Brewed Fresh Daily

Richard Florida's Innovation Center may have to relocate outside of his hometown of Pittsburgh, where he teaches at Carnegie-Mellon. If you're a Cool Cleveland reader, you've probably got a well-read copy of his book, The Rise of the Creative Class, and how it's transforming work, leisure, community and everyday life. And you may have even caught one of his three or four appearances here in Cleveland in 2002, preaching from the podiums of the City Club or University Circle, Inc., about how Cleveland needs to become more tolerant and diverse, focusing on the arts, technology and creativity in order to attract, harness and mobilize the key 30% of the population that Florida calls The Creative Class: those individuals such as designers, software developers, financial wizards, legal eagles and medical geniuses. Now he finds that his message may be more welcome outside of Pittsburgh. He wants to start an institute devoted to the issues of the creative class and to put those ideas into action, and places like the University of Toronto, the New School in NYC, the Gates Foundation in Seattle, and supporters in Kansas City, Chicago and LA have stepped up to make him offers. It is always the prophet who is ignored in his own land, but is this an opportunity for Cleveland? He only needs $5-6 million for a staff of 5 to start. What could such an institute do for CWRU, the City of Cleveland and NEOhio?