Efficiently, effectively, and understanding how you can do that what you balance that with security challenges at the border and that is of fundamental importance for border communities and our economies as a whole. However, i do not think that is enough. Not enough for u. S. Border communities or for Mexican Border communities to really have the vibrant communities that we want and the quality of life that people in the Border Regions aspire to. This requires strategies for Economic Development that leverage the unique position of those communities along the border as a way to attract companies to do business in the region. There is a unique Value Proposition there. The combination of the competitive advantages of the two countries sidebyside that makes working and producing in the border region particularly attractive and interesting. If we look back over time and go border say the Industrialization Program of the 1960s, the beginning of free trade between the countries, andsed on the border region it was effective in attracting a certain amount of manufacturing investment to that part of the border. Side of thean border. It is called the twin plant model. That was the idea of the program. Meaning there would be a plant on the mexican side of the border and a plant on the west side of the border. Plantsmexican side, the appeared but oftentimes, they did not have the twin component on the u. S. Side of the border. Sufficient to get those investments on the u. S. Side of the border. Where you need people like these guys here to make the case to the companies that this is where they needed to do business. And then we needed to set up factors that would make the region attractive. That is what i want to think through and talk to our panelists about. I think there is a time in that space of what else is needed that we can think about. Workforce development is more key than ever. Having the qualified, welltrained workforce to operate more sophisticated machines and equipment than ever and that is one of the things that companies are looking for. Quality of life. Like john wagner was just talking about. It is what Everyone Needs and our local community to attract talent to fill positions so Companies Want to do business there. Access to energy and infrastructure. The list goes on and on. We could get some sort of prioritization about the key elements. I am really thrilled to have three great panelists here with me today. I will go through and do a brief introduction of each of them. You have your bios in your packet you have their bios in your packet. We have the director of the texas border of Economic Development. Frederico has a number of previous positions he has held in the City Government and the state government. He worked as a mexican customs broker for some time. A lot of different experiences he will be drawing upon. To his left is john parrella. John is the ceo of the Border Alliance which is unique in representing three different states, new mexico, texas, and two while the chihuahua. Secretaryo a cabinet for new mexico and has a lot of fascinating experience from his time there. And finally, last but not least, is mario. I am flipping through and missing my spot. He is with the greater brownsville investment corporation. Incentives corporation. And is executive director and ceo of it. He is he also sits on the board of directors for the hispanic caucus institute. Toyota also worked with in san antonio. Thank you for joining us. One last thing before i jump in. Of work over bunch the years on Economic Development in the border region but recently wrote a chapter for a book that is about to be published through the university of Arizona Press and interviewed two out of the three of these gentlemen through that process. I spoke with frederico and john about this topic in detail and will probably try to draw out some of the points that we spoke about recently. I also had the chance to work with the university of texas and other stakeholders in the greater brownsville area about an Economic Development project over the last several years that the department of commerce eda helped fund. This will be a good chance for thesedig deep on some of issues. I want to give each of you a chance to make some opening comments about your thoughts regarding Economic Development in your corner of the border. Mario, i know you have a couple of slides about the brownsville region so maybe we will start with those and then jump into more conversational pieces of the program as well. Mario good afternoon, everyone. What i thought i would do is a small set of slides to set up the conditions about what we are talking about and i think that will open up some conversation. Ofwnsville is at the tip southern texas. Way down at the bottom of the border. You can see where it is. There, the ports of brownsville. Relative to san antonio, you can see how far it is. Here are some key numbers. And i hope we touch on these because these numbers are not just relevant to brownsville but to many communities along the border in the region. It is the Largest Community in the valley. 31 is below the poverty level. I have another chart about what that looks like compared to our neighbors. We just looked at this data where we have 15,000 per capita income. It was 13,000. The Median Income per household 64 make it out of high school. This these are the challenges we have in the border region. When i started using this particular number, we saw the commission are talking about the digital divide. And a discussion about conductivity and broadband. 60 of the households in brownsville are not connected. When you go into a Technology Phase and the teacher asks their students to do homework online coming you are leaving a lot of the population behind. It is a further struggle. That is the point i am making. Withis the comparison brownsville and its neighbors. These are the three poorest states in the country, along this border. In terms of problem problemsolving, we need to hit it with a lot of different angles. Workforce development is our top item based on the conditions i just showed you. The disconnected condition, the poor condition. We feel Workforce Development is key especially when we look at high skill, high tech programs and the lead time to get someone 46 years. R that, we need to start in middle school and get them going. We recently launched a Workforce Initiative in brownsville called we grow our own. Two weeks ago, we were awarded the Texas Workforce award. We are proud of the work we are doing. Technology a senate bill was passed two sessions ago and it allows High School Students to graduate with a twoyear technical degree. I know many of you have children or you yourselves have gone through a dual credit program. We went to austin and said we need dual credit in technology so we can get students in the hightech space right away. There are about 15 schools that are in this space in dallas and two more south of that. We are working on creating a manufacturing hub. Based on what is happening in think we need to be prepared in a larger way, not just workforce but also research and development. We hope to do that with a Multi National university system. Monterrey tech. University of texas. And texas a m. That would make it a regional concept. Serviceuring and center. This is funded through the department of commerce. Create given to texas to nine partnerships in manufacturing assistance. Towant it to change or add its scope for Workforce Development. We really work very hard with , and as we discussed the twin plant system. Recently, in san antonio, in terms of what we are doing in key come innovative ways to incentivize companies. We are not Incentivizing Companies unless they provide hightech, high paying jobs. We closed six deals recently adding 1155 jobs. On average over 16 an hour which is a lot in this area. Unique kinds of ways we are looking at Incentivizing Companies to come in. And the target for everything we are doing is to meet these targets together. And to share this across the valley and then the binational perspective. At least we could understand the condition we have along the border region. Christopher wilson the border is very diverse. A lot of different conditions along parts of the border. Some of the communities represented here, for example, the san diego context versus brownsville context. Different challenges but also different assets. John, do you want to talk about how the border system works to kick us off . John many thanks to all of you for being here and to the Wilson Center for hosting this. My friends and allies in the audience. There are a lot of issues to deal with and address. Alliance islex unique. It represents the three states in two countries. Region. E our it is a region that is comprised of about 2. 5 million residents. Put it in the middle of the United States and it would be in the top 20. It is geographically located as andsouth as brownsville is as far west as you can go in texas and still be in texas. We are right in the middle of the nafta countries east and west and north and south. Strategically, we like to consider ourselves the gateways to trade. 1 5 of the trade transacted between the u. S. And mexico at our six ports of entry to the region. With the uncertainty currently existing in the world today and especially with respect to our bilateral relationship with mexico, and make no mistake that mexico is a strategic and economic ally to the u. S. Despite all the uncertainty, our organization which has three functions, to serve as the Economic Agency of the region, we act as the policy advocacy we act as the policy Advocacy Organization for the region. The uncertainty, we are seeing record levels of interest from companies, and vetted projects in our region. We are moving up quickly especially in the manufacturing sector. In our region, we are the fourth largest manufacturing hub in north america. In the last year, 18 months, we surpassed detroit as being the fourth largest and you factoring hub in north america. We thousand highpaying jobs created in our region. 3000 highpaying jobs created in our region. We should be a model. We certainly are very proud of those statistics. Two days ago, it was announced that el paso has record level low unemployment levels. We are at 3. 6 prenafta. It was always hovering around the 12 14 range. Our sister city, below 3 juarez. Ment, see yociudad and that is leading to wage gains in a positive way. We are happy about the development of occurring along the border. We dealopeful that as not only with workforce issues natural policy issues in washington, that we could reach a level of certainty. As has been mentioned. Is it is i have heard important for future development and economic opportunity. Uncertaintyntra is the enemy of jobs, economic growth, and investment. To maximize their potential we need to be working at the macro level but those of us on this panel need to be working at the local level to prepare ourselves for the jobs of the future. For a workforce that is trained and trainable. That is the number one issue for Companies Looking to expand or relocate do you have a trained or trainable workforce . And im happy to say that not ,nly does el paso have that most if not all of the communities along the southern border offer that strategic advantage for Economic Development. For Companies Looking to keep the competitive advantage in the region, i always emphasize that we do have that trained and trainable workforce. But we need to get into a discussion about some of the artificial ceiling that exists and why we still have room to grow in our respective