Submitted by jim karlock on Fri, 10/14/2005 - 5:14am.
Sam,
I think the major emphasis should be on solving this: "their biggest challenge remains turning local research into local products. They said that venture capital is hard to come by locally and that as a result too much local research is turned into products in other cities."
Of course this is another way of saying that Portland has a lousy business climate and that is a good, obvious place to start solving problems.
Most sales people will tell you that it is hard to sell the same thing as 100 other vendors (in this case cities). You need something unique. And I don't mean a prettier street car or a tram. I mean an all out effort to make Portland a no hassle, business friendly city, with top notch education (clean out PPS), police, and fire. You also need to solve traffic congestion with the only proven solution - build lane miles (although ramp metering might be improved on I5 in N.Portland as it is being allowed to degrade to LOS F- more time waiting in line might be rewarded with a LOS E). Let the world know that we are open for business and mean it. Don't pick winners - let business take that risk, not the taxpayer.
Get off their backs, and likely you will not even need to give tax breaks. After all the purpose of tax breaks is to lower the cost of doing business and much of the cost in Portland is petty BS. (I have a tape of reporter from California saying that one city there is using such a strategy to great success.)
The problem with this strategy is that it isn't sexy, of course neither is running a well managed company.
re: BLOG: "Let Knowledge Serve the City" Better
Sam,
I think the major emphasis should be on solving this: "their biggest challenge remains turning local research into local products. They said that venture capital is hard to come by locally and that as a result too much local research is turned into products in other cities."
Of course this is another way of saying that Portland has a lousy business climate and that is a good, obvious place to start solving problems.
Most sales people will tell you that it is hard to sell the same thing as 100 other vendors (in this case cities). You need something unique. And I don't mean a prettier street car or a tram. I mean an all out effort to make Portland a no hassle, business friendly city, with top notch education (clean out PPS), police, and fire. You also need to solve traffic congestion with the only proven solution - build lane miles (although ramp metering might be improved on I5 in N.Portland as it is being allowed to degrade to LOS F- more time waiting in line might be rewarded with a LOS E). Let the world know that we are open for business and mean it. Don't pick winners - let business take that risk, not the taxpayer.
Get off their backs, and likely you will not even need to give tax breaks. After all the purpose of tax breaks is to lower the cost of doing business and much of the cost in Portland is petty BS. (I have a tape of reporter from California saying that one city there is using such a strategy to great success.)
The problem with this strategy is that it isn't sexy, of course neither is running a well managed company.
Thanks
JK