What Economic Development Really Looks Like with Sarah Hoefgen | Ep7

Awesome, well thanks for hanging out. Thanks for having me. Yeah, of course. Guys, welcome to the Killer Growth Podcast, I'm Sam McVeigh. Today I've got Sarah, and Sarah I'm going to have you pronounce your last name. Hefkin. Hefkin, exactly how I would have said it the first time. I actually say Hofkin a lot behind your back. I used to, prior to marrying into it. You used to say Hofkin? Honestly, I didn't know how to say his name, so I think it was more Hofgin. We get a lot of Hofgin. Yeah, that makes sense. Do you really know, is it Hefkin? Are you for sure now? I think. Yeah, I think so. Does he really know? No. Perfect. Kneeled was easier, that was my maiden name. Say that again? Kneeled. Oh, okay. Like field, but kneeled. Was it spelled like that? Yeah, but everybody spelled it wrong, but easier to say. How do you spell kneeled? N-I-E-L-D, but people would do N-E-I. Yeah, that's what I would do. That's not how you spell field. I would misspell field, most likely. I live on spell correct. Then you definitely can't spell Hefkin. No. Yeah, I can. It's H-O-E, it's not in front of me, everyone. I did not get last in every spelling bee that I was in. Great. Well, thanks for hanging out. Purpose of this is to go deep. There might be a little bit of crying, so don't. If you can get me to cry, good luck. I'm not a crier. Challenge accepted. It's a challenge, yeah. No, we'll start easy. Let's start with your story. Let's start college to what got you to Eldredo Inc. College, okay. You don't want me to start from the beginning? No, I want to start college. I know it's wild. I know you were wild before that. I was from the UK. Oh, that's right. Okay. I don't like starting before that for the sake of time, but you should. So I was born in the UK. Because I've never had an immigrant on the show. So I was actually born in Chester, England, and my dad made sure to drive my mom over the border so that I wasn't Welsh, I was English. I have one sister, and my dad is in aviation. So he drove over the border just to be able to say that. We were in the English hospital, not the Welsh hospital. Okay. Yes. Wild. How did your dad get involved? He took a job with Raytheon in the late 90s. So it was the second British invasion, is what I call it. There was about 100 families. We all came over 1997. So that was pretty crazy to switch countries in second grade. How old were you? Second grade. Yeah. I was almost eight. Okay. And then fast forward, so I went to Andover High School, and then I went to Wichita State. I was a stalker and graduated there. Then I started out at the Augusta Chamber of Commerce. So I live just on the edge of Augusta, and they were looking for a new director, and it was a good time to do community events and whatnot. My kids were little, so I really enjoyed that. Got to know Linda Jolly, who was my predecessor at Eldorado Inc., and she called me a few times and said, Sarah, I really would like to retire one day. Would you be interested? And I'm like, no, I'm comfortable. I'm fine. I like what I'm doing. And she's like, no, really. You need to come over here, and you need to see what we're doing. Sounds like Linda. The rest is history. Here I am, and Linda finally retired. How many years were you at the chamber in Augusta? I think I was there about six or seven years. And what was your degree in leading up to that? I had a dual major, business administration and management, and a minor in finance. Oh, okay. Cool. And then the draw to chamber was a combination of you liked the event side of it, and for personal, like raising a family, it was a good... So at the time, I think my daughter was maybe six months old. So I was still just at home with her. And my husband's work partner was like, hey, there's this job open, and you need to go do it. You'd be really good at it. And if anybody knows Angie Johnston, you just kind of do whatever she tells you to go do, and it usually works out. I don't know her, but she sounds like a force. Here I am. She is. Yes. That's awesome. You should have her on the podcast. She'd be great to interview. Okay. Got it. So let's go into Eldorado Inc. You came over there. Eldorado Inc. is a economic development partner of the city of Eldorado in Kansas. Yes. And let's start with this. When someone asks you what you do, what's the simplest, most accurate answer? Sure. So it's promoting investment in Eldorado to try and grow our economy here, to put it pretty simply. Describe Eldorado Inc., how it works. How does an economic development partner with a city function? Is it part of the city? Is it its own thing? So we're a public-private partnership, which means we do have some city funding, but we also have investors. And so it kind of blends together the business needs and the city needs. And then we're not a city department, so you can avoid a little bit of the red tape of things you can say or cannot say because I'm not technically a city employee. Gotcha. So public-private, I've never heard that before. Yes. That is on the website. I saw that on the website, public-private partnership. Is there a certain amount of funding you have to raise to secure a certain amount of public funding, like private funding to raise public or public set, and then private is what it is? So we have an agreement with the city for a certain amount of dollars per year, and then we have another additional agreement that whatever we raise in membership, investor dollars, the city will match that. And there is a cap of one mil. Gotcha. So that part's a little more flexible. I don't know what that means. One mil? Yeah. In your context. It's what one mil will generate in tax dollars. So it changes year to year based on the city's valuation. Gotcha. So I'm not sure what one mil is going to be valued at for 2026, but... Okay. That's the most you can draw from the city. In the match dollars. In the match dollars up to one mil. Great. Yes. Tyler, would you like us to pause? Would that be helpful? It's on the fritz. Guys, we have a camera. Is AI inside that camera? I think AI might have taken over one of our cameras. Wow. It's just not happy. I am. I'm very white. I shock. Shocking. But I am white. The white balance just went