‘I tend to be an optimistic guy’

In October, the Dallas Regional Chamber named a new incoming president and CEO: Brad Cheves, a longtime Southern Methodist University executive who had recently led the university through a record-setting fundraising round.

The 63-year-old New Mexico native with deep Dallas ties officially assumed leadership of North Texas’ largest business group earlier this month. The Dallas Morning News joined him in the chamber’s 26th-floor office on Akard Street to talk about the future of downtown, Y’all Street and (briefly) Mustangs football.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

So I guess you’ve been in this job, what, a couple of weeks?

Yeah, this is the 12th day, business day.

Anything surprise you this early?

I don’t know that there’s a surprise — if anything maybe I underestimated what the opportunity was. What we’re seeing and what I’m now learning are the interests of companies that still look to Dallas and the Dallas region for HQs. [That’s] something that I’m very excited about.

You’re already getting a sense from companies still looking to move here — that trend is still in play?

100 percent. And in all the areas you would expect. Financial services continues to be a very strong area. I think the life sciences area, and then advanced manufacturing. There’s some impressive conversations going on in that area in the region as well. So it’s diversified — that’s one of the strengths.

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Can you give me a sense of your priorities? You’re new in the role, but you’ve become sort of the face of the regional business community.

Well look, I mean in the early days it’s listening and learning. I need to really understand the needs of our membership and our business, our board and our executive committee, and where they see the important priorities. But there’s no doubt that it’s people and quality of life. And we want the entire region to grow and for all to be a part of that prosperity.

I really wanted to ask you about downtown. Obviously you saw AT&T announced they’re leaving. And it seems like we have this more obvious struggle [with] the downtown core, different companies leaving, and big questions about the future. What’s your read on the situation? What does a healthy Downtown Dallas look like?

Well, urban cores evolve, and we’ve seen that here in Dallas. There was a time when there wasn’t an arts district, and now it’s a vital component. We’ve seen where there was not the kind of residential living and learning in downtown that there is now. And because of that, I think that what has emerged out of AT&T’s decision is exactly what the mayor and the city manager said, that it’s an opportunity to envision what the next chapter and the next opportunities are for this urban core.

But we need only see right here: Goldman has doubled down on what we have right here, Scotiabank is — you can look out that window and see what they’re doing. And so there’s going to be an evolution of this, of the urban core. And I think what any chamber can do is partner with all of our leaders, business and others, to envision [the future].

You sound pretty optimistic. I know that’s your job.

I tend to be an optimistic guy.

But it’s a huge blow, right? To lose AT&T downtown. I guess, what does it mean for the future of D-FW, if you have a weaker downtown? Other parts of the region are thriving, but [there’s] this kind of dichotomy of downtown and the suburbs.

Yeah — I don’t think one corporate relocation is going to be a verdict on the future of downtown or the urban core. It’s just not. What that means is now that opportunity is opening up, and it’s not as if we’re adrift. It could actually be an opportunity that opens up a lot of conversations on the broader context, and that’s a good thing.

And by the way, this chamber, many many years ago, was involved in attracting AT&T here, and there’s not many regions that can claim that they can grow and evolve with one of the top corporations in the country and still keep them in the region. And so our neighbors, and the jobs that are part of AT&T, ironically are moving to exactly where Ross Perot identified a node of potential business 40 years ago. And that in some ways — it’s just the next generation. It’s not as if it’s a final verdict on our future. It’s probably a lift off to our future.

Does it mean that sort of the epicenter or the center of business in North Texas is shifting, too? It seems almost like Plano or Collin County is kind of more the center now.

Nah, nah. I mean, we have nodes of activity, whether it’s energy or economic or cultural nodes that are across all of this region. Plano didn’t just start. It’s been there since it was a farm that emerged with a company called EDS. [Perot’s company, Electronic Data Systems, moved from Dallas to Plano in 1985.] So none of this is new. No one would say that what Mr. Perot envisioned somehow hurt the Dallas region. It actually helped the Dallas region. And maybe what AT&T’s doing could in a broader sense — nothing’s been abandoned. It’s actually growing, evolving and moving into the future. Our urban core can do exactly the same thing.

On a different note: Y’all Street. A lot of news, a lot of excitement, right? Talk to me about how you see that evolving. And financial services more broadly in Dallas. What does it mean for this region?

