Project

Grand Bay-Westfield (New Brunswick) Economic Growth Planning

The Town of Grand Bay-Westfield – a small community just northwest of Saint John, NB – retained EBP to develop an initial economic development plan.

The community of about 5,000 is largely residential in nature and has a legacy of being a cottage community for Saint John. The Town needed to enhance its ability to be economically self-sustaining and to develop sources of revenue to fund additional community services and resources.

There is no historic commercial center in the Town, and many businesses in town are home-based. The Grand Bay-Westfield community expressed a desire to also grow the population base and use this as a draw for additional retail development to serve a growing and thriving community. The Town also wished to identify the kinds of businesses that would best complement the vision of a flourishing suburban residential lifestyle.

Grand Bay-Westfield needs to enhance its overall capacity for growth. There are challenges to organizational bandwidth, utility infrastructure (water and sewer), and developable land under town control. The Town has access to some tax and incentive tools and wishes to understand how best to leverage these and other tactics in pursuit of economic growth.

EBP worked with Grand Bay-Westfield officials to enhance readiness for growth through developing institutional capacity and working with landowners to increase awareness of investor needs. EBP also worked with the Town to develop tools for supporting existing businesses and enhance the town's marketing profile.”