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Aberdeen EcDev Boss: Good Teachers for Immigrants Key to Workforce Growth

Last updated on 2017.08.08

¡Es necesario enseñar inglés! Aberdeen Development Corporation CEO Mike Bockorny (left) addresses Commissioner Tom Fischbach (right) and other members of the Brown County Commission, Aberdeen, SD, February 24, 2015.
¡Es necesario enseñar inglés! Aberdeen Development Corporation CEO Mike Bockorny (left) addresses Commissioner Tom Fischbach (right) and other members of the Brown County Commission, Aberdeen, SD, February 24, 2015.

Aberdeen Development Corporation CEO Mike Bockorny briefed the Brown County Commission this morning on his organization's current aims. Bockorny, who took the ADC reins last August. Bockorny upheld the conventional wisdom that they greatest obstacle to economic development in South Dakota is a shortage of workers. Bockorny said that while South Dakota's business climate remains much more attractive than the business climate on either Coast, if a business swoops in with an offer to move to Aberdeen and asks ADC to help them find 200 to 400 workers, "that would be a challenge."

The South Dakota Department of Labor puts Brown County's unemployment at 2.9%, meaning 640 workers out of a workforce of 21,675. I agree that the chances that the skills of one to two thirds of those waiting workers aligning with the needs of a single big employer are slim.

Bockorny told the Brown County Commission that he and his brand-spankin' new workforce development coordinator Kati Bachmeyer are working on targeting certain markets for recruiting new workers and integrating newcomers and refugees in the community.

When Commissioner Rachel Kippley asked what areas ADC is targeting for those new recruits, Bockorny said we pretty much have to look to foreign immigrants, to "folks that don't look like the majority of us." Bockorny said Aberdeen currently has 250-some Somali, Karen, and Latino workers, mostly toiling away in the industrial park. Bockorny said the ADC has "acquired contacts" with certain relocating groups who could bring immigrant workers to fill the needs that we can't on our own.

Bockorny said that Aberdeen and Brown County will need to support the integration of these foreign workers. An essential part of that integration will be the English as a second language program at Northern State University. The need for language skills means we're going to need teachers to help these immigrants make themselves at home in South Dakota...

...which leads us to the payoff for this story: Teachers are essential to South Dakota's economic development. If we don't recruit good teachers with good wages, our new immigrant workers won't be able to learn English and integrate into our communities, and we won't be able to keep the workers we need to grow.

Economic development starts with teachers. English teachers.

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31 Comments

  1. leslie 2015.02.24

    so econ development means we gotta have 400-600 unskilled (are low cost imported immigrant laborers more skilled or more willing than SD born, bred, educated and trained?) standing around, ready to move at a moments notice, when a big juicy corporation decides to reap the benefits of SD?

  2. mike from iowa 2015.02.24

    If you paid a decent wage well then I'm sure you could fill all employment needs with whites-people that look just like you. But it is infinitely more profitable to bring in furriners for lower wages and less benefits. Gotta watch that bottom line.

    If you have to import labor to fill imported jobs,how does that help the citizens of your state?

  3. leslie 2015.02.24

    since this is an EB5 related issue, there is a helluva good book to be written about joop and benda's exploits pulling the wool over the eyes of every related elected and appointed GOP official in the state to the tune of nearly a billion bucs in cash flow. google-vice-phillipino transgender murder by US citizen frequenting seamy sex club side of naval layovers. sorry i cant link

  4. Owen reitzel 2015.02.24

    Watch the hate mail come in. It won't be about the economy it'll be the people with different colored skin

  5. John 2015.02.24

    Better pay, so simple.............

  6. Rod Hall 2015.02.24

    And big business will make the profits of these foreign workers and the SD residents will pay high real estate taxes. The income taxes of these foreign owned companies will pay corporate taxes to other states. By the way Dreaming Dugaard thinks college students might have $100 thousand debt. Well if they go 4 years to a tech school he might be right!

