SSTI Digest

On the SSTI Calendar of Events webpage, we present brief descriptions and contact links for more than 100 regional or national conferences, meetings, and workshops planned for the coming year. The list ranges from workshops on how to secure federal technology funding for programs such as the Advanced Technology Program to venture capital forums to annual meetings for most of the associations involved with tech-based economic development.



Suggestions for additional events for inclusion should be directed to Mark Skinner at skinner@ssti.org

Please note: events should be intended for a regional, national or international audience.

The most common component of state tech-based economic development efforts -- technical and financial assistance to small, technology firms competing for federal research funding -- got a much needed boost last Friday with Congressional approval of legislation creating the Federal and State Technology Partnership (FAST). Equally important for proponents of better state outreach for the Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR) was a $3.5 million initial appropriation for FAST.

As one of the most thoroughly studied federal technology programs, SBIR has been found to be an effective instrument for accelerating innovation and commercialization by small businesses. For more than a decade most state science and technology programs have encouraged involvement in SBIR through outreach and technical assistance. Several states offer financial incentives for proposal development and matching grants for SBIR awards.

On its final day of work, the 106th Congress passed two new programs to encourage community development and reinvestment: the New Markets Tax Credit and the New Markets Venture Capital Program.



The New Markets Tax Credit will provide 30 percent tax credits on a present-value basis to investors in economic development projects in low-income areas; community development venture capital funds would be a major beneficiary of this credit. Credits for up to $1 billion of investments will be available in 2001.



The New Markets Venture Capital Program, to be administered by the Small Business Administration (SBA), will provide $30 million in technical assistance grants and up to $100 million in guarantees for investment matching funds to community development venture capital funds.

Several years of record growth in tax revenues are apparently over for many states, according to Fiscal Survey of the States, released jointly by the National Governors’ Association and the National Association of State Budget Officers on Monday.



Just as many corporations are lowering profit expectations and the stock market takes a nose dive, Governors and legislators in many states are preparing for tighter than expected budgets. Most state coffers are expected to grow, however, but at lower than anticipated rates.



“While the data show positive fiscal health through the time period, tightening of budgets will become more apparent when governors present their fiscal 2002 and fiscal 2003 budget recommendations over the next months,” according to the report’s executive summary.



The survey included budget figures from actual fiscal 1999, preliminary actual fiscal 2000 and enacted fiscal 2001. Twenty-nine states responded to the survey.

Colorado leaders want to encourage more college students to go into science and teaching and two recent proposals, coming from Governor Bill Owens and the state's Commission on Higher Education, are designed to do just that.

In Owens' proposed FY 2002 budget for education, announced on Dec. 6, $51.3 million will be allotted in teacher pay incentives to allow principals to reward outstanding teaching, to offer recruitment bonuses to encourage Colorado's best teachers to serve in schools with unsatisfactory academic performance, and to offer recruitment and retention bonuses in hard-to-recruit subjects including math, science and special education.

Funding totaling $18 million is available during FY2001 through the U.S. Department of Agriculture to assist in economic development projects in rural areas. The Rural Economic Development Grants program has $3 million available, while the Rural Economic Development Loans program has $15 million.

Funds must flow through Rural Utilities Service-financed telephone and electric utilities, but they can be used for a broad variety of economic development projects, including incubators, revolving loan funds, project feasibility studies and technical assistance, and projects to provide education and training to rural residents to facilitate economic development.