Nassau hires consulting firm to develop 'economic portrait' of the county after the pandemic

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County Executive Laura Curran stood Thursday on the steps of the Executive and Legislative Building in Mineola with the two heads of Nassau's Coronavirus Economic Advisory Council — Industrial Development Agency Chairman Richard Kessel and Hofstra University President Stuart Rabinowitz —to announce results of a weeklong survey to assess the state of local business amid the coronavirus outbreak.

The news were grim.

The county received 1,431 responses to the survey, Curran said. Many businesses said they have or would need to lay off workers. Half predicted no profit for the year. And 80 percent said they would need loans to sustain their businesses.

"It's pain now, and we know it's going to be pain down the road," the county executive said.

Nassau, she said, has hired HR&A Advisors, a real estate and economic advisory firm based in New York City, to develop an "economic portrait" of the county before and after the crisis. From there, the firm can create models of the county's potential economic state in order to prove future need for federal and state aid.

Curran said she was "incredibly grateful for the help received by the state and federal government."

But, she noted, "we will need more."

She also said she would work closely with Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone on a regional plan for future economic development after the medical crisis has abated.