great. I'm glowing. Evervescent. Yeah. Evervescent. That's all right. We'll stay on this wide view while he figures that out. Great. So, yeah, you talked about those lanes. So what are those? Describe those lanes. So your public-private partnership. Yeah. You do have independence from the city. But you're also tied to the city with part of the funding. What does that relationship look like between you and the city? So we're hand-in-hand with the city. City manager. City engineer. I can only sell what we can offer as a city. So if I can't promise all the incentives or all the land deals because ultimately it's up to the city to make, I can't promise all the incentives or all the land deals because ultimately it's up to the city to make. Those decisions, but I can recommend what I think would be a comfortable fit for the city. That makes sense. And then meeting with the city manager and staying in close communication on projects or potentials or things like that. Yeah. So you're finding opportunities. Is your responsibility to bring them to the city? They identify if it's a good fit. Ultimately, does it go through the traditional methods like city commission has to vote on it? Is there anything that can just happen because it happens and it goes straight to the city manager, city engineer, or do these kinds of deals always go through the voted positions of commissioners, mayor? So they don't have to. A good example is the project we just landed, which is Amazona, which is from Germany. They filled a vacant building for us and they didn't ask for any incentives. So nothing to do with that project ever went before the city. If they would have asked me those questions and wanted those things, we would have, but they're just leasing the facility. So. That makes sense. So it wasn't an ask there. What, what would incentives look like if you have an opportunity to bring economic development, what kind of incentives would someone be looking for that you would have to take to the city? Sure. So it depends the scale of the business. So we can do industrial revenue bonds, which gives them favorable financing terms, basically. For their project. And it also gives them an exemption on their sales tax on construction materials. So that's kind of the big one, but most cities offer that. And so they're expecting that if they're going to do a new build, they also are looking at a property tax exemption. So we have different parameters for how much of your capital expenditure you're going to bring to the community, your wage level and the number of jobs you're going to bring. And that kind of matrix tells us how much of a percentage you'll get abated from your taxes. And it can go up to a hundred percent. If it was a billion dollar project. Gotcha. Yes. What's the longest time period for something that large? I think the longest we've done is 20 years, 20 years. It's a long time. Yeah. So I think BG products have 20 years. And that would only be on the property tax side. Right. Specifically. Okay. So new, just curious. So from an economic development perspective, when an enterprise or large, we got BG products and Eldorado for example, right? That produced how many jobs? I think they're at 150 or so. 150 jobs. What, what other intangibles are you looking at or things that you can actually measure that have a direct impact if you were to give them 20 years off of where the city would see income? Sure. So there's, there's a cost benefit analysis that goes into every incentive. And we typically use Wichita state for those before, but they'll tell you if they're going to invest this much money of this many employees, but you're going to give them this estimated amount of dollars over the course of 20 years, is it a good deal or not for the city? And if it's, you know, it gives you a number that's one point something. And if it's one point plus, then it's a benefit to the city, even with the incentives you're going to give them. Because if they're doing a new build, your tax revenue right now is low. So you can continue to get the low amount where you can get this investment. The property tax rate will go way up. You won't see it for 20 years, but then maybe either paying 1000 a year. Now you'll get 200,000 a year. So essentially it's like a scoring metric, like rating something. Yes. Yes. Like a credit score. Yes. Kind of. It's probably a bad example. It gets really technical. That's why we have Wichita state do that. That's cool. What department at the university does that? They just rebranded their name that I can't remember it. The center for economic development, business research. Gotcha. I think that's right. Interesting. I believe you. I believe you. Fact check, drop it in the comments. Is this real or not? CEDBR. That's right. Yes. What is one thing you wish the average resident like in our town understood about what Eldorado Inc. Is. We've talked about this before in the past. When I started a business in this town, I did not know what Inc. Was. I did not know who Linda Jolly was. Right. What is something you wish everyone in your area of services understood about Eldorado Inc. I think that we're always working behind the scenes to make things happen in Eldorado. And you may not always see what we're working on or hear about what we're working on. We're trying to get better about sharing our story with the city commission and the greater citizenry. But that without us, there would be organic growth, you know, sure, but there wouldn't be any big growth. I don't think if you don't have an acting economic developer, someone with a huge company, isn't just going to land and decide to choose this community. They haven't heard of. We're not trying to be secret. We're not trying to hide anything. We'll be as transparent as we can be, but we sign a lot of NDAs on a lot of projects and. You won't win a project if you share about it a little too soon. So. Makes sense. I feel like most communities, even in Wichita, people have a pretty good understanding of what a chamber is. What a, you know, a main street organization does, but the economic development piece of it or greater Wichita partnership, I think is what it's called. I have an office in Wichita and I talk to people. I have no idea what that is as well. Right? what is it actually doing? There's all these people there. What are they? What are they up to? Can you talk about what a. Give me an example of a pretty high end experience. Said organization puts in a, like from A to Z, like, where does it start? What's the first point of contact you get all the way to the last point of contact you get before you get it or you don't. A high end experience with Eldorado Inc. Yeah. Start to finish. Okay. Well, I'll give you an example of a project that is currently in the works. So it starts with. An email that comes from the Kansas Department of Commerce and it's gives you enough project detail to respond, but it doesn't tell you who it is. Usually a really quick timeline. And then you have to fill out this Excel spreadsheet that can go from anywhere. 