communities along the southern border. Once again, thank you for inviting me here. Frederico thank you, chris and to you all for being here. I workedction with the custom brokers. I am not when. Seen what they have gone ,hrough because of mexican laws they lose their livelihood and even sometimes their liberty, i would never want to be a custom broker. I have worked with them for 16 years in mexico city and the last time i was there i was in charge of training custom brokers and their personnel. I not only live at the border but i have a very strange story. It like this i am a mexican that was born in canada and now i work in the United States. L and of to a year ago, i had a son working in states one in the united and one in mexico. I go back and forth every day. Slides just a couple of so we can get into the conversation. , theu all well know importance of our border ports of entry. This is what texas represents for world trade. 30 point 8 of all u. S. Trade with the war with the world crosses through laredo. Second behind los angeles. 10. 7 , el paso. 10. 1 in dallas, fort worth. And 5. 6 , port arthur district. Will have the slides so if anyone wants them, we can send them to you. All of these come you already know. This one is interesting. The share of trade between mexico and the United States since 20122018 has been growing constantly. This lastthat we have year was 36. 9 through the city of laredo. Through the14. 9 includinge ports brownsville. That gives us 52 of all u. S. Mexico trade through our district. Visit 12. 5 is trade through el paso. 19. 7 is trade through the other ports of entry. And 15. 9 is the rest of the ports of entry. This is u. S. Mexico trade. Minute through all of these. And maybe this is interesting for some. Crime rate at our ports of entry, the u. S. , this is fbi information. Out of every 100,000. Down here come you have laredo, 622. El paso, 379. San diego, 367. At our border communities, we have the lowest crime rates of many parts. And do not get me talking about other cities like the one where we are at right now. This is information just radio. If any of you wants this information come you can go to our website. States, of the border we have all of the ports of entry. This is information for the then we have imports and exports for each and every one of the cities of your respective states. You information is here and can download it and it is constantly uploaded with recent data. And here are the commodities that cross throw. Through the ports of entry. Those are the slides i wanted to share. Iristopher wilson why dont keep going with you for a moment. When we talked during the process of creating that book chapter i mentioned, you talked to me about how it was that the together to build the world trade bridge. Hub ofis the major u. S. Mexico trade. How is it that the city developed that skill set . Someone like you in your career skill. Nts a lot of it takes a lot of skill to develop a logistics cluster. How was it that city built the bridge and had such a specialization facilitating trade . Doderico it has a lot to with the origin. And its geographical location. Before and after nafta, it was a very important crossing trade crossing point for trade. Have customs and trade community that is very proactive. In the 1980s, before a lot of the things that we take for granted now in technology, who justustom borders returned after studying at m. I. T. Started working on ways of using computers to facilitate transmission of data. We are about floppy disks. Withhen, they went over the mexican customs and they developed this system where everything was starting to go through computers. And even though at the beginning it was once a week when they took the disc to the bridge and downloaded everything, and then it was every day and eventually as agot to develop it Pilot Project for all of mexico. Uarter ofrq there. Lso have offices and that is something we can talk about later. Of thing is that because these individuals who live and whose parents and grandparents live because of trade, they went full of ahead on this. The thing that really changed everything was they got together , who was twice mayor in the beginning of the 1990s and at the end, the city had long lines of trailers that went through the middle of the city. And in front of schools. There were so many accidents. I used to go to a school that 1960s,oss, in the and it was awful then. 1980s and 1990s, it was incredible. Transportation guys put their money where their mouth was and started financing the construction of the bridge because the Mexican Federal government did not do it. They do keep the revenue of the tolls. Texas, theyaredo, get a lot of that. It was that there was political will and Economic Vision that they had to do something to get the traffic out of the city and make it faster. Christopher wilson one lesson there is that it is a coming together of the public and private sectors to get things done. And sometimes, it get things done even when the federal government is not working so well. We heard that story again and again. Local communities figuring out ways to get things done and how about the federal government when they are experiencing challenges and problems in facilitating the trade. States you different represent. Across the u. S. Mexico border is sometime a local community on the u. S. Side of the border is competing with another local community on the u. S. Side of the border for investments, for traffic, across bridges, things like that. How is it that an organization like yours is able to overcome some of those challenges . You represent three different groups of people that have elected officials with different sets of consistencies yet somehow you get everyone to see the value of cooperation over the possibility of competition. How does