D.C. Mayor Vince Gray gave a much anticipated speech on jobs and economic development Monday morning. When boiled down, the wonky mayor’s speech was mostly a recounting of the process for growing the city’s economy he planned to employ before being elected and the creation of new processes going forward.
There were a few nuggets of news: Yards park area near National’s Baseball Park is getting a Harris Teeter and a handful of restaurants and pubs and the mayor had decided to tear down Ballou High School and build a new one focused on vocational training.
But the bulk of the 5,100-word speech was spent talking about blueprints, those already drafted and new ones being still being drawn. There will be new panel meetings on how District residents are trained for jobs and new plans forged to bring the thinking of those panels to life.
As the mayor said in his speech, “all that we envision for our city can be obtained through a strong plan, a plan that outlines achievable short- and long-term goals.”