20 questions. I've seen 800 questions. Jeez. And you have to decide when you get that. Okay. What are the parameters of this project? How many acres do they need? All the things. And then you have to know your sites. I mean, that's Eco Depot one on one. You have to know your size. Available industrial land. Yeah. Yes. And so you say this site could work for this project. I'm going to submit all the things I know about this site, fill out that form, send it back. And then sometimes you hear back. Sometimes you hear nothing. Sometimes you hear back a year later. You never know. And so they're, they're disguised via the state. So the state knows who they are. Not necessarily. Oh, really? So it's usually a site consultant that reaches out. Third party goes to the state. So if I'm big company, XYZ, I reach out to a site consultant and say, I need a facility that's going to be half a million square feet. I'm going to invest this much money and I'm going to have a thousand employees find me the best place to put this. And they'll narrow it down first by state. So Kansas, we've been doing a really good job on selling ourselves that Kansas is the place for your investment, all of that sort of stuff. So we're usually on the list of let's narrow it down. Let's narrow it down. So once it gets to that point, our business development people at the state level get this project and they either send it out statewide or they send it out based on the parameters of the project. So some, maybe you have to be in a metro area and we usually can be on that cusp. We're kind of surrounding, which surrounding area anyway, but it depends. And so then that project comes to my desk. I fill all the information out, send all the info back. And sometimes you get a site visit and so they'll give you maybe a week's notice on a site visit and they want to see the site. They want, I think I had about 15 presenters. So you have to coordinate. So this one just happened, which is great. Last month. Perfect timing. Yeah. So you have to get not only the city engineering, electricity, natural gas workforce, butler community college, Wichita tech, um, environmental specialists. I mean, the list just keeps going and we had them for, we had them from like eight to five that day. Full day. So they flew in how many people? There was three consultants, three consultants. And so none of them are actually at the entity. They're still the third party. They're a consultant group. Gotcha. So that's how you fly out and vet the different potential locations. So. Well, that's cool. You have to coordinate all those people. Can you come at nine 15, nine 30, nine 45, 10 o'clock. I mean, it was to every 15 minutes really. And where do you do all these meetings at? So good question. It depends. Um, I did this last one at gravity works architecture, a really cool basement. And I thought that would be kind of a good. Spot to sell Eldorado rather than bring them into my office. Um, and Vince and McLaren are great hosts and hostesses. And so they provided coffee and all the thoughtful hostess things for me. So it helps events is involved on the board. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. That's a great spot. Right. Yeah, for sure. Wow. So eight to five 15 from energy to local players, do you have the stakeholders in the land opportunities as well involved? Are you, or do you represent them? Like there's land that's not, you know, there's land or industrial potential that you don't own or the city doesn't own. So it, it depends. Um, some of them weren't in state. And so we had them on a team's call for their portion of it. The other, uh, met us at their site. Okay. And we brought a ATV vehicle. We had a Dave Sundgren was nice enough to bring a vehicle out for us. So we can get out on the property. So then right before it got dark out, it was like five 30. So they physically will go to the land. I mean, there's nothing out there. Yes. It's just oil, wells, trees, and grass. Yeah. We'll just look at it. Yep. They want to know that whatever you just described, they have kind of a picture in their mind of what you can offer. Do all the pieces fit. And then let's go actually look at the site. Interesting. Then they leave and, and then you wait it's hurry up and wait. So yeah, you never know. Do you get a no, even sometimes? No. Really? Which can be really difficult. Yeah. That's annoying. But do you know that that's gone some direction or move forward? So even whenever I know what type of project it is. So even if I heard an announcement of X project, I could be like, maybe that was the project, but I wouldn't know. I feel like that'd be hard though. If someone else put in a request and you did the same thing for another third party, the same location. And then you're like, but yeah, I just had someone else look at this. Like, so we submit the same sites over and over and it's first mover advantage, you know? So, so then if they reach out, we've decided on your site, then it's just simply a, yeah, we've already settled with someone else. Yeah. That's interesting. All right. Let's talk about our water advantage. I love to talk about water. Let's do it. So let's, let's, let's make it really easy first. Okay. Let's talk about Eldorado's and I want to talk a little bit about when you're an economic development, obviously you have to find a unique value proposition, especially if you're going after big industry. I'm assuming you've got to have some, something