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Day 1 Keynote Address by Deb Socia
Coralette Hannon: I’m pleased to introduce Deb Socia.
Deb spent some time with us earlier and shared some of her important work.
After her prerecorded keynote presentation, she’ll also join us here live to answer your questions.
You should see the instructions on how to ask a question.
c’mon enjoy this incredible keynote from Deb, which will last about 20 minutes.
My name is Deb Socia, and I’m the president and CEO of The Enterprise Center.
But today I’m going to talk to you about the rise of Chattanooga’s Innovation District.
A few thoughts about the rise of Innovation District.
The first one was quality placemaking.
As we started this process, we knew there was ample opportunity in our downtown area.
The second was unusual anchor institutions.
And so we really looked beyond them to neighborhood assets, nonprofits.
libraries, schools, and local philanthropy.
The third was a highly collaborative innovation ecosystem.
Some history about Chattanooga.
So Chattanooga is legitimately the city, a citywide gigabit city.
In other words, we got it, what are we going to do with it?
And so The Enterprise Center, already in existence, helped to lead this conversation.
A variety of stakeholders participated in the planning process, not just politicians and business owners and developers.
The planners really thought about things.
Like, what would make people want to relocate here?
What would make people want to come and stay here?
Not just the typical amenities, but the intangibles.
What’s our transportation like, our networking, our shared resources, our education, our diversity?
All of this was part of the work.
Now, who would have thought that there’d be a walk-to zone for coffee shops?
Other opportunities and spaces that developed were really interesting and innovative.
One of them is the Tomorrow Building.
It had programming, common spaces and it really helped to promote connections and innovation.
The Innovation District itself is a one-quarter-mile walk-to distance that includes about 140 acres.
you’re able to see some of the assets listed here.
It’s ostensibly a circle, but with a couple of bump outs along the way.
In fact, what happened as this work moved forward was about $400 million in private investment.
This is initial investment in hotel rooms, apartments, and other neighborhood assets.
We had several great success stories here initially, and those have continued.
You’ll see some listed here, but there were a lot more that moved on along.
The significance of this aspect of the plan really can’t be overstated.
On Floor 1, we have CoLab.
Originally, they were here.
They have now moved on to a new location.
But it was part of that original effort.
And CoLab is a nonprofit that helps to amplify really early stage startups.
You don’t necessarily have to be an entrepreneur to work in a startup.
So, how do we make all those connections?
So, UTC is an active and necessary ingredient to Chattanooga’s success.
Then Floor 3 is the city’s IT department.
Having easy access to city innovators and city collaborators is another essential ingredient to our success.
The Enterprise Center, where I work, is located on Floor 5.
That’s where I am right now.
One of the most important aspects of this work is the opportunity to bump into each other.
They’re mission driven, driven to help businesses grow.
They’re a wonderful asset to have for local startups nearby.
More recently, we’ve had Qubitekk join the ADME.
You have got to keep that innovation wave going here.
Qubitekk is collaborating on this project and the EDNI is literally connected to this quantum data pipe.
Now to the unanticipated issues that surface.
Opportunities are not outcomes.
And if we’re not getting the outcomes we desire, we need to reframe our strategy.
Second, we really wanted to bring more diverse participation to the table.
It was more challenging than I think the original planners anticipated.
And there are a bunch of factors at play here.
The city of Chattanooga, like a lot of other cities, has been fairly segregated.
And folks of color do not necessarily live in or regularly visit downtown Chattanooga.
Next, I really feel like representation matters.
How we responded, we recognized the importance of trust.
In essence, we’re working to build trust by proxy.
Next, we stopped telling folks what we could provide and started asking, what do you need?
We listened and learned and responded.
I’ll give you an example.
During COVID, it became abundantly clear that many of our small businesses in our neighborhoods were cash only.
We created a somewhat complex web asset we call the Resiliency Checklist.
To help small businesses and startups get their projects on the books.
And by the way, this web asset is free and available to anyone.
Who is not part of this wave?
How do we support local folks to be involved?
It really has been a powerful process for our community.
We recreated our project to really remove some of the barriers to success.
We provided digital literacy training, a gadget, and home access up front to get folks started.
We helped with childcare and transportation, both of which are huge barriers to participation.
And then we importantly provided a stipend so folks could quit a low paying job to participate.
It’s pretty hard to engage in training if it prevents you from paying your rent.
It’s been a great project.
One of our graduates recently got hired to be the IT director for a small local town.
These are great projects that can help change the trajectory for our local folks.
We also helped to get something started here called Black in Tech.
It is a national movement, but we now have a Black in Tech Chattanooga.
And its mission is to increase representation and participation of Black folks in the industry.
I don’t want to give you the impression we have solved this issue.
It is certainly a work in progress.
So, here are my overall recommendations if you are considering implementing, uh, an innovation district.
First, listen more than you tell.
Work with community stakeholders to plan a responsive and inclusive project.
Seek suggestions on how to build a broader ecosystem that’s welcoming to everyone.
And create a plan that responds specifically to the needs of each community.
Two, build structures that focus on innovation and support those projects.
For example, we started here in Chattanooga, the Chattanooga Smart Community Collaborative.
The Enterprise Center and UTC organize and facilitate conversations with a wide range of stakeholders.
Use innovation to support the whole community.
Three, get into the available expertise.
In Chattanooga, we have a wide variety of support available.
I sincerely beg to differ.
I may not be I don’t have youth on my side, but I certainly have experience.
With age and experience comes wisdom and clarity of focus.
Rely on those in your community who have done this work before.
Get their mentorship, seek their advice, pay them for their wise counsel.
Old folks are the ones who get stuff done.
And by the way, nothing makes me happier than when folks underestimate me.
If you tell me I can’t, you better move aside and watch me make it happen.
Next, build a collaborative web link before you actually need that web link.
And I’m going to give you an example of that.
We could get together and create an opportunity for our children to be connected to the internet.
We actually connected over 16, 000 children to a minimum of 300 megabits symmetrical.
At no cost to their family.
We were able to work with the district to provide other assets as needed.
The project EdConnect powered by EPB continues and will do so into the foreseeable future.
And as an aside, you might think this would be easy with a municipal utility.
It was challenging, but really rewarding.
One of the best projects I have ever been engaged in.
Next, create flexibility.
But who makes the rules?
Tthink in terms of building stronger districts as opposed to holding the line.
Next, build on what you know.
In Chattanooga, we are currently quite focused on mobility, sustainability, logistics, smart solutions.
It helps to focus primarily on one or two areas or goals.
And last, be prepared for what’s next.
We have to think like entrepreneurs.
[00:22:21]
Mike Watson: Welcome back, everyone.
Deb, thank you so much for being with us today.
So great to see you.
We all just spent the time watching your video.
Now we have the opportunity to ask you questions.
And we’re seeing lots of questions in here around the question of engagement.
Lisa and others are asking this.
Deb Socia: I think there are challenges there, depending on your community.
Figuring out what organizations do they, do they tend to spend their time with?
Are they part of the chamber?
Are they part of Urban League?
Are they part of the faith-based community?
Find where they tend to get together, communicate with one another and come and ask questions.
The part that gets missed a lot is just asking for help.
Folks are really willing to give you a hand.
Mike Watson: I love that.
I think that’s fantastic guidance.
And you mentioned asking questions.
There’s a lot more rolling in, so I’m going to jump to the next one.
We’re also seeing a theme of questions in here around different community sizes.
You talked about the work in Chattanooga.
Deb Socia: I’ll tell you, scale does matter.
Sometimes they’re small, so it’s hard to find the resources necessary.
Most certainly, we would engage, happily, and we do with the smaller communities that surround Chattanooga.
I still would consider finding what our niche is, right?
What is the thing that makes us special?
And really trying to highlight that.
I would highly recommend working on it that way.
Mike Watson: Love that.
Find your niche, work with regional partners, and tell your story really effectively so people hear that.
I think that’s great guidance for everybody.
Where can they get access to the resiliency checklist you mentioned?
Deb Socia: It is actually on our website,TheEnterpriseCenter.org.
Mike Watson: Fantastic.
How, how do you measure success for a district like this?
What are the ways that you actually track that over time?
Deb Socia: There are a few things we’re doing.
One of them is regarding the investment.
We know what’s being invested in our community in terms of dollars, particularly for development.
So those we all consider successes.
I think the other piece for us has been really looking at outcomes.
We have an incredibly low unemployment rate.
How many open positions do we have?
Are we bringing people into the community?
The interesting thing is that when you are really successful at this, you also get new challenges.
The cost of housing here has gone up.
Planning in advance is really important.
How, what has been the impact?
Have units ended up being eliminated?
I know you mentioned rents have gone up.
How has the community had to respond?
Have there been policies enacted or other programs put into place as a result?
Deb Socia:We actually have done a lot.
Because there have been some issues with that.
We’ve got this great outdoors, we’ve got hiking trails and kayaking and so many other options.
We really had to think about that and see to it we were planning.
Of course, the pandemic also made it worse.
Mike Watson: That was a fantastic answer.
I think again, a lot of the questions we saw were right in that theme.
You’ve given them some great food for thought and all of us a lot of really good thoughts.
Unfortunately, we’re out of time for questions.
So Deb, I want to thank you again so much for joining us.
And for bringing together our Day 1 elements, the built environment and digital connections.
Thank you so much.
Deb Socia: It was wonderful to be here.
Mike Watson: Thank you again.
We appreciate you taking the time to be here.
This has been great.
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