Eureka Times-Standard
Five Gifts for Humboldt County’s Economy, Revisited
Sunday, January 16, 2005
I have to admit I was sorely tempted to submit Chris Crawford’s excellent Tech Beat Article from November as my own. This article, “Five gifts for the local economy” described five technology improvements that, if implemented, would represent a significant improvement in the technology infrastructure of Humboldt County and, therefore, our economic competitiveness.
I am sure that not all readers of this column also read the “Tech Beat” column, though they should. Therefore, I’d like to restate the “five gifts” because they are relevant, important, and should be made high priorities for local economic development.
A
SECOND FIBER OPTIC CONNECTION
At the end of 2003, we celebrated the long-delayed
completion of the fiber optic project that connected Humboldt County with the
rest of California. The completion of
this project had almost immediate results with the expansion of broadband services
in Humboldt County. However, just as we
would not be happy with a single road with a single trucking company, we should
not be satisfied with a single fiber optic connection. Redundancy and
competition is needed to ensure reliability and price competitiveness with
other areas.
A COMMUNITY WEB PORTAL
In a recent article in Newsweek, Steven Levy notes that if
not for the war and election, 2004 might be known as the “Year of the
Search.” An Internet revolution, led by
Google, is underway. The revolution
will result in our ability to find even the most obscure fact immediately via
web-based searches. Those that can
manage and present information in a clear, coherent, accurate, and fast way,
whether they be businesses or communities, will have a clear competitive
advantage. It was not so many years ago
that I would spend time in the college library scanning books and periodicals
and photocopying pages to gather information for a research paper. Last month, Google announced plans to
integrate the contents of entire libraries into its indexes. In not too many years (months?) you will be
able to search entire university libraries from your computer. So what?
So, our expectations are raised.
We want our information now and we want to find it easily. Currently there are well over twenty
websites in Humboldt County that have business or economic development
content. Many are incomplete,
redundant, or dated. There is no single
site that brings all of this data together and presents it in a way that is easy
to search and understand. This
fragmented approach not only makes it hard to find information, it conveys the
destructive message that our community is behind the times.
G.I.S.
BASED INVENTORY OF PROPERTIES AND LAND USE
As discussed above, the management and presentation of
information is and will be increasingly critical for businesses and communities
to remain competitive. More and more,
communities are using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to help them plan,
protect, and promote their communities.
Again, we now expect to be able to find information on most anything
from our computers. Our management, and
presentation, of information regarding commercial and industrial properties
in Humboldt County is rudimentary.
Gathering information on commercial and industrial property in Humboldt
County is still a slow process that cannot be done via the World Wide Web. We
are very fortunate, however, to have a great resource in the Advanced Spatial
Analysis Laboratory at Humboldt State University. RREDC is working with this group, the HSU Office of Economic and
Community Development and local jurisdictions to incorporate the use of
web-based GIS in our economic development efforts. For a good example of another rural county’s efforts, look to the
Nevada County Economic Resource Council at http://www.ncerc.org.
GSM
CELL PHONE TECHNOLOGY
Last year, I remember having a meeting with an
out-of-the-area businessperson who, for no apparent reason, could not get his
cell phone to work. He was pretty
frustrated by this. While I can only
guess, I suspect the issue was that his phone used the Global System for Mobile
Communication (GSM) technology. GSM is
used in over 100 countries and allows you to surf the web, use email, and
calendars through your cell phone. A
quick Google search took me to www.gsmworld.com
and shows that most all of California, including the rural central valley is
covered by GSM. The North Coast, from
Mendocino County to the Oregon border is not.
This is, again, a competitive disadvantage.
A
LONG DISTANCE POINT-OF-PRESENCE (POP)
Of course, a great deal of business is still conducted via
“landlines” i.e. traditional telephones.
The North Coast currently does not have a long-distance POP, which
connects local telephone networks to long-distance carriers. This restricts the long-distance options
available to local businesses.
Crawford concluded his article by saying; “The effective
use of technology helps to diversify our local economy, and makes our existing
industries more profitable, which leads to job growth and prosperity. If we
choose our gifts wisely, we can lead our community to a better tomorrow.” I can’t say it any better than that.
I want to add one more priority for 2005 to Chris’ list and
that is continued modernization of our airport services. As you might know as the result of hard
work of the Redding and Eureka-Arcata Airports to secure a grant from the
Federal Aviation Administration, flight service to Los Angeles International
Airport will begin in mid-May. This is
a pilot project, which must demonstrate its profitability to Horizon Airlines
in order to become permanent. In simple
terms, if we don’t use it, we’ll lose it.
Another important airport event will be the release of the draft Master
Plan for our regional airport. Once
this report is released, RREDC will be working with the County Aviation
Division to facilitate public education meetings on this important
project. It will be important that all
of those who rely on the airport for their businesses voice their support for
modernization.