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Alejandra Y. Castillo is the Assistant Secretary of Commerce. As the head of EDA, she is responsible for fulfilling the bureau’s mission of leading the federal economic development agenda. As part of this, she is working to promote economic development in those communities traditionally underserved, including Tribal nations.

November is National Entrepreneurship Month, and we celebrate all American entrepreneurs as we reflect on how we support and enable entrepreneurship. As technology innovators and entrepreneurs face their unique challenges and opportunities, EDA and the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE) are committed to learning from the entrepreneurial experience and to continue to evolve our program design and delivery to accelerate technologies as entrepreneurs take them from the lab, to the marketplace, and into our lives.

This week, the U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA), in partnership with the Argonne National Laboratory, announces the launch of the Economic Development Capacity Index (EDCI), a web-based, publicly accessible dashboard designed to assist economic development practitioners in answering the question: “How did an individual community’s capacities change over time due to EDA support?”

Over the last 18 months, the U.S. government has relentlessly focused on an industrial strategy designed to revitalize the nation’s manufacturing base, strengthen critical supply chains, and position U.S. workers and businesses to lead and compete globally. The Economic Development Administration (EDA) is a linchpin of the government-wide effort to invigorate and sustain a historic recovery in domestic manufacturing, committing a major portion of its $3 billion American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding toward catalyzing projects and initiatives leading to good-paying, manufacturing jobs.

President Biden’s American Rescue Plan (ARPA) allocated the Economic Development Administration (EDA) $3 billion in supplemental funding. This investment is assisting communities nationwide in their efforts to recover from the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic by accelerating the process of economic recovery and by improving the resiliency of local economies to future economic challenges.

On September 2, 2022, President Joe Biden announced the 21 winners of EDA’s $1 billion Build Back Better Regional Challenge. It was the culmination of more than a year’s work, which began with 529 applications from all across the country.

The Economic Development Administration (EDA) recognizes the need for more resources to improve technical assistance and capacity building in underserved populations and communities’ representation in local economic development. Therefore, last year, we elevated ‘equity’ as our top investment priority.

The U.S. Economic Development Administration’s $500 million Good Jobs Challenge is making once-in-a-generation investments in 32 high-quality, locally led workforce systems to dramatically transform America’s communities. The goal of the Good Jobs Challenge is to create workforce training programs in communities that will help workers secure jobs in growing, essential industries, and accelerate regional economic development following the pandemic. To further this work, this month, EDA’s Research and National Technical Assistance program is announcing a $592,783 grant to Research Improving People’s Lives (RIPL) — a national social impact non-profit based in Providence, Rhode Island — to develop and implement Return-on-Investment (ROI) metrics that will help a broad range of stakeholders, including policymakers, assess the Good Jobs Challenge on equity outcomes. This grant is funded through EDA’s ARPA Research and Networks Funding Opportunity.

The United States economy is built on innovation, a fact affirmed in 2009 with the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act which set out to provide “investments needed to increase economic efficiency by spurring technological advances.” The 2021 American Rescue Plan Act further committed the United States to the development of an economy primed to lead in the global marketplace through the creation of new industries and the application of cutting-edge technology in traditional enterprises.

Since designating the first Economic Development District (EDD) in 1969, the Economic Development Administration’s (EDA) network of EDDs has grown to more than 390. These locally governed, multi-jurisdictional entities are both critical drivers of regional planning efforts, and important interlocutors between the federal government and local communities.