that's unique for them to pick Eldorado. It's not just because we just have land. There's, there's other aspects to it. So water is a big advantage to us. Take, take us from square one. Why is water an advantage? Why do we have so much water? Sure. So back, I want to say it was 1950s. Eldorado lake was built and the city of Eldorado negotiated the water rights in the lake, which is unusual for a municipality to own the water rights in their reservoir. Typically the core of engineers just owns all of it. Okay. And they control, um, when it's released or, you know, all those things when it floods and things, they still control all that. I'm assuming we own storage capacity in the lake. Okay. That makes any sense. So we own from the, a certain depth, like from the top down or it doesn't really matter where it's at. The top. I don't know how many feet at the top is reserved for recreation. Okay. However that works, you know, so you can still boat and use it for those reasons, but then it's recreation. We own a, I want to say a big chunk of the metal. And then there's a little bit at the bottom that the core of engineers still owns. If the lake were to somehow get that low, which it's not going to. So, so with the lake. Okay. So here we go. Everybody's looking at the screen. So recreational ownership, then next level depth city. Yeah. And then at the bottom is core of engineers. If the lake shrinks. So it's obviously not an amount or a foot. Is it prorated based on like where the lake's actually at? Like, does the core of engineer, is that the only one that actually gains more? Like, so let's say the lake's higher. The normal, right. Does that affect? So I think anything over conservation level, they own. Got it. There's a, and I don't know what the, these are Scott record questions. Yeah. What I do know is that there was a water study done on the lake and in back-to-back record droughts, which I think was the fifties for us, that we can still provide an additional 10 million gallons a day out of the lake for industrial purposes. That doesn't include residential, other commercial. That's on top of everything else we're doing today. Yes. Plus additional housing growth, or it was, it's a very conservative number back-to-back droughts. So drought resilient supply or firm. That's what that means. So based on all the last century, I don't know what a drought study looks like. Is it over a hundred years? Is it over? So I think you could consider it like a hundred year drought, but it was the biggest drought Eldorado had ever seen is what it's all based on that. Yes. 10 million gallons a day. That seems like a lot additional. And the fact that it can be firm, that if you're a company that needs 5 million gallons a day, we're going to commit to 5 million gallons a day. It's not going to be well, even in a drought in the summer, people are using too much water. We're not going to be able to do that. Like it's firm. If you want five, we can do five. When I talk to people about where we live, they're regularly confused. Even in Wichita, just 20 miles away, they have all kinds of restrictions. And I'm like, I run my sprinklers seven days a week and it's cheap. It is a huge advantage here having that much water. What kind of industries like immediately light up to we have 10 million gallons a day available? So food processing, chemicals, plastics, advanced manufacturing. Lately, it's been a lot of data center talk. Um, they need a lot of water for their cooling processes, things like that. Liquid bottling, you know, beverages. We've always rated really high on our water quality reports. We have like a, an award winning wastewater plant, which is like people be like, what does that even mean? You don't become an award winning wastewater plant easily guys. This is impressive. I think of that as the back end though. I don't think of that as like, like the drinking version. Is that both sides? So. Like the water's treated. It gets treated. At the same place. And then it gets treated again before it goes back into. And then the waste goes back to the same place too. Just in a different area. Again, these are Scott record questions. No, no waste. And that's where I'm like, okay, when I flushed my toilet, it goes to the wastewater plant, wastewater plant. But when it comes out of the lake to turn into drinking water. That's the water treatment plant. Thank you. There we go. Yeah. No, I'm like, I feel like if someone makes those up, we should make a call. That could be a bad deal. They're in that room for a reason. I'm sure they know what they're doing. If they want awards. Go city builder. I know enough to know we have 10 million gallons. Yeah. I mean, that's all you got to know. Yeah. That's interesting. And we don't even really have to talk about how to balance that because of that data and the drought history. There's not even like a concern. If we bring a big industry with him, what, what's a, what have you had come through that considered us regardless of our water advantage, like that has nothing to benefit them, but they've still considered us as a, as a location. Is there any industries that consider us for other reasons? Yeah. So our rail access is a big deal. There's not that many rail accessible sites left and we're dual served. We have a dual serve site, so you can get union Pacific and BNSF off the same site. So makes sense. That's a unique advantage on top of the water and then power we can get. I won't commit to any sort of megawatts on this, but we can have access to pretty good power. What's like, what are some questions that a site selector pretty quickly rules you out? Like, have you ever had someone come do a tour and they see something and they're like, yeah, this isn't going to work fairly quickly. Or you get that vibe from workforce to housing to like, is there any things that you've noticed in your time doing this? That I would say the one thing I've noticed is if they come from an area of the country that doesn't have oil production and they're like, what is this thing in the parking lot? This can't go together. This needs to be a flat. Just tell them it's like kids playing on it. It's like a teeter totter. Yeah. So we always drive any potential clients by BG products cause they