Heartland Forward pulls Findlay offer after criticism

FINDLAY — A proposal for Findlay to join Heartland Forward's national "30 by 2030" initiative fell apart last week, with Findlay Council pulling the ordinance from its agenda on Tuesday. In a letter dated Feb. 26, Mayor Christina Muryn told council that Heartland Forward had withdrawn its invitation earlier that week, saying the organization pulled out because of "negativity that was unfoundedly directed towards their organization" from the public response in Findlay. The removal came two weeks after council postponed final approval of the agreement, saying residents needed more time to understand the program. On Feb. 17, Heartland Forward staff spent about an hour with council members in committee answering questions about data dashboards, how information would be managed, and how much control the city would have over future reports. In regular session later that day, council then voted 8-1 to postpone the decision until Tuesday's meeting, with Councilman BJ Preston, R-2, casting the lone "no" vote and Councilwoman Carol Smith, R-3, absent. Heartland Forward is an economic development "think-and-do tank" based in Bentonville, Arkansas. The group works with cities to build data dashboards and analyze local economic conditions. Findlay's proposal called for a multi-year partnership costing about $7,500 a year and would have placed the city among the first five communities in the country to join the initiative. But in the days leading up to the postponement, residents began raising questions online about cost, data use and how quickly the proposal was moving. Several council members also expressed concerns about approving a multi-year agreement tied to emergency language, saying the city needed more time and a more public process. Muryn defended the agreement, writing that the partnership would have given Findlay access to economic tools and research assistance "worth tens of thousands of dollars." She said the project was budgeted within her office to avoid concerns about outside influence and emphasized that the group approached Findlay directly because of its economic performance. Tuesday's agenda included more criticism of Heartland Forward from city residents. Ken Silvers, Ward 4, wrote that Findlay already has access to much of the data the foundation proposed to provide and questioned why the city should "pay for outside analysis we don't need," saying the partnership felt rushed and poorly explained. Another Ward 4 resident, Mark Thomas, warned that the agreement lacked transparency and raised concerns about committing public dollars to a multi-year program; he said the public had little time to review. Patty Klein, Ward 3, focused on the broader mission of Heartland Forward, writing that the group's multi-state economic strategy was "not a Findlay-first approach" and cautioning that the partnership risked turning the city into "a testing ground for regional economic engineering." Muryn said the withdrawn offer should serve as a warning about how quickly public commentary can alter outside perceptions of the city. "We must all realize that the things said online have a real-world impact," she wrote, adding that "opportunities in our near future are watching."