that develop . How do you talk to people so that they see that value of cooperation . Thats a great question, chris. And its certainly a very relevant, germane question. Ive had the unique opportunity to see it not only serving as a Public Servant in new mexico, as cabinet secretary, where is there some competition, youre always trying to create jobs and what the taxpayers of new mexico expected me to do, and the governor. By the same token we know that the region that we inhabit all rely on one another. And the bottom line is that we indeed are a bicultural community that shares the same border, the same culture and, yes, we share the same economy. And that last point is absolutely critical in overcoming some of the objections that maybe some more parochial political leaders might have about the region. To take a step back, when i did serve as cabinet secretary in new mexico, in 2011, it was interesting to say that the state of New Hampshire did more trade with mexico than new mexico did, as stunning as that might sound. And we had to engage in a regional, certainly, when we were talking about workforce, when we were trying to draw businesses to this area, to the new mexico side of the border, we simply had to say and share resources, because we do have universities that are almost about 40 miles apart. The university of texas in el paso and new mexico state. We had to tell employers it was ok to hire graduates from u tech for example, and viceversa now that im in this job we brag about the wonderful universities we have in the region. Combined, we have more University Students in the region than any big 10 community in the United States has, combined. Were graduating more engineers in our region than any big 10 community which has huge universities in the United States. So these are the types of things that we all brag about, ought to talk about. And the message has gotten out to political leaders and the Business Community gets it and im working on a strike plan that will focus on wildfires development primarily and pulling resources together. And the last thing i want to say about the issue, chris, is that the workforce issue is very, very critical, so is local infrastructure. David, who works at the free trade zone, in the audience, is emblematic of a lot of how we have to cooperate when it comes to things like transportation. Every state has to Work Together, for example, with the transportation infrastructure in our region or things will come grinding to a halt. Before that over 2 billion worth of investment on just the u. S. Side on the border is occurring in new mexico and texas, 2 billion, keeping ahead of growth, making sure we have this competitive flow of trade and at the same time, securing the border, frankly, and the two concepts are not mutually exclusive. All of these and others are contributing to overcoming the objectives. Were working very, very well together, especially private sector and government sector how we move our entire region forward. The bottom line is this is not a zero sum game. I always say a job created in one place ought to be a job created in the u. S. Thats how we approach it. You very much. That is very interesting. When we did this study i mentioned earlier, the way we started it was about what trade was moving through the region and started seeing where are there opportunities to attract suppliers, Different Industries that might fit in the supply chain moving through the greater brownsville area. Can you talk about what industries do you all target . And just us through a bit, what are the conversations like when talking to potential investors . What are the things theyre asking you . What are you pointing out to them that resonate the most when you try to land the companies in those industries . Its a very complicated question. I think different communities across the border deal with it differently. In brownsville to laredo, probably, region. I think years ago, especially in the times of the heavy involvement or movement, to today, we didnt have a true assessment or inventory of whats the percent of types of industries there . Are they tech, automotive, medical, energyrelated . Now that we have some manufacturing associations working together and sharing data on both sides of the border on Economic Development can better assess what kind of package and incentives package can we put together to entice a company, say an Automotive Company we can now say we can give you logistics costs because we have automotive t1 or t2 and we can help with the profitability windows when we bring them in. Before, we were saying pie in the sky. We want more jobs but dont know how to attract these companies. I think were Getting Better at that as we share data across the border and towns. I can tell you as it is coming around and hopefully gets ratified soon, theres still different investment from Different Countries and regions and so we see a lot of hesitation again. The rules of war will be an issue and hopefully works on our behalf and betterment of the region. The steel tariffs and the like are also conversations when they come see us about hows that going to work, right . The unique condition in brownsville. We have a port, we have brownsville msa that can probably mitigate a lot of that tax and tariffs through opportunity zones and the like. But i tell you recently in the last two months, the gentleman here brought it up earlier, is the first question they asked was security. Some people around the world and other parts of the country think its a war zone around the border and its not. Brownsville for example is the number two safety city in texas, number 13th in the country. Laredo is a very safe community. El paso, mcallen, all, depending what websites you look at, they are essentially all very safe communities, right . Thats