Smarter Decisions Start with Better Data

Economic development is, at a fundamental level, about reducing uncertainty and friction for our businesses and potential investors. When a local company considers expansion, an external investor evaluates our city, or our community leaders prioritize the development or maintenance of infrastructure, they are all asking variations of the same question: Is this a smart, sustainable decision? The strength of the answer depends on the reliability, breadth, and relevance of the data justifying that decision.

That’s why Medicine Hat Economic Development (MHED) is launching a new community data module powered by Cityviz. This expanded platform significantly enhances the accuracy, depth, and accessibility of local information – while introducing interactive mapping and customizable report exports in Word, PDF, PowerPoint, and CSV formats.

This is more than a website enhancement. It is a strategic tool aligned directly with MHED’s core objectives: investment attraction, business retention and expansion, workforce development, investment readiness, and evidence-based decision-making.

Data as a Strategic Asset

Our strategic direction emphasizes being data-driven, industry-validated, and regionally aligned. To execute on that mandate, we must ensure that the information we provide is accessible, defensible, and an accurate reflection of our local economic conditions. Our new data service provides comprehensive datasets spanning key economic and social measures, including:

• Population growth, estimates, and projections (2001–2050)
• Migration trends (interprovincial, non-permanent residents, and more)
• Dependency ratios and demographic structure
• Labour force participation, unemployment, and workforce rates
• Business counts by year, size, and industry (NAICS codes)
• Incorporations and bankruptcies
• Housing starts, tenure, vacancy rates, and affordability indicators
• Education, infrastructure, crime, and social indicators

Each dataset listed above contributes to a clearer understanding of where our community is now and where it is headed in the future. From a strategic perspective, this strengthens our ability to communicate confidently with investors, businesses, and government partners using credible, transparent statistics and proofs. For businesses and investors, this also enables them to explore additional realms of information and use this data to plan ahead.

Investment attraction requires more than a compelling narrative. It requires proof – our new community insights offers that in abundance. For example, population projections through the year 2050 help demonstrate long-term market sustainability and simplify projections for potential investors. Migration data reveals trends in population growth and demonstrates talent flows. Workforce participation rates and class-of-worker data provide insight into labour availability and the smaller, granular structure of our labour pool.

For sectors such as manufacturing, aerospace and defence, agriculture, and energy – all listed as priority industries within our long-term economic development strategy – this level of detail strengthens site selection conversations. Investors can examine not just current conditions, but forward-looking trends.

It’s not just about the availability of this data – it’s how it is delivered. With this new platform, stakeholders can generate customized reports in professional formats, further enhancing accessibility and responsiveness. Instead of manually compiling information for a variety of sources, tailor-made investment packages can now be produced directly from our website, ensuring that inquiries are met with timely, data-backed responses. In a competitive environment, speed and credibility are key differentiators. Our new insights platform enhances both.

Supporting Business Retention and Expansion

While attracting new investment is important, supporting existing businesses is equally important for sustained economic growth. By providing a central repository for economically relevant data and information, we reinforce our commitment to our responsive service delivery model. Conversations with businesses and investors become more directed, impactful, and strategic, instead of reactive.

This aligns directly with the objective of supporting local industry with practical, actionable tools. There are new primary areas where this new economic insight platform will help:

• Understanding economic statistics like business counts and shifts in business distribution provides early insight into ecosystem health while workforce trends – including commuting patterns, place of work, and work-from-home data – inform discussions around the city’s labour mobility and talent retention.
• Housing indicators such as affordability, vacancy rates, and ownership trends play a direct role in workforce attraction and retention. Employers evaluating expansion often consider whether incoming staff will find attractive, affordable, and attainable housing with reasonable commute times to a potential new location. This data platform now allows those conversations to be grounded in objective reality.

One of MHED’s strategic priorities is talent attraction and workforce alignment. Long-term demographic projections and dependency ratios provide critical context for this work. This also helps answer key questions such as:

• Are we aging? Is the working-age population growing or contracting?
• How are migration patterns shaping labour supply?
• Are there gaps (projected or actual) in our talent pool?

Meanwhile, education indicators, participation rates, and class-of-worker data add additional depth. When paired with measures of housing and affordability, these statistics paint a comprehensive picture of the Medicine Hat’s competitiveness in attracting and retaining skilled professionals.

This shows that workforce development cannot occur in isolation. It intersects (by necessity) with housing, transportation, education systems, and social and economic supports. By bringing these datasets together in one accessible platform, our new data module supports integrated, long-term planning. It ensures that workforce strategies are grounded in evidence rather than assumption.

Data That Moves at the Speed of Modern Business

A defining feature of the module is its usability and regular data updates (with email notifications, no less!). Medicine Hat’s business community can now access and create built-in, customizable reports, which can then be exported in Word, PDF, PowerPoint, or CSV formats. This new feature will allow our local businesses and external users to integrate verified data directly into presentations, proposals, or internal analyses for a variety of purposes.

This function transforms the data we offer from static – potentially stale – information into an operational tool. For us here at Medicine Hat Economic Development, it means we’ll be able to quickly respond to business inquiries and site selectors. For our local businesses, it means easily accessing datasets for market analysis and exporting them into their preferred format. For our other stakeholders, partners, and community organizations, it means incorporating consistent, reliable data and statistics into their funding applications and advocacy materials.