Trump seen as boon for business in the county
It’s the attention Miami-Dade was used to receiving, as a big dot on the map of America, chock-full of consulates and corporations.
But suddenly the spotlight has turned to little Palm Beach and keeps returning with each presidential weekend.
Though it has roughly half the population and a fraction the skyline of Miami or Fort Lauderdale, in Palm Beach County the presence of Donald Trump and his entourage and the high-powered heads of state who meet with them at Mar-a-Lago has economic development types basking in the glow.
“The story is about all the hype and buzz and halo that we’re still feeling, every single time President Trump is in town,” Kelly Smallridge, president and CEO of the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County, said Thursday, as Chinese President Xi Jinping was about to arrive, a month or so after a visit by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Since November, plenty are the complaints of traffic as Trump comes and goes, of the trampling of businesses at airfields restricted by the secret service and FAA, and of the prohibitive and often unreimbursed cost of security coverage by county deputies and city police.
But if it’s your job to catch the eye of corporate chieftains from the Northeast and Midwest, and you’ve had to spend your career shouting “Hey! Look at me! Over here!” then you’re feeling pretty good now.
“We cannot begin to buy this kind of national or international exposure,” Smallridge said.
Smallridge keeps tabs on the more than 25 billionaires who make Palm Beach their full- or part-time home, and on its hundreds of millionaires.
It’s not idle curiosity. She and her staff are perpetually encouraging the CEOs among them to bring their companies down here.
But the phone isn’t ringing off the hook and companies don’t turn on a dime, in any event, she said. “A decision to relocate is a lengthy decision and you can’t point to one reason.”
Still the phone is ringing. She got three calls last week from Northeast executives and t wo of the three said things like, “‘I talked to you a couple of years ago about moving my company there, and with the president there, it reminded me, ...’ ” she said.
The mere day-and-a-half of the Chinese visit wasn’t long enough for the Business Development Board to rope the 40 bus loads of visitors into tours of downtown real estate. But having Palm Beach County as the backdrop for diplomatic and trade talks could lead to increased interest from Chinese and other investors, she said.
The presence of so many members of the president’s leadership team also helps attract attention, Smallridge said. There’s Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, Housing Secretary Ben Carson, presidential adviser and Skybridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci and a host of other Palm Beach County residents in line for ambassadorships.
Hotels and restaurants already are benefiting from the attention.
“No doubt this is a great opportunity to put Palm Beach County and the Palm Beaches, and Palm Beach and West Palm Beach on the international map,” said Glenn Jergensen, executive director of the count y’s Tourist Development Council.