A weekly compilation of news links about and for regional communities pursuing local and regional development.
Published on line since November 11, 2003.
1. House fuses Regional Development Centers - Gainesville Times - Gainesville, GA, USA
A bill passed Monday by the Georgia House of Representatives would consolidate the Georgia Mountains Regional Development Center and 15 other RDCs in the state into 12 regional commissions.
The bill, which was sought by the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, would not change the service area for Georgia Mountains RDC, but would change the way its board, which would become a regional council, is selected.
"It allows us to line up state agencies within these regional commission lines, " said Mike Beatty, commissioner of the Department of Community Affairs.
He said the proposal was studied for a year by a panel appointed through Gov. Sonny Perdue’s Commission for a New Georgia.
"We brought everybody to the table, " Beatty said. "We wanted to determine how we could deliver services to the citizens of this state in a more effective way."
The bill would make the chief elected official in each county a member of the regional council. In addition, there would be one elected city official from a municipality in that county.
One change from the current law would give the governor three appointments to the regional commission council and one each for the lieutenant governor and the speaker of the House. One of the governor’s appointees must be a school board member or school superintendent. The others must be private citizens of the region.
The bill will consolidate eight current regional development centers into four larger regional commissions. The Georgia Mountains service area will still include Banks, Dawson, Forsyth, Franklin, Habersham, Hall, Hart, Lumpkin, Rabun, Stephens, Towns, Union and White counties.
Danny Lewis, executive director of the Georgia Mountains RDC, said his board supports the change. However, he is concerned about the loss of some board members from the private sector.
…
Georgia General Assembly - HB 1216 - State government; change regional development centers to regional commissions; provisions
2. City, Town Challenges Cry Out For Regional Solutions - Hartford Courant – Hartford, CT, USA
For three or four decades, it has been Groundhog Day in Hartford. ...
What if we actually tried to do what much of the world does and solve some of these problems regionally? I moderated a panel on this topic a week ago at Trinity College, part of the school's new Center for Urban and Global Studies, and came away with a scintilla of cautious optimism.
Forgetting any altruistic motives, towns may have to act together because it's getting too expensive to keep going it alone. To paraphrase Ben Franklin, we must hang together or we will go broke separately.
The postwar era of American prosperity was built on cheap and plentiful energy and little international competition. That party is over.
We need to change, to get lean and smart, but we're not organized to change. Lyle Wray, executive director of the Capitol Region Council of Governments, told the panel that we're organized on the town state and national level, but that many problems come at us on the neighborhood, regional and international level.
Such issues as transportation, affordable housing, energy, and economic and workforce development are regional.
Heidi Green, president of 1, 000 Friends of Connecticut, offered the valuable observation that how we grow will greatly influence how well we grow. She's right. To keep pushing low-density sprawl further out into the fast-diminishing countryside will cause more driving, energy use, urban and suburban isolation and higher costs for services. To recreate prewar densities in cities and preserve farms and forests is to retain and enhance a quality of life that attracts business. This is a regional mission.
...
The liberating truth is that we can organize ourselves any way we want. Let's at least have the discussion.
Note: If you read the whole article it will be helpful to know “get off the schneid” is baseball jargon meaning “ To break a scoreless or hitless or winless streak (i.e., a schneid), this according to Wikipedia. Ed.
3. Report Suggests New Tolls For Region - Washington Post, United States
Regional transportation and political leaders are increasingly coming to the conclusion that the only way to keep the chronically congested Washington region moving is tolls, and plenty of them.
A report to be released Wednesday pushes a regionwide system that would place tolls on most existing area highways, bridges into the District, the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, George Washington Memorial Parkway and such major District thoroughfares as New York Avenue. The key to success, the authors say, is the comprehensiveness of the network.
Officials, pointing to the lack of any sizable investment in the region's transportation infrastructure by Virginia, Maryland or the federal government, say they see no other realistic options to keep traffic moving, accommodate newcomers and get desperately needed money to pay for new roads and improved transit. The tolls could generate more than $2.75 billion a year, according to the report.
"We've got to be straight with people, " said Michael Knapp (D-Upcounty), a Montgomery County Council member who worked on the federally funded study undertaken by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments Transportation Policy Board. "These recommendations put them out there. It's pretty clear that there's no money coming from anywhere outside the region."
The Washington region has the second-worst traffic in the nation, and projections call for the region to grow by 1.3 million people and 1 million jobs by 2030, according to the planning board.
