Posted by Terri Lester
The U. S. Department of Commerce, Economic Development Administration (EDA) recently released their Fiscal Year 2007 Annual Report which addresses the performance goals and measures for the various EDA program investments made during that time frame. The document is available here.
According to well-known columnist Neal Peirce ("Citistates")the discourse on the nation's crumbling infrastructure is beginning to heat up, with pressure coming from Governors of some of the most populous states (California, Pennsylvania and New York), planning groups such as the supporters of the America 2050 initiative, as well as politicians and investment bankers.
In fact, just about anyone can see that what is needed is a pro-active policy towards infrastructure development and maintenance, rather than a reactive, "fix it when it breaks" approach. Technology today offers advantages such as road surfaces that deaden the sound of traffic, sidewalk and parking area surfaces that allow rainwater to pass through into the aquifers, "smart" roads, new options for mass transit and on and on. Yet as Peirce describes it, the Federal role in assisting states and localities to vamp up their infrastructure and take advantage of these advances has grown steadily smaller. It's something that we all need to think about. Go here to find out what Neal Peirce thinks.
The West Michigan WIRED region has launched a new Web portal designed to provide more access to the region's intellectual property. (WIRED stands for Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development, an innovative program by the US Department of Labor. We have our own WIRED region in North Central Indiana. Learn more by visiting our Indiana WIRED web site.)
The West Michigan Web portal tackles a difficult problem of how to capitalize on underutilized intellectual property. You can read more about the project here.
You can visit the web site here.
Healthy populations and access to health care services are important factors influencing economic development and prosperity. Since geographic access is an essential feature of an overall health system, it is important for health service researchers to develop accurate measures of physical access to health. In their research, authors develop a series of gravity-based health care accessibility measures for all the counties in Indiana. The research paper can be found here.
The U. S. Department of Commerce just issued an important report on how to improve the measurement of innovation in the economy. The committee that put the report together defines innovation as, "The design, invention, development and/or implementation of new or altered products, services, processes, systems, organizational structures, or business models for the purpose of creating new value for customers and financial returns for the firm." For more information about this report go here.
Here is an interesting "working paper" from the Carnegie Mellon Center for Economic Development. It takes a look at the correlation between metropolitan fragmentation (how many units of government there are in a region) and economic competitiveness (average wages). Guess what. More units of government typically means a region is less competitive. Guess what else. It looks like the Midwest has regions that are more fragmented then other parts of the U.S. There is no date on the working paper but it seems to be a bit old (uses data from 1972-2000). Nice little analytical model, though.
Below are some of Richard Florida's thoughts about the role of the university in the Creative Economy. This is excerpted from his Creative Compact.
Universities are the hubs of the Creative Economy. America's strong university system is the source of much of our best scientific, social, and creative leadership. To this point, though, our modern conception of what universities could or should be has been somewhat limited. The tendency to see universities primarily as the laboratories of new research and technology has grown particularly acute in the last 20 years. They do indeed serve our society as technological and scientific laboratories and amazingly productive ones. But they are much more than that.
Universities also do a remarkable job of fostering the other 2 T's of economic growth: talent and tolerance. On the one hand, they are undeniably our strongest talent magnets, attracting (as we've seen in previous chapters) the best and brightest to our shores. They are the Ellis Islands of the creative age. A huge percentage of the high-tech entrepreneurs that power places like Silicon Valley, Austin, Texas, and the Research Triangle came here originally to attend graduate school. Not surprisingly, almost all of our leading creative regions have one or more great universities.
Higher education institutions are also the community entities that, perhaps more than any other, have opened up city after city and college town after college town to the world. In this respect, they are bastions and breeders of tolerance. A university, with its tendency towards openness to ideas, people, and practices not always considered mainstream, is a natural source of diversity ethnic, socioeconomic, and cultural.
Universities and colleges also serve as key building blocks around which older cities like Cleveland and Pittsburgh can rebuild. Whenever I am asked how to save Detroit's economy, my answer is the same: Ann Arbor - the future of the Detroit region in the creative age lies more with the technology, talent, and tolerance engine that is Ann Arbor than in stadiums and a refurbished Renaissance center.
The December 2007 issue of Economic Development America is just out, and features an article by the Purdue-Indiana University partners who just completed the nation-wide industry cluster study and database for the US Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration. This article is not yet available online, so click here to view a scanned copy taken from the magazine itself. To view the national database and discover cluster data for your county - or to create your own region go here.
A number of universities around the U.S. are asking important questions about their role in helping communities realize their economic and quality of life goals. "Centers" like PCRD represent one strategy to harness the vast economic development resources and focus them on local and regional communities and also to provide a point of entry for civic leaders and others to access those resources.
It is always a great idea when the people from these centers can learn from each other. On Friday, leadership from PCRD and leadership from the University of Kentucky Appalachian Center (and UK faculty) will spend time together doing just that.
The aim of the Appalachian Center is to build robust partnerships with its diverse constituents to address the issues, challenges, and opportunities of importance in Appalachia. They place great value on participatory and collaborative processes and are committed to involving community-based partners and faculty in the design and implementation of their programs. The use an interdisciplinary approach to call on a wide range of expertise from across the campus and the region to generate the best possible benefit for the people in Appalachia.
PCRD was asked to develop a PowerPoint for the meeting and it is available here.
The European-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) does some great work examining the role of the university in rural development. Here is a report that makes some interesting findings and recommendations. It contends that a university's contribution to the regional/statewide economy goes far beyond its impacts related to specific elements of their activities - technology commercialization, K-12 STEM engagement, policy development, etc.
The most significant value comes in the interplay between these activities and the region-wide networks that result. Universities represent the civic spaces through which global, national and local actors can connect in seeking to realize their goals. Regions and states that take full advantage of this potential are best positioned to grow their economy. Many regional economies consider themselves to be AT a crossroads perhaps they should be looking to their universities AS a crossroads - a major strategic hub in the globally-networked economy.