  7. Jamie 2015.02.24

    You can tell by the comments who is in the skilled labor field. It's not about wages it's about work ethic. Construction trades to assembly lines there is a shortage with a short list of LOCAL applicants

  8. mike from iowa 2015.02.24

    Walker in Wisconsin has a workforce Development group of which he is the head and they dole out state monies to worthy campai..... job creators whether they create any jobs or not. Is that what this thing does?

  9. Loren 2015.02.24

    Big Business swooped in to ND and they didn't have any problem finding workers. Folks are coming in from all over to fill vacancies. Why do you suppose that is???? Now, if the oil field jobs paid min wage and had no benefits, those executives would be pumping their own damn oil, me thinks! Wake up SD!

  10. BIll DIthmer 2015.02.24

    there is a helluva good book to be written about joop and benda's exploits" yup if I had the resources of Mr Cory, it would be me. If that wasn't hint enough, "Cory write the Damn book.

    The Blindman PS We've come full circle now, two years ago we played with this subject in Madville.

  11. Jamie 2015.02.24

    Sorry Loren but I totally disagree with your comparison. We looked at projects in that area with great profit margins for our company but terrible quality of living for employees. 8 x 26 camper parked next to 250 just like it with a great rate of 1550.00 a month without a shower sucked up the $35 dollar an hour wage pretty fast. That's before you go and grab anything to eat. The guy that travels from sturgis to the state fairs selling steak sandwiches probably makes $150 an hour and lives in an rv is making a hell of a lot more in same conditions. I do not want half of the kids in our school children living in campers and there parents are making 170,000 a year. These jobs will be gone when some other industry pays them a buck more an hour because it's all about the buck and not the quality of living. To each there own but I want employees in our state that love our state and plan on putting down some roots.

  12. SuperSweet 2015.02.24

    Begs the question. If Aberdeen is at full employment and almost everyone has a job why look for more?

  13. caheidelberger Post author | 2015.02.24

    SuperSweet—I suspect that's the kind of question that would bring a typical economic development committee meeting to a screeching halt. You're asking us to investigate the basic assumptions of economic development.

    SuperSweet's question reminds me of what Madison City Commissioner Mechelle Nordberg said nine years ago about local economic development: we can't "just sit here and be stagnant." It's not economic maintenance; it's economic development, meaning more, more, more!

    But here we are, with pretty much all the jobs that conventional economics would tell us Brown County needs. What would happen if Brown County held steady at 37,907 people and 21,035 jobs. Mr. Bockorny, county leaders, would that be so bad?

    Or is Bockorny saying that we need to import workers to replace locals who are retiring faster than the natural birth rate can replace them?

  14. Deb Geelsdottir 2015.02.24

    "Bockorny said that while South Dakota's business climate remains much more attractive than the business climate on either Coast,"

    He begins with an error and it's an error that SD has been doubling and redoubling over the years. There are only 2 good things about SD's business climate: 1. Bad wages. 2. Bad regulations. (Those are good things?)

    SD may have a better business climate than . . . Well, I don't know if SD has a better business climate than any other state. If it did, the state's economy would be better. Jeez, it's not rocket science. Workers don't come here and businesses don't settle here.

    I guess lousy wages and a lack of oversight does not make a good business climate.

    A better educational system would help, marginally. Big business wants smart people who are interested and creative thinkers. Work that might be considered mundane requires smart, creative, thoughtful people too. I'm talking about welders, machinists, and others.

    SD has been beating that dead horse for nearly half a century. Duh. It's the kind of thing that makes one beat her head repeatedly against a rough, stucco wall.

  15. caheidelberger Post author | 2015.02.24

    Indeed, Deb, where is the big whooshing sound of Fortune 500 employers racing here to make the fortunes they just can't squeeze out of the stagnant, oppressive economies of the East Coast and West Coast? If our economy is so great, why do we have to import workers from overseas? Why has our population never cracked a million? And why do we have soft sales tax revenues hamstringing our policy aspirations?