No one is suggesting building tollbooths in the middle of New York Avenue. The study envisions tolls being deducted through E-ZPass
-like transponders as vehicles travel at normal speed. Tolls would range from less than 20 cents a mile to an average bridge toll of $2.80.
"Here we are in a rapidly growing region and barely able to maintain our systems, address congestion or add transit, " ...
4. And now, a sort of regional dowsing - Boston Globe - United States
When it comes to preserving open space, every community in the region pretty much works on its own. But when billions of gallons of drinking water in the Plymouth-Carver aquifer are at stake, representatives of seven towns work together.
It's the only way.
The seven-town Plymouth-Carver Aquifer Advisory Committee is mapping the location of the region's most environmentally sensitive and valuable land, under which the 200-square-mile underground reservoir lies. It is the second-largest underground reservoir in the state and the principal water source for Plymouth, Carver, Kingston, Plympton, Middleborough, Wareham, and Bourne.
The advisory committee is preparing a regional open-space plan members hope will encourage cooperation among towns on land acquisition and protection and put aquifer protection at the top of each town's open-space priority list.
Rather than "mainly look at what's within our boundaries, " as each town currently does, said Lee Hartmann, Plymouth's director of planning and development, a cross-borders open-space plan can "help us with what's going on at a regional level."
Well sites, and future well sites, are high priorities when it comes to protecting drinking water quality, the aquifer group determined. The committee has identified what environmental planners call "recharge areas, " places where ground water feeds a well that provides a community's drinking water.
The recharge area is "where rainwater seeps into the land and is drawn out of a well, " said Kristin Uiterwyk, a research associate for Urban Harbors Institute, the project's University of Massachusetts Boston-based consultant. It's the area that communities most need to keep contaminant-free, she said, to keep drinking water safe. So far, the group has produced a map that identifies recharge areas related to current wells and also highlights areas where wells are either planned or likely to be dug in the future.
...
5. Regional land-use initiative sets dates for community forums - Franklin Press, NC
The Mountain Landscape Initiative's (MLI) outreach team has developed a draft DVD documentary featuring a collection of interviews on regional attitudes towards growth and land-use planning.
Project outreach coordinator Gabriel Cumming presented the video, tentatively entitled "Balance in the Mountains, " to the MLI advisory committee March 13 at the Southwestern Commission office in Sylva.
The MLI is a three-phase pilot project of the Southwestern Commission (the council of governments serving Region A, the seven westernmost counties of North Carolina) and an umbrella regional effort of the Community Foundation of Western North Carolina, to create guidelines for responsible growth.
As part of phase one, Cumming and fellow outreach coordinator Dr. Carla Norwood have conducted 40 open-ended interviews (some individual, some group), comprising a total of 70 stakeholders throughout Region A plus the Qualla Boundary.
The documentary shows excerpts from these interviews and aims to represent the core values and common themes expressed about growth challenges and planning issues facing the region.
Interviewees include developers, farmers, local officials, property rights advocates, realtors, environmental advocates, community development organizations, civic clubs, etc.
...
6. To thrive, cities need many hands - Toronto Star - Ontario, Canada
The economy and nature of cities is changing and it is challenging the traditional ideas of municipal governance.
Toronto's City Council, like many others, is dominated by two political traditional perspectives. The left wing believes government is really the only honest and properly motivated provider of public services and infrastructure, and that using private capital and non-governmental agencies to deliver services is suspect at best. The right wing opposition is led by those who argue that less government is best and markets benefit from non-interfering, disengaged government that should, essentially, just hire more police and fill more potholes.
The reality is that neither of these views is sufficient or big enough to deliver the collaboration, resources and leadership necessary for a city to thrive in the new dynamics of a creative economy set against the deterioration of the natural environment and loss of natural capital.
The pace of change, the complexity of public policy challenges, and the limitations of the resources and competencies of the public sector have made traditional legislative solutions to economic and environmental challenges less and less useful over time. Yet, the capacity of a creative public sector and the quality of the public realm are essential to success.
The Internet has created new ways for citizens and groups to participate and network. This has done more than enable shared governance; it has shifted the political culture of cities and the expectations citizens have to be involved.
…
You can see the emergence of civil society organizations engaged in new collaborative governance partnerships that are capable of mobilizing the community's creativity. …
7. Regional policy up for debate Monday - Daytona Beach News-Journal - Daytona Beach, FL, USA
Government officials from across Central Florida will gather in Orlando on Monday night for another public meeting to decide how the region should grow.
If this sounds familiar, it's because similar meetings have been taking place for a couple of years now. What makes this one different is the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council has a state mandate to create a new regional policy that must be submitted to the Department of Community Affairs in Tallahassee.
