Drnek: Marketed Right,

Oneonta Has Future As

A Telecommuting Hub

By LIBBY CUDMORE • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com

ONEONTA – Calling Oneonta a “jewel,” Mayor Gary Herzig said that the city’s Economic Development Task Force is looking to not only support the city’s downtown, but bring people here to settle.

“Our goal is to have every single business not only survive the crisis, but thrive afterwards,” he said during tonight’s Common Council meeting. “We’ve always known it was a jewel, but we think more people will soon be seeking that jewel.”

The meeting was streamed live on the city’s YouTube page.

Council member Mark Drnek, Eighth Ward, who chairs the committee, agreed. “We’re strategizing on how we can make Oneonta as attractive as we can be,” he said. “Folks are telecommuting and realizing that they can work from home, so they might want to make their home here. Companies don’t need everyone to occupy the same space, so we want to invite them to move here.”

He did note, however, that the task force would have to look at the housing concerns and work to address them. “We can’t bring people up here if we don’t have housing,” he said.

Judy Pangman, community development director, said that she is working with Trampoline, the city’s Glens Falls marketing agency, to get the images used in their signage to put together a brochure for the task force.

Though they’ve only met once, Drnek is already hearing feedback from the community. “People come up and they tell me they want to join, that they’ve got ideas they want to share,” he said.

But the larger a committee gets, he said, the harder it is to get anything done. So a moderated forum was created on SupportOneonta.com, where the public can share their ideas with the task force.

“We want ideas from all quarters,” he said.