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Washington Woos Tech Companies
by Liza Porteus
The District of Columbia is moving to implement rules designed to attract and retain high-tech businesses in the area.
The New Economy Transformation Act (NET 2000), authored by Councilman David Catania and cleared by the council almost a year ago, includes 14 incentives to transform the District's economy by encouraging companies to locate and stay here. The comment period on the proposed regulations began Tuesday, and comments are due within 30 days.
The regulations, issued by the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development and the Office of Tax and Revenue, implement almost all parts of the law: incentives for workforce development, financial incentives for qualified companies and efforts to make facilities more affordable.
"The District of Columbia is now the most competitive jurisdiction in the region in which high-technology companies can locate, operate and expand," Catania said in a statement.
The D.C. New Economy Advisory Group will monitor implementation of the regulations. The group is co-chaired by Shabbir Safdar, cofounder of mindshare Internet Campaigns, and Greenberg Traurig, an attorney with Sanford Saunders. Safdar said in an interview that "there is still a high degree of interest" from tech companies to locate in the District given these incentives.
"In a down economy, it's more important than ever to build your industry," Safdar said. "D.C.'s tech industry will weather the storm, partly because the District is making efforts to make sure it doesn't leave and to make sure it thrives and will prosper."
In other Washington news, with the support of the Case Foundation, the Internet firm Exit1 on Tuesday announced the launch of the District of Columbia College Access Program, or DC-CAP, which provides counseling and preparatory and financial assistance for students who otherwise may not be able to attend college. The site also provides information on the college application process, a listing of college student services and other resources.
Covisint To Call Southeastern Michigan Home
The Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC) has offered Covisint, the online auto consortium, an aggressive incentive package to convince the company to permanently locate in southeastern Michigan. The company has named Southfield and Detroit as finalists for Covisint's permanent world headquarters.
MEDC's $59 million package includes a single-business tax credit. Both Detroit and Southfield also have pledged local incentives.
Covisint's presence in the state will provide more than $158.4 million in revenue to the state over the life of the tax credit, resulting in a gain of more than $106.5 million, according to the University of Michigan. It also is expected to generate more than $2 billion in personal income.
States Scored For Science
Science scores for fourth- and eighth-graders have changed little since 1996, while the scores for 12th-graders have declined three points, according to a report released last week by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).
At the state level, six states had the highest average scores for fourth-graders in 2000: Iowa, North Dakota, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana and Vermont. At the eighth-grade level, Montana had the highest score, while Massachusetts, Minnesota, Idaho, North Dakota, Ohio and Vermont also ranked high.
Virginia fourth- and eighth-graders outperformed students in every other Southern state. Michigan Gov. John Engler, meanwhile, congratulated his state for ranking second but said, "Our competition, however, is not with students in other states; it's with the students around the world, and we have a long way to go to become world-class."
People Around The States
Michigan's new Information Technology Department has a permanent director. Jacque Passino took office as head of the new Cabinet-level agency as chief information officer (CIO) on Monday. Passino has 30 years of IT consulting experience and has served with Accenture since 1972. He also led IT integration efforts in the banking industry.
In other personnel news, Richard Bendis, CEO of the Kansas Technology Enterprise Corporation, will lead the Innovation Philadelphia Corporation. Bendis was chairman of the Federal Business Investment Committee on the Science and Technology Council of the States, which helped create the new federal and state tech partnership administered by the Small Business Administration.
Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell has named a Microsoft attorney and former Commerce Department official to head his economic development office, according to The Tennessean. Tom Jurkovich will assume the post Monday to help local businesses interact with government. Jurkovich was involved in former Vice President Al Gore's 1988 presidential campaign. He currently lives in Washington and is a federal government affairs manager with Microsoft. He also served as a deputy assistant secretary of intergovernmental affairs with Commerce.
Elsewhere, New Jersey's first state CIO, Wendy Rayner, will resign Dec. 28, after helping with the transition of the incoming administration. And in Montana, Quinn Ness has joined the Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity as the business recruitment officer. Ness joins the state from the Montana Commerce Department, where he has served most recently as the business recruitment officer.
Florida Courts Wary Of Full Online Disclosure
A committee of Florida judges, lawyers and court officials has recommended that the Florida Supreme Court establish a moratorium on public access to complete court documents via the Internet, reports The Miami Daily Business Review. The committee calls for restricted access to documents that might be scanned in entirety for publication online.
Seven of 67 counties in Florida have placed some records online. Florida law requires clerks to have electronic images of documents online by Jan. 1, 2006. The state Supreme Court is expected to solicit public comments before deciding whether to adopt the recent recommendations.
Bluegrass State Pursues Security
A new Kentucky state Senate committee has been created to study military, veterans and homeland security issues. The panel will look for ways to improve local and state law enforcement knowledge about terrorism threats, assess the vulnerability of possible terrorist targets in Kentucky, ensure that state police have the intelligence-gathering ability they need, and ensure that the state is alert to cyber-terrorism threats.
Nebraska Taking Tech Grant Applications
Nebraska Lt. Gov. Dave Heineman, chairman of the Nebraska Information Technology Commission (NITC), this week announced that grant applications are being accepted for the Community Technology Fund.
About $200,000 is available for grants to communities for IT projects. Awards will be up to $25,000. Public entities, including local governments, public schools, community colleges, state colleges and county hospitals, are eligible. Last spring, 12 projects received grants totaling $273,522 from the fund.
Massachusetts Tech Sector Alive And Well
Massachusetts' software and Internet industry grew by $700 million in revenue in the past year, despite the economic downturn, according to figures from the Massachusetts Software and Internet Council.
The organization this week made available a guide to the state's industry, which shows that while the number of software and Internet companies combined declined slightly from 3,310 in 2000 to 3,272 in 2001, the number of Internet companies alone grew 13 percent. Employment at Internet firms rose from 35,119 to 37,095.
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