Below is a listing of the region’s largest employers:

American City: St. Louis Architecture Three Centuries of Classic Design with text by Sharoff and 140 color photographs by Zbaren, is stunning. The book is the first large-format book on the city’s architecture since the 1920’s, and traces the evolution of St. Louis’ built environment.

Quoting from the book, “From its early days as a frontier fur-trading post in the 1700s, St. Louis grew into ‘Paris on the Mississippi,’ a bustling city of elegant hotels, offices and government buildings that was one of the marvels of 19^th-century America. More than just about any city in America, St. Louis embraced the imposing forms and lush ornamentation of the Beaux Arts tradition. Indeed, one can make the argument that in the United States, only Washington, D.C. has a more impressive collection of Classically inspired structures.”

This book is the second in their American City series. The first was Detroit. Upcoming volumes will look at Chicago and Savannah.

Sharoff penned an outstanding article back in February about St. Louis’ unique information technology (IT) infrastructure. His article, “Data Centers Offer Hope for St. Louis Office Market,” was published on February 8^th.

The RCGA had pitched Sharoff several months ago through our national media relations team at Fleishman-Hillard, inviting him to consider doing this story following the region’s successful recruitment of Unisys’ new Center of Excellence and the expansion of such companies here as Contegix and Xiolink. This “national media pitching” is part of the RCGA’s ongoing national media and branding effort to support the region’s economic development initiatives.

This was the 3^rd article Sharoff has written in the New York Times about St. Louis in the last several years. His first, in 2006, was about the revitalization of downtown. When he came here to research that piece, he was awed by the architecture he found throughout the community and decided, with Zbaren, to create a book about it.

A several month long photo exhibition, by Sharoff and Zbaren will open on June 10^th at the newly renovated Ridgeway Center at the Missouri Botanical Garden, displaying 70 large photos from the St. Louis book. Following the exhibit at the Garden, the show will tour both Washington, D.C. and Chicago. Sharoff's book is available at left Bank Books.

The gains in March were focused on a few sectors. Retailers in the region added 2,300 workers compared with March 2010. The leisure and hospitality sector - such as restaurants, hotels and casinos - added 4,400 jobs from last year.

Graduate! Philadelphia is one of the nation’s first successful programs bringing business, higher education, government, private foundations, and community groups together to help adults finish college. Started in 1995, G!P operates at the programmatic and policy levels to promote college completion in Greater Philadelphia. Among its key features is a public messaging campaign that encourages adults who started college but dropped out before finishing getting back into school and completing their degree.

RCGA Board member Lee Kaplan, senior vice president and chief administrative officer at Enterprise Holdings (right) welcomes members of the Regional Talent Council to Friday’s working session with Graduate! Philadelphia Executive Director Hadass Sheffer. Council chairman, Doug Koch, senior vice president, Brown Shoe and Mary Atkin, chief administrative officer at Wells Fargo Advisors, are pictured in foreground.

According to the 2009 American Community Survey, 451,000 adults aged 25 and older in the St. Louis metro area fall into this category. With 32% of our adult population of working age having bachelor's degrees or higher, St. Louis is slightly better educated than the U.S. as a whole, but ranks below several competitor metros, including Research Triangle, Minneapolis, Denver, Atlanta, and Kansas City.

Hadass applauded research on this topic that the RCGA recently published under the title “Making the Case for a Campaign to Increase College Completion Rates in Greater St. Louis.” She also affirmed the importance of the Talent Council’s expressed vision for St. Louis “to be a growing community known for our diverse talent; a community with college graduates and other skilled individuals available to meet current and future employment needs; and a community with vibrant collaboration among employers, educators, civic groups, government agencies and individuals so that employment opportunities are created and realized.” One of the four action priorities supporting this vision is to “design and implement an action plan to increase the percentage of the region’s adult population with college degrees.”

Last Friday’s meeting was chaired by Talent Council Chair Doug Koch, Chief Talent Officer for Brown Shoe, and hosted by Lee Kaplan, Chief Administrative Officer for Enterprise Holdings, Inc. It was attended by Talent Council members and representatives of Ameren, Brown Shoe, Sigma Aldrich, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Enterprise Holdings, Wells Fargo Advisors, Great Circle, Inc., AdamsGabbert, and the RCGA.

This past Thursday afternoon, nearly 60 representatives of business, higher education, government, foundations, and community groups came together in the RCGA’s Regional Collaboration Center to hear the Graduate! Philadelphia story and engage in dialogue with Hadass about the “nuts and bolts” of successful adult college completion efforts.

Detained en route by a series of air travel problems, Hadass participated in this gathering by speaker phone from a corner of the Pittsburgh airport, thereby demonstrating very effectively three of the key attributes of an effective collaboration: flexibility, resourcefulness, and persistence.

Susan Stauder, RCGA Vice President For Infrastructure & Public Policy, Announces Her Retirement:  After nine years of outstanding service at the RCGA, Susan Stauder, Vice President for Infrastructure and Public Policy, will be retiring on May 20^th.

Susan Stauder

Initially recruited to the RCGA back in 2002 from Bi-State Development Agency (Metro), where she was deputy executive director, Susan brought to the job more than 25 years of diverse infrastructure and public policy experience and a strong working relationship with the transportation and public policy leaders throughout the St. Louis region.

During her tenure at the RCGA, Susan’s efforts helped contribute to the success of the Mayor’s Business Task Force on Lambert Airport, supported strong business involvement in the long process of getting the new Mississippi River Bridge off the ground, fostered the active participation of businesses in getting behind the I-64 reconstruction project, and encouraged public and private sector collaboration to begin to address freight issues in the region. Susan’s work has led to better understanding and more effective involvement on the part of the business community in “all things infrastructure.”

She plans to be very busy this summer traveling with her husband, Gerry, to visit children and grandchildren in Vermont and Yorkshire, England, and vacationing in the Rocky Mountains.

Susan also currently serves as Chair of the St. Louis City Planning Commission and Chair of the City’s Downtown Economic Stimulus Authority.

We wish Susan well and thank her for her many civic contributions to the bi-state region.

Richard C.D. Fleming
President and CEO

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