Category: Economic Development

USPTO Approves MicGrowPolitan® Trademark

A couple of weeks ago we received some exciting news.  The United States Patent and Trademark Office has official approved and registered our trademark for MicGrowPolitan® – a brand of economic development services created and tailored to the needs of the nation’s 551 official Micropolitan Statistical Areas.  Learn more

What Do You See?

Looking at this picture, what do you see? You may see a typical suburb.  Or a small town in flyover country.  Both answers would be correct! However, when we look at the picture we see: The commuting patterns that are impacted by zoning decisions The small business that is trying to get a building permit […]

Approved: Hawks Prairie Logistics Park

Last night the Lacey City Council approved the master site plan and wetland development permits for Hawks Prairie Logistics Park, a 130-acre industrial development that will feature three buildings totaling 1.9 million square feet of industrial space.  The main building on the site will house a new Home Depot distribution center. Our firm played an […]

Spencer Project Complete

On Monday (Jan 7, 2019) we presented the Spencer City Council (Spencer, Iowa) with a final draft of their Economic Development Strategic Work Plan.  The plan, developed in conjunction with the city’s Grow Spencer Commission, covers a range of economic development initiatives for the next five years.  Check out the plan. In accepting the final […]

Understanding How City Plans Fail

In my experience a City’s successful implementation of a plan depends greatly upon a their reaction to and investment in the actual elements of the plan.  For successful implementation to occur, a city must be mindful of the tendency for its performance to ‘default’ to status quo (generalization and avoidance), substitution (solving a less complex […]