Mountain Home continues to develop

The job of developing Mountain Home and bringing both industry and small business growth is a long and drawn out process, with little chance for accolades. Economic development is a job where one project can take years to decades while a staff of two is juggling multiple projects, all with different needs.

The process of bringing industry into the City of Mountain Home or Elmore County requires secrecy of the highest order. Similar to a spy movie, the use of code names are used to protect their chances of attracting a business.

Paula Riggs and Courtney Lewis of the Economic Development Offic, use names such as "project mustard," "project falcon" or "project deuce" to prevent the leaking of actual business names.

It was discovered in other towns and cities that once an interested company name was leaked, real estate prices suddenly doubled,

Riggs said. This type of greed ran off prospective companies that would have brought jobs to those communities.

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From left to right: Courtney Lewis, Billy Richey and Paula Riggs work together on a multitude of development projects to better the City of Mountain Home.