Research center deals with all stages of business

Published August 2004
By Olivia Burley, olivab@burleygroup.com
Pensacola Business Journal

Rick Harper Title: Director of the University of West Florida Haas Center for Business Research and Economic Development; professor of Economics. Age: 47. Birthplace: Pennsylvania. Education: Bachelor of arts degree in Spanish and economics from Gilford College in Greensboro, N.C.; master of arts degree in economics from Duke University; doctorate in economics from Duke University. What brought you to Pensacola? "I came here in 1989 after graduate school at Duke. This was my first job after graduate school." Harper turned in his dissertation revisions on Aug. 9 and arrived in Pensacola on Aug. 11. That first position was a professor in the economics department at the University of West Florida, which he maintains today. What do you enjoy most about being a professor of economics? "Autonomy, flexibility and working with students. It's a tremendous feeling to realize that you made a difference in some student's life in the way that they approach what they're going to do in the future." What do you enjoy most about being the director of the Haas Center? "The reward of being at the Haas Center is that you do have this deep understanding of what drives our region economically, why it's special, where it's likely to go. Also, it's very rewarding to think that in some small way, you can help economic development in the community. You can help improve people's economic quality of life by pointing out things that are working well, things that remain to be done and strategies that might be pursued. The gratifying thing about it is good relationships and helping build public understanding of the way economic life works the way it does. What is your economic philosophy? "I'm much more oriented toward the view that it is private enterprise that creates value in the economy. Any time you look at a situation where you're considering public policy, I think you have to look first at the role of the marketplace. I think that any student of economics has to recognize that, first and foremost, it's the private sector and people's individual initiative that creates value and creates opportunity in the economy. Having said that, I think there's important places where the private sector doesn't do a good enough job and where there's a need for government intervention." Harper cites education, national defense and pollution as examples. What are your personal interests? "I love to travel. I've been able to do a lot of traveling over the last couple of years." Harper also is an avid tennis player and enjoys hiking.

This August, Rick Harper will reprise his role as director of the Haas Center for Business Research and Economic Development.

He took a break from the position after a five-year stint that began in 1997. In 2003, Ed Ranelli, dean of the College of Business, asked him to return.Harper has been with the University of West Florida since 1989, serving as an economics professor and mentor to undergraduate and graduate students.

Rather than serving an academic function, the Haas Center exists as an outreach department, collecting, analyzing and distributing data to clients throughout Northwest Florida.

The Haas Center specializes in data analysis for economic forecasting, marketing research, business expansion, tourism and real estate development as well as industry and academic studies. The Haas Center publishes a quarterly newsletter, Northwest Florida Economy, as well as a tourism resource Web site with information on Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa, Walton and Bay counties.

In addition to state money, other funding sources include private donations as well as grant and contract funding. Raymond Haas was a major contributor and is the namesake of the Haas Center for Business Research and Economic Development.

“About 40 percent of our funding is state line-item funding in the budget which the taxpayers funded, and we’ve probably received about 60 percent of our funding as grant and contract funding from local, state and federal sources,” Harper said.

The Haas Center contracts to provide large-scale research, database and Web development projects. Because the center is state funded, the department provides basic data services for free to the public.

“People have paid for those with their tax dollars,” Harper says. That means Northwest Florida businesses can call upon the Haas Center for economic and business-related questions and receive free assistance. The Haas Center limits each instance to four hours of free help but places no limit on the number of times a business may utilize the service. Harper estimates that the Haas Center handles between 800 and 1,000 information requests each year.

Rather than particular industries or company sizes, the businesses that utilize the Haas Center fall into three stages of development:

• Start-up businesses that are looking for feasibility studies.
  
  “We work a lot with the Small Business Development Center as new business start-up clients move through the SBDC process,” Harper said.
  
  
• Established businesses. One example for research assistance is when such a business is considering an expansion. “It’s generally when they’re thinking about a change in their operation. (The client asks,) ‘Will the market support a greater level of operations, or am I as big as I can get in this location already?’ ” Harper said. Established businesses are looking for information about the competition as well as changes in industry sales.
  
  
• Subsidiary companies with regional or national headquarters outside of the area.
  
  “We get lots of calls from subsidiary companies who will say things like, ‘Our VP is coming into town next week and wants to know why this market is different from South Florida,’ ” Harper said.

  “So we get them at all stages, and I generally think it’s not the size of the business but it’s the timeframe. Are they just starting? Are they mature? Are they thinking of expansion? That’s when they come to us for additional information — when they’re scratching their heads, thinking, ‘How do I make this decision?’ ” Harper said.

  “Having one of the 11 campuses of the state university system in Pensacola is a great benefit because … for every dollar that a local student brings and pays in tuition, that pulls in four more dollars. The university spends over $100 million in the community every year. The Haas Center’s Pensacola location is a good thing because it lets entities which are involved in economic development (such as Florida’s Great Northwest) or the hospitals or the military have a ready inexpensive source of credible information,” Harper said. He noted that information can serve many functions, including attracting new businesses, educating people about the importance of their economic sector and serving as a tool to analyze the impact of laws or changes.

  Although Harper is proud of the role the Haas Center plays in the region, he feels the department has even more to contribute to Northwest Florida.
  “I’d like to see some of the economic analysis functions expanded. We should be doing more in terms of the economic outlook, publishing information about what drives our economy, where the opportunities are, where the threats are,” he said.