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Rancho Cordova Easing Pathway For New Businesses, Offers Assistance And Loans

RANCHO CORDOVA (CBS13) — It has been said, "if you build it — they will come." That's the approach the city of Rancho Cordova has taken in terms of business development.

The city is aggressive and progressive when it comes to bringing in business — providing a liaison in the economic development office to help walk businesses through the process and offering $10 million in business loans. But the owner of Burning Barrel opted to use his life savings to fund this project.

"This is our brewhouse," said Jack Alexander as he showed us around.

He is pretty proud of the family business. Alexander had been brewing for decades before he and his son decided to open Burning Barrel Brewery.

"We started the project two years ago full time all in," he said.

That's when he quit his job. Initially, they had tried to open in Downtown Sacramento.

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"We needed a special use permit. And you basically got in the back of the line... in Sac, it was a very long line," said Alexander.

He said the process dragged on and on.

"We were just another business and Rancho Cordova was actively recruiting, so we looked into it," Alexander said.

So they decided to tap into what Rancho Cordova has to offer, working with an advocate from the economic development office.

"They helped smooth out any road bumps, helped you understand the process and know of grant monies available to different types of things."

The city has seen tremendous growth. Right now there are 65,000 local jobs in a city with a population of 74,000. Many of those jobs are from companies who have relocated.

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Ashley Downton with the city of Rancho Cordova said, "One of the businesses is Centene, which added 1,500 jobs to our city, and is the largest office space lease in the entire Sac region."

With good schools and a central location, the applicants are pouring in.

"We put out a job ad for beer tenders and we had 250 applicants for 8 spots," said Alexander.

Alexander said the city even had representatives at the California Brewers Craft Association actively recruiting for this barrel district.

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