It’s already been a huge benefit, right? The jobs that have come here, the capital improvements that are taking place as a result of Scotia and Goldman, Charles Schwab a little farther out. All of this is starting to send a signal to the country that we’re open for business and we’re open for financial services business. And then you have the ripple effect of all the industries that are a part of that.

Where do you see it going?

I mean, one might say we’re only limited by our imagination of the good that can be done from it. And so if you think of it this way, as this starts to coalesce into this region and maybe away from other regions, this becomes the place to be. And if you’re not headquartered here, you maybe have an HQ2 here, because there is so much activity that you don’t want to not be a player in that.

And the state of Texas has supported that. The voters of Texas passed constitutional amendments that made it very clear this is a welcome industry in this state, and that in and of itself sends a huge message to the stability and the continuity that businesses are going to look for as they start to make long-term plans.

There’s so much going on — tariffs, the Federal Reserve, interest rates, housing. How much do you sort of see the local business community being able to drive the fate of the economy here compared to global events or macroeconomic events?

We have influence in the types of global companies we attract here. We have influence in how we support that and their employee base. And we have some influence over the public policy that will continue to nurture that. There’s certain things that are out of our control, and if certain things were to go negative, my experience — particularly in the last few years — in this region is that maybe if some things go down, they don’t go down as much for us. And when they go up, they seem to go up more for us.

And so we are in a unique ecosystem that has the ability to weather some of these storms that come that are not of our making but we all get impacted by. And that’s part of being in a country. But if you’re going to weather it, I’d rather weather it here in North Texas than I would anywhere else.

What kinds of things are you anticipating will impact the economy this year? What keeps you up at night, maybe is a better way to say this. In terms of thinking about the regional economy.

No, I come to this with a real sense of confidence, so it’s not as if I go home and worry. If there’s anything that I want to make sure that we do [it’s] that we expand our ability to be a voice and an influence over this incredible momentum that we have. And so what I’d like to make sure that we do is that we look at all the areas, whether it’s policy or our initiatives and the quality of life, how we reach out across all of North Texas, including looking to the southern county, and what do we do to make sure that this incredible vitality is shared by all people in this region. I want to make sure is that we as a team, as a Dallas Regional Chamber of Commerce team — staff, board, executive committee — are moving forward with one voice together. And that includes all of the quality of life things, making sure that we have the right voice on transportation, the right voice on water, the right voice on the grid, right voice on the things that allow families to have parks and leisure and opportunities to come here and to raise their family here.

Another quality of life issue — it seems like the whole country really is talking about affordability these days. And Dallas, too. What are you hearing from the business community on that? Is it affecting corporate bottom lines?

Well, we certainly — in terms of housing affordability we rank very well against Westchester County [New York] and Rye and places like that.

I moved from L.A., so yeah, I get it.

And I moved here from California, and I can tell you — it was a long time ago and we still rank in a better light than some of those folks.

But not — I mean, Dallas is not as cheap as it used to be.

No no, but if you’re a homeowner aren’t you glad that the value of your house has gone up? If you’re coming in, you want to be able to buy, and you know it’s more expensive, but the reality is that we need to all be aware of that and we need to all be able to say, ‘What is it that’s driving this and where are there opportunities for that affordability in all of the region?’ I mean, yeah, we’ve gone way north and we’re seeing growth to the east and to the west, and I think you’re going to start to see opportunity as it relates to the southern county and beyond.

And so affordability is something we have to watch, but if you were to really look at the stats we’re not wildly out of range from the competing cities that are in the hunt for other HQs. We’re actually competitive if you were to look at some of those cities.

On a business level, or a corporate attraction level, it’s not damaging Dallas at this point.

No. It’s not. You got to watch it, and it’s maybe not what it once was, but maybe to some [companies] that are looking for relocation, we’re still a place [where] you can have the affordable housing that you would want.

Last question: What do you like to do for fun? What are your hobbies?

I like to run. I’m very into CorePower right now, a thing I’ve been doing since COVID, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. And then my best fun is with my family, my wife and our adult sons. One’s graduating from SMU this coming May. He’s going to be graduating as a sports management major — Keaton’s been a walk-on football player for four years. He was part of this incredible run up there.

It’s been a good time to be an SMU fan.

Well, I’m not going to give that up. I’m going to be at basketball and football games. It doesn’t mean I don’t love all of our members in higher education, but there’s only one Division I basketball and football team that’s sitting right here in my own backyard.