Over the past several months, the Town of Westford’s Economic Development Committee and other local business leaders have worked with Northeastern University’s Barry Bluestone to gauge the business climate in town.
The bad news: Bluestone thinks Westford completely wasted its money working with him. Why he thinks the town wasted its money is the good news, however.
According to the results of a recent Economic Development Self-Assessment Tool report conducted by Bluestone and the town, Westford earned high marks on six of the eight key factors synonymous with a healthy local business environment.
Better known as “EDSAT,” the 250 question survey was developed by Bluestone and others at Northeastern’s Dukakis Center for Urban & Regional Policy to help municipalities examine their strengths and weaknesses when it comes to developing business in town.
To date, Bluestone has helped 78 communities with conduct their own EDSAT analyses, and at the Westford Business Association’s recent annual meeting, he indicated that Westford ranked highest in that group.
Despite this, Bluestone still indicated that Westford does have room for improvement, most notably in regard to timeliness of the town’s permitting process.
A full copy of the report is available on the Economic Development Committee page on the town’s website.
An analysis of Westford’s EDSAT narrated by Bluestone is available at WestfordCAT’s Youtube page.
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