mayor of Temecula, Zak Schwank, about all the exciting updates with the city.

​In September, we will host another site visit for a foreign company called “Project Sun.” We look forward to sharing everything our region offers with this company. This project is another connection our executive director, Connie Stopher CEcD, made at SelectUSA earlier this year in Washington D.C. Select USA proves time and time again to be a great tool in our foreign business recruitment. We can’t wait to attend SelectUSA again next year!

​In August, our marketing specialist, Leah, attended the International Economic Development Council’s Economic Development Marketing and Attraction Course on August 27th-28th. Leah will be sharing all about the course at the September board meeting.

​ After our summer hiatus, we are back with our monthly TECHSouthwest meetings. Our first meeting will be held on September 5th from 3:30- 4:30 p.m. at the Temecula Entrepreneur Exchange Building. We have many things to discuss at this next meeting, including our upcoming Manufacturing Idea Exchange event in partnership with the City of Menifee. 

Mayor's Advanced Manufacturing Idea Exchange

​Our next board meeting will be September 7th at the Temecula Entrepreneur Exchange Building at 9 a.m. This will be a working meeting to focus on topics we discussed at our board retreat in June. Please bring your ideas and collaborative spirit as we work to grow the EDC and strengthen the region together.
We also look forward to attending the Wildomar State of the City in September.

​We are working hard in preparation for our second annual regional FAM tour on November 6th-7th, which is very exciting. “FAM tours” are known as familiarization tours where we invite site selectors from across the country from the industries we are interested in and show them everything we have to offer in this region. Last year was a great success; we are using all the feedback to improve this year. If you are interested in sponsoring this year's FAM Tour please contact Connie at cstopher@edcswca.com.

EDC FAM TOUR 2022

This month we also hosted a site visit for “Project Polaris", which is an international manufacturing company interested in bringing their first U.S location to the region . This site visit came from a connection Connie made earlier this year at SelectUSA. The site visit went very well and we received a lot of positive feedback. We'd like to thank our many partners who helped make it a success. Connie will be providing a full update at the board meeting. We are excited about more site visits with foreign companies considering locating in the region in the upcoming months. ​ 

The next board meeting will be on August 3rd. We will be two guest speakers from the University of California, Riverside, Rodolfo Torres, Vice Chancellor for Research and Economic Development, and Rosibel Ochoa, Associate Vice Chancellor for Technology Partnerships. We are honored to welcome them both to our meeting this month. If you are interested in attending our August board meeting as a guest, please click here.

Our next TechSouthwest meeting will take place on September 5th at the Temecula Valley Entrepreneur Exchange Building at 3:30. If you want to join the group, sign up here. One of our focuses of the group moving forward will be the industry-centered idea exchanges that we host throughout the year in partnership with the City of Menifee. If you are interested in identifying the needs of local businesses and growing tech in our region, then TechSouthwest is where you need to be! If you have any questions regarding TechSouthwest, please get in touch with leahs@edcswca.com

Connie Stopher, CEcD
​Email: cstopher@edcswca.com
Office: 951-694-9800
Cell: 951-557-8040

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To kick off our June Newsletter, we would like to introduce our new member, the Lake Elsinore Unified School District! This month we also like to introduce our new board of directors. We want to thank these individuals for stepping up beyond their membership and committing to the EDC.
Platinum/City/County
1. Brad Neet, Southwest Healthcare-Term ending June 2026
2. Shaun Bowen, Brookfield Properties-Term ending June 2025
3. Armando Villa, City of Menifee-Term ending June 2024
4. Joseph Troya, Consolidated Contracting-Term ending June 2026
5. Aaron Adams, City of Temecula-Term ending June 2025
6. Jason Simpson, City of Lake Elsinore-Term ending June 2024
7. Rob Moran, Riverside County-Term ending June 2026
8. Dan York, City of Wildomar-Term ending June 2025
Gold Members
1. Matt Hyatt, Millipore Sigma-Term ending June 2026
2.  Ann Shaw, Abbott Vascular-Term ending June 2025
3. Heather Holmes, Pechanga Development Corp-Term ending June 2024
4. Jonathan Jean-Marie, Loma Lina University Medical Center-Term ending June 2026
Silver Members
1. Don Hitzeman, Reid & Hellyer-Term ending June 2025
2. Adam Eventov, SoCal Gas-Term ending June 2026
3. Roxanne Roundtree, Eastern Municipal Water District-Term ending June 2025
Bronze Members
1. Kari McFall, Hamel Companies/McFall Strategies -Term ending June 2024
2. Diane Strand, JDS Video and Media Productions- Term ending June 2026
3. Morris Myers, MSJC-Term ending June 2025
Non-Profit/In-Kind:
1. Kim Cousins, Lake Elsinore Chamber of Commerce-Term ending June 2024
2. Michael Cano, Menifee VFW Post 1956-Term ending June 2025

​We would also like to thank JDS Studio and Brookfield Properties for being Ruby-level sponsors and the Law Offices of Rosenstein and Associates for their Topaz-level sponsorships.