But council officials say they'll rely on momentum from the myregion.org's How Shall We Grow project that identified a regional vision and growth principles.
The planning council plans to use the policy while reviewing county comprehensive plan amendments and developments of regional impact to send comments to community affairs officials. While the council can make recommendations, it has no authority to require any government to act on its suggestions.
"We are trying to nudge communities in our region in the right direction, so that their plans reflect the regional vision, " said Andrew Landis, a regional planner with the council. "We're trying to advocate long-range thinking and collaborative planning."
The council has invited about 1, 500 to participate in Monday's meeting. It's the first of three in a yearlong process to rewrite its plan for implementing a regional vision. The council's existing planning policy was written 13 years ago.
The policy will address issues like transportation, affordable housing, economic development and natural resources, including one of the bigger hot-button issues in Florida at the moment: water.
The council plans to adopt a map that shows natural resources of regional significance. It will use the myregion-org's "4 C's Vision, " which suggests outlining conservation lands first, promoting more growth in centers and along transit corridors in an effort to preserve the rural countryside.
Council officials say they don't plan to get into much discussion about rural land stewardship, even though the secretary of the state's community affairs department has asked for such stewardship proposals to be considered on a regional basis.
8. Alberta must plan better for oilsands boom - Edmonton Journal - Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
As one wag said recently, with only a modicum of exaggeration, we are all suburbs of Fort McMurray, the epicentre of oilsands development. Arguably, that metaphor could take you all the way to the steel mills of Hamilton, given the oilsand's impact on the national economy.
...
In addition, spending on construction of new oilsands plants will rise even faster than the last five red-hot years. Between 1996 and 2006, construction spending was $47 billion. From 2007 to 2012, that will rise to a whopping $124 billion, according to the new report from the Regional Issues Working Group, a committee of industry and community players.
The regional group now sees Fort McMurray in transition to a permanent manufacturing centre of bitumen that will rival Ontario cities. It's no longer a boom and bust oil town, it argues.
Meanwhile, the province is quietly considering building a new town north of Fort McMurray to serve more remote oilsands projects though details are hard to come by. What more is in the works? The public should know.
...
What kind of input did the public have in plans for another community north of Fort McMurray? How does the secretariat connect with the city councillors of Wood Buffalo? Is there a regional plan?
Stelmach needs an agency with higher profile -- partly because there are billions of public dollars needed to build these new communities, and also because elected representatives should have some input into shaping the response to these problems.
Alberta has a history of dealing with such growth. The Socreds had the New Towns Act in the post-Leduc boom, the Lougheed government set up the Northeast Regional Commissioner to handle growth in the first oilsands boom. But those skills were lost just in the late 1990s. Stelmach should revive the tradition.
9. Devour: Local, Organic, Sustainable - Santa Fe Reporter - Santa Fe, NM, USA
This mantra is much easier said than done.
...
"If we want less expensive local food, we have to make different choices, " Steve Warshawer, a long-time local farmer who is now enterprise development manager in charge of farmer outreach at La Montanita Co-op, says. "Everyone probably thinks that because we have taken away a lot of the transportation costs, we should get cheaper food by buying local. The major factor is the issue of scale in the industrial model and what it does to drive down cost. The industrial food system creates phenomenal cost economies. Our sense of what food ought to cost comes from that paradigm."
...
Through their responses to an annual survey, La Montanita Co-op's 14, 000 members make it clear that the No. 1 reason they choose La Montanita is because it supports local and regional products. Twenty percent of sales in the Santa Fe store can be attributed to local and regional products - that's up from 16 percent in 2003.
As La Montanita tried to strengthen its partnerships with 400 local and regional producers within a 300-mile radius of Albuquerque, it found that producers' economies of scale had turned upside down - transportation costs alone had tripled.
"If we didn't want to be doing business with the last generation, we had to find a way to help, " CE Pugh, the Co-op's outgoing general manager, says.
To the extent that it can, La Montanita and other organizations are devising creative ways to help local and regional producers. La Montanita's Regional Food-Shed Project, a distribution and economic development initiative begun in 2006, operates with two drivers and trucks. In the first year, it collected more than $100, 000 of locally produced meat, eggs, milk and produce from approximately 30 local producers, all to be sold through the Co-op. ...
