Manassas Next recognizes Economic Development as second in importance only to schools in our pursuit of success in the future. The job of the City is to make the ground fertile for Economic Development. We achieve this by polishing our image, working with the private sector to attract the businesses we want and conveying to the wide world that we are a well-run organization. Image is crucial and we need to ensure that our every success is in the media.

However, Economic Development is also about retaining and attracting citizens. If the government is not successful in working with our private and public partners to deliver the type and quality of commerce that citizens want, they will leave. If citizens start to leave, we will not be able to attract quality retail no matter what we do. In short, we need to keep moving forward.