SSTI Digest

Jennifer Alexander is the new president of the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce.

Gov. Jim Doyle last week unveiled his plan to jumpstart the Wisconsin economy. The plan, "Grow Wisconsin," calls for a series of executive actions, private sector partnerships and legislative steps to create high-wage jobs and achieve other goals. Some of the tech-based economic development items outlined in "Grow Wisconsin" are:

After 30 years as leader of the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce, Robert Brennan is leaving to become a consultant to the new Office of Corporate Relations at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Phillip Z. Sobocinski has accepted a new position as Assistant Director of the new Office of Corporate Relations in the Office of the Chancellor, University of Wisconsin-Madison. The new initiative will be led by Charles Hoslet.

The Wisconsin Venture Network (WVN) in Milwaukee has folded into the Wisconsin Innovation Network (WIN) Foundation in Madison, and the combined WIN entity has become a subsidiary of the Wisconsin Technology Council.

The Center for Advanced Technology and Innovation (CATI) Partnership Board and the Gateway Technical College Board of Directors recently held a groundbreaking to begin construction of the new 40,000-square-foot facility located in Sturtevant’s Renaissance Park.

Thomas Still has been selected at the new president of the Wisconsin Technology Council. Still, currently associate editor of the Wisconsin State Journal, will fill the vacancy created by Larry Kline's departure this past spring.

Larry Kline has resigned as president of the Wisconsin Technology Council to take a position as chief financial officer and vice president for business development with a biotech firm.

The Wisconsin Legislature presently faces two bills which could greatly boost venture capital funds in the state. 



Clearing the Senate October 26, Senate Bill (SB) 296 requires the state investment board to invest up to $50 million in venture capital investment firms and to provide a high-technology business development corporation a grant of up to $2.5 million in FY 2001-02. Intended to help place Wisconsin at the fore of biotechnology, the bill supports the creation, development and retention of science- and technology-based businesses. 



Receiving passage by House representatives on October 17, Assembly Bill (AB) 579 would provide capital investments totaling $100 million to companies with a 100 employees or less and a net worth of $5 million or less. The bill would require that the companies also be located in and have their headquarters in Wisconsin. 



SB 296 and AB 579 await passage by the House and Senate, respectively. More information on both is available under 2001 Legislative Activity at the Wisconsin State Legislature website: http://www.legis.state.wi.us/ 

On July 16, both houses of Wisconsin’s state Legislature passed a state budget including numerous incentives for technological development. The budget covers state spending for a two-year period that began July 1. Gov. Scott McCallum has until August 30 to approve the budget; several of the tech-related items were in the Governor's first state of the state and executive budget addresses. See the February 23, 2001 issue of the SSTI Weekly Digest for a related story: http://www.ssti.org/Digest/2001/022301.htm

Two new Governors, Bob Wise of West Virginia and Wisconsin's Scott McCallum, have put tech-based economic development in the forefront of their respective economic agendas.



West Virginia

In his first State of the State Address, delivered February 14, and the Economic Development Plan released during his campaign for office, Governor Bob Wise outlined several tech-based economic development and education initiatives for the state to pursue immediately. He followed up the address by giving the state assembly several specific legislative proposals.



Governor Wise's proposals include:

What can policymakers and practitioners do if the statistics and other metrics indicate a state, region or locality is not well positioned for the technology-based economy, but the elected leaders and economic development professionals are plodding along with traditional approaches to job creation and development? Or, on the other hand, what if there are several fragmented or isolated technology-related activities and success stories occuring that could benefit from a little political exposure and synergy?



Jump-starting tech-based economic development often requires a shift in the mindset or thinking of the economic and political stakeholders for a state or community. Tools often used to encourage this change in outlook include innovation indices or S&T report cards that present the state or region's relative performance along several metrics. Creating state science and technology councils or drafting strategic plans for tech-based economic development are other often used approaches for trying to keep public investment in science and technology on the public agenda.



A third approach is the use of large public conferences or summits to convey the importance of changing paths in economic development policy or to recognize and reward the technology-based activities already underway. Maryland, for example, has held an annual technology summit since 1998. The approach has been particularly popular in the last three months. Minnesota, Mississippi and Wisconsin present three examples:



Minnesota

Twelve hundred people attended a Summit on Minnesota’s Economy, convened by the University of Minnesota on September 20, 2000. Held in response to growing concern over the position of the state to compete in the New Economy, the summit included briefings by experts in a number of areas. The summit examined: