State & Local Investments

RESEARCH RESOURCES

Alliance for Regional Stewardship
www.regionalstewardship.org
Formed in 2000, the Alliance for Regional Stewardship aims to foster collaborative multi-sector regional stewardship in America’s metropolitan regions. Their web site includes presentations and papers from past conferences, as well as specific links and resources tied to four topics: new economy (e.g., high-tech industry), sustainability, collaborative governance models, and social inclusion.

Appalachian Regional Commission, “Research Reports”
www.arc.gov/index.do?nodeId=57
The on-line research library of the federal government’s Appalachian Regional Commission provides a wide variety of studies on regional economic strategies including reports that look at telecommunications, business development, and general infrastructure issues.

Center for Venture Research, (Whittemore School, University of New Hampshire, Durham)
http://wsbe.unh.edu/cvr
Founded in 1984, the Center for Venture Research has undertaken and published numerous studies in the area of early-stage equity financing of entrepreneurial ventures, including its annual survey of angel investors. Abstracts of the survey and the Center’s publications are available on line.

Citistates
www.citistates.com
Founded in 1995, the Citistates Group is a network of journalists, speakers and civic leaders focused on building competitive, equitable and sustainable 21st century metropolitan regions. Its web site includes reports on regionalism, newspaper commentary articles, essays, and reviews of major books relating to topics of regionalism and local community development.

Economic Development Research Group
http://www.edrgroup.com/index.shtml
The EDR Group is a consulting firm that works on economic development strategies, with a specialty in doing economic impact analysis. Its on-line library provides a large collection of downloadable articles on economic development impact analysis.

Employee Benefit Research Institute
www.ebri.org
Established in 1978, the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization committed exclusively to data dissemination, policy research, and education on economic security and employee benefits. Their web site contains a wealth of information and studies, including fact sheets, newsletters, and records of past congressional testimony on pension issues.

Governing Magazine Online
www.governing.com
Governing is a monthly magazine whose primary audience is state and local government officials: governors, legislators, mayors, city managers, council members and other elected, appointed and career officials. It has a total circulation of 85,000 and provides some of the most in-depth analysis available of state and local policy innovation.

Heartland Labor Capital Network
www.heartlandnetwork.org/index2.htm
The Heartland Labor Capital Network works to implement jobs, creating economic development investment strategies that utilize the capital held by labor in pension funds and other institutions in order to create high road workplaces and build sustainable regional economies.

Local Government Commission (Sacramento, CA)
www.lgc.org
The Local Government Commission (LGC) is a nonprofit membership organization that provides inspiration, technical assistance, and networking to local elected officials and other dedicated community leaders who are working to create healthy, walkable, and resource-efficient communities. Two primary areas of concentraiton are smart growth and resource conservation (including the promotion of renewable energy sources). On both issues, the web site has a large number of freely available reports, articles, and case studies.

Metropolitan Policy Program, The Brookings Institution www.brookings.edu/metro
The Metropolitan Policy Program (formerly the Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy) of The Brookings Institution was launched in 1996 to provide research and policy analysis on the shifting realities of cities and metropolitan areas. Their website includes city-by-city analysis of the 2000 U.S. census results, as well as a number of downloadable newspaper articles, presentations, and studies by Institute fellows.

National Governors’ Association, “Center for Best Practices”
www.nga.org/center
The Center for Best Practices seeks to identify and promote innovation in state government by surveying states on key issues and cataloguing innovative programs. (It also does consulting for individual states on specific issues). On its web site, it has a weekly newsletter, Front and Center and makes available many of its reports for public dissemination.

Pension Research Council, Wharton School of Business
www.pensionresearchcouncil.org
The Pension Research Council sponsors interdisciplinary research on the entire range of private pension and social security programs, as well as related benefit plans in the United States and around the world. Their web site includes working papers and conference presentations on a wide variety of pension-related topics.

Pension Funds and Urban Regeneration
www.urban.ouce.ox.ac.uk
This project, organized out of Oxford and Harvard universities, with support from the Rockefeller and Ford foundations, aims to investigate and promote best practices of US public sector pension funds in urban infrastructure and economic development. A preliminary report, issued in conjunction with a November 2004 conference in New York City, provides an overview of such efforts. Also on the web site are a number of papers that highlight individual states' pension investment policies.

Working for America Institute (AFL-CIO)
www.workingforamerica.org
This web site provides a number of reports on labor strategies to promote “high road partnerships” that pursue economic development strategies that focus on the creation and maintenance of good paying jobs.