Port Authority Discusses Local Economy

ZANESVILLE, Oh – The Zanesville-Muskingum County Port Authority held a meeting Wednesday.

They discussed a variety of issues impacting the community & local economy.

The meeting addressed the post-pandemic environment and its impacts on the local economy and workforce.

ZMCPA Executive Director Matt Abbott says they’re seeing a lot of improvements despite COVID impacts.

“We’re seeing low unemployment rates, but the numbers that we continue to see trickling into our community are good and positive as far as a workforce re-entry back in this post-Covid world that we live in,” Abbott told us.

Their business retention and expansion program was another topic up for discussion. 

Abbott went more in depth with how they help local businesses.

“We are pretty aggressive in getting out and talking and working with existing businesses and their expansion plans. Really, our organization acts as a gap filler. A bridge between the public sector and the private sector when investments are being made or massive hiring is happening within a facility. We do have programs that can assist those companies, whether it be incentives or grants or loans, we’ve got a lot of different avenues that we have to offer,” he said.

Abbott says they are continuously striving to address the needs of the private and public sector to help them succeed and be able to create new jobs within the community.