  16. Deb Geelsdottir 2015.02.24

    Oh, one of the reasons I'm so luke warm about education is because I can't imagine SD Republicans encouraging and financially supporting a much improved public school system. I also forsee them pushing rote, technical skill teaching, sans creativity and critical thinking.

  17. leslie 2015.02.24

    Two governors, GOED, NSU International Business Center and the Board of Regents applied their considerable skill in creating a government program into a phenomenal engine of cash flow. Then they let a state employee making less than 50 grand take it, with a no-bid contract to himself. i don't think any further regulation or ethical considerations are being made in the legislature. therefore deb, you are right about about regulation, but gee, if we only knew, i think the employee got paid pretty well. EB5, of course.

  18. CLCJM 2015.02.25

    You are correct, Deb, about the rote learning, etc. Hence, the deal with Sanford to give scholarships for welders. What economic development means in SD is crony capitalism. It's about more money in the pockets of the rich while the rest of us get less.

  19. mike from iowa 2015.02.25

    Walker and wingnuts in Wisconsin fast tracked a right to work bill through yesterday. Businesses begged wingnuts not to do this because they and unions had an agreement that unions recruit and train workers. Now all that cost belongs to businesses. Walker also ran his re-election campaign last year claiming that RTW bill was a dead issue and he wouldn't sign it. Now he's is champing at the bit waiting to sign it.

  20. clcjm 2015.02.25

    Yup, mike, to some extent these right wingnuts will keep shooting themselves in the foot. If we can keep putting reasonable ideas and solutions out there to build unity while they keep doing/saying this insane garbage, we can regain control of our country and government!

  21. David L. Newquist 2015.02.25

    The Development Corporation is faced with having to correct its own blunders. Back when the governor's office and other agencies loudly and enthusiastically proclaimed that South Dakota was a cheap labor state--right to work, no benefits, low wages, no union--the ADC was a strident supporter and advocate. Companies were supposed to flock in to take advantage of the desperate labor force that poverty hethld here in bondage. However, the 14 county area around Aberdeen led the nation in outmigration, as people moved away and made a Dun and Bradstreet for that notable achievement. And an inventory at the industrial park and other sites run by the ADC show empty buildings and vacant tracts. The mall is in bankruptcy and has the aspect of mausoleum. Restaurants have left buildings standing empty. This is the situation the ADC faces.

    The English as a Second Language program lost any connection with the English Department years ago and became an entity to itself under the regime that created Joop Bollen's IBI. Its director is not listed as a faculty member, so it is not supply teachers. What instruction it provides and to whom is another question.

    The ADC helped create this economic boom. Who knows what it can do to entice workers to return?

  22. David L. Newquist 2015.02.25

    Sorry. My miserable laptop makes random deletes of text.

  23. leslie 2015.02.25

    dln- good summary and tie in w/ EB5. we are slowly getting to the bottom of this. would be nice if duffy and SDDP would release his findings, if any, for the benefit of discussion here.

    is your 2d to last sentence tongue in cheek? 15:06

  24. leslie 2015.02.25

    mfi-noticed that about walker's campaign bid to avoid unnecessary heat, then this turn around. pretty deceitful. we have to watch this guy as it seems SD GOP does and perhaps mimics. how about in iowa?

    labor people need to help us in the dem party build labor defenses and get rid of this RTW b.s. that SD has had for years.

  25. Douglas Wiken 2015.02.25

    We don't need to educate uneducated illegal aliens, we need to deport them. Democrats want cheap votes, Republicans want cheap labor. They will turn the US into a Mexican or South American slum.

  26. David L. Newquist 2015.02.25

    Leslie (I assume not my daughter Leslie), Yep. Sarcasm.

  27. clcjm 2015.02.25

    Douglas, the truth is as us baby boomers age we'll need more workers than we can supply here. Deporting millions of workers isn't feasible even we didn't need them to fill jobs! Sioux Falls is at, I've heard, 2.5 to 3.0% unemployment. Employers won't raise wages and whine that they can't get workers. The Republicans fight every attempt to raise wages, improve benefits or working conditions and can't figure out why all our teachers and most of our young people leave SD. They constantly raise the cost of education but not the wages and rewards that an education is supposed to bring. They lure in manufacturing companies that we don't have trained workers for. Where did they think the workers would come from? Out of state? To come here for what? Poverty? Few benefits? No organizing rights? Our wonderful weather?