actually have an oil rig on the property. Yeah. But that, that freaks people out. It can. Yeah. If they're from an area of the country that doesn't do that, they're like, you can't build on top of that. You know, they're going to be producing oil out of this for decades. Well, they will, but you can have the surface rights and you can build around them. So gotcha. That's where you go watch land, man. And it'll tell you all about, I hear that. That's great. I've not watched it yet. My husband just started watching it and I heard oil and I was like, I'll start listening. Yeah. Right. I could learn something from this. Um, that's interesting. So you're not building on it though. It's just the proximity. Right. Is it an access concern? I mean, they only take environmental. Yeah. So just like what, what it could be. Yes. Or what could happen. Or the, the risk associated with it. When we're like, it's not risky. You can cap some wells, they can build new wells in different places. Um, you can have a pad site still of a hundred acres if you want. And you're like driving by and it's that one time in 50 years that it's overflowing or exactly. Yes. They just aren't used. Yeah. That makes sense. I mean, I would, yeah. If I wasn't around it, I would assume that's got some environmental. That can't be, but it can. Yeah. Just ask BG. Yeah. They do it. Uh, what, what else, what other things are, can be a red flag for site selectors that you've learned about? Nothing. Nothing that I do. Okay. Well, no. Yeah. I mean, just more as a community aspect. Um, it really depends on the project. Um, if it's got a high workforce number, um, we're usually still in the running because we have, they like to use a one hour drive time or we do, because that touches Eureka almost to Hutch. Yeah. All of Wichita. Um, and it's 800,000 plus people. So. Interesting. And we have highly skilled workers in the area with all the aviation. And those skills are usually transferable because it's, you know, CNC machining or CAD work, or you can transfer those skills to a different industry. It doesn't have to be aviation. Yeah. Uh, how important do you think that presentation is? Which I think this is cool for people that don't know what economic developers do. Uh, just that day, that eight to five days. Fascinating. Wow. That was loud. It's a lot of noises today on the truck route. This podcast is up against a wall. It's against a truck route. My office is very loud. Yeah. Just down the road. Yeah. You're right over there. Um, so on that day of presentation, how much do you think that influences the deal? Like if you gave it a weight, I would say pretty influential. Um, now, you know, at the end of the day, I'm a mom and I like to host events and I like, you know, to do all those sorts of things. So prior to them ever coming to town, I sent an email and said, Hey, can you let me know if you have any dietary concerns or any beverage of choice? Because I personally have a beverage of choice. It's diet Coke. And so if I was on a site visit somewhere new, I'd be like, I need a lot of diet Coke on hand. And these guys emailed back like, yeah, iced tea would be like, thanks so much for asking. Like, I don't drink iced tea. I'm British. We drink hot tea. So I would never even think to really bring iced tea. Right. And they came to town and they were like, you know, I've been doing this for a long time and no one has ever asked me if I had a drink of choice. Thanks so much for asking. And that was like hospitality that we've never even seen before. I think those sorts of things get you remembered even if that's not the project maybe for you, but they'll remember they had a good site visit with you. And the next project they would be like, we'd go back to El Dorado. Well, it makes sense. If their job is representing industry, looking for location, you want them to be your best friend, right? Like that's ultimately who you are representing the most. Like that's who you want to remember you. They have the most influence. I would think if their job is to find the location on behalf of that business, that makes a lot of sense. I go to a lot of sites, electric conferences or events or dinners, all the things. And it's always, you know, you get like a five second, tell them who you are and where you're from. And I'm always just like, I'm Sarah Hopkins and I'm from El Dorado. We have 10 million gallons a day of water. If you remember anything, El Dorado has water, El Dorado water. And then they will email me and be like, Hey, so you have water, right? Tell me what that means. How much are you serious? Um, because everybody's like, we're the best place to live, work and play. You know, it's like, yeah, you've got to have something else. Oh, yeah. Memorable. So if somebody comes across their desk that needs a ton of water, they're calling me to say, you need to submit on this one. So I have something good to show the client that I have an option for them. Yeah. Well, and you know, water, uh, Jeremy, who had on this podcast earlier talks about water is the new gold, you know, there's, there's a, yeah, everybody's trying to find water and everyone's trying to find power. So great transition to the next question. Um, that, that is a, uh, I'm not sure if you're aware, uh, just talking to someone in the Wichita area where they were running into some opportunities where the power side didn't make sense. Uh, how can we address, uh, an opportunity that everything fits the bill, but power, uh, how, how can we address that? Or how can you even influence that as an economic developer? So staying close to Evergy and they work with us one-on-one all the time, which is our energy provider here in Kansas, having them know what sites we have available, where they are. So they know how close it is to their substations. And then we've also been working with the Evergy teams that work on their future capital investment as a, why they should invest in Eldorado before the project even is here so that we can have the power to serve. So, so are you able to leverage prospects, site visits, like all these stories, are you able to leverage those with, with players, partners, uh, from the power side to workforce side? Like these are the type of conversations we're having. Yes. We