Brewed Fresh Daily

Reading all the connections coming out in the coverage of the County investigation gets a mind-numbing after a little while.

A group of us are turning to social network software to draw maps of the relationships. The patterns become more clear with a network map.

Here’s an example of how network maps can uncover covert networks.
You can help. Visit Map the Mess and contribute what you know.

Add you voice to the Forums.

Or, just join the citizens interested in cleaning up the “civic space” we share in Cuyahoga County.

Not too long ago I was an active participant in heated conversations that went something like this:

Person 1: “There aren’t any promising new businesses in Northeast Ohio worth investing in.”

Person 2: “You’re wrong. What’s missing is smart investors willing to take a risk and smart enough to turn a good idea into a great success.”

Being a world-class flip-flopper, I’ve played the role of both Person 1 and 2 in those conversations. But I no longer have such conversations, and I believe it’s because we’ve addressed both concerns (or at least have made significant progress in addressing them).

Turning Technologies, Hyland Software, MemberHealth, NDI Medical etc. have all shown there’s lots of good ideas being turned into high-growth companies in Northeast Ohio.

And today we’re reminded again (this time by the Third Frontier program) that there’s a fair amount of capital available for entrepreneurs to pursue. Importantly, there’s now a new fund being formed to help minority entrepreneurs. Yes, more capital is needed. And so are more entrepreneurs with great ideas. But we’ve moved onto other important conversations, and for that I’m grateful.

It’s a major sweep: 200 agents involved from as far away as Youngstown and Pittsburgh. The County’s on lock-down.

Whatever the outcome, it looks like the end of an era. It’s almost certainly the end of the Med Mart deal. Jacobs got out of his sour downtown investment (Ameritrust) in time. Forest City still gets tagged with Tower City.

Time, apparently, has run out on using the County as a piggy bank.

FBI searches county offices in Cleveland

Perhaps now the County can begin to focus on what really drives economic development: brainpower and innovation. Here’s an article from today’s Wall Street Journal that underscores the point with evidence from Kalamazoo.

Other companies besides Kaiser have unveiled plans to create jobs in Kalamazoo, with some saying the Promise played a role in their decision. Among them is MPI Research, a privately held preclinical drug-testing company in Mattawan, Mich., which in April announced plans to create 3,300 jobs in southwestern Michigan — including 400 in downtown Kalamazoo — over the next five years as it moves into laboratory and office space once housing Pfizer.

Class Act: Kalamazoo’s lesson — Educate and they will come

Here’s how St. Paul, MN positioned its new economic development strategy released last week:

If St. Paul is going to become a better place to do business, it’s going to take teamwork.

That will be the underlying theme Mayor Chris Coleman lays out Monday when he releases a six-point economic development plan for the city.

It was devised in conjunction with major St. Paul business organizations and states goals and responsibilities for improving commerce.

Acknowledging that St. Paul can do more to attract new businesses and keep the ones it has, the plan outlines common-sense ways for the city to:

• Cut through some of the red tape.

• Retain businesses and recruit new ones.

• Revitalize downtown as well as neighborhoods

• Ensure the schools are doing their part to build an educated and skilled workforce.

Business plan for improving St. Paul is all about teamwork

You can download a copy of the plan (including an action plan) from this page.

The Ohio Department of Development’s Division of Entrepreneurship and Small Business and Small Business Development Centers are now accepting nominations for the 2008 Keys to Success Awards, which recognize the accomplishments and economic contributions of successful Ohio women business owners.

Keys to Success Award winners will be selected based on nomination forms received. Awards will be selected in seven categories: Manufacturing/Technology; Service; Wholesale/Retail; Real Estate/Construction; Healthcare/Medical; Marketing/Advertising/Public Relations; and Rising Star (in business less than five years). Potential recipients must be female majority owners of companies with annual revenues in excess of $500,000, except for Rising Star ($200,000).

Ohio Lieutenant Governor Fisher Calls for Nominations for The Keys to Success Awards

Ohio communities that want to try innovative ways to enhance the viability of local agriculture and the health of area farms can apply for funding from the Center for Farmland Policy Innovation at Ohio State University.

The center, which works with local communities on their farmland protection priorities, has issued a request for proposals focusing on community-based agricultural economic development.

Proposals are due Oct. 31, 2008. The center expects to allot mini-grants in the range of $1,000 to $10,000 per project.

OSU Farmland Policy Innovation Center Announces Mini-grant Program for Ohio Communities

Venture Financing With a Mission Beyond Profit

Here’s an idea: Since it may not be possible to build a convention center for $400 million, why not invest the County’s money into JumpStart and BioEntreprise?

I-Team: Medical Mart Money Problems

(BTW, competition for medical and health care conventions in the medical area just got a little tougher: Philadelphia convention officials announced earlier this week a new strategy to brand Philadelphia as “America’s life sciences meetings destination.” Read more.)

From a Jim Cossler e-mail:

Another national shout out for the exciting and unique managed technology cluster being built by the Youngstown Business Incubator.

This from the national public policy organization PolicyLink in its soon to be released report, To Be Strong Again: Renewing the Promise in Smaller Industrial Cities :

“The Youngstown Business Incubator, which has turned the city into a hot spot for business-to-business software development, is creating jobs and reversing the ‘brain drain’. Against all odds, YBI has made Youngstown the place to be for B2B software developers.”

When so many said we couldn’t, we did. Come see for yourself.

You can review the report in its entirety here.

I’m in New Orleans at Workforce Innovations and looking at CNN this morning.
They’re doing a story on electric vehicles. The host, Miles O’Brien, started his reporting by driving up in a Sparrow, manufactured by Myers Motors in Summit County.
Several years ago, at REI we highlighted the opportunity of the Sparrow. We had a few of them outside Weatherhead and many of folks at Tuesday@REI drove the Sparrow around the block. Herb Crowther and Phil Lane, as I remember, arranged the event.

Today several partners, including the Fund for Our Economic Future (my employer), issued research done by the Center for Governmental Research in Rochester, NY, that details what governments in Northeast Ohio spend on various services.

The research examines local government revenues and expenditures for hundreds of governmental entities in Northeast Ohio’s 16 counties. You can access the reports, raw data and summary charts at the CGR web site, live.cgr.org/NEO/.

The research is not prescriptive — it doesn’t tell governments what to do. But it will be used in a wide variety of efforts under way that are examining what changes are needed to make government more efficient and effective. Such efforts include a new 9-member commission that will recommend changes in Cuyahoga County government by early November to the state, and the 21st Century Government Initiative that is taking off in Stark County. The Canton Repository’s take on the research can be found here. And hopefully it’ll be used by the broader public to help them evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of their local governments.

This research is an important step, but by no means the final step, in a very important conversation that the region must have about the structure and effectiveness of our governments. I look forward to seeing the change it helps prompt.