Facing a projected budget deficit of more than $600 million, Gov. Tim Kaine told lawmakers the state must invest more money in research and commercialization efforts to accelerate Virginia’s progress in key areas.

 

Increasing and modernizing university research capacity is a priority for many states. Contrary to programmatic or operational appropriations being required annually, funding for such construction projects can be phased over decades as part of a state's larger capital budget/bond programs. Recent research from the National Science Foundation (NSF) documents the results of the increased importance placed in university research building programs.

As most practitioners know, measuring progress for tech-based economic development efforts can be difficult given the long lead time necessary for most research investments to yield results. Consequently, many programs rely on interim measures to evaluate a policy or program's impact.

Gov. Tom Vilsack announced that Mary Lawyer will serve as acting director of the Iowa Department of Economic Development. Mike Blouin resigned from the position last week to launch his campaign to become the state's next governor.

Amit Yoran replaces Gilman Louie as In-Q-Tel's new CEO.

After being struck down by the Iowa Supreme Court in 2004, the state legislature recently passed legislation re-creating a $500 million version of its Grow Iowa Values Fund. The bills commit $500 million over 10 years to support tech-based economic development and other economic development initiatives. Gov. Tom Vilsack signed the measures on June 10.

While some regional assessments attempt to benchmark economic indicators of smaller regions to those of notable accomplishment such as Silicon Valley or Research Triangle Park, a new study from the Center for Regional Strategies at Virginia Tech compares regions with similar economic and demographic characteristics, a potentially more useful model for other metro areas.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has released Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering: Fall 2002, a collection of 54 statistical tables presenting the distribution of graduate students in science and engineering (S&E) across population segments, fields of science or engineering, and by college and state. Overall long-term trends for S&E graduate students from 1975 to 2002 and short-term trends from 1995 to 2002 by detailed fields are presented as well.

The Iowa Entrepreneurs Coalition has been formed to help advance an innovation- and entrepreneur-friendly agenda in the Iowa legislature.

The National Science Foundation has released its report on Federal Science and Engineering (S&E) Support to Universities, Colleges and Nonprofit Institutions for Fiscal Year 2002, revealing the government distributed nearly $24.4 billion to the nation's research institutions during the year. The figure is 8.5 percent higher higher than the FY 2001 total of $22.5 billion.

On Friday, President Bush announced his intention to nominate Michael D. Griffin, of Virginia, to be administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Dr. Griffin currently serves as Space Department Head at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Prior to that, he was president and chief operating officer of In-Q-Tel, Inc.

Kathie Olsen, nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate, is the new deputy director of the National Science Foundation.

The average budgets for local and regional economic development organizations fell nearly 3 percent between 2004 and 2005, according to the second annual survey by ACCRA.

University R&D is considered a fundamental element of innovation and technological competitiveness. If R&D spending equates to more R&D, then the 10 percent increase between 2002 and 2003 as reported by the nation's academic community to the National Science Foundation (NSF) would be a rosy sign for America's future.

Virginia Gov.-elect Tim Kaine named Aneesh Chopra as his administration's secretary of technology.

A complete description of this opportunity and others is available at http://www.ssti.org/posting.htm.

In recent years, Iowa, like many midwestern states, has experienced a boom in ethanol production. Iowa's natural competitive advantage in growing and processing corn has helped it to move to the forefront of the emerging biofuels industry. The state provides numerous incentives and assistance programs through its Department of Natural Resources to help spur the creation of ethanol-related companies and jobs.

Browsing the business section of a bookstore may yield dozens of titles purporting to explain the process of innovation. This newsletter and most others serving the nation’s policymakers and science and technology communities have covered reports calling for a national innovation strategy. Unfortunately, most meetings on the subject have to begin by developing a working definition of the term innovation that most can accept.

Incentive packages to attract companies are nothing new in economic development. In recent years, though, incentives have been used to recruit technology companies, and these incentive packages are growing in scope and complexity, with some in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Two recent reports that take a close look at experiences in North Carolina and Iowa may be of interest to communities and states using incentive packages to recruit companies to their area.

 

North Carolina