need plans. Yes. Okay. And then, so they will put in some preemptive thought like premeditated to an extent. I'm sure it's not, they're just going to start doing it, but at least they can give you some rough estimates of how much power you could have by 2030. Yes. And the timelines have started to come down a little bit. There was a time right after COVID when it would be like, yeah, you can have that in like eight years, six years, four years. And now we're seeing two to three years, which for a project to go from start to finish, it's going to be two or three years anyway. So, um, we're starting to get more favorable answers. And then also the two natural gas plants that are being built. Um, one's just north of us in Reno County and one just South and Sumner County. It's the first, or it's, I don't know how long it's been since they built more natural gas plants, but it's been a long time. And those will provide like 700 megawatts each to the system. And they're both in South central Kansas. I don't know what that means. 700 megawatts. Like, so I should have looked this up beforehand, but I don't know how much an average home uses in a year. Um, but this would be like a data center that's running 24 seven. They could use a hundred megawatts or more. Okay. A home is probably less than one megawatt, right? Like a megawatt powers the neighborhood. Yeah. I don't know exactly. I should have looked that up before this, but I don't know. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Hairdryers would kill a lot. So I'm thinking of this and like, right. There you go. Yeah. That's good. Yeah. A thousand kilobytes and a megabyte thousand megabytes and a gigabyte. I think of it from memory storage. There's a word to describe it. It's something ton. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. Talk about other forms of energy you see happening in the future in the state of Kansas. So there was an announcement recently that Terra power has made an agreement with Evergy or electric provider to work on looking where they could put a nuclear facility in Kansas. So it's a small scale nuclear reactor. It's not a three mile Island or a Chernobyl, but that's kind of what people jump to when you hear nuclear power. We do actually already have a nuclear power plant in Kansas that people may not know up in, I think it's cloud County. I don't know where that's at north, like in between Kansas city and Topeka ish. Oh, okay. Um, but these facilities could generate 500 megawatts and you can, they ramp up and down quickly. Um, whereas a natural gas takes a long time when you flip the switch, it's not immediate power. Gotcha. But a nuclear facility is, is that fusion? Is that what these power plants are? The nuclear that they're talking about coming to. So I know enough to be dangerous, but I don't know anything. Heating, they use molten sodium in the process and molten sodium has a way higher boiling point than water. Okay. So they're not really at risk of the same issues that an old nuclear plant would have. Yeah. And they separate, they have a energy Island where the energy, the steam transfer goes over to here and it turns the turbines and creates the power, the nuclear reaction happens separately over here. So it's a lot safer. Do they use a lot of water? I don't know their water usage. We've been trying to find out. Um, I was at an event with their business development guy actually recently. Um, and I think he's out of Seattle, but I'm going to try and get him to come to El Dorado because it's going to go somewhere in Kansas. We may not have a choice on where it goes, so we may as well be as informed and, and you know, know what the potential is. And it seems like it's happening everywhere. There was a, I can't remember where else I saw one went up, but, uh, as far as like the amount of what it takes to run it, the efficiencies, the carbon outputs, like nothing. Yeah. Parsons. They have, did you just see the announcement? That's right. Yes. Parsons. That's what it was. Yeah. This is going a mile underground. So the reaction happens a mile underground. Um, it's, uh, so it's a different company though. It's a different company. It's deep. You just mentioned, I think that's who it is. So their process is different and it's not as many megawatts. I think it's like 15 for each. Well, for lack of a better, you know, the one drill down for the reaction I think is 15 megawatts. Mile underground is pretty far. I know. So I know the guy. So is it just like pipes mile down there? Is there actual tanks? Listen, I'm just trying to get those answers. Right. I reached out to my Parsons contact and said, Hey, tell me more. Yeah. I just want to see it. I hope they do a time-lapse. Yeah, but it's in their industrial park down there. So it will serve, it will go to the grid. You know, just how any of this power would just go to the grid, not for a certain project, but it'll be great for their industrial park to serve, um, their growth. So the, the one that we, we heard actually presented, uh, just a month ago, it sounds like it does provide some pretty great jobs as well. Uh, very high paying jobs. Yeah. Yeah. Like average six figure income, 80 to under jobs. I think. Yeah. But I saw some of these plants are producing, which is great. And there's, I think 1500 construction jobs to over the construction takes. How long does it take to build one? Um, I think the holdup is usually the regulations and you have to get, um, from the nuclear commission. I don't know what their NRC, I think they are. Um, so their first facility is going to be in Wyoming. Okay. I think they started, they announced in 2024, they were going to choose, and I can never say the city's name, right. But it's Kermammer. I think it's a very strange Kermammer in Wyoming. So they're planning to be online in like 2030. Oh, 2031. So it takes a long time. Yeah. And they're building that in an old coal mine. So it's kind of a cool reuse of that property. So. Still perplexed that they can. New wave power. Yeah. Well, and we need it. I mean, especially with AI and data centers it's. Yeah. Need more and need less carbon output. Yes. Uh, so back to, uh, your relationship with a city, um, specifically the civilian side, uh, in small business owners. Why