something we never had to entertain before as an Economic Development organization. To say hey, this is very safe. And the Workforce Development component is very important. I did a lot of work with toyota and my charge at toyota was help us find a profitability window sooner based on Workforce Development strategies, right . Based on Workforce Development strategies, right . If its hightech, can build a quality product. If your cfo and your manufacturers target so much production a day or a month a year, they should be able to make profit this much a year and therefore can project, i can make my money back, investment back in 10 years, right . But when you have a weak workforce that cant problem solve problems, supposed to have 1000 trucks a day but because of problems, making 700 n. Those are profitability problems and now we have data with companies coming into our region, we know what to do. We have the Human Capital. Come to us, were ready for business, the border is. And another point i would like to make, although we see a lot of investments in the port of entry we just saw, in my opinion, it benefits a lot of the interior of the United States and not border region. It created a passthrough region, a lot of produce coming through the port or entry but not the border region. Its important to regionally Work Together to understand these numbers better so we can help reflect this investment in our communities. Federico, that was one of the things when we talked you brought up as well, laredo did, why i started with the question, what did laredo do right recently, attract trade through the community and the community lives on that trade, but maybe missed an opportunity to attract manufacturers and others. Can you talk about that side of the equation and what you see that was missing that didnt have laredo develop in the same way as other communities on the border . I mentioned in mexico there are 880 custom brokers and 200 have their license and work in their headquarters and another 200 plus operate another location. 450ou have around 400, workers, 99 of whom have operations on the u. S. Side from brownsville to san antonio. That means that those 400 plus, just in laredo. On the mexico border, 67 of mexicocustom brokers have their headquarters on the border cities. That is i have tried to do it with thought, some time ago, could that be considered a Foreign Direct Investment from mexicans and the United States . Because theyre creating jobs, paying taxes, theyre building warehouses and they have from custom brokers businesses to transportations to boutiques and restaurants, they diversified. And what could have been done with respect to manufacturing . A lot. The thing is that i, ive mentioned it before and thinking of some people dont like it, that we take for granted trade is always going to cross through laredo. They never thought about a second economic location for the city. Not laredo. Thats it. 90 plus of the workforce is services. So that is something that we missed. 1988, in laredo, we had an event, and we were trying to attract businesses from all around to invest there, and most of them went to renosa or el paso or tijuana. And everyone was fine with that because trade was still number one. That was prenafta. So, we could have done a lot. And i still think that enormous volume of trade and but that is something that just, maybe. Thats one of the things we hear all the time, how it is that, how can communities add more value in the supply chains that theyre a part of. And i think related to that is what is the unique Value Proposition of being a community along the border as you are going out to attract business . Jon, can you come in on this and talk about how you framed that Value Proposition working and investing along the border . I think if i remember you talked about some investments coming in that required a bilingual workforce for example, or moving back to creation where you do have some level of joint manufacturing happening on both sides of the border, spillover effects from the manufacturing side of things. Talk about how you approach that and the special Value Proposition of a border company. There are countless advantages to being along the southern border with mexico. I think all of our communities, and especially in our region, we have one of the youngest demographics of any large msa metropolitan statistical area on both sides of the border. We have that trained and trainable young dynamic workforce. So we talk about that. We have strategic advantages we offer for direct foreign investors. 15 years ago, i saw in my prior job, my prior life, that china, make no mistake, china is a trade foe. They are going through a very difficult tile right now, in terms of their workforce, and how, really, in my humble opinion, theyre becoming less and less repetitive. The trend was the reshoring the american jobs. When youre looking at fdi, especially from asia, i think our communities and the borderplex region has a very, very compelling story to tell when it comes to reshoring of these jobs from asia. Make no mistake, that trend, i think, will continue. Why . Because in china you have rising wages, you have very expensive utility costs there. You have a very unpredictable political system, and finally, you see a situation where transportation costs are rising. But most of all, the quality of the chinese products do not compare to the quality of products being made in north america both in mexico and the United States. For that reason, i think you will see that trend continue. We should be the place of choice for reshoring of these jobs. Make no mistake, hundreds of thousands of these jobs are coming and coming soon, tariffs or no tariffs against the chinese. And we need in our region to be able to tell that story and make sure that we are in the