Mar. 22—Frederick County Executive Jessica Fitzwater on Wednesday announced the appointment of a new director for the county Office of Economic Development.

Lara Fritts will take over for Acting Director Jodie Bollinger on April 3, according to a county press release. Fritts will serve in the acting capacity until she is confirmed by the Frederick County Council.

Bollinger was appointed to the position after the previous permanent director, Helen Propheter, spent 12 years as the department's head and retired last June.

Fritts, 51, most recently served as the CEO for Community Development Inc., an Annapolis-based real estate development company that specializes in building affordable housing options for the D.C. area.

Her salary with Frederick County will be $185,000, according to county spokeswoman Vivian Laxton.

In an interview on Wednesday afternoon, Fritts described what she hopes to bring to the role and how her past experiences in the public and private sectors will inform her approach.

Before entering the private sector in Annapolis, Fritts spent three years in Salt Lake City, where she started the city's Department of Economic Development for then-Mayor Jackie Biskupski.

Fritts held similar roles in regional municipalities, including a stint in Rockville during the late 1990s, where she sowed the seeds for its own economic development organization focused on bolstering public-private partnerships, and with Annapolis city government, initiating a similar venture in the early 2010s.

In each of those roles, Fritts said, she specialized in guiding local businesses to achieve goals in employee recruitment and retention, with broader aims to expand businesses and improve relationships between them and their surrounding communities.

Her role in Frederick County will be one of the first in which she's not helping to build an economic development program from the ground up.

"I'm looking forward to leading a well-established, highly regarded economic development program," Fritts said.

Fritts recognized the budding industries Frederick County hosts in technology and life sciences and said she would work to continue growing opportunities for workforce development in those areas.

New workers will need affordable housing, Fritts said.

"Traditionally, economic development has been the recruiting and retaining and expansion of existing companies," Fritts said. "But now, companies are saying that workforce is really important. ... Along with that is, 'Can my workforce afford to live in that community?' "

The county's agricultural community and the small businesses associated with agriculture, like agritourism and craft beverages, are other areas that Fritts said the county can continue to grow.

Fritts promised to continue support for local minority business leaders, following the initiatives of Propheter, who launched the EmPOWER program that provides networking and mentoring for minority business leaders.

"I am confident with Lara in this role, Frederick County's diverse and growing economy will continue to flourish and thrive," Fitzwater said in a statement.

Fritts grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin. She received a bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, and a master's degree in urban studies from the university system's Milwaukee school.

She's come to love Maryland and its proximity to both the ocean and the mountains.

"I am two hours from everything I could possibly need or want," Fritts said. "I love the Maryland spirit, that the local, county and state economic development programs work closely together to bring forward opportunity."