On Tuesday October 30th, Saugeen Connects and the Newcomer Centre of Peel, hosted an Investor Tour to five local municipalities. This tour brought 30 potential Investors into our area where we had an opportunity to showcase our communities and to present to them a variety of local Investment opportunities. The tour arrived in Mount Forest at 10:00am where they were welcomed by the Mayors of Wellington North & Minto and then travelled to Hanover where the Mayors from West Grey, Hanover and Brockton welcomed the group. Investment opportunities were presented to the group by the municipalities Economic Development personnel. Participants then toured the region, including Durham, Walkerton and Palmerston, stopping at a number of businesses and investment opportunities along the way to see them first hand and to speak with local business owners. “Attracting new investment into our community is a requirement for all small rural communities and it is important that we try innovative new ways to attract investment. We are hopeful this partnership with the Peel Newcomer Centre will translate into new investment” said Rose Austin General Manager of the Saugeen Economic Development Corporation “and certainly everyone involved in the day considered it to be a huge success.” One of the investor’s provided the following testimonial. “I had a wonderful experience during the trip. It was amazing to visit the country side, meet with the town personnel and the Mayor’s and learn about exciting opportunities available at these locations. I would also like to take this opportunity to extend my thanks to the Town’s personnel for their time and efforts to host us and showcasing some alternatives to live beyond city life. We as newcomers get stuck in the place of our initial arrival, and often only get to visit places of tourist attractions. I believe that such trips should be conducted more often to help newcomers experience the diverse culture habitation and available opportunities out of big cities to explore and make it our home.” The Newcomer Centre of Peel will be completing a survey with the investors in order to obtain their feedback. Discussions are currently underway for the next tour to be an “employment” tour in an effort to attract new workers into our communities. Saugeen Connect is a partnership with the Saugeen Economic Development Corporation, Town of Minto, Town of Hanover, Municipality of West Grey, Municipality of Brockton and the Township of Wellington North. The mission is to collaborate and positively impact area economic growth; support youth retention and development; support growth and retention of businesses; and to integrate efforts to leverage immigrant attraction to the area as residents, workers, entrepreneurs, business owners, operators and investors. For more information about the Investor Tour or any other Saugeen Connects program please contact the Economic Development Office at one of the partnering Municipalities or go to www.SaugeenConnects.com. The Rural Economic Development (RED) program provided funding towards the Saugeen Connects Project