10. U.S. regional communities - sub-State, State or multi-State - in news articles. Bold font words are Google search terms. Bold italic words considered worth noting. In this and section 11, links to websites of organizations are added to the news excerpt when this is the first time an organization has been found. A goal of this newsletter is to find every regional council in the
.10 County ends 'Appleton Airport' ad flap
Appleton Post Crescent – Appleton, WI, USA
County Board members were infuriated to learn from reporters Wednesday that an ad calling the Outagamie County Regional Airport "Appleton Airport" - a name Paltzer has suggested for the facility - was scheduled to run Sunday in The Post-Crescent's 53rd Annual Report.
The move, some suspected, was an end-run around their authority. ...
.11 Downtown Must Walk The Walk
Tampa Tribune - Tampa, FL, USA
The Brookings Institution, the Washington, DC-based think tank, released a survey of the top 30 metropolitan areas regarding the ranking on the per capita number of regionally significant walkable urban places in their regions. The results for the Tampa-St. Petersburg area - dead last....
.12 Mass transit plan details emerge
Richmond Times Dispatch - Richmond, VA, USA
"In order for this to be successful, there needs to be some sort of regional authority that has the ability to transcend these regional boundaries and ...
.13 Solid Waste District Receives $25000 Grant
Fort Smith Times Record - Fort Smith, AR, USA
Communications company AT&T awarded a $25, 000 grant Friday to the West River Valley Regional Solid Waste Management District to enable a wireless technology educational program on waste management principles. Headed by Tim Lewellyn of Western Arkansas Planning and Development District, the waste district encompasses nine counties: …
.14 New Residential Construction Report: February 2008
Paper Economy – A US Real Estate Bubble Blog
Today’s New Residential Construction Report continues to firmly demonstrate the intensity of the total washout conditions that now exist in the nation’s housing markets and particularly for new residential construction showing tremendous declines on both a peak and year-over-year basis to single family permits both nationally and across every region.
.15 Government Reports Warn Planners on Sea-Rise Threat to US Coasts -
New York Times, USA
... report noted that airports in many large coastal cities are built in tidal areas, often on fill, making them “particularly vulnerable.” In the New York metropolitan area, Newark Liberty International Airport and La Guardia Airport are especially at risk, ...
.16 Builders bullish on region’s prospects
Schenectady Gazette – Schenectady, NY, USA
“I think this region has a low self-esteem, ” said Jeff Lawrence, executive vice president of the Center for Economic Growth in Albany. ...
.17 Rentech wants new trestle, second railway
Natchez Democrat - Natchez, MS, USA
Director of the Southwest Mississippi Planning and Development District Wirt Peterson said the CDBG usually requires some type of funding match from the ...
.18 PS ... On regional development
Toledo Free Press - OH, USA
... The evidence is getting stronger every day. A regional approach to Toledo's future and, indeed, the future of Lucas County, Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan, is essential if we are going to reverse our slow decline and become a competitive force in the global economy. ...
.19 Supervisors to discuss regional water plan
Tucson Citizen - Tucson, AZ, USA
"This particular effort should be primarily viewed as early, initial steps related to regional cooperation on water issues, with the ultimate goal being to ...
.20 Don Severson: Regional plan panel must go back to drawing board
The Capital Times – Madison, WI, USA
The Dane County Public Affairs Council has objections regarding the recently adopted goals and objectives for the Capital Area Regional Plan Commission. ...
.21 Shared turf: Police agencies open boundaries to fight gangs
Burlington Times News - Burlington, NC, USA
"It's a county-wide thing, " Russell said. "(The task force) only makes sense. Gang members don't care about jurisdiction. We need to erase any boundaries that law enforcement has." …
.22 Texoma Council of Governments awarded Hazard Mitigation Planning Grant
North Texas e-News - TX, USA
Subsequent to the devastating floods experienced by the Texoma area this summer, Texoma Council of Governments set to work to obtain planning funds to work on Hazard Mitigation Action Planning for Cooke and Fannin Counties. ...
.23 Area has positive regional cooperation
The Coloradoan - Fort Collins, CO, USA
Let me share two examples of positive regional cooperation — one that took place 30 years ago way before NCEDC was formed and one that is currently being ...
.24 Regional commission receives planning grant
Belleville News Democrat -
The Southwestern Illinois Metropolitan Regional Planning Commission has received a $52628 grant from the Economic Development Administration of the US Department of Commerce. ...
.25 Oberstar announces economic development grant
Coon Rapids ECM Publishers - Coon Rapids, MN, USA
Washington DC – A federal agency has singled out the East Central Regional Development Commission (ERDC) as a leader when it comes to creating jobs and ...