should, uh, like a business owner that's listening to this podcast? Why should a business owner connect with an economic development group in their city or town? Um, why should they make that connection? What could be potential benefits? Um. Sure. So I think it's important to know what's going on in town and what's available incentive grant wise. Um, and if you don't already know me, uh, Sam, you can share my contact information, but. I don't have time to necessarily go into every business and introduce myself. I'd like to, but time doesn't allow. Is this. Should I move her mic up? By the way, it's drooping. Is it starting to fall? Yeah. You're doing great. It's not you. It's the mic. You probably don't want it. It's fine. That'll sound better. Um, but there's a lot of different moving parts in economic development. I hear of lots of different grants or opportunities, or if you have a struggle, you have a pain point and all you're doing is complaining about it. Help me help you figure out a solution to that problem. Um, and kind of be that liaison between the city as well. We've done that for multiple small businesses as well. Like, Hey, I need help with this, but I don't necessarily just want to go to the city. Can we work on this? And then when I'm ready, we can make the ask of the city or this incentive or, or whatnot. So, yeah. So anybody looking to expand should be in the know of what the opportunities are. Yeah. Um, people starting out like for the first time. Yeah. So I'm involved with the chambers network, Kansas program, which is kind of gap financing for startups or growing businesses. Doesn't have to be a startup, but usually the chamber kind of receives those and then get some with me like, okay, do you have a business plan? Do you have a financial plan is, you know, those sorts of things. So, yeah, yeah. From startup to billion dollar business. Um, what I do can relate really to any, any size business. Um, I would assume it'd be a lot of value. I know it's been valuable to me just being, being on the board with Eldredo Inc, understanding, uh, what's coming when it does come, understanding what that impact is because economic development benefits everyone. It benefits the roofer. It benefits the home builder. Yes. Uh, cleaning company. I mean, whatever you, if you provide services in a community and you add, 100 plus jobs to a community, everything benefits. Yes. And so I think every small business really wants that to happen, right? Ultimately, obviously if a competitor comes in, there could be other view vantage points, I guess, if something came in to compete with you, but most likely with what you're dealing with, um, they're bringing in some process that's, uh, yeah, creating goods that are, that are going to be distributed. Yes. Right. On the larger scale. And if they're new to town, the only person they know and trust is sometimes just me. And so there'll be like, for example, I had a call on who could I get to hang up this sign for me? Who could I order a sign from? Who do you trust? That's a builder. Who do you trust to clean? Yeah. Um, and it's usually whoever's a member of Inc. I think of first, obviously, but then sometimes it's like, well, who do you trust? Who do you trust to clean? Yeah. Um, but then sometimes it's the chamber list. Okay. I don't have somebody that does this. Do you know somebody that does this? Yeah. Um, yeah. I didn't even think about the referral aspect of if you're a service provider in that area or a lot of contractors, like all. Yeah. Yeah. All the things really. Yeah. And the subcontractor benefit. One thing I've noticed over the years, a big part of, uh, the refinery success for our town is the subcontractors that have built up. So when you have big industry come to town, you, you have some subcontractors that become much larger suppliers. Yeah. You get all these suppliers, partners that come to the town, um, that need property, uh, need workforce to help take care of this facility. Cause they don't employ a hundred percent of everything in there, or you have a contractor from out of town, moved to town or set up a new location just to be next to this larger opportunity, which again, the nice thing is that drives up everything for everyone. Uh, that's been an angle we've used on recruitment as well is okay. Holly frontier. They're suppliers that are far away that you would like to be closer. We can try and go out and recruit them or BG. Um, Barton solvents is a client of BGs as well. And they actually, um, I was told this, I haven't actually seen it, but I'm pretty sure it's true. Maybe cut this part out, but there's a pipe in between the two buildings for chemicals to go from Barton to BG. It cuts out the logistics of moving chemicals, which sounds expensive to me to get it in a truck, unload it from a truck, the risk involved with that, that you're literally co-located and you can just pipe it over. Yeah. And the refinery was a key part of that as well, because they have a dedicated fire department that can treat chemical fires. So Barton solvents actually had a big fire in Valley center and everybody was like, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. They were looking to move and Eldorado was that choice because we could, we have that specialized department. No, that's good. Um, so talk, talk a little bit, I guess, go a little more depth about the partner side, the private partnership from the only two other economic development groups that I'm aware of also raise funding. And then they, they don't always have public funding, but most of the time there is some public funding. Um, what from, from a resident standpoint, business owner standpoint, what, why should they buy in? Why should my business buy in to investing in what you do, what Inc does, uh, for our city? What, why should there be buy-in? It's an investment in your community's future, I would say. And it helps us to get the reach out further. So we're always running in circles with the state and national and now international to sell Eldorado as the location for their next growth opportunity. And so if you're not in, you're not going to know about those opportunities and what's going on. And so, yeah, I would say, like you said earlier, economic growth is