Life sciences and biotech have taken center stage of late in Marin, and there’s a new leader aiming to attract new business.
Steve Lockett, formerly an associate director in venture catalyst unit at the University of California, Davis, has taken the reins at the Marin Economic Forum from Robert Eyler, who will continue to serve as the forum’s chief economist.
Eyler, who was the forum’s founding CEO, stepped back into the role after Neil Stone stepped down in November 2011, after just six months on the job. The forum, a nonprofit created by a public-private partnership in 2010, is designed to foster local economic growth.
Hamilton Landing, the 410,000-square-foot office complex at the former Air Force base in Novato, was purchased Wednesday by Portland-based ScanlanKemperBard Companies.
Hamilton Landing, the 410,000-square-foot office complex at the former Air Force base in Novato, was purchased Wednesday by Portland-based ScanlanKemperBard Companies.
Marin’s population is growing at a faster pace than earlier in the decade and that may be directly linked to the strong economy and younger families coming to the county.
The county saw population growth of 0.2, 0.3 and 0.4 percent between 2010 and 2013. Between 2013 and 2014, the county’s population jumped 0.9 percent and last year the increase was a more modest 0.7 percent, but still more than what was seen earlier.
“It is the stronger economy that has allowed people to afford Marin,” said Robert Eyler, CEO of the Marin Economic Forum — a public-private partnership that works to enhance the county’s economic vitality. “There is not much new housing being built in Marin, but you may have a case where a single senior is moving to a retirement home and a family moving in with children.”
A decades-old San Rafael pawn shop has closed as part of what observers described as evolution in the industry.
Alan Hyman, owner of the 57-year-old Pawn Advantage at 846 Fourth St., sold his business to Robert Verhoeff, owner of Best Collateral. The latter company has eight stores in the Bay Area, including one in San Rafael, and has a forward-thinking business model, according to Marin Economic Forum head Robert Eyler.
With Pawn Advantage shuttered in Marin, it appears that Best Collateral is essentially the last pawn shop in the county. The Gold Drop in San Rafael buys gold but does not accept items for pawning, industry sources said, and Hyman and Verhoeff said they knew of no other pawnbrokers in Marin. A call to the Gold Drop was not returned.
Old-school pawn shops are taking a beating for many reasons, Eyler said.
Rob Eyler, CEO of the Marin Economic Forum and an economics professor at Sonoma State University, said, “At the current minimum-wage level, the two major options are to combine households or commute from a lower-rent area. We don’t have a great solution for it because we love the way markets work in almost every other way, but there are social costs.”
To afford a one-bedroom unit in Marin County, someone earning the California minimum wage of $9 per hour would have to work 140 hours per week, according to a report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
[L]eaders of the center believe it can be more of a cultural resource and are creating a new homegrown nonprofit, the Marin Cultural Association, to help raise revenue and contributions to help pay for improvements, repairs and programs.
The idea follows in the civic footsteps of the Marin Center Renaissance, which was formed to build new buildings and facilities on the Marin Center site. That ambitious plan ran out of steam, largely thanks to the financial hit to private and county funds during the recession.
A 2013 study prepared by the Marin Economic Forum concluded that by expanding the number of events staged at the Marin Center, revenue could dramatically increase not only for the county, but for surrounding businesses.
Increasing use of the center, especially for multi-day events, would dramatically increase that contribution to the local economy, the study concluded.
Marin County tallied the highest median income among all counties in California in 2013, according to new figures released last week by the state’s Franchise Tax Board. In 2013, the county’s median income was $57,224 for individual tax returns and $133,389 for joint returns.
Marin has led the state in this category as far back as the tax board’s public archive goes—since 1999—and the latest data is the highest median-income mark the county has enjoyed during that entire period. Median income is computed to give a sense of how much income a typical taxpayer makes, and economists tend to view it as a barometer for how a local economy may be performing. Still, many analysts say the latest figures paint an incomplete picture.
“We have no idea about how wealthy households are,” said Robert Eyler, the executive director of the Marin Economic Forum. Income data collected in affluent cities in southern Marin disproportionately drive up the county’s overall median-income figure, he said. As a result, the data does not accurately represent the entire scope of the county’s motley regional economies, especially those in North and West Marin.
A political showdown is imminent on a multinational trade agreement that has been championed by Marin County native Michael Froman, the U.S. trade representative since 2013.
Originally conceived during the administration of George W. Bush, the Trans-Pacific Partnership has been expanded from four Asian countries to 12 countries on both sides of the Pacific stretching from Peru and Chile to Japan and Vietnam, and accounting for 40 percent of global economic activity.
The Buck Institute for Research on Aging in Novato announced Tuesday that it has entered into a partnership agreement with Calico Life Sciences, a Google-backed life extension company based in South San Francisco.
“It’s a great partnership between two organizations aimed at helping people live longer healthier lives, and we look forward to collaborating with their team,” said Buck Institute CEO Brian Kennedy, in a prepared statement.
Chris Stewart, chairman and CEO of the North Bay Life Science Alliance, an effort to develop the North Bay into an economic hub for life-science companies, said, “We’re very excited. You’re seeing for the first time a significant amount of private sector money going into research on aging. I think it is a good marriage between the two organizations.”
The Marin Economic Forum got a $150,000 matching grant from the county this week as its departing executive warned that the county is not immune to the drought.
The county board approved the grant amid news forum CEO Robert Eyler will step down this summer to take on new responsibilities at Sonoma State University, where he has been promoted to dean of international education. He will remain as an associate of the forum, serving as an economist.
Eyler told supervisors the biggest problem the Marin economy faces over the next year is the drought, which will wallop other regions in California, then have a ripple effect “permeating most parts of the state. … It will trickle upward toward higher income households” including those in Marin. One benefit, he added, will be innovations in “water-smart technologies.”
