While some understandably say the County’s economic decline has slowly happened over the last 50 years, the statistical evidence proves our economic collapse is much more recent.
Anecdotally it is true that Chautauqua County began losing manufacturing, often to the non-union South, 50 years ago in the 1970s. But those losses were significantly offset by the arrival of Cummins Engine in 1974, with Joe Gerace as Chair of the County Legislature and the first time in Chautauqua County history that Democrats controlled the County legislative body. Cummins’ arrival ultimately led to at least 1,000 jobs to this very date.
The 1970s and early 1980s saw other significant advances in economic development. County leaders volunteered to do very hard things. County government led the way to create County sewer districts around Chautauqua Lake (when the lakefront…
