Half Moon Bay votes to extend Opportunity Center

The project was lauded by employees and residents at the meeting as an extremely successful initiative, serving 122 clients, placing 15 individuals in jobs and engaging eight startups, all prototyping, market-ready or market-engaged, with two negotiating multimillion dollar contracts. 

“When our residents have access to workforce development and good jobs, they are in a better position to afford our astronomical housing and gas prices in our region,” Karen Decker, Economic and Community Vitality manager, said. “If we can create conditions for small businesses to thrive, they create local jobs which creates general sales tax hotel tax.”

Alongside the business incubator and job seeker services, the center also hosts the Chamber of Commerce as well as small business support through Renaissance. 

It’s located at 637 Main St., and the new location has drawn business owners, residents and visitors through the doors, Chamber of Commerce President Krystlyn Giedt said. 

“Why this matters is our community hasn’t had a group of organizations in the same house so dedicated to their success,” she said. 

The city is considering options for moving forward with the Opportunity Center once grant funding runs dry, Decker said. Coastside Venture — which focuses on agricultural technology, water technology and built environment-focused startups — is making progress on that front, said Eric Vettel, president of the American Energy Society, which runs the incubator. 

“Consistent with your vision to spin out a self-sustaining financially independent venture studio that continues to offer economic benefits to Half Moon Bay and the coastside, we have secured a verbal expression of interest to fund the Coastside Venture studio in 2026 and going forward,” he said. “I am very pleased we are being looked at as a textbook example of an ideal private-public partnership.” 

JobTrain has also been a success for residents thus far, enrolling nearly 60 people and speaking to 33 employers. They offer career training in five different sectors, including hospitality training and digital skills, and are working on programming unique to the coastside. 

“JobTrain is not about helping people get a job, it’s a means to an end. Our goal is to help people step onto the path of economic mobility so they can begin, for the rest of their life, growing economically,” CEO Barrie Hathaway said. 

Renaissance has also experienced success as part of the opportunity center, working with 63 clients — a third of which are existing business owners. 

One such Renaissance client is Rosalva Mendez, who testified during the meeting that their support and programming helped her as she navigated her business dreams with caring for a teenage daughter in the hospital. 

“I had my own plans to have a business, because I’m the only breadwinner in my family. I would have to describe that this Renaissance resource is like a hope in my life,” she said. “In my own personal life, it had a major impact and it’s also empowered me to continue on.” 

Councilmembers also expressed excitement for the Opportunity Center to continue. 

“This is a wise investment in the future,” Councilmember Robert Brownstone said. “There’s risky investments and there’s well-thought-out, smart investments. And when I hear all the things going on in this Opportunity Center, and the potential … that’s pretty incredible what we’re doing here, for a small city.”