The most listened to, relevant organization in Annapolis,bar none.
Robert L. Ehrlich - Governor, State of Maryland

And the Winner Is... Criteria for Corporate Site Selection"
A Presentation made by Stephen A. Fragapane

Mr. Fragapane is President of PHH Relocation and Real Estate Service and Senior Vice President of PHH Corporation based in Hunt Valley, Maryland. The division of PHH Relocation and Real Estate Service provides geostrategic management consulting and relocation management services plus information and financial management services to businesses around the world. Mr. Fragapane has assisted the Maryland Chamber of Commerce with long-range economic development planning for the state of Maryland among other civic activities.

I'd like to share with you some examples of what the business community thinks it needs from the state of Maryland based on my experience in the relocation industry. PHH's services help business to be mobile. We see all the people issues associated with relocation and learn about both the decision-making process as well as the emotional aspects.

As a new Maryland resident, I see a fairly onerous tax on residential real estate and on personal income, and I begin to question: why would I want to move here as a corporate executive to work for a corporation doing business in Maryland? This raises issues about the cost of moving into a state like Maryland, and the difficulty CEOs face when trying to move executives into their organization.

One case in point was the decision by United Parcel Service to relocate its corporate headquarters. The main reason the CEO felt he had to leave Connecticut was that he couldn't persuade executives in his company to relocate to Connecticut any longer. Then, when he called the state of Connecticut to tell them that he was leaving - he felt it was his obligation since he had been there so long - their answer was, "We didn't know you were here." About 900 jobs and all the economic impact that creates left with him and his company.

Making Maryland a great place for business is critical to making Maryland a great place to live. Business should be viewed as a customer of the state with needs to be listened to and responded to through thoughtful programs that really make a difference. Taking the business customer for granted, ignoring their needs, will only result in job loss which shrinks the tax base and the ability of the state to meet all its public service requirements.

To understand the business customer a little better, first let's explore why the business customer is a mobile customer. CEOs today are less loyal to place and more loyal to being competitive than they've ever been before. Corporate decisions factoring in the global opportunities and shifting markets to the growing importance of labor availability, shrinking trade barriers and technological advances are substantial. The cost of living differences, the rising importance of quality of life, the aggressive business attraction activity by competing states, and the growth of service businesses are just a few of the issues that come to my mind that make the business customer a more mobile customer.

But in spite of these factors, the inertia of staying is still probably the most important one. It's the reason that business will look to its home roots first to find a solution. But when these issues are not addressed effectively they're compelled to look elsewhere.

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