By Robert D. Atkinson, Daniel Castro and Stephen J. Ezell
Spurring investments in IT infrastructure not only can provide an important short-term boost to the U.S. economy; it also can lay the groundwork for long-term economic growth, international competitiveness, and significant improvement in Americans’ quality of life.
Letter sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid
By Florida Municipal Electric Association
Why barriers to entry stifle economic development, disadvantage school children, and worsen health care.
By Jeffrey R. Lee, Medill News Service
Two years ago Princeton, a town of about 7,500 two hours west of Chicago, was staring at a potentially grim future. One of the community’s largest employers had just moved its manufacturing facilities to Chattanooga, Tenn.
LCN, a division of Ingersoll Rand Co. Ltd., had just hired a new plant manager for its Princeton factory, and he had a wake-up call for the town’s industrial board.
“He said that if Ingersoll Rand was looking to relocate a new facility, Princeton would not be on the list,” recalled Jason Bird, superintendent of the town’s electric and telecommunications utility. The town simply did not have the communications capacity that modern companies need.
That conversation was enough to scare the town council and the mayor into action. Last October, the town started construction of a $400,000, 12-mile fiber optic network, and on Dec. 15, it announced it would take the fiber optic cable to any customer that wanted it.
by John W. McCurry, Site Selection magazine
Broadband Internet access is rapidly being perceived by governments and business as an essential utility which will soon be as important as water or electricity to economic development. Cities or regions that embrace this concept and make this new utility widely available are variously described as being “intelligent, smart or wired.”
When Mitch Davis needed a high-speed launching pad for his startup Internet company, he ditched high-priced Seattle for its blue-collar neighbor some 35 miles to the south: Tacoma. When John Gorst needed a place to set up his Internet utility company that provides Web hosting of applications for small businesses around the country, he moved to Broadway — that is, 1101 Broadway Plaza in downtown Tacoma. And when e-commerce giant Amazon.com went searching for a site for its next-generation call center, guess where it landed? Tacoma.