City pitches self as finance hub

They might as well have had the meeting on the dock. The water was sparkling, the sun, shining, the megayachts, rocking gently in the breeze. If you wanted to make an impression ...

The city and Business Development Board launched a campaign Friday to brand a large swath of downtown as The Flagler Financial District, a bid to lure hedge funds and other financial firms from the chilly Northeast. Along with the geographic designation comes a new website, flaglerfinancialdistrict.com, boasting of the city’s amenities and an ad campaign set to hit TriState trade publications from December through April.

At a noon meeting in the Lake Pavilion — as close as you can get to a waterfront gathering with air conditioning — Mayor Jeri Muoio was joined by Russell Marcus, chief of business and Tony Doris economic incentives for the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity; Emily Clifford, chairwoman of the county Business Development Board’s Financial Services Task Force, and Chris Roog, the mayor’s director of economic development.

The district lines stretch from the middle bridge to the north bridge, from Rosemary Avenue on the west to the waterfront.

The city and the BDB have been working on the plan for a couple of years, with the initial idea of getting New York execs who live parttime in Palm Beach to set up trading desks in downtown West Palm Beach, Clifford said.

West Palm Beach has little top-tier office space to offer, and a public outcry recently rebuffed efforts that would have allowed 30-story buildings next to the waterfront. But at least two major projects are in the works, and the city has more than $2.2 billion worth of recently completed or pending real-estate projects, with room for more downtown, she said.

Muoio said the city isn’t set on attracting many companies with major space requirements. More realistic in today’s corporate environment would be to attract financial firms that need 7,000 or 8,000 square feet. The idea is to bring high-paying jobs and add vitality to the city’s downtown, she said.

Marcus told the audience of a couple of dozen business leaders that the branding effort fits with Gov. Rick Scott’s efforts to add Florida jobs, particularly as Northern states consider tax increases. The Department of Economic Opportunity hopes other Florida cities will emulate the effort, he said.