local funds, with state funds to invest in workforce training,” Salinas said. “Really what you’re doing is you’re investing in a local asset. If a company packs up and leaves you have a trained workforce.” The challenge for Salinas and others has been a chronic shortage of affordable housing, including rental properties. The entrance of D.R. Horton, along with smaller builders, may turn the tide in the market, which has witnessed historically low housing starts since the Great Recession. “We’ve put this in our economic development area as well, which is housing developments,” said Salinas, adding that as many as four major projects, including the D.R. Horton development, in the works. “Some of the others are more on the multifamily side.” From an economic development perspective, Salinas’ focus isn’t so much on the next big box retailer, which drove plenty of activity across the state and country before the recession, but on job creation. “Today it has now transitioned into workforce,” Salinas said. “It’s all about workforce and talent. There is a distinction between the two. The companies now are going to areas that have the talent that they need.” Salinas said two of the key factors in driving development here is quality of life and
Salinas said the expansion of the Guadalupe River Trail to Schreiner University is an example of a quality of place project that will provide greater connectivity to the city’s vital recreational assets and its downtown. quality of place. They sound similar but they are unique in their definition. “Today it’s not quality of life but quality of place,” Salinas said. “So, quality of life is the different amenities that you have — the river, places people can go. Kerrville is a perfect example of where we can build a quality of place. There are things like the river trail. The river trail is now connecting all of these quality of life amenities. It’s connecting places where people live and to the downtown area. Now, it’s about mobility and that’s the quality of place.”
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Salinas said that a company recently visited Kerrville to determine if the city was suitable to open up shop, and they were immediately impressed with the city’s beauty and connectivity to the river. “That was a great example of how Kerrville is ahead of the curve when it comes to quality of place,” Salinas said. “A lot of communities now are trying to figure out how to go from quality of life to quality of place, which five years from now all of the companies are going to be looking for that.”
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