The Intelligent Community

Lou continues The INTELLIGENT Community Podcast with Adrianne Furniss and touches on the subject of HOW small communities develop brain gain and capacity over the long term.  They also discuss how broadband can reinforce cultural restoration and its role in enabling democracy to persist in the Digital Age. Adrianne Benton Furniss is Executive Director and Board Member of the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, a 40-year-old nonprofit focused on broadband policy, working to make sure everyone can use and benefit from high quality, affordable broadband. They strengthen local, state, and national leadership by providing the timely information, rigorous evidence, practical guidance, and advocacy needed to articulate and implement a broadband for all agenda. They inform and give policymakers, practitioners, researchers, and advocates information they need to advance a broadband for all agenda. They research and build knowledge by providing a body of research and best practices to guide our field’s work. They partner and engage with communities to develop strategies for ubiquitous, high-speed, reliable, and affordable broadband to meet larger community goals. And they advocate and advance a broadband for all agenda at all levels of government through policymaker education, legal and regulatory filings, and coalition participation.

Our goal is to bring open, affordable, high-performance broadband to all people in the U.S. to ensure a thriving democracy,” says Adrianne Furniss. In a rare interview and her first podcast, the Executive Director of the Benton Institute discusses the current state of rural broadband in the United States and her view of how to build capacity within very small communities that have suffered brain drain and the loss of their economic vibrancy. The work being done by Benton and the research this famed institute relies on continue to launch what many call the “rural renaissance.” https://www.benton.org/. Adrianne Benton Furniss is Executive Director and Board Member of the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, a 40-year-old nonprofit focused on broadband policy, working to make sure everyone can use and benefit from high quality, affordable broadband. They strengthen local, state, and national leadership by providing the timely information, rigorous evidence, practical guidance, and advocacy needed to articulate and implement a broadband for all agenda. They inform and give policymakers, practitioners, researchers, and advocates information they need to advance a broadband for all agenda. They research and build knowledge by providing a body of research and best practices to guide our field’s work. They partner and engage with communities to develop strategies for ubiquitous, high-speed, reliable, and affordable broadband to meet larger community goals. And they advocate and advance a broadband for all agenda at all levels of government through policymaker education, legal and regulatory filings, and coalition participation.

What makes Canadian cities such as Waterloo, Ottawa, and Toronto hubs of high-tech entrepreneurship and successful Intelligent Communities? Since moving to Canada, Professor Darius Ornston, author of When Small States Make Big Leaps, which chronicled how the Nordic countries developed the ability to enter new, tech-based markets, has similarly studied two Intelligent Communities of the Year in Canada and tells us how these Canadian communities represent a collaborative approach which has resulted in Canada having more designated Intelligent Communities than any other nation. Darius Ornston is an Associate Professor at the prestigious Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto where he specializes in innovation policy and the relationship between cooperation and economic change.

What makes Canadian cities such as Waterloo, Ottawa and Toronto hubs of high-tech entrepreneurship and successful Intelligent Communities? Since moving to Canada, Professor Darius Ornston, author of When Small States Make Big Leaps, which chronicled how the Nordic countries developed the ability to enter new, tech-based markets, has similarly studied two Intelligent Communities of the Year in Canada and tells us how these Canadian communities represent a collaborative approach which has resulted in Canada having more designated Intelligent Communities than any other nation. Darius Ornston is an associate professor at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of Toronto where he specializes in innovation policy, specifically the relationship between cooperation and economic change. His first book, When Small States Make Big Leaps, illustrates how the Nordic countries use cooperation to enter new, high-technology markets. In Good Governance Gone Bad, he demonstrates how the same, tight-knit networks which accelerate reform and restructuring can lead to policy overshooting, overinvestment, and economic crisis. Professor Ornston’s work with Dan Breznitz on the politics of innovation and the design of innovation agencies has been published with multiple outlets, including the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the OECD. Since moving to Canada, Professor Ornston has focused on high-technology entrepreneurship in Ottawa, Waterloo, and Toronto. 

This week marks the start of another global awards campaign at ICF. We begin the search for the successor to the current Intelligent Community of the Year, Binh Duong, Vietnam. Who will it be? We begin by naming theSmart21(see the video) on March 20th.  This year’s S21 Awards and Conference will be held in Taipei, Taiwan. Taipei was the 2006 Intelligent Community of the Year and this year hosts the Smart City Expo andThe Smart Cities and Intelligent Communities Forum, produced by the Taiwan government and ICF. What will that event be like? What is Taiwan like and why does it have 15 Intelligent Communities!? We hear directly from Tiffany Lin of ICF Taiwan, who is the Acting Deputy Manager for the Industrial Technology Research Institute in Taiwan. In a delightful conversation with Lou, she talks about life in Taiwan, freedom and why the country has embraced the ICF program. 

A NY tech exec and mother decides to serve her community by running for office in one of the most high-profile districts in Manhattan.  Elizabeth Golluscio looked at her city’s $106 billion budget and found that there was limited transparency on how decisions were being made.  She looked at challenges like unlicensed E-bikes (part of the 56,000 deliveries of food in NYC each day!) and met with Police and found a basement in the precinct full of them.  She got a sense of what was happening with local crime and safety. Then she did what people who want answers from their local government and know they can do better often do: she ran for office. She used social media against an incumbent whose party dominates the city. (Oh, and in between she attended ICF’s Top7 Reception to find out what Intelligent Communities can teach.) Listen to her talk frankly about the experience. Elizabeth Golluscio has lived in Carnegie Hill for nearly 15 years, and served on the board of her Coop for a few years after first moving into the neighborhood - on 90th Street between Lex and 3rd Aves. - from the west side.  Her two sons attended the La Scuola Italian school on East 96th St, for their early school years.  They are now in public high schools (ages 15 and 16). Ms. Golluscio is not a politician and this would be her first campaign; she’s spent her career in the high tech (software) industry.  Most recently, she was a Managing Vice President at Gartner, leading the team of research analysts who advise clients on their software design & development strategies.  She started at Gartner as a Research Analyst in 2015, covering application architecture and integration topics. Prior to that, she held a variety of roles in product management, marketing and sales in early-stage software start-ups, experiencing a wide variety of opportunities and challenges, e.g. helping raise VC funding, launching new products, working abroad to integrate newly acquired businesses, an IPO, etc.   She’s lived and worked in Australia, Ireland, and Italy. Ms. Golluscio’s completed dozens of marathons, half marathons and triathlons, and is now a Crossfit enthusiast, so you’re likely to find her in Central Park or at the gym.  She earned her engineering degree from Cornell, and her MBA from MIT Sloan.

ICF announced early this year that it issued a license for its third Institute. The new ICF Institute will be based in Atlantic Canada, in the city of Fredericton, New Brunswick at New Brunswick Community College. The new Canadian institute joins those established in Dublin, Ohio (USA) and Hsinchu, Taiwan to further promote the Intelligent Community Forum’s method for accelerating the growth of regions and states by transforming clusters of cities and towns into economically robust and socially stable “Intelligent Communities.” Dr. Simon Potter, the Director for the College Office of Research Enterprise at New Brunswick Community College discusses the importance of the new Institute, how he hopes it will increase innovation and collaboration throughout the region and why New Brunswick was chosen as the site of Canada’s first ICF Institute. Dr. Simon Potter joined NBCC’s research office with extensive experience in biomaterials, composites, forestry, precision health and genetics applied research. He is responsible for NBCC’s overarching research program which, based on its exceptional strength and depth in ICT, is now expanding into new areas such as agriculture, precision health, and educational and accessibility research. Simon holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology from the University of Edinburgh, a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from the University of Bath and has built a global reputation in the implementation of large-scale research initiatives in Canada and Australia.

A NY tech exec and mother decides to serve her community by running for office in one of the most high-profile districts in Manhattan.  Elizabeth Golluscio looked at her city’s $106 billion budget and found that there was limited transparency on how decisions were being made.  She looked at challenges like unlicensed E-bikes (part of the 56,000 deliveries of food in NYC each day!) and met with Police and found a basement in the precinct full of them.  She got a sense of what was happening with local crime and safety. Then she did what people who want answers from their local government and know they can do better often do: she ran for office. She used social media against an incumbent whose party dominates the city. (Oh, and in between she attended ICF’s Top7 Reception to find out what Intelligent Communities can teach.) Listen to her talk frankly about the experience. Elizabeth Golluscio has lived in Carnegie Hill for nearly 15 years, and served on the board of her Coop for a few years after first moving into the neighborhood - on 90th Street between Lex and 3rd Aves. - from the west side.  Her two sons attended the La Scuola Italian school on East 96th St, for their early school years.  They are now in public high schools (ages 15 and 16). Ms. Golluscio is not a politician and this would be her first campaign; she’s spent her career in the high tech (software) industry.  Most recently, she was a Managing Vice President at Gartner, leading the team of research analysts who advise clients on their software design & development strategies.  She started at Gartner as a Research Analyst in 2015, covering application architecture and integration topics. Prior to that, she held a variety of roles in product management, marketing and sales in early-stage software start-ups, experiencing a wide variety of opportunities and challenges, e.g. helping raise VC funding, launching new products, working abroad to integrate newly acquired businesses, an IPO, etc.   She’s lived and worked in Australia, Ireland, and Italy. Ms. Golluscio’s completed dozens of marathons, half marathons and triathlons, and is now a Crossfit enthusiast, so you’re likely to find her in Central Park or at the gym.  She earned her engineering degree from Cornell, and her MBA from MIT Sloan.

How does a university become a key driver for starting, building and maintaining industry-academic partnerships for the benefit of the local economy?  Durham College’s Chris Gillis shares how he develops successful partnerships and overcomes many of the obstacles that keep other communities from moving ahead on this vital piece of the economic puzzle. In his current role, Chris is the college lead for applied research project development in the areas of electric, connected & autonomous vehicles, advance technologies and craft beer/beverage development. Chris’ career of 35 years plus started after graduating from Dalhousie University and The Technical University of Nova Scotia with a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering. Chris worked in several manufacturing organizations with every increasing responsibility until leaving to start his own consulting company focusing on operational performance improvement, innovation and customer satisfaction. For over 35 years he has worked with both private and public sector organizations, covering a wide variety of industries and sectors in Canada, the United States, Mexico and the United Kingdom, developing and implementingcustom solutions.

  In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with Amy Rowland, Award-Winning Novelist and Lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley.   Amy Rowland’s second novel, Inside the Wolf, was published by Algonquin in July 2023. She is also the author of The Transcriptionist (Algonquin 2014), which received the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Amy is the recipient of fellowships and residencies from the National Endowment for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, the Norman Mailer Center, and the Sewanee Writers Conference. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in The New York Times, The Southern Review, The Iowa Review, Lit Hub, New Letters and elsewhere. Amy is a former editor at The New York Times Book Review and she teaches at UC Berkeley.

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with Amy Rowland, Award-Winning Novelist and Lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley.   Amy Rowland’s second novel, Inside the Wolf, was published by Algonquin in July 2023. She is also the author of The Transcriptionist (Algonquin 2014), which received the Addison M. Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Amy is the recipient of fellowships and residencies from the National Endowment for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, the Norman Mailer Center, and the Sewanee Writers Conference. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in The New York Times, The Southern Review, The Iowa Review, Lit Hub, New Letters and elsewhere. Amy is a former editor at The New York Times Book Review and she teaches at UC Berkeley.

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks further with Karl Grossman, Journalist, Host of the Enviro Close-Up TV program and Professor of Journalism at SUNY at Old Westbury. They continue their discussion on the changing landscape of journalism, particularly at the local level. Karl Grossman has specialized in doing investigative reporting in a variety of media for more than 50 years. He teaches as well as practices journalism. He is a full professor of journalism at the State University of New York Old Westbury, where his courses include Investigative Reporting and also Environmental Journalism. He began teaching at SUNY Old Westbury in 1978. For over 32 years, he has hosted the nationally aired TV program Enviro Close-Up with Karl Grossman syndicated by Free Speech TV and broadcast in 40 states. He is the author of seven books, including Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed to Know About Nuclear Power, Power Crazy, The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program’s Nuclear Threat to Our Planet and Weapons in Space. He is active in doing investigative reporting on the Internet, writing regularly on CounterPunch, NationofChange and OpEd News. And he writes for the local press on Long Island. His weekly column appears in newspapers on Long Island including The Southampton Press, The East Hampton Press, The Shelter Island Reporter, The Sag Harbor Express, Community Journal, the South Shore Press and on Long Island news websites including Smithtown Matters. Honors he has received for journalism include the George Polk, Generoso Pope, James Aronson, Leo Goodman and John Peter Zenger Awards. His articles have also appeared in publications including The New York Times, USA Today, The Boston Globe, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Science Monitor, Newsday, The Baltimore Sun, Cleveland Plain Dealer, The Progressive, The Orlando Sentinel, Village Voice, Common Cause Magazine, In These Times, The Montreal Mirror, The Boston Phoenix, Space News, The San Francisco Bay Guardian, Columbia Journalism Review, The Globe and Mail and The Miami Herald.

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with Karl Grossman, Journalist, Host of the Enviro Close-Up TV program and Professor of Journalism at SUNY at Old Westbury. They discuss the changing landscape of journalism, particularly at the local level, and what may be in store for news reporting in the future.   Karl Grossman has specialized in doing investigative reporting in a variety of media for more than 50 years. He teaches as well as practices journalism. He is a full professor of journalism at the State University of New York Old Westbury, where his courses include Investigative Reporting and also Environmental Journalism. He began teaching at SUNY Old Westbury in 1978. For over 32 years, he has hosted the nationally aired TV program Enviro Close-Up with Karl Grossman syndicated by Free Speech TV and broadcast in 40 states. He is the author of seven books, including Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed to Know About Nuclear Power, Power Crazy, The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program’s Nuclear Threat to Our Planet and Weapons in Space. He is active in doing investigative reporting on the Internet, writing regularly on CounterPunch, NationofChange and OpEd News. And he writes for the local press on Long Island. His weekly column appears in newspapers on Long Island including The Southampton Press, The East Hampton Press, The Shelter Island Reporter, The Sag Harbor Express, Community Journal, the South Shore Press and on Long Island news websites including Smithtown Matters. Honors he has received for journalism include the George Polk, Generoso Pope, James Aronson, Leo Goodman and John Peter Zenger Awards. His articles have also appeared in publications including The New York Times, USA Today, The Boston Globe, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Science Monitor, Newsday, The Baltimore Sun, Cleveland Plain Dealer, The Progressive, The Orlando Sentinel, Village Voice, Common Cause Magazine, In These Times, The Montreal Mirror, The Boston Phoenix, Space News, The San Francisco Bay Guardian, Columbia Journalism Review, The Globe and Mail and The Miami Herald.

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks further with José Roberto Lagunes Trejo, Research and Strategy Lead at Mexico City’s Fundación Hogares. They discuss trust and how a social index the Fundación has created is helping repair the social fabric in Mexican communities.   José Roberto Lagunes Trejo is an architect and urban designer from Veracruz, Mexico, who works on the intersection between urban design practice and community development. Since 2018, he has worked in Fundación Hogares, a non-profit organization based in Mexico City that promotes participation in social housing territories. Their projects strive for building capacity in communities so that citizens become agents in co-designing strategies for the transformation of their environment. Aside from his work within the foundation, José Roberto teaches Architectural Design and Urban Sociology at Anahuac University Mexico and is an experienced speaker at national and international conferences. He participated in the Urban Future Young Leaders programme in 2022, in Helsingborg, Sweden, and is one of the founding members of the Young Leaders Academy, a value-driven education and consulting collective created for the next generation of change-makers that hosted its first educational programme this June in Stuttgart, Germany. He considers himself a life enthusiast and is interested in reducing inequalities through his work towards a more sustainable future for all.

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with José Roberto Lagunes Trejo, Research and Strategy Lead at Mexico City’s Fundación Hogares. They discuss the method used by José Roberto's organization to reinvigorate rundown neighborhoods and build trust among citizens in places where mistrust and fear have become embedded.   José Roberto Lagunes Trejo is an architect and urban designer from Veracruz, Mexico, who works on the intersection between urban design practice and community development. Since 2018, he has worked in Fundación Hogares, a non-profit organization based in Mexico City that promotes participation in social housing territories. Their projects strive for building capacity in communities so that citizens become agents in co-designing strategies for the transformation of their environment. Aside from his work within the foundation, José Roberto teaches Architectural Design and Urban Sociology at Anahuac University Mexico and is an experienced speaker at national and international conferences. He participated in the Urban Future Young Leaders programme in 2022, in Helsingborg, Sweden, and is one of the founding members of the Young Leaders Academy, a value-driven education and consulting collective created for the next generation of change-makers that hosted its first educational programme this June in Stuttgart, Germany. He considers himself a life enthusiast and is interested in reducing inequalities through his work towards a more sustainable future for all.

When you watch ICF’s videos on Youtube, what you see publicly are representatives from a city celebrating when their city is named Intelligent Community of the Year. Sometimes, as in the case of the mayor of Espoo, Finland, you see tears of joy. Sometimes, you see Eindhoven representatives from The Netherlands donning red shirts in celebration or Columbus representatives from Ohio storming the stage behind their mayor like a football club. What you do not see is the incredibly hard work done by a group of people from around the world to analyze the information from these cities, assess it and judge them for you, the world’s media and other aspiring places. They are the ICF Analysts and Jurors, the heart and soul – and the brains – of the ICF Awards program. In Part 2 of this podcast series, ICF co-founder Lou Zacharilla speaks further with 6 of them to collect their memories, thoughts and advice for cities around the world as ICF heads toward naming a successor to New Taipei City as the 2023 Intelligent Community of the Year next week. You'll hear from: Moez Chaabouni, Managing Partner and Chief Revenue Officer at Summit Technologies LLC and Chair of the ICF Jury Bill Coleman, Owner of Community Technology Advisors Professor Shirley Fenton, Research Associate, CSG at the University of Waterloo, VP of the National Institutes of Health Informatics and Co-Founder of Waterloo MedTech Dr. Jay Edwin Gillette, Professor Emeritus of Information and Communication Sciences and Senior Research Fellow at Ball State University's Center for Information and Communication Sciences Dr. Norman Jacknis, Professor of Practice, Innovation & Entrepreneurship at Northeastern University and ICF Senior Fellow Gordon Kennedy, Director at Clearbluewater 2.0 Ltd.

When you watch ICF’s videos on Youtube, what you see publicly are representatives from a city celebrating when their city is named Intelligent Community of the Year. Sometimes, as in the case of the mayor of Espoo, Finland, you see tears of joy. Sometimes, you see Eindhoven, The Netherlands representatives donning red shirts in celebration or Columbus, Ohio representatives storming the stage behind their mayor like a football club. What you do not see is the incredibly hard work done by a group of people from around the world to analyze the information from these cities, assess it and judge them for you, the world’s media and other aspiring places. They are the ICF Analysts and Jurors, the heart and soul – and the brains – of the ICF Awards program. In this podcast, ICF co-founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with some of them to collect their memories, thoughts and advice for cities around the world as ICF heads toward naming a successor to New Taipei City as the 2023 Intelligent Community of the Year this October. You'll hear from: Moez Chaabouni, Managing Partner and Chief Revenue Officer at Summit Technologies LLC and Chair of the ICF Jury Bill Coleman, Owner of Community Technology Advisors Professor Shirley Fenton, Research Associate, CSG at the University of Waterloo, VP of the National Institutes of Health Informatics and Co-Founder of Waterloo MedTech Dr. Jay Edwin Gillette, Professor Emeritus of Information and Communication Sciences and Senior Research Fellow at Ball State University's Center for Information and Communication Sciences Dr. Norman Jacknis, Professor of Practice, Innovation & Entrepreneurship at Northeastern University and ICF Senior Fellow Gordon Kennedy, Director at Clearbluewater 2.0 Ltd. has context menuComposeParagraph

In this episode of The Intelligent Community, ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla speaks with Idoia Postigo, Director General at Bilbao Metropoli-30. Idoia shares the story of how Bilbao recovered from industrial decline and revitalized itself into a city that won the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize in 2010. Since the inception of the Association for the Revitalization of Metropolitan Bilbao (Bilbao Metropoli-30) in 1991, Idoia Postigo has been responsible for promoting and disseminating the revitalization plan and implementing its strategic actions. Making use of her 30 years of international experience in urban planning strategies, Idoia’s work has positioned the Association at the center of the metropolis’ urban development and an influencer of all the main actors responsible for it, especially public institutions and citizens. Idoia’s influence spans widely, as an active member of many local boards, societies and networks, including the Advisory Council of the Urban Agenda at Euskadi-Bultzatu 2050, the Bilbao-Bizkaia Action Group, and the Bilbao Port Community UNIPORT. She is also a published author, graduate in political sciences, international relations, psychology and organizational behaviour and – seeing interpersonal relationships as fundamental in her field – a teacher in training modules for Emotional Intelligence, Social Skills, Team Management and Motivation.

In part 2, Chairman and CEO of Toronto’s Institute Without Boundaries and now the Brookfield Sustainability Institute Luigi Ferrara talks about sustainability, why we are far away from it and what Brookfield is going to do to move it into the consciousness of communities.   Luigi Ferrara, Dean, Centre for Arts, Design and Information Technology, leads program development, partnerships and innovation centres that provide students with challenging and exciting real-world learning opportunities and position George Brown College as a key player on the global stage.   Luigi has also served as the Director of the Institute Without Boundaries, an academic program and studio aimed at solving real-world problems through design research and strategy with goals of social, ecological, and economic innovation. This has now been transformed into the Brookfield Sustainability Institute.   Luigi is the inaugural Chair and CEO of the Brookfield Sustainability Institute, a centre of excellence that will be housed at Limberlost Place, George Brown College’s net-zero carbon emissions mass-timber building that is set to open at Waterfront Campus in 2024. The Institute will focus on aligning the processes of digital transformation and sustainability for the benefit of communities everywhere, becoming a beacon for ‘smart sustainability’.   Luigi has devoted his career to advocating and practicing interdisciplinary design both in Canada and internationally, working on the relationship between architecture, urban design, sustainability, digital transformation, strategy, and design thinking. He continues to take on professional design projects every year and lends his expertise to several boards and associations while showcasing his talent and knowledge through exhibitions, publications, and lectures.   Luigi Ferrara is a graduate with distinction in the Faculty of Architecture at the University of Toronto. He worked for the internationally recognized firm Stirling/Wilford Associates, and locally with Peter Turner Architects, Paul Reuber Architect and Russocki/Zawadzki Architects. Luigi is an Honorary Member of the Association of Chartered Industrial Designers of Ontario and a former president and current senator of the World Design Organization (formerly the International Council of the Societies of Industrial Design), the UN-recognized NGO for Design (formerly the International Council of the Societies of Industrial Design). Luigi is also the Chair of the Board for the McLuhan Foundation on Media Literacy.

Chairman and CEO of Toronto’s Institute Without Boundaries and now the Brookfield Sustainability Institute Luigi Ferrara dives deep into how cities are being rebuilt and redesigned for sustainability and why Europe and Asia lead North American communities in this important area.