Nearly every day, the Hoosier Energy economic development team is answering questions.

But Economic Development Manager Jeff Pipkin wasn’t satisfied with questions from member cooperatives, member consumers, or other local government and economic leaders.

Over the past three years, Pipkin has taken classes with the Midwest Community Development Institute and recently answered many more questions to pass the exam to become a Professional Community and Economic Developer.

“It’s always been a professional goal of mine to get a certification,” Pipkin said. “Community development is more focused on the foundation of a community to accept industrial development or economic development. You’re looking at the quality of a place, you’re looking at housing, and you’re looking at developing your government assets so they can work as efficiently as possible while making sure parts of the community are not being left behind.”

That certainly fits with the work Pipkin and fellow Economic Development Manager Jeremy Sowders do. They’re involved in projects that could impact Hoosier Energy and its member cooperatives, as well as the towns and counties in and around those territories.

Pipkin sits on the economic development boards in Lawrence County and Greene County and is the Board President for Radius Indiana, an economic development organization for the eight-county region of Crawford, Daviess, Dubois, Greene, Lawrence, Martin, Orange, and Washington.

Sowders is on the economic development board in Owen County, a board member for the Bloomington Economic Development Corporation, and serves on the boards for the I-74 Business Corridor and Accelerate West Central Indiana Economic Development. He is also an accredited Certified Economic Developer through the International Economic Development Council (IEDC).

“One of our department’s focuses is constantly working with our local economic development organizations within our members’ territory,” Pipkin said. “Our local economic development organizations are contacting us regularly, asking for advice on how to tackle some of the issues they face on a daily basis.”

Those issues range from financing to site development and learning how to take advantage of things like the USDA Rural Economic Development Loan and Grant (REDLG) program. One such approval out of that program is a health clinic in Connorsville, just outside of Whitewater Valley REMC territory but located where it will benefit its members.

“We have a good knowledge of what’s going on in the entirety of Hoosier Energy territory, and we try to work together as much as possible,”
Pipkin said.