Oklahoma Welcome (OKW), a local electronic news site in SE Oklahoma, is teaming up with the Poteau Chamber of Commerce to host and jointly announce that State Treasurer Ken Miller will be speaker for the first OKW Economic Meeting that will be open to the public," said OKW Executive Director, Samantha Kiger.
The economic meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, September 26th to be held at the Days Inn & Suites in Poteau, Oklahoma beginning at 11:45 am and concluding at 1:00 pm.
Tickets for individual seats or larger groups can be reserved and purchased by calling the Poteau Chamber of Commerce at 918-647-9178 or by calling Samantha Kiger at 918-649-7959.
"Ticket prices will be $9 each and the price will cover the cost for the lunch and drinks that will be provided by The Coffee Cup," stated Karen Wages, CEO of the Poteau Chamber of Commerce.
In addition to the Economic Meeting scheduled with Treasurer Miller, OKW is working with an Oklahoma economist in developing "The REID Report." REID stands for Regional Economic & Industrial Data. The report will be developed to cover four geographic regions in our area that will include a large part of SE Oklahoma, Tulsa, Oklahoma City and Sebastian County in Arkansas.
"At this first economic meeting we thought it would benefit everyone locally to start with State Treasurer Ken Miller to provide an overview of our state's economy and what we can expect in Oklahoma for 2013," said Kiger.
Miller has a PHD in economics and is also a college professor of economics.
After this first economic meeting, OKW will then start providing monthly and quarterly updates for several economic indicators called The REID Report that should be useful to businesses in our region.
All economic data will be produced digitally by OKW under the "Business" tab on OKW's news site at oklahomawelcome.com.
"OKW's plan is to host one to two meetings annually, with a regional economist being scheduled to present 2012 year end results sometime in January 2013," said Kiger.
Indicators being considered for The REID Report are still being finalized in discussions with financial groups and economists, but we're looking at possibilities from a list that will include Gross Domestic Product (GDP) related to consumption, investment, government purchases and net reports involving imports and exports, Consumer Price Index (CPI) that includes housing, food, transportation, medical care and apparel. Employment-Jobs that includes goods, production, manufacturing, construction, and we'll take a good look regionally at tourism and we want to take our time and get advice back from experts and provide as much data on agriculture as possible.
Another area of importance for area businesses that are expanding or have plans to spend money on capital improvements will be to get the word out that local businesses or industry may be eligible for federal grants to help offset some of these costs.
OKW has access to experts with extreme knowledge that has helped and may be able to help a local business in the future with expenditures to help grow opportunities for their business.
The purpose of The REID Report being provided quarterly isn't just to report the numbers, but to give clear and precise meaning of the data that people can use," Kiger said.
In his power point presentation at the upcoming meeting, Miller plans to discuss state tax collections that could include personal income tax, corporate income tax, sales tax, gross production related to gas and oil, motor vehicle tax, insurance premium taxes, and tribal gaming fees that have been collected and discuss if they are in line with historic collections and meeting state financial expectations.
We will also get a briefing on upcoming state questions to be voted on in November and how they can affect everyone and our local and state economy.
"We're scheduling only State Treasurer Miller for this first economic meeting to stay within one and a half hours for lunch and hearing our speaker," Kiger said.
The State's Treasurer's office also creates a monthly publication called the Oklahoma Economic Report. It can be found by going to www.treasurer.ok.gov