White House, Governors Agree to Cooperate on Technology Issues

An agreement between the White House and the National Governors' Association (NGA) to establish a new mechanism, the U.S. Innovation Partnership, for coordinating federal and state technology efforts was announced by Vice President Gore and NGA's Lead Governors on Technology John G. Rowland, (R-CT), and Parris N. Glendening, (D-MD), earlier this week.

"Building on the work of the State-Federal Technology Partnership Task Force led by former Governors Richard Celeste and Richard Thornburgh, I am committed to working with our nation's governors to establish a U.S. Innovation Partnership. This partnership will

coordinate federal and state efforts to stimulate the development and use of new technologies that can help us meet our common goals of generating economic growth, improving our schools and health care, better protecting the environment at lower cost, and reinventing our government at all levels," President Clinton said in a letter to Gov. Bob Miller (D-NV), chair of NGA.

Four USIP task forces have held meetings in Connecticut, Nevada, and Missouri to help set priorities and to refine specific workplans. Initial objectives of the task forces include:

• stimulating technology commercialization;
• easing business access to technology development information;

• improving SBIR;
• regulatory streamlining for environmental technology and building/construction technology;
• expanding the Angel Capital Electronic Network (ACE-NET);
• expanding the capacity of the Manufacturing Extension Partnership; and
• developing "Idea to Market" demonstrations.

For more information about the U.S. Innovation Partnership, send e-mail to USIP@nga.org, or contact Tom Unruh at NGA, 202/624-7833.