.26 Jacksonville's D-MAT Supplies Moving to Tampa
First Coast News - Jacksonville, FL, USA
The team's cache of medical equipment is being moved to Tampa as part of a regionalization effort by the US Department of Health and Human Services. ...
.27 Area Officials Discuss Future Of Education
Jamestown Post Journal - Jamestown, NY, USA
Regionalism applied intelligently certainly makes sense.’’ According to Dr. McNamara, public schools are a good investment, but it requires collaboration ...
.28 Council considers statewide trauma system
Myrtle Beach Sun News - Myrtle Beach, SC, USA
The mishmash of rules different emergency responders use to determine when a patient should be flown has the S.C. Trauma Advisory Council considering statewide guidelines that could reduce the number of unnecessary helicopter transports. "A statewide regionalized trauma system must operate under one rule, " …
.29 Sheriff opposes proposed statewide radio system
Oshkosh Northwestern - Oshkosh, WI, USA
"This is important because we've seen a disaster crosses community and regional boundaries, " Sugden said. "And taking a statewide approach is important ...
.30 New York joins Great Lakes Water Resources Compact
EmpireStateNews.net - Newburgh, New York, USA
The Compact is a multi-state agreement designed to protect, conserve, and improve the water resources of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin. ...
.31 Regional group gets federal grant
Grand Haven Tribune, MI
The West Michigan Shoreline Regional Development Commission has received a $166884 grant from the US Department of U.S. Department of Commerce to fund planning for local economic development infrastructure projects....
.32 International lecturer informs community of a future 'mega state'
Oskaloosa Herald, IA
Dr. Villarreal began his lecture by explaining regionalism and stated that “it is not a matter of if North America will become a mega state, but rather when ...
.33 Regional Theaters: The More the Merrier
New York Times - United States
… regional theaters have succeeded far beyond the dreams of the movement’s pioneers. The original dreamers envisioned a nonprofit theater in each major city. Nowadays a major American city is likely to have dozens of such theaters, …
.34 Chilton Rogers honored for support of entrepreneurship activities
By ASU News
Chilton Rogers, deputy director of Appalachian State University’s Appalachian Regional Development Institute (ARDI) has been recognized by the NC Rural Center’s Institute for Rural Entrepreneurship for her leadership in creating ...
.35 Regional Development celebrates 40th
Chillicothe Gazette - Chillicothe, OH, USA
Ohio Valley Regional Development Commission's 40th anniversary March full commission meeting and election of officers will be Thursday, March 27, ...
11. Other regional community news for our Local Planet.
.10 Caribbean plans tsunami warning system by 2010
Reuters India
Peter Koltermann, executive secretary of the United Nations Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, told a meeting of around 30 Caribbean states that the likelihood of a tsunami hitting the region at some point was "probable. ... experts estimate there have been around 105 tsunamis in the Caribbean and surrounding areas in the last 500 years ...
.11 Growth and garbage tops Region's priorities
Kawartha Media Group - Peterborough, Ontario, Canada
... proposed energy-from-waste facility as being the big issue. The upcoming year will be full of milestones in the joint study between Durham and York regions to find a method of dealing with garbage, which is -- with the exception of Brock Township -- currently trucked to Michigan. ...
.12 Council amalgamation: Shotgun marriages
Gold Coast News - Molendinar, Queensland, Australia
Isisford now is mixed with Ilfracombe and Longreach to form the new Longreach Regional Council. To the west, in Blackall's main street, locals have erected ...
.13 Signs of merger all too clear
Sunshine Coast Daily - Queensland, Australia
The sign was taken down at 5am yesterday, in preparation for the new Sunshine Coast Regional Council logo to eventually be put in its place. ...
.14 SC asks people to be more tolerant, slams regionalism
CNN-IBN -
The Supreme Court (SC) has slammed the recent trend by some sections of the society to protest and demand the ban of films, books and painting on the ground that it hurt their religious sentiments. ... In an oblique reference to the rising trend of regionalism, it said, "India is not a confederation of states. There is only one nationality and that is Indian. ...
.15 'There is design to create problems in name of region'
Hindu - Chennai, India
... problems in the name of language and region in various parts of the country and asked states to identify trouble spots for taking anticipatory action. ...
.16 Resilient region upbeat over jobs
Financial Times - London, England, UK
... to express confidence that many of the redundant will find their skills in demand from other employers in a region growing at an above-UK average rate. ...
.17 Initiate collective efforts to tackle poverty, combat terrorism
The Daily Star - Dhaka, Bangladesh
“Regional cooperation can mitigate these affects. Mutual mistrusts among the nations should also be dispelled, ” he added. As the largest country, ...