forefront of telling that story, not only in the borderplex region, but in our sister communities up and down the border. And were happy to do that. The last thing ill say about it is that in order to stay competitive we have to make sure were staying ahead of infrastructure once again. You heard that today a lot as a theme. If the federal government wont take the lead the states and the local communities need to, just like the state of texas is doing and local leaders in el paso, to make sure our road system and everything from roads and water by the way, i have to compliment our water authority, Public Service board. What they have done in el paso is incredible by providing and making sure there is a sustainable and very, very viable amount of water, with conservation, to last for several more decades. And what theyre doing there is incredible. Because there is that perception, too, at least in el paso, we dont have enough water. Yes, we do. We can tell all that story and do it in a forceful compelling way, you know what . We win these projects more often than not and were defeating places like phoenix and other spots in other communities. And i love beating phoenix. I love beating communities. There might be somebody from phoenix here. So be it, its friendly competition, right . It always comes down to the same communities vying for these fdi projects, it seems, at least in my experience. We had some verym very good fortune being competitive. Last thing i will say as proof of the pudding, we are finalists for very large significant projects because weve been able to proffer all these advantages and competing with cities more inland in the United States, so very happy to report we may not win any of them, but god willing we won maybe all of them. Thank you. We have time for a couple questions before we finish up here. Anybody have one they want to throw out there . Heres one. Let me give you a microphone, if you could identify yourself. Then ask the question. Thats ok. If you could just wait for the microphone. He preempted me on the water. I dont know if there were specific things you want oo mention about how this works. You know you have enough water. Theyre doing something innovative, i assume . Yeah. The water in the tristate area is very, very, interesting, a little complex legally. As a recovering lawyer i wont try to explain it, made complex by interstate water compact. Ill leave it there. We have to comply with not only the International Compacts we have with mexico but we also have to comply with interstate water contacts. That being said, what the psb and the Public Service board has done is not only buy additional water rights, they emphasized number one, its the Worlds Largest inland Desalination Plant they have. We have almost countless amount of brackish water in the area and in the region. One end is technology and foresight and making sure we have enough water rights in the region. And the second is a very aggressive Water Conservation effort throughout all three states, really. And so, the combination of which has been a very powerful story to tell. And luckily, were in the situation were in right now because of that. Thank you. Can i add to that . That point . Its not just about acquiring water, its how can communities smartly use the water, especially from an Economic Development perspective. When i was at toyota we used 1. 3 million gallons of water a day. A company wont come into your region if they dont have water for the manufacturing process, and oftentimes its large amounts. How the municipalities utilize their water not only for population, use water for frackish, whatever, so that they can accommodate the needs of industry for Economic Development. Thank you. Another question here. Maybe, if you dont mind, collect a couple of questions and that will be the final round. Hi. Youve been talking about investment and the strikeategic plan. I was wondering if there is anything about entrepreneurship or small to medium scale businesses or any program or idea on maybe having them from both of the sides Work Together as small and medium services, i mean, businesses or entrepreneurship programs, projects, things like that. Thank you. Thanks. Mario brought up a point about the conception that we are dangerous on the border. I heard five or six senators and 10 to 15 congressmen say its a crisis on the border, they paint this broad brush. How many people dont call making their decision based on the news, and what can we do to counter that . Lets finish it up. Jared, did you want to jump in with one last question . I wanted to ask mario, actually, all three of you all, understanding the challenges we have of our youth in the border communities, we have the asset of a bicultural environment, how far back do you identify back to tap into the young men and boys and girls . At what level should we be working on to prepare them for what 25 years from now the usmca may look like . I actually did that study in san antonio coincidentally. I set it up for you, buddy. I will give you 5 later, jerry. I use the football analogy. You have a professional quarterback and look at the recruiting for a professional quarterback, they probably recruited out of a lot of tier 1 schools and maybe some tier 2 schools and those schools recruited out of a lot of smaller schools and those schools recruited out of high schools and those schools prepare their other smaller teams, all that to get one quarterback. We did the math what does it take to get one technician to fix robots. 