This month we would like to thank Terri Delhamer for her years of service to our organization as secretary. We want to introduce our new secretary, Kari McFall, from McFall Strategies and Hamel Contracting.

We attended the Temecula Valley Chamber of Commerce’s Economic Forecast at South Coast Winery this month. Our Executive Director, Connie Stopher, CEcD, was a panelist and shared all about the exciting things we have been up to at the EDC recently, including our work on recruiting our commuter workforce to local jobs.

We hosted our Board Retreat for our new board of directors this week at the Lake Elsinore Storm Stadium. Our board of directors dove into the bylaws and outlined clear objectives for our organization moving forward. Thank you to the Storm for hosting us!

​We are wrapping up the month from the City of Menifee. Today we partnered with the City of Menifee for the Mayor’s Advanced Manufacturing Idea Exchange on June 29th. We want to thank our expert panelists: Arun Sinha from Opto 22, John Slyne from MilliporeSigma, Peter Jackson from Chase Bank, and ­­­Paul Kirwan from the SBDC. Thank you to our event sponsors, Southwest Healthcare, Brookfield Properties, The Law Offices of Rosenstein and Associates, and JDS Studio.

Reminder there will be no board meeting for July, our next meeting will be August 3rd, and we will have a presentation from Vice Chancellor Rodolfo Torres and Associate Vice Chancellor Rosibel Ochoa from UCR. If you are interested in attending our next meeting as a guest, register here!

Despite not having a board meeting in July, that doesn’t mean we’re not still busy. We have a site visit from Project Stars in July, a project we met at SelectUSA. We are excited to share all about that and more in August.

Thank you to our platinum investors Brookfield Properties, Southwest Healthcare, and Consolidated Contracting!

​Contact Us
Connie Stopher, CEcD
Email: cstopher@edcswca.com
Office: 951-694-9800
Cell: 951-557-8040

It’s been a busy month at the EDC. We have so many exciting updates to share with everyone.
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First, we would like to introduce our new member, the Temecula Valley Unified School District, to the EDC. We started the month with our board meeting at MSJC’s Temecula Campus, where we listened to a presentation from Tim Dignan of the Temecula Valley Unified School District. We look forward to all the great things we can achieve for the students in our region.

​We also want to thank our current member Consolidated Contracting for upgrading their membership to become Platinum Investors of the EDC. By becoming Platinum Investors, it allows the EDC to attend more conferences to attract exciting business opportunities, and it allows us to host many beneficial events in our region.

​Next, we would like to recognize Southwest Healthcare for becoming a Sapphire-level sponsor of the EDC. We can't say thank you enough for your commitment, generosity, and support to our organization and region. 

​At the beginning of the month, our Executive Director, Connie Stopher CEcD, spent a week in Washington, D.C., for SelectUSA. Each year, this conference is held for developers to meet with international companies who want to enter the U.S. market. The trip was very successful. Within one week of the trip, we already had a site visit from one of the companies, and they were very impressed by our region. Other companies are also interested in visiting, so we are excited to host them in the upcoming months.

​This month we also hosted NAIOP Bus Tour. The sold-out bus tour took industrial brokers on a site visit to each city in our region to tour available spaces. We have heard great feedback and are looking forward to partnering again with NAIOP in the future.

​We are wrapping up the month in Las Vegas for ICSC. We hosted an event at Top Golf Las Vegas that allowed each city to invite its own guests to learn more about the region. The event was at full capacity, and we want to thank our City partners for attending and making it a great event!

Our next board meeting is June 1st. We will be having a presentation discussing the Highway 79 project. Just a reminder, if you would like to bring a guest to the meeting, please have them sign up here so we can have a name tag ready for them when they arrive. Link: https://www.edcswca.com/be-a-guest.html

​We have a lot going on in June as well. We will have our board of directors elections at our June Board Meeting. If you have any questions, please get in touch with Connie. At the end of June, we will have our board retreat and our Major’s Manufacturing Idea Exchange event with the City of Menifee.