.18 Champagne expands domain to answer demand surge
Reuters - USA
"It formalizes the organization of the geographic area into two zones: the working zone of 675 districts, and the (grape) production zone of 357 districts, " ...
.19 'Dull' Coast Regional Council logo unveiled
Sunshine Coast Daily - Queensland, Australia
But let us all hope that the Sunshine Coast Regional Council logo isn’ta reflection of our new super council. The old signs were taken down last Thursday ...
.20 A Declaration of Energy Independence: One Year Later
Council on Hemispheric Affairs
On a regional level, Brazil has the sufficient standing to convince a number of its Latin American neighbors to follow its lead. Conversely, Brazil’s growing relationship with the US can potentially hinder its relations with Venezuela ...
.21 Stress on sub regional cooperation
The Hindu – India
... India has to embrace much more aggressively its neighbours, particularly South Asia, to go forward. Sub regional cooperation could be formed with neighbours without breaking the political boundaries. ...
.22 UN warns climate change melting glaciers at alarming rate
AFP -
However, Steiner said the 2009 climate convention in Copenhagen will provide the true litmus test of governments' commitment to reducing greenhouse gas ...
.23 Uganda: Regional Bourses Moot Securities Training Curriculum
AllAfrica.com - Washington, USA
"The course is designed to change the mindset from local to regional markets. This will allow brokers to seek and compete for investors anywhere in the region."...
.24 China: It's Not Just Tibet
BusinessWeek - USA
"The western development plan is a strategy without effective policies, " says Zhang Baotong, director of the regional development consultancy center at the ...
.25 PARO regional economic development conference devoted to women
Lake Superior News – Thunder Bay, ON, CA
One aim is to open doors to future business and community partnerships by creating networks between all stakeholders who recognize the value of women inlocal and regional economic development. Registration is $149.00 for both days, $99.00 for one day
.26 Man-Made CO2 As Seen Regionally From Space
Scientific Blogging - News Account
Using data from the SCIAMACHY instrument aboard ESA's Envisat environmental satellite, scientists have for the first time detected regionally elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide – the most important greenhouse gas that contributes to ...
.27 Psychology of corruption
Inquirer.net - Philippines
... Metro Manila ... study found that people commonly defined corruption as some form of stealing. Corrupt acts fall into two types: small scale (those done by individuals as citizens or in a business context) and large scale (those associated with government). ...
.28 Collaborate and innovate through poor economy
Charlotte Observer - Charlotte, NC, USA
... as chronicled in the book Wikinomics, are fourfold: being open, sharing, having peers work on projects across boundaries and thinking globally. ...
.29 Is this the end of traditional governments?
RINF.COM
The answer, according to Rothkopf, is not global government, but “governance, ” fewer formal agreements and mechanisms among international entities. The registration and management of Internet domain names (via a collection of organizations) is one example of this sort of governance, orderly and helpful in a way you wouldn’t automatically associate with Rothkopf’s ominous-sounding definition of the term: “Fulfilling government roles with mechanisms” that “lack the full traditional power, authority or mandates of governments.”
12. Blogs
.10 Regionalism--Antidote to a Failing Economy
Smart Communities By Suzanne Morse
While the voices of gloom and doom about the economy are getting louder, all of us are wondering how to stretch dollars further. No where is this more evident than in our localities and states. Decline in revenue and increase...
.11 Brands vs. Regions?
By Evelyne Resnick
There is no difference between brands and regions, claims Anthony Spawton: brands and regions are the same. Why is that? A brand is "the encapsulation of the IP of a winery/region" and is also "the vehicle that will ensure its future ...
.12 Geo-attention data - places you care about
By bounder
My Region – the wider city or county. This you would think would be a simple one, but administrative boundaries bear very little relation to the ones that exist in our head. Witness the endless debates about what’s ‘The Black Country’ or what is or isn’t in Birmingham. Different bodies also have wildly different views on what is contained in a region (an example int he comments here). …
.13 Agreeable and conscientious, that’s us!
By christa t
Florida’s hypothesis is that personality and a city or region’s economic growth and development are very much correlated, with openness to experience being the only type that seems to have a direct role in regional economic development. ...
.14 The closing Kwame didn't give
By John Bebow
As a crescendo, he could have worked himself right into a truly transformational message of regionalism. Four points of regionalism: 1) Cobo; 2) Airport City; 3) Transit; 4) Regional cooperation (or at least an end to the decades of ...
