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When BusinessWeek named 20 cities most likely to be hit hard by the economic crisis, it was a shock to see West Des Moines and Urbandale on the list.

It’s tempting to attribute the whole thing to an editor who simply looked at the percentage of employees in the financial and real estate industries and didn’t evaluate any other factors. But we do have some problems to stare down.

It’s not just the steadily spreading effects of the national and global credit crunch. We’ve seen some questionable financing actions of our own. Regency Homes took out loans all over town; when its business plan fell apart, the pain spread widely. The borrowing methods apparently employed by the late Ed Boesen expose lending standards that seem almost laughable.

So it’s time to switch our mindset from “we’re different, and we’re insulated from the crisis” to “we have more trouble to unearth, and we need to make some changes here, too.”

We’ve boasted about our status as a financial center in recent years. Unfortunately, no one anywhere is predicting a quick turnaround for that sector, and some observers are talking about a long, excruciatingly slow comeback like the one experienced by Japan after its economic crash.

Investment experts have long advised individual investors to diversify. The same advice might apply to regions.

We have had success in luring companies of all kinds to come here for the ease of doing business, the low costs and, frankly, the easy incentive money from a region that knows it has to pay extra to play.

This is no time to sit back and wait for the economy to turn around. Some companies and entrepreneurs will be wiped out before this is all over, but many more will be looking for ways to retrench with a more workable business model.

Des Moines, West Des Moines, Urbandale and the rest of Central Iowa have a lot to offer to that crowd.