Fwd: LATEST FOCUS GROUP RESULTS FROM NEXT ECONOMY PARTNERSHIP PROJECT

Interesting findings on the economy from Gerstein Agne research with Dan Carol.

Colleagues:

Please find attached the briefing slides and an overview memo on our
recent focus groups, held in Columbus, Ohio. These materials are the
promised followup to our last briefing call, held March 15.

These groups demonstrated deep support for the idea of local job
creation councils, and giving local citizens, businesses and community
leaders greater say and authority over how federal economic
development funds are spent – not Washington.

These materials were briefed earlier this week with colleagues at the
White House, Treasury, and other federal economic development
agencies.

Also attached, for those new to this list, is a one-pager on our
project and the briefing report from our first set of groups.

UPCOMING CALENDAR NOTE:

Our next catch-up and briefing call will be May 5th at 3 edt/12pdt.
I will send around more information as we get closer to the date.

In the meantime, if your group is interested in arranging additional
briefings on these focus group and narrative results, or partnering on
future efforts, please let me know.

USEFUL RESOURCES ON TREASURY'S SMALL BUSINESS INITIATIVES

This week the Treasury Department held an important conference on
access to capital for small business -- a critical issue in every
region and community.  For more:

http://www.treasury.gov/press-center/news/Pages/access-to-capital.aspx

For more on fostering and financing innovation, we would also
recommend this post by Don Graves (Treasury’s Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Small Business) who has recently been named as Executive
Director of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/03/17/fostering-innovation-across-america

Best

Dan Carol