good for everyone, whether it's a Wendy's or a Barton solvents or Amazona that just relocated. So it's Amazon, not Amazon. Yes. I was given, uh, a lesson on that. So in German, the E sound is an, uh, sound. Gotcha. And the cool part about that story is that this is their first American location, right? Yes. They're not from around here. They're from Germany. Yes. They have a location in Canada. I believe they actually started in Brazil. Okay. Um, but they're kind of a unique agricultural equipment manufacturer in that they also pair software things with it. And I know enough to be dangerous on this as well. Um, economic developers know a lot about, you know, we know a little bit about a lot of things, um, but the cool thing about having them in Kansas is some of their, um, seed planting machines have wind control. So maybe farmers would wait to plant if it was a windy day because the seed might blow everywhere. When you're trying to, how does the equipment control the wind with opposite wind? You know? Oh, seriously. Counteract it. Yeah. Wow. That's farming. And they're actually working on like robotic farming equipment. Yeah. So, you know, they're like, we're not John Deere, but we also have green, but we're a different green. Gotcha. Yeah. Yeah. That's a cool strategy, but that's cool. What, what drew them here in the first place? Was it access the existing facility? I know they're leasing a location currently. Sure. So it all started. Uh, our Lieutenant governor went on a trade mission to Germany and they visited Amazon in Germany because they were on some list that said they were ready to expand. He visited in person. That means a lot to those sorts of companies. Um, and then they, I don't think they had a site selector because we knew pretty early on who it was, but they narrowed it down to a few different States that are into agriculture. You could probably guess who, and they visited, they came over and visited all those States. So we had a really good site visit with them. They enjoyed working with our team. And I think that was a key. Yeah. So I'm assuming then the Lieutenant governor, um, where, where did that referral come from? Like, obviously it, they checked out Kansas. Then the department of commerce. So there's, there's a lot of database things that will tell you, that will give you a list of companies who are showing signs that they're about to expand. And whatever voodoo happens, it gives you that list. It gives them what they call a G score. And this G score goes from one to five. If there are five, they've probably already pulled the trigger on expanding. So we look at the threes and fours, and I'm assuming, I don't actually know where the lead came from, but if I was guessing woman, that's where I would guess that it came out of some lead list like that. And when they were in Europe, they decided to add them to the list to visit. Cause you never know. And you have a relationship with the Lieutenant governor, right? You, you've met, you've collaborated. I think you just had a really cool meeting in Western Kansas. Iola. Yeah. Originally from Iola. So, I mean, it's pretty cool that he did that visit in person. Yeah. And then all of a sudden it ended up here. Full circle. Yeah. He actually called me out on it. They had a Christmas party at the governor's residence a couple weeks ago. And he was like, Sarah, Amazon, what's the cap X, what's the employees. And I was like, you know, I don't know the total numbers. Don't call me out on that. Yeah. They're just still just kind of getting in place. They're not even tariffs have been kind of a, yeah. An issue. They've got a few people there, but they're there. Yeah. They're making plans. Yes. Yeah. That's, I think that's really powerful on a local level. Anybody listening to this, that's what you're investing into with Eldorado Inc. You've got Sarah doing site visits with site selectors representing international companies. I think that's, that in itself is powerful and I don't think enough people understand that. And then you have, we have someone in our town that has a relationship with Lieutenant Governor, the State Department of Commerce that knows you by name, knows our town for what it adds, like what our value is and greater Wichita partnership, which has a big influence on what happens in the state as well. Yeah. And that's, that's what we're investing in with this. So yes, I think that's really powerful and appreciate you and everything does. It's a great job. It's something new. What is your favorite part about the job? Oh, meeting all this podcast. Is this the opportunity to have this conversation? Yeah, I would say I've always loved learning. So learning about all the different company types and like the wind controlled seating, I never would have thought about that. And there's other companies that we've got to do tours of. I got to go tour the Amazon facility, just blew my mind. Just blew my mind how organized and all that happens and the security level of that building was crazy. But just learning about all the different industries. And then I just really like to talk about Eldorado. So I talk about it all over the world every day. Yeah. Probably in my sleep, like you said. Yeah. Yeah. That's powerful in itself. What's the best way for people to get in touch with you if they want to ask questions or maybe even another economic developer loves what they're hearing they come across this. Sure. LinkedIn, email, Google me. It'll all pop up. It'll all pop up. Yeah. Great. And we'll drop that in the podcast description. All the things. Any final thoughts, statements you'd like to put out there? Thanks for having me. I had no idea what to expect and I really wish you would have given me the questions. I know, I know, but you did really get, there wasn't one you couldn't answer. Because I just talk about it all day anyway. Right. That's what I told you. I wasn't going to ask anything that was crazy, but no, we appreciate it. Thanks for the time. And I learned a lot and I talk to you all the time. Yeah. So this was a super helpful and we'll, we'll do it again when the next big thing happens. Sure. Yeah. You know where to find me. I do. Just down the truck route. I can throw a rock. It can get there. Okay. Thanks Sarah.