200,000 touches of people to get one technician. We took it down to middle school. We think that from an Economic Development perspective and capitalizing on Human Capital need to really start investing through some sort of legislation in your communities to create programs at the middle school to prepare them for technology in high school and get them into a job, career phase right after high school. Because typically in hightech environments, 5 to 10 require a four year degree, make no mistake about it. If everybody wants to get a four year degree, thats fine, wont get hired by industry. Typically 8020 rule and 80 require High School Diploma and 20 require a two or four year degree. We think the middle school is the sweet spot. Lightning round, let me try to answer all three questions. Innovation, number one. Fortunately we have incubators in tech hubs in several cities. Were working to develop a seamless pipeline, especially in technology, really, giving entrepreneurs in the hightech space every tool they possibly can have. El paso is becoming a really hip place for young hispanics. The Downtown Revitalization is attracting young hispanic millennials, cool place goss to eat and have a good time and concerts. So were starting to attract young entrepreneurial talent. We got a Silicon Valley to move to el paso. Because they have had success. The retention rates have been off the charts. We are going to keep pushing that. Second, you are right, that is the artificial limit or two optimizing job growth in our region. I probably speak for everybody here you have to get past the perception of our region being a dangerous, violent and lawless frontier. Its perpetuated in pop culture and now politics. And unfortunately thats an additional thing we have to overcome to optimize job growth in the area. But once we can show the data, el paso second safest city over 500,000 in the United States. That chart, second safest over 500,000, number one, by a fraction of a point, san diego, they are not really on the border, close, but a sister city on the border. Finally, workforce, yes, we need to continue to emphasize Work Force Development not only in the innovation and tech sector. Lets not forget about the basic sector that has sustained our area at least in many parts of the border, warehousing, transportation, logistics and manufacturing sector. Because those sectors are continuing to grow and will continue to grow, at least in our region. And we need make sure we have trades people, we have electricians and other folks like that, high paying jobs, truck drivers, welders. We cant forget about that as far as our Workforce Development needs. I would also quick, first of all, Strategic Plan you mentioned, that is something that has to be done. We worked on a long term vision plan to 2040, like, nine years ago. In 2015 we did an update. Laredo did a comprehensive plan and another thing is bring it together because both plans consider a long term vision, developing infrastructure, developing workforce. So that is something we should probably all along the border do. Collaborating and not so much competing with one another. The thing about the perception, you already mentioned there, we need provide hard, cold facts to those who are, who need them. Its going to be practically impossible to fight media pop culture and politicians who have an agenda, but we need to have that information out there first on our forefront. Finally, regarding the workforce, we need to prepare our students to adapt, be flexible, be lifelong learners and that is something we should also probably do. Things are changing so fast if we dont prepare students to be, have the availability and vision to work, they wont do it. Finally for the future, id like to give a shoutout to jerry and ibc and everyone because we need that type of engagement and commitment to the north american freetrade agreement or usmca and development of the border and theyve done it magnificently. I want to second that. I see jerry everywhere around these road trips and his friend, eddie. Thank you for what you do. Its great. I hope you all have enjoyed this panel and all the panels throughout the day as much as i have. It hes been a fantastic day and i really appreciate the contributions you have made to the conversation and our understanding of the Border Regions. Obviously something we need to get out there more from washington and we will keep doing the work from the Wilson Center and keep engaging you in that work. It is a really important thing for us. I want to thank our sponsors for helping make the day possible and just hand things over to close it out for the day. [applause] thank you, chris. On behalf of the border trade alliance, we want to say thank you again to duncan wood, to chris, and the team here at the Wilson Center of the mexico institute. Its a pleasure too partner with you for our sixth annual conference. Also i want to thank the Board Members for their leadership. A very Productive Program obviously today, thanks to all of you. And as you mentioned, our sponsors, ibc, how great your work is and appreciate Constellation Brands for helping to make our reception last night and to angela at the Wilson Center for your help at the Reception Center last night and also to ct strategies. Were at a critical juncture. Weve been talking about it all day, all seeking the modernization of our trilateral trade agreement. We will remain focused, we will remain engaged and hopefully get this agreement done this year. So just yesterday, the bta board, we were on capitol hill, we were sharing much of the message we talked about today. We feel like we are gaining traction, and we will get there. The bta members and i do look forward to continuing to build on the success of nafta for the past 25 years, not anything negative. And ratifying the usmca. So thank you for your leadership and thanks for your support. Lets continue to fight the good fight and win together. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] me know when it is time to go. Good morning. So, welcome to the Wilson Center. We are going to get started