Huron County's Director of Economic Development says fairly early in the current pandemic, his department identified six indicators they would like to see that would suggest we might be returning to something close to normal.
Cody Joudry outlines those indicators as seeing unemployment rates back at historical norms.
"Our unemployment rate in Bruce, Brey, Huron and Perth is almost nine and a half per cent. Provincially it's around twelve and both of those numbers are still ticking upwards. Last year our numbers would have been 3, 4 or 5%," said Joudry.
They'd like to see commercial and industrial vacancy rates closer to normal and the same number of people in business.
"That commercial and industrial vacancy rates are on par with traditional trends. They go up and down in different communities, but if those numbers are about what they were before then we would be in good shape and that there are close to the same number of people in business as were in the recent past," added Joudry.
And for residents, he says that would mean people reporting they plan to make discretionary purchases into the near future.
"So residents widely report that they plan to make discretionary purchases into the near future. A large portion of our economy depends on that discretionary spending. And then the other one is that residents report their financial outlook is stable without emergency government support."
Joudry says when we can check all of those boxes we would probably be in a strong economic recovery position.