.15 Bruce Agnew is crazy
By daimajin(daimajin)
The Discovery Institute's Bruce Agnew is spewing insanity again, this time in a Seattle Times Opinion piece. He's saying he's got the region's transportation problems figured out, and here are his ideas: ...
.16 Make Eastside a proving ground for innovative transportation ideas
By Stephen Rees
An arresting and challenging opinion piece from the director of Discovery Institute’s Cascadia Center for Regional Development. I do not know enough about the area to comment on the viability of any of these ideas, but the approach is ...
.17 A sustainable city-region for Bristol
By Susan Warren
Today sees the launch our Sustainable Bristol City Region Programme at Bristol Zoo Gardens. Jonathon Porritt will talk about... read more.
.18 Merging Services a Positive Step
By Allegheny Institute(Allegheny Institute)
But instead of swallowing the kool-aid of regionalism, and clamoring for a mass city-county merger, these two communities are embracing sensible changes to save their taxpayers money and hopefully improve the efficiency in which ...
.19 Library Community Must Make Their Voices Heard
By The Western Massachusetts Regional Library System
It administers state and federal grant programs for libraries and promotes cooperation among all types of libraries through regional library systems and automated resource sharing. It also works to ensure that all residents of the ...
.20 Is it an East Coast, West Coast thing if we all bleed green?
By Brandon(Brandon)
The New Green Deal focuses on developing basic requirements for moving towards sustainability such as green collar jobs, regional ecological restoration, and inclusion of under-represented communities. ...
.21 Are you Certified Friendly?
By Columbia, South Carolina(Columbia, South Carolina)
The Columbia Riverbanks Region is known for its friendliness. That’s why we offer a one-day training session for employees that frequently interact with area visitors that provides information on enhancing the visitor experience and ...
.22 The Upstate
Investing in Communities By SpyglassProperties
Not just regionally, but with national aspirations as well. ICAR is the acronym for the ’International Center of Automotive Research’. As a cornerstone of this initiative, the “Millenium Campus” is being designed and built to support ...
.23 How does regional economic development work?
By Ohio Economic Development(Ohio Economic Development)
The author takes a research look at the definition of regional development, asks questions (but doesn't, thank goodness, answer them!) Otherwise, we'd be too depressed. Worth readying, anyway. Understanding Society: How Does Regional ...
.25 SOCIAL ENTERPRISE IN PRACTICE
By admin
Regional Development Agencies and local authorities have their part to play too, by delivering socially-relevant support packages. Social Enterprises must not be judged on whether or not they rely too heavily on one form of funding, ...
.26 Information, Advice & Guidance for entry to the Digital Industries: A Digital 2010 Futures Event
By rscyhexchange
The conference will pool expertise to strengthen our regional offer by bringing guidance professionals together with expert contributors from industry, business, curriculum and awarding bodies, diploma development partnerships and ...
.27 Regionalism .. is a good thing
Eternal Optimist
As far as regionalism goes, ideally people in India should be very regionalistic possible. Economically if all regions were to develop, this need for migration would not arise. Welcome in Maharashtra or not is secondary, these people ...
.28 Is the world advancing towards globalization or will regionalization stake its claim ?
Recent events in Latin America suggest that instead of the greatly marketed idea of "globalization, " the world may actually be advancing towards division into blocks or regions which come together more out of mutual interest than any ...
.29 Taking it global - How can Europe change the world? 18th March
By Compass Youth Group(Compass Youth Group)
What actions should be taken to improve transatlantic relations on security and defence? How should the EU deepen its cooperation with other regional entities? How should the EU support a better cooperation between the ILO and the WTO? ...
.30 From Green Car Congress - ORNL Study Explores PHEVs’ Impact on Power Generation Requirements
By mybiodie
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) study examines how an expected increase in ownership of plug-in hybrid electric cars and trucks could affect regional power generation requirements depending on what time of day or night the vehicles are charged. ...
.31 Countries, Nation-States And Regimes
By Daniel Larison
There will be a counter-argument that the boundaries of these countries were still identified with political boundaries, and that patriotic Virginians identified with the Commonwealth government, which would seem to push back against a ...
.32 Regional Accreditation for Online Schools - The 6 Regional Accreditors
… choose an online school accredited by one of the six regional accreditors. These regional agencies are recognized by both the United States Department of Education (USDE) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA). ...
13. Announcements and Regional Links
.10 Research Network on Sub-national Collaboration for Regional Development: the role of networking among regions - 13-14 June, Pisa, Italy
This Research Network has been proposed by professors Nicola Bellini (Sant’Anna School, Pisa, Italy) and Ulrich Hilpert (Jena University, Germany) and approved by the Regional Studies Association with the aim of promoting a network of scholars and practitioners interested in analyzing and providing an appropriate theoretical framework to analyse the increasing collaboration among regions (Euro-regions; inter-regional networks etc.). The participation to these networks is by no means limited only to regional governments and local authorities, but involves also development agencies, enterprises, associations, universities and research institutes etc. This phenomenon is evolving very rapidly from the exploratory approach of earlier phases into a more mature awareness of the opportunities that international cooperation offers to regional development policies. This is also linked to the policy issues related to globalization. Through international networks regions may try to face the challenges of international outsourcing and delocalisation of production, inward investment and migration flows. ... Call for Papers - PDF
.11 Current Research Networks – Regional Studies Association
Peripheral, Marginal and Border regional issues in Europe
While there has been much research and attention paid to the regions in the core of Europe - and especially to cities, city-regions, old industrial areas, border regions and to some of their underlying characteristics - such as clusters, agglomeration phenomena generally, regional innovation systems, the specific features of peripheral and marginal regions have been relatively neglected. This Research Network seeks to address this by establishing a regional studies network of interested parties to bring together facilities, expertise, experience and other resources as the first step in the development of more significant cooperation.
Contact: Peter de Souza, University College of Hedmark, Norway
Michael Danson, University of Paisley, Scotland
.12 Collaboration Framework - Addressing Community Capacity - National Network for Collaboration
…
Technically, collaboration is a process of participation through which people, groups and organizations work together to achieve desired results. Starting or sustaining a collaborative journey is exciting, sometimes stressful, and even new for many people, groups, and organizations.
Initiating Collaborations
When beginning the journey, it is critical that all existing and potential members share the vision and purpose. It is this commonality that brings members together to focus on achieving a mission. Several catalysts may initiate a collaboration - a problem, a shared vision, a desired outcome, to name a few. Regardless what the catalyst may be, it is critical to move from problem driven to vision driven, from muddled roles and responsibilities to defined relationships, and from activity driven to outcome focused.
...
.13 ACOSA - Association for Community Organization & Social Administration
ACOSA is a membership organization for community organizers, activists, nonprofit administrators, community builders, policy practitioners, students and educators. ACOSA sponsors the Journal of Community Practice, the leading peer reviewed journal in this field. Academics and practitioners who are engaged in community practice are invited to submit articles for review and publication in the Journal
14. Custom search: region, regions, regional communities
To search on topics like those in Regional Community Development News use this custom search engine which utilizes regional related sites. Entering the terms knowledge economy returned 190 items while “creative class” returned 149 items. Without quotes, creative class only returned 89. Such are the ways of search. Please recommend links for inclusion.
My name is Tom Christoffel. I've worked in the field of intergovernmental cooperation since 1973. As a consequence, "I see regions work." Regional Community Development News is published weekly based on news reports as of Wednesday.
Making visible analysis and actions at multi-jurisdictional regional scales is its purpose. "Think globally, act locally" was innovative in its time. Today the local scale is often too small to address today's needs and opportunities. "Think local planet, act regionally, " is my candidate paradigm. (No one said we're only allowed one paradigm.)
We can see that “regional communities” are organized locally and now act both to avoid tragedy in the commons and gain benefits. An effective multi-jurisdictional regional community has DNA: it is geographically Defined; has a common Name and its Alignment is inclusive of smaller communities and participatory in larger communities. So, by scanning this compilation, reading articles and checking organizations - you too will be able to see the regional communities that already exist.
News references are found using the Google News search service. Media article links are “fair use” to transform globally scattered reports to make regional approaches visible. Links go to the publisher and do not compete with it. Such publishers are likely to have related stories and thus be seen by new customers. “Regional” is an emerging news category. There is no charge for this service and no profit is made from its use, though any user can become more aware of the topic itself.
To read and search previous issues go to: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/regions_work/
The term “Development” was added to the name in January, 2006.
For a free subscription use this email link – no additional information required:
regions_work-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
For the Google Groups version go to:
http://groups.google.com/group/regional-community-development-news
Editions since April 11, 2007 can also be found at: http://regional-communities.blogspot.com/
Questions, comments or items to feature in Regional Community Development News?
Please e-mail the editor: Tom.Christoffel@gmail.com
Thomas J. (Tom) Christoffel, AICP Making regions visible for Leaders and Problem-solvers. www.regionalintelligence.com
