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Businesses won't look at city until it grows
"Why can't we get another big name restaurant?"
"Why don't we have a large shoe store here?"
They're arguments that Paula Riggs hears all too often. As the head of Mountain Home's economic development office, she knows the answer to these and similar questions.
It all comes down to the numbers. In terms of population, Mountain Home and Elmore County are simply too small to meet those firm's criteria.
To bring in a nationally recognized restaurant chain, the city needs at least 20,000 people or an equal amount of vehicle traffic. To encourage a big-name shoe store to come here, that population figure jumps to 100,000 people within a five-mile radius of the store's intended location.
According to one head count, the county only has 30,000 people with 11,000 of them living in Mountain Home.
It's not even close.
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