A Letter to the State of Ohio:
Over the past year, the Brookings Institution and Greater Ohio have undertaken the Restoring Prosperity to Ohio Initiative with the goal of revitalizing the state's core communities and reinvigorating their economic competitiveness. The Initiative has evaluated the economic potential of core communities in Ohio and assessed the impact of past state policies on the health and vitality of these places. The initiative is also about building a constituency for change by engaging local civic, political, and business leaders around the state around the core principles of the Restoring Prosperity agenda. Our initial findings and policy recommendations are contained in a preliminary report that was released on September 10, 2008 at the Restoring Our Prosperity: The State Role in Revitalizing Ohio's Core Communities Summit in Columbus. A final report will be delivered in 2009.
Our principal finding is that Ohio's political, corporate, and civic leaders must take stock of the state's core communities, their assets, their challenges, and their role in the economy and life of their regions, the state, and the nation. Taking stock means recognizing that prosperity in 2008 and onwards will not look the same as prosperity in 1950, and that core communities will have different strengths and status in 21st Century Ohio than they had in the mid-20th century. Just as the state has seen its workers and industries adjust to a more integrated, technology-driven, globalized economy, so, too, must its places adjust.
Some of Ohio's core communities will find a role as critical hubs in a larger metropolitan area, the home of cultural amenities, top-notch medical centers, job-generating higher education institutions, historical attractions, and lively, interesting downtown neighborhoods. Other core communities will not thrive if they try to recreate their former industrial strength or population, but could stabilize as smaller places with town centers, region-serving health facilities and walkable, human-scaled neighborhoods.
The state must guide and support its cities as they identify their assets and build on their strengths because those places that recognize and leverage their assets are the ones that will succeed in the global economy. At the same time, the state must focus its existing efforts on economic development, transportation, and a myriad of other fronts on the core communities and their surrounding metropolitan areas, which are the seedbeds for 21st century prosperity.
In a time of great needs and limited resources, Ohio needs to focus its investments and efforts, and to pull together disparate policies on transportation, housing, work force, innovation and education (to name just a few) so that they work in concert to achieve their goals. All these policies actually happen in specific places, and leaders need to adopt a uniting framework.
Sincerely,
Greater Ohio
Learn more about the Policy Summit and view the Summit Agenda and Reports
Read the Restoring Prosperity's Strategic Approach
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