New York

During Fiscal Year 2013, EDA invested $21,053,085 in 24 projects in the State of New York. These projects are expected to create or retain 1,383 jobs and leverage $62,425,000 in private investment, according to grantee estimates.  EDA’s investments help New York communities achieve bottom-up, locally-defined economic development goals and strategies.

EDA offers a complementary, balanced portfolio of grant programs designed to help rural and urban communities grow their private sectors and create jobs.

Investment Spotlight: Rochester’s Center for Urban Entrepreneurship

After decades of decline caused by the contraction of its largest employer, Eastman Kodak, downtown Rochester is at a critical development juncture.  With growing economic strength and prosperity in the rest of the region, Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) is encouraging reinvestment in the downtown area by actively creating a regional culture of serial entrepreneurship.  RIT, the Greater Rochester Enterprise, Rochester Business Alliance, High Tech of Rochester, new angel and venture capital networks, and university business incubators, are all working together to reshape the region's economy through new business development in the center city.

In September 2013, EDA awarded $1.5 million to fund rehabilitation of the former Rochester Community Savings Bank building to establish RIT’s Center for Urban Entrepreneurship in downtown Rochester.  The renovated facility will serve as an urban entrepreneurship program and incubator to foster and assist business creation and growth in the region’s growing high-tech clusters.  The Center mission will focus on job growth, business expansion, developing minority-owned enterprises, and increasing access to venture and other capital. The long term goal of the Center is to create a multidisciplinary center for entrepreneurial education and business incubation that will leverage existing regional resources and promote economic development and business creation in clean technologies, biotechnologies, imaging and computing.

As one of the top five exporting regions in the country, the Center's location in the heart of downtown Rochester, will uniquely position RIT in assisting entrepreneurs to tap into export markets. As fledging businesses grow, the Center also has the potential to drive new and diverse tenancy in largely vacant structures in downtown that will spark the rebirth of more traditional retail which declined dramatically over the past three decades.