    We do need these immigrants and we need them EDUCATED! Not to mention that we need to educate our own students in needed meaningful vocations and careers!

    At the legislative coffee last weekend, I ripped into Mickelson to support the same minimum wage for teens. He doesn't think they should receive that because they're not supporting a family! I told him that my grandson needs to save up money for his dream of becoming a surgeon. He whined about some business man who owns several grocery stores in small towns who said if he had to pay the minimum wage to teens, he'd have to lay people off! Oh, yeah, he's going to let his shelve go unstocked and his customers not checked out! I've seen stores who run short like this and they are driving business away! If this man is this stupid, he deserves to fail!
    And here's another truth about that deal. If a teenager who will get $1/hr. less and a 19 yr. old with a family who will get the minimum wage, apply for the same job, who do you think is going to get the job? So the teen gets less money or the family man won't get hired...or both! Yup, this wonderful keep as many people in poverty as possible system. This is what trickle down economics looks like!

  28. clcjm 2015.02.25

    Douglas, the truth is as us baby boomers age we'll need more workers than we can supply here. Deporting millions of workers isn't feasible even we didn't need them to fill jobs! Sioux Falls is at, I've heard, 2.5 to 3.0% unemployment. Employers won't raise wages and whine that they can't get workers. The Republicans fight every attempt to raise wages, improve benefits or working conditions and can't figure out why all our teachers and most of our young people leave SD. They constantly raise the cost of education but not the wages and rewards that an education is supposed to bring. They lure in manufacturing companies that we don't have trained workers for. Where did they think the workers would come from? Out of state? To come here for what? Poverty? Few benefits? No organizing rights? Our wonderful weather?

    We do need these immigrants and we need them EDUCATED! Not to mention that we need to educate our own students in needed meaningful vocations and careers!

    At the legislative coffee last weekend, I confronted Mickelson to support the same minimum wage for teens. He doesn't think they should receive that because they're not supporting a family! I told him that my grandson needs to save up money for his dream of becoming a surgeon. He whined about some business man who owns several grocery stores in small towns who said if he had to pay the minimum wage to teens, he'd have to lay people off! Oh, yeah, he's going to let his shelve go unstocked and his customers not checked out! I've seen stores who run short like this and they are driving business away! If this man is this stupid, he deserves to fail!
    And here's another truth about that deal. If a teenager who will get $1/hr. less and a 19 yr. old with a family who will get the minimum wage, apply for the same job, who do you think is going to get the job? So the teen gets less money or the family man won't get hired...or both! Yup, this wonderful keep as many people in poverty as possible system. This is what trickle down economics looks like!

  29. Deb Geelsdottir 2015.02.25

    Here is an idea for economic development - Green Energy! Read on.

    Look to the sun, Grasshopper. Says David Brakke in the St. Cloud Times, “Solar energy has caused a surge in careers for Minnesotans, according to a report by The Solar Foundation. The foundation found that nearly 940 jobs were added to Minnesota's solar industry last year, bringing the total to about 1,800 workers. The foundation also reported about 120 solar-related businesses operate in the state. St. Cloud Technical & Community College student Ryan Meyer has recently reached out to several of them. ‘I've applied to 10 different solar installation companies in the (Twin Cities) metropolitan area. They're always looking for people,’ he said.”

  30. Tim 2015.02.26

    Deb, here in SD, you will have to run that idea by ALEC and the fossil fuel industry for approval.

  31. clcjm 2015.02.26

    I concur with Deb. Minnesota is leading the way in many ways. And what are we doing? Fighting recent attempts at increasing solar and wind energy!
    Unfortunately, I also have to agree with Tim. Our government entities on all levels are so beholdin' to big money, they don't dare allow new, green enterprises that would let us grow our economy like Minnesota!

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