The Alliance for Regional Development, in partnership with the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, hosted the second annual Summit on Regional Competitiveness on December 19, 2014 at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago Conference Center in downtown Chicago. The Summit–an invitation-only event–served as an opportunity to brief stakeholders about the progress of the Alliance Working Teams, with high-level keynote speakers discussing regional economic development, a panel discussion on the UI Labs Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute, and a Strategic Doing exercise led by Purdue University.
The Alliance convened the Working Teams in early 2014 to develop strategic plans to implement the recommendations for improving the regional economy of contained in the OECD Territorial Review of Chicago’s 21-county Tri-State Region. The Working Teams, comprised of leaders in government, academia, and the private sector drawn from all three states, also explored additional opportunities for collaboration over the course of the past year. At the Summit, regional economic development strategies were showcased in four key areas including Green Growth, Human Capital, Innovation, and Transportation & Logistics.
The Summit, emceed by Jeremiah P. Boyle, Managing Director of Economic Development—Community Development and Policy Studies Division, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, opened with a specially created video of interviews with Alliance leaders underscoring the importance of “Working Fast Together” to grow the regional economy. View on YouTube
Throughout the course of the day, keynote speakers from government and the private sector discussed the impact of collaborative economic strategies on the regional and national economies. Keynote speakers included:
- Charles L. Evans, President, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago
- Matt Erskine, Deputy Assistant Secretary, U.S. Economic Development Administration
- William Tompson, Urban Development Program Head, Regional Development Policy Division, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development | View Slide Deck (PDF); and
- Nicholas Pinchuk, Chairman & CEO, Snap-on Inc., who spoke on “The Midwest Manufacturing Renaissance: The Importance and the Way.”
Interspersed with they keynotes were presentations by the Alliance Working Teams in the four key areas, promoting collaborative regional economic strategies.
Alliance Green Growth Working Team
The Alliance Green Growth Working Team focused on the water cluster and the potential to grow the water sector in our region beyond its traditional, long-recognized base of leadership in southeast Wisconsin. The Great Lakes represent the largest freshwater resource on earth, accounting for one-fifth of our planet’s freshwater supply. The combined Great Lakes shoreline is longer than the East Coast or the West Coast of the United States. With leadership from the Milwaukee-based Water Council and the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee and UWM School of Freshwater Sciences, water technology companies were identified in Chicagoland and Northwest Indiana and invited to participate in a Regional Water Summit hosted by the Green Growth Working Team and the Loyola University Institute for Environmental Sustainability at Loyola’s Water Tower Campus in Chicago in November. The Water Summit serves as the beginning of a new Tri-State conversation about the water sector. View Slide Deck (PDF) | Read about the Water Summit in the December 2014 Monthly Update
Presenters included:
- James F. Stern, Executive Vice President, General Counsel, & Secretary, A.O. Smith—Moderator
- Heather Ennis, NWI Forum President & CEO
- Dr. David Garman, Founding Dean—School of Freshwater Sciences, University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee; and
- Dr. Sammis White, Interim Dean and Director of Workforce Development—School of Continuing Education, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee.
Alliance Human Capital Working Team
The Alliance Human Capital Working Team focused on reaching existing business, those that are considering locating in the region, as well as site selectors to inform them about the quality of our region’s workforce, as well as about the innovative matching tools that are available to them from area workforce and employment agencies. The Working Team created a short video to explain to target audiences the popular hiring events that are now being implemented throughout the region. These events differ from job fairs in that job seekers are pre-screened and meetings with employers are scheduled in advance. The objective of the hiring events is to secure an employer-job seeker match as soon as possible. View Slide Deck (PDF) | View Video (YouTube) | Read Email Announcement
Presenters included:
- Dr. Carmel Ruffolo, Director—Corporate Engagement and Regional Development and Director—Wisconsin Center for Commercialization Resources, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and University of Wisconsin-Parkside, and Alliance Wisconsin Operational Chair—Moderator
- Deborah Davidson, Vice President—Workforce & Economic Development Division, Gateway Technical College
- Dr. Rena Cotsones, Associate Vice President for Engagement and Innovation Partnerships, Northern Illinois University (NIU); and
- Linda Woloshansky, President & CEO, Center of Workforce Innovations.
Alliance Innovation Working Team
The Alliance Innovation Working Team addressed the Tri-State Region’s role as a maker of things. The Working Team sought to provide start-up and established companies with access to innovation resources throughout the region in order to sharpen the regional focus on developing, making, and marketing new products and services that meet customers’ needs. Building upon existing, web-based innovation resource locators in all three states from the Illinois Innovation Network, Indiana’s Innovation in America’s Regions, and the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation, the Alliance’s Innovation team with Purdue’s support, created an online portal, FastProduct.Net, of resources for start-up and established companies bringing together asset information from across the entire Tri-State Region. The portal is currently in beta, but has the potential to significantly enhance the ability of our region’s innovators to network and find key resources across state lines. View Slide Deck (PDF) | Browse FastProduct.net
Presenters included:
- Don Babcock, Director of Economic Development, Northern Indiana Public Service Company (NIPSCO)—Moderator
- Tim Syth, Executive Director, BucketWorks; and
- Dr. Robert Wolcott, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Kellogg Innovation Network.
Alliance Transportation & Logistics Working Team
The Alliance Transportation & Logistics Working Team focused on the the Milwaukee-Chicago-Gary corridor as the nation’s premier transportation and logistics hub and a major continent-wide player in air travel, air cargo, railways, and trucking. With leadership from planning agencies and universities in all three states, the Transportation & Logistics Working Team created a first-ever comprehensive GIS map and analysis tool of tri-state transportation assets as an aid for regional planning efforts. Creating the tool required close collaboration on the part of leaders and staff from the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission, the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission, the Purdue Center for Innovation through Visualization and Simulation, and the Purdue Center for Regional Development. View Slide Deck (PDF) | View Video (YouTube)
Presenters included:
- Hon. Gerald Bennett, Mayor, City of Palos Hills, Illinois
- Hon. John Dickert, Mayor, City of Racine, Wisconsin
- Jim Ford, Project Executive, Clayco
- Ty Warner, Executive Director, Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission (NIRPC)
- Ken Yunker, Executive Director, Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (SEWRPC); and
- Dr. Chenn Zhou, Interim Associate Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Studies, Director—Purdue Center for Innovation through Visualization and Simulation, and Professor of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University Calumet.
The day was rounded out with a Strategic Doing Exercise led by Dr. Scott Hutcheson, Senior Associate, Purdue Center for Regional Development, to give attendees a better understanding of the process used by the Alliance Working Teams to develop their regional strategies, and a panel discussion on the UI Labs Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute, with:
- Greg Hummel, Partner, Bryan Cave and Alliance Illinois Operational Chair—Moderator
- Dr. Caralynn Nowinski, Executive Director, UI Labs; and
- Dr. Larry Schook, Vice President for Research, University of Illinois
The Alliance would like to thank our leadership and management team, Working Team members, Summit speakers, generous sponsors, and regiojnal stakeholders, in addition to the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, for making the Second Annual Summit in Regional Competitiveness a great success! Alliance Working Team Members, leadership, and staff will meet in March in downtown Chicago to discuss further implementation strategies and set the Alliance’s future agenda.
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BROWSE MEDIA COVERAGE:
- Tri-state summit endeavors to erase state lines (Times of Northwest Indiana, Dec. 19, 2014)
- Interstate collaboration brings benefits (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Dec. 20, 2014)
- Broad industry support helped Chicago land Goose Island initiative | Photo gallery (Chicago Tribune, Dec. 22, 2014)
- Collaboration key to growing tri-state economy (Times of Northwest Indiana, Dec. 26, 2014)