Business View Magazine | March 2018

142 finery located there is the largest in the United States. The Covestromanufacturing site is their largest in North and Central America,producing a varietyof high- tech polymer materials,and the Cedar Bayou plant,in operation since 1963,is Chevron Phillips Chemical’s largest manufacturing site in the United States. According toMayor StephenDonCarlos,the avail- abilityof relativelycheap natural gas over the last several years has allowed several of thosemajor manufacturing facilities to undergomulti-billion dollar expansions.“The petrochemical complexes are taking advantage of cheap natural gas prices to expand their plastics-making facilities,”he reports.“It’s led to over 20,000 construction jobs over the last three years, and,based on the companies’estimates,somewhere around five to ten thousand permanent jobs in our city. BAYTOWN, TEXAS STEPHEN DONCARLOS MAYOR NICK WOOLERY DIRECTOR OF STRATEGY & INNOVATION RICK DAVIS CITY MANAGER When we saw all this growth happening, we knew there was going to be some pretty significant opportunities for us to make improve- ments in the community. So we endeavored to do our first, real, true community-based strategic plan. Instead of just getting all this new revenue in and sitting in a roomwith City Council and staff and decid- ing where to spend the money, we went out and engaged the commu- nity to find out what they wanted to see. NICK WOOLERY DIRECTOR